Page 120 of Road Trip with a Vampire

Becky and Lindsay exchanged a meaningful look before turning their attention back to me. They looked nervous, which was not something I was used to seeing from my friends in this room, where our most heated debates usually involved where to put Pilates on the schedule.

The hairs on the back of my neck now stood at full attention.

“What is it?” I asked.

My friends exchanged glances again.

“There’s something we should tell you,” Becky confessed. “It’s about the person we’re considering hiring to fix the roof.”

“Please don’t get mad,” Lindsay added.

“Why would I get mad about you hiring someone to fix the roof?” I asked, bewildered. “It doesn’t matter to mewhodoes it as long as they take care of it before it rains again.” If the roofer charged more than the studio could afford, I could chip in from my personal savings.

“It might matter to you when you find out who it is,” Lindsay said in a small voice.

My gaze darted between my friends, my confusion growing. I was just about toinsistthey tell me what was going on when I figured it out.

“Wait,” I said, stunned. “Peter’s in California again?”

“He said he’s not in town long,” Becky said, looking sheepish. “He’d left behind some things in his apartment when you wenton your trip. He just needs to pack up before he’s charged another month’s rent.”

He was in town and hadn’t told me. I felt a flash of something that was absolutelynotdisappointment course through me. “I see,” I said.

“He dropped by late last night when it started raining, just to see if everything was all right with the studio,” Becky continued. “He seemed to already know our roof leaks when it rains. As it turned out, the roofwasleaking. You must have been deeply asleep, because you didn’t reply to any of our texts about this.”

“We sent you, like, a million of them,” Lindsay added.

Had they? I fumbled in my pocket for my phone and checked my messages. Sure enough, I had missed more than a dozen texts from my friends late last night, confirming everything they were saying now.

“Peter wassoconcerned,” Lindsay continued. “Seriously, you should have seen how worried he was. When we explained that we were looking to get the roof replaced, he outlined a very detailed plan for getting it done in three days.Andgave us a list of references we could call if we wanted assurances that he can do the work.”

Lindsay sounded genuinely awestruck by this, but I was unsurprised. Peter would, of course, have a thorough plan for repairing our roof. He’d be able to execute it, too, in no time at all.

Who on earth had he provided as references, though? I didn’t want to think about it.

“We’ll tell him to get lost if you want us to,” Becky said, likely confusing my stunned silence for angry silence. “If he hadn’t offered to get started right away and do the work for free—”

“Hold on,” I said. “He offered to do it forfree?”

“Yes,” Becky confirmed, incredulous. “We couldn’t believe he was refusing payment for such a huge project. But he insisted. He said he has a lot to make up for.”

My eyes fell to my hands as I tried to wrap my mind around all of this. “I see,” I said again. “What did you tell him?”

“That we needed to ask you first,” Becky said.

Before I could tell her that I needed to think this over, the lights in our conference room flickered a few times before going out altogether.

Shit.

Power outages were nearly a foregone conclusion when it rained in Redwoodsville. Our town’s power lines were old and above ground, which meant windstorms often knocked out power to an entire city block until the utility company sent someone out to turn it back on.

I closed my eyes. We needed this roof repaired as quickly as possible. If Peter wanted to do it…fine. I wouldn’t let my baggage with him get in the way.

“Can one of you call the power company?” I stood from my chair, mentally running through the list of everything we needed to do. “We also have to cancel today’s classes and let everyone who’s signed up know that they’ll be refunded.”

“Of course,” Becky said. “We’ve got it. And about the roof?”

I took a deep breath for strength. “I’ll text Peter and let him know he can get started right away.”