Page 13 of Will Bark for Pizza (Bluebell Springs #1)

TEN

BECKETT

“This’ll have to be the last one for this round,” Joe Mason said, shimmying a sheet of drywall onto the high stack in the bed of my heavy-duty truck.

We were both sweating our asses off after hauling this out the back of the hardware store and into my truck.

The humidity in Bluebell Springs was far lower than I was used to, but once that sun came up over the mountains, everything warmed up fast. I wished this was all there was, but the Kniffen Street house was a gut job.

I’d have to come back tomorrow to get the rest.

I went around the side of my truck to fish tow straps from the built-in toolbox, catching sight of something purple tucked beneath it.

Red’s paddle.

Red .

She caught me off guard this morning, right in the middle of an argument with Madeline.

As I suspected, my sister begged me to put my parents up in one of my rentals, and she did her homework to know which one was currently sitting empty.

Madeline was a pain in the ass when she set her mind to something, which explained the dozens of text messages and two voicemails since this morning’s discussion —including one from my brother-in-law.

Seeing Red eating a cupcake with her dog eased some of the tension. For those few minutes, I forgot all about my headache-inducing family.

Until Husker spotted a chipmunk and iced coffee went everywhere.

I really needed to stop running into Red in wet clothes.

Lake water. Iced coffee. It didn’t seem to matter.

Fuck, would it be a torrential downpour next?

All possibilities were responsible for showcasing the shape of her perfectly curvy body, and left my imagination running wild.

I tried to convince myself it’d be different if she were a brunette or a blonde, but I suspected that was a bullshit lie.

Something about that woman had my full attention.

A woman with a red Jeep and Nebraska plates who I might never see again.

“I’m going to grab you a box of drywall screws.”

Joe slipped inside the back door of the store before I could tell him I already had plenty, so I set to work on the tow straps.

The trip to the Kniffen Street house was a short drive from here, but it was up a steep hill.

I wasn’t risking any of the drywall falling out on the three-minute trip over.

“That’s everything,” Joe said upon returning. “Got enough straps? ”

“Yeah, plenty.”

“My boys helping you out with this?” Joe asked, leaning his arms against the side of my truck as I tightened the straps.

“Tomorrow.”

“Good. Glad you have some help.”

I could tell Joe was stalling, but I didn’t want to push him into a conversation about his late wife’s bookstore if he wasn’t ready. I checked all the ratchets once more to buy him time.

He pulled off his ball cap and scrubbed a hand through his thick silvering hair. He’d been infantry; growing out his hair now was a point of pride. He wore it well, except when he was stressed. His finger combing often left it standing on end until his ball cap tamed it back down.

“You’re here about the bookstore, right?” he asked.

“I am.”

“I don’t have a price yet,” he admitted. “Waiting to hear back from the appraiser. Might be a couple days, but could be early next week.”

“You’re skipping a realtor, then?”

“I already talked to Owen,” he said of Aspen’s husband. “It’s an expense I’d rather not add to the list. He understands. But if you want to utilize him, I’m not opposed.”

I’d only purchased one other commercial property to date, with Owen’s help.

Nana might smack me upside the head for it, but I could figure this one out on my own.

The end result would be a better, stronger relationship with a family that meant a great deal to me.

It would firm those roots I so badly wanted to put down.

“You sure you want to sell it?” The entire family was pretty tight-lipped about the whole thing. I couldn’t begin to guess what prompted this decision, and I didn’t ask. It wasn’t any of my business. But the weary expression on Joe’s face suggested finances were at play.

“Want to? No.” Joe shook his head. “Don’t exactly have a choice, though. So, if you want it, I’m offering you first right of refusal.”

“Why me?”

“I know you’ll do a good job with what needs fixing up. You’ll do it right .”

“There’s no one else in the family who wants it?

” I was pushing here, and I knew it. This felt like the same conversation I had with Luke yesterday about the cabin.

I just didn’t understand how no one seemed to care about keeping family things in the family.

If I had the kind of tight-knit family they did, I’d hold on tight to them.

Maybe Joe sensed that about me. Trusted I’d take care of the bookstore as though it were a family heirloom, regardless of what it became once I leased it to a new tenant.

“It’s too far gone to burden anyone with now.”

I waited, giving Joe the chance to decide whether he wanted to fill me in or not. I wouldn’t push any more than I already had.

“I have a daughter who’s an author. Did you know that?”

“I didn’t know she was an author,” I admitted, trying to place her name but failing. Kayla? Kendra? Something with a K. I always thought of her as snake-girl .

“She isn’t interested in coming back here, though,” Joe said, his expression hardening a little more. “She made that pretty clear last time I saw her.”

Another thing the family was tight-lipped about.

“Well, if you’re sure, I’m definitely interested in seeing the place.”

“We can do a walk-through this week, with the appraiser.”

“I look forward to it.”

“You just have to promise me you won’t lease it to any of those fucking gift shoppers with their cheap-ass trinkets. Those money-hungry city slickers are only interested in exploiting tourists. Brenda wouldn’t have wanted that.”

“You have my word.”

“You’re one of us now, so I’m holding you to it.”

One of us .

I made the decision to move to Bluebell Springs just over three months ago.

I’d been visiting my Army buddies after that disaster with Amy—aka the last redhead I inadvertently got tangled up with.

Though to be fair, I did my best to steer clear of her from day one.

My troubles with her were all because I wouldn’t go out with my boss’s daughter.

Rejection activated a special kind of vengeance in her toward me.

But not like any of that fucking mattered now.

She left me no choice but to walk away from a life I considered quite comfortable.

Another reason I should know better than to ask another redhead for her phone number. What the hell had I been thinking this morning? It didn’t matter that Red didn’t give it up. She’d been flirting with me, and I liked it. Too damn much.

I shook away the thought as I finished securing the drywall.

What was supposed to be a long weekend away earlier this spring turned into the decision to relocate to the small lakeside Colorado community near friends I considered family. Real family. The kind of family who had your back, no matter what.

I was no stranger to collecting income properties.

I had a few in Richmond, and a handful more in Fayetteville, outside the base.

But this would be different. I wasn’t buying some random house in a city too large for anyone to care.

Each transaction could be taken personally, in a town that boasted a population just shy of a thousand. This was more than just business.

“Let Connor know I can put that tile order in whenever he’s ready to get started on that bathroom remodel,” Joe said, closing the tailgate after I hopped down.

“You’re not coming over for dinner tonight?”

“Afraid not. I have a phone call to make. Let Connie know?”

“She won’t be happy,” I said, half teasing to lighten the mood. But Connie Weston took skipping the weekly family dinner as a personal offense. I learned that the hard way, the first week I stayed with them.

“She’ll understand this one.”

I nodded.

That was my cue to leave. To head back over to the Kniffen house and offload this drywall before the threat of a late afternoon rain shower came to pass. But I couldn’t seem to help myself.

“Do you know anyone in town with a red Jeep? A redheaded woman with a dog?”

“Doesn’t ring a bell. Why?”

“Just want to return something she lost.” It’d been a long shot. The Jeep had out-of-state plates. It stood to reason she was a tourist, but I couldn't shake away one detail: she knew how to get to Ghost Lake, and she seemed quite comfortable out there.

“I’ll keep an eye out.”

“She might be gone by now,” I said, waving away the question as I hopped into the driver’s seat. “She had Nebraska plates.”

“Nebraska?” Joe asked, his attention snapping to me as I closed the door and hung an arm out the open window. “With a dog? Almost sounds like . . . But a redhead, you said?”

“Yeah.”

“Never mind. Wrong person.” Joe lifted his ball cap once more and scrubbed a hand through his hair. “I’ll give you a call about that walk-through. Might be able to squeeze it in tomorrow.”

I nodded, and headed for the Kniffen Street house, eager for the manual labor that would help me avoid my sister’s annoying persistence. I’d work until I had to head to the farm for family dinner. With any luck, the sun would set after I successfully avoided any and all red Jeeps.