Summer Kisses. Melinda Curtis
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Название: Summer Kisses
Автор: Melinda Curtis
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
isbn: 9781472054456
isbn:
The world hadn’t totally screwed him. The barn held. The sun continued to shine. Beyond that, Flynn was having a hard time finding a silver lining.
“Everyone’s accounted for,” Dane announced moments later.
“Thank God,” Flynn murmured into his shirt. As favors went, that was huge. Unfortunately, his timeline had undoubtedly ballooned.
The balding inspector faced Dane looking like Christmas had come early and Santa hadn’t fulfilled any of his requests. “What happened?”
“We were shoring up the beams on the north side,” Dane said. “It must have caused instability on the south.”
Slade tugged Flynn away from the others. “Let’s tear the barn down and rebuild. It’s safer and cheaper.”
“I know you’re worried about the budget, but this is a piece of Harmony Valley history. We promised to preserve it.”
“Some promises aren’t meant to be kept.” Slade gestured toward the barn. “If someone had been hurt or killed trying to preserve the barn, we’d be ruined.”
The inspector was shaking his head at Dane. “This got away from you. I’m shutting everything down on both structures until you can reassure me that any work—be it demolition or rework—is safe.”
“Which is when?” Flynn quit pretending he wasn’t listening.
“Until it’s safe,” the inspector repeated coldly.
Word quickly spread through the men that work was over for the day, sending them streaming like large ants toward the rows of parked trucks, until only a few of Dane’s crew remained.
“It’s going to be hell proving to County this is a safe construction site unless we take her completely down.” Dane turned to Flynn. “I suggest we demolish the whole thing, salvage what boards, posts and beams we can, and resell the rest. There’s a good market for old, weathered barn wood.”
The promise they’d made to the community warred with the pressing need to speed things up. “How long?”
Dane looked toward the trees lining the river. “We’ll lose three to five days from the collapse and a day or two in salvage. We’re out in the boonies. County inspectors can’t just stop by on their way to another job. We’re at the mercy of their schedule.”
Flynn hated when things were out of his control. A programmer by trade, he liked plugging in commands and seeing them work in predictable, stable order.
“I’d like to see the estimate for a complete demo before we decide how to proceed,” Slade said.
Flynn nodded in defeat. “And we’ll need to confer with Will.”
The construction worker who’d rescued his truck appeared at Dane’s shoulder. His gaze pierced Flynn’s, distracting him for a moment from the outline of familiar cheekbones and sharp chin Flynn suspected was hidden beneath the man’s gray goatee.
“Before you go, I’d like you to meet my job foreman, Joey Harris.” Dane’s voice sounded like it was coming from far away.
Flynn’s vision dropped from those unapologetic eyes to the hourglass prison tattoo on his forearm.
It couldn’t be...
He would never...
But it was. And he had.
Dane’s foreman was Flynn’s father.
CHAPTER THREE
ROSE AIMED HER antique ladies birding binoculars out the window at Agnes hurrying back to the car. “Where did you get that ring?”
Drat. Agnes was hoping that her two friends wouldn’t notice the ruby ring. And Rose hadn’t until she’d retrieved her binoculars, a pair Agnes assumed would only magnify the appearance of a bird if she was standing beneath the tree it was in. And only if it was a small tree.
Agnes slid behind the wheel of her beloved Buick, a pair of binoculars draped around her neck. “I got a call from Mayor Larry. Part of the Henderson barn just collapsed.”
From the backseat, Rose gasped.
“Was anyone hurt?” Mildred lowered her own binoculars.
“No.” Agnes started the car and headed toward Jefferson Street and the Harmony River bridge. The morning sun had yet to chase away the briskness in the air. It reached through the windows and chilled Agnes to the bone.
“Agnes, about the ring?” Rose was doggedly annoying sometimes.
“Which ring?” Agnes tried to play dumb.
“The red ring as big as a stapler on your finger,” Rose said sarcastically. “Do you think I’m as blind as Mildred?”
“I take offense to that,” Mildred half turned, her eyes barely visible behind her thick lenses.
Rose huffed. “As if you noticed Agnes was wearing a new ring.”
Harold’s ruby ring glinted on Agnes’s right hand. She’d returned the engagement ring to him decades ago on the Harmony River bridge. The same day the army informed her there’d been a mistake—her husband hadn’t died in the Battle of Inchon. He’d been captured, freed and was coming home, leaving Agnes to choose between her childhood sweetheart and the man who’d picked up the pieces of her heart when she thought her first love was dead. “I can’t believe we’re talking about a ring when there’s been an accident at the winery.”
“Thank heavens no one was hurt or killed.” Suitably distracted, for now, Rose clutched the back of Agnes’s seat as she took a corner faster than usual. “Do you think they’ll realize this is an omen and quit?” Rose wasn’t a proponent of change.
“More likely they’ll realize the barn is past saving.” Mildred raised her binoculars to her thick glasses, twisting the dials for a clearer view, which was nearly impossible given Mildred was legally blind. “Sometimes you need to cut your losses and move on. No regrets, right, ladies?”
Agnes pressed her lips closed and tried not to look at the ruby ring. She had regrets aplenty. If she’d chosen Harold that day instead of honoring her wedding vows, maybe her life would have been different. She was nearly eighty and she’d never gone skydiving or driven a race car, something both of her friends had done. Her days were spent cleaning and gardening, meeting up with Mildred and Rose to go to a museum or the botanical gardens. She’d been a boring, devoted housewife, and that was no doubt why her kids and grandchildren rarely came to visit.
The ruby winked at her, reminding Agnes of all that life had to offer. She could hear Harold’s baritone whispering in her ear: come away with me.
She’d been unable to run away. She’d needed to stand by the promises she’d made. She had more promises keeping her here today, as she tried to breathe some much-needed life into Harmony Valley before it became a ghost town.
“It’s a shame when old things СКАЧАТЬ