The Next Always Read Free

lifted over eyes of gold-flecked green. “I thought you were mostly doing it to get into Drew’s sister’s pants.”
    “It was part of the motivation.”
    “How’d that go for you?”
    “She hooked up with somebody a couple weeks ago, a detail nobody bothered to pass on to me. I never even saw her. So I’m bunked down in Drew’s spare room trying to pretend I can’t hear him and Jen fighting every damn night, and listening to him complain how she’s making his life hell every damn day.”
    He drained the coffee. “The deck looks good though.”
    “Now that you’re back I could use some help on the built-ins for The Library,” Owen told him.
    “I’ve got some catching up to do, but I can give you some time after noon.”
    “That’ll work.” Owen handed him a file. “Mom’s been down to Bast’s,” he said, speaking of the furniture store down the street. “Copies of what she’s after—with dimensions, and the room they’re for. She wants you to draw it up.”
    “I just did the last batch before I went to Drew’s. How fast can she shop?”
    “She’s meeting Aunt Carolee there tomorrow. They’re talking fabrics, so she wants to see if and how what she’s got going fits ASAP. You’re the one who took off a couple days hoping to get laid,” Owen reminded him.
    “Struck out, too.”
    “Shut up, Ry.” Beckett tucked the file under his arm. “I’d better get started.”
    “Don’t you want to go up, take a look?”
    “I did a walk-through last night.”
    “At three in the morning?” Owen asked.
    “Yeah, at three in the morning. It’s looking good.”
    One of the crew stuck his head in. “Hey, Beck. Ry, the drywaller’s got a question up in five.”
    “Be there in a minute.” Ryder pulled a handwritten list off his clipboard, passed it to Owen. “Materials. Go on and order. I want to get the front porch framed in.”
    “I’ll take care of it. Do you need me around here this morning?”
    “We’ve got a few million pickets to prime, a mile or two of insulation to hang, and we’re decking the second-story porch, front. What do you think?”
    “I think I’ll get my tool belt after I order this material.”
    “I’ll swing back through before I head out to the shop this afternoon,” Beckett told them, then got out before he ended up with a nail gun in his hand.

    AT HOME, HE stuck a mug under his coffee machine, checked the level of the water and beans. While it chomped the beans, he went through the mail Owen had stacked on the kitchen counter. Owen had also left sticky notes, Beckett thought with a shake of his head, listing the times he’d watered the plants. Though he hadn’t asked Owen—or anyone—to deal with those little chores while he’d been gone, it didn’t surprise him to find them done.
    If you were dealing with a flat tire or a nuclear holocaust, you could depend on Owen.
    Beckett dumped the junk mail in the recycle bin, took what mail needed attention and the coffee through to his office.
    He liked the space, which he’d designed himself when the Montgomery family bought the building a few years before. He had the old desk—a flea market find he’d refinished—facing Main Street. Sitting there, he could study the inn.
    He had land just outside of town, and plans for a house he’d designed, barely started, and kept fiddling with. But other projects always bumped it down the line. He couldn’t see the hurry, in any case. He was happy enough with his Main Street perch over Vesta. Plus it added the convenience of calling down if he wanted a slice while he worked, or just going downstairs if he wanted food and company.
    He could walk to the bank, the barber, to Crawford’s if he wanted a hot breakfast or a burger, to the bookstore, the post office. He knew his neighbors, the merchants, the rhythm in Boonsboro. No, no reason to hurry.
    He glanced at the file Owen had given him. It was tempting to start right there, see what his mother and aunt had come up