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“As long as you’re happy, we’ll support you. Do you need us to cover anything? Help you out?” Mom always looked for a way to help me make the most of any situation.
“Well, I’m not going to be able to get everything out to Idaho on the plane ride. Think you could cover getting my car out to Idaho?”
“You find someone to move it and put it on your credit card. We’ll pay it that way,” Dad said. “And whatever you can’t fit in your suitcases for the flights, either. I imagine you’ll be taking your suitcase and your backpack?”
“Yeah. And I’ll make sure you know when I land. I’m not leaving until tomorrow, and I should be getting into Waterfront around… I think dinner time?” I pursed my lips. “It’s a four-hour flight and about an hour and a half drive from what I can see from the airport to the town.”
“Well, you let us know what all is going on. We love you.”
With that, they hung up. I made a few calls around and found a moving company that could make the trip out to Waterfront, Idaho once I knew where I’d be staying. It turned out that since I was an out-of-state hire, Mr. Delaney had a room ready for me on the lodge grounds. Perhaps it was meant to help me with the cost of living, since that would be included in utilities and such that he was already paying for the lodge. The job came with a good wage, but with the final cancelled wedding expenses to pay off, it would take me a long time to save up enough to rent a place of my own in town.
The next day, after making sure my room was all cleaned up and getting my car and what boxes I wasn’t taking with me into the small moving truck, I turned in my room key. My parents gave me a ride to O’Hare airport since they were leaving tomorrow and still had their rental car. It was somewhat bittersweet, as they had done this when I moved from Nebraska out to college, too.
I gave Bailey and Mr. Delaney an update on my flight because it was leaving a little earlier than I had originally booked it, but I was able to make the flight. Even with having to go through security and checking a bag.
The flight itself was inconsequential until we started flying over Idaho. I had visited Bailey before but had never flown over the state. After college in New York, this was such a different kind of wilderness. From above, the Idaho looked to be nothing more than a big wilderness. Considering a good chunk of the eastern part of the state consisted of national forests, I wasn’t entirely shocked. As we flew over the panhandle, I wondered if Bailey and Mr. Delaney were looking up, thinking about me arriving in Spokane soon thereafter.
The moment we landed and I took my phone out of airplane mode, I got a text from Bailey. She had parked and gone into the airport to wait for me at the baggage carousels. As soon as I knew which carousel my bag was coming on, she would meet me there. I was relieved to have clear instructions. I didn’t know the airport, and the huge changes I’d made in my life over the past week were beginning to sink in.
Once I got off the plane, I headed down to the carousels to find her waiting at carousel five, exactly as I had told her.
“Laurel! Oh, it’s so good to see you again,” Bailey said as she hugged me tight.
“I’m glad to be off the plane,” I said, returning the hug. “But yes, it’s good to see you too. My bag should be here shortly, but while we wait, no need for me to stay at your place. I’ll be on site at the lodge.”
“Oh wow! That’s a sweet deal,” Bailey mused. “I’m so glad that you’re out here. Take advantage of the fact that it’s warm now. In the wintertime, it won’t be nearly this warm. I hope you have decent snow boots in your stuff.”
“It’s in the stuff coming with the movers, but I have good snow boots,” I reassured her.
We grabbed my bag when it came around the carousel, and then, headed out to Bailey’s car. It was a smaller car but given how she was struggling with her wage right now, I understood the need to downsize. It fit my suitcase just fine, though, which is all that mattered.
We piled into the car and started out towards Waterfront. I texted Mr. Delaney that I would be there, hopefully before dinner, but I couldn’t make any guarantees. All depended on how traffic played out. He told me that he was just thankful I’d be there by the time he went to bed, and I left our conversation alone after that.
“How much do you know about Luke Delaney, anyway, Bailey?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Not much,” she chuckled. “He’s not old, but he’s got the reputation of being a bit of a grouch. He gets along great with his guests, but he’s pretty reserved otherwise. He’s been in charge of the lodge for a couple of years now,” Bailey said. “I think you’ll like him. He can be friendly, but also he’ll definitely let you have your own space.”
When we arrived at the lodge and walked in, we were in the middle of our conversation. That didn’t stop me from catching the sight of a handsomely rugged man. He had brown hair, almost black in this lighting, with a square jawline covered in a beard. His deep brown eyes pierced the air as he talked to another man, and I only barely managed to keep my knees from buckling underneath me.
This was not the time to let my heart run wild with fantasies.
Chapter six
Luke
“What if we did some simple cold-cut sandwiches?” I looked at Rick. “Those are easy enough that anyone can handle making them. And we have all the ingredients. We also have the stuff for a good night of hot dogs.”
“I think the sandwiches are a better bet tonight,” Rick said. “Especially if our new chef is… too exhausted… Luke, you may want to turn around.”
I raised an eyebrow. Rick simply pointed behind me. I turned around and found myself face-to-face with both Bailey and a woman of average height with blonde hair and sparkling blue eyes. She had a simple, rounded face, but it worked well with her features. Her eyes were set a little closer together, but with a smaller nose, it looked rather pretty. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, which I presumed was her way of holding it all together when she didn’t want to do anything else – or nothing else was practical.
They walked over to us, still talking to each other as they wandered through the lobby. I turned to finish my conversation with Rick, but he’d vanished into the back room.
“Wow…”
I could now hear their voices as they spoke, and I caught the first sounds of Laurel Pennington’s overly excited tone.
“This looks like it would be the perfect place to try out some of the recipes I’ve been dying to try, Bailey. I could try out a chicken a la penne, some salmon filet with the most tender roasted vegetables you’ve ever tasted, and even some macarons might look good here!”
