Doing It Over (Most Likely To #1)(11)

“Is that a rhetorical question?” Wyatt asked.

Luke offered a grin. “Women!”

Wyatt had to agree. A man wouldn’t let the oil run dry. Not a self-respecting man who did more than shove a key in the ignition and fill a gas tank. Thankfully, small towns weren’t filled with lawyers, doctors, and white-collar workers who fell into that category.

Women, on the other hand, didn’t have to hold six-figure careers to be deemed clueless when it came to cars.

“Can it be fixed?” Wyatt wasn’t completely sure why he asked.

“Cracked block.”

He blew out a long breath. A long look at the late model sedan had him shaking his head. “More trouble than it’s worth.”

“Yeah.” Luke shook his head. “Hated breaking that news to an old friend.” He shrugged and leaned an arm over the car. “It’s not a complete loss. She’ll make a great target out back of Grayson’s farm.”

Wyatt huffed. The image of a drowned shadow of a woman with wide eyes and fear swam into his head. She’d accused him of being an escapee from Sing Sing . . . Jack the Ripper, even. She had the right lines, but not an ounce of trust in a stranger. To hear she was an old friend of Luke’s made Wyatt wonder. “I’m sure your friend enjoyed the thought of her car being used as target practice.”

“She’s smarter than her cracked block implies.” Luke nodded toward Wyatt’s truck. “Where you headed today?”

“Miss Gina’s. I’ve been telling her for two years her roof needed to be replaced. Buckets in her attic after last night’s storm proved me right.”

Luke rolled his eyes. “That woman is still living in the sixties. Let me know when you find her pot plants.”

Wyatt had his head in the same place.

Miss Gina had a way of waving away problems as if she were high on something most times.

“I’ll do that.”

Wyatt pushed Mel and her cracked block from his head as he turned his truck back onto the main road through town.

Every year the annual high school reunion brought in new faces and the occasional casual hookup. Small towns had a way of limiting a single man’s sex life. Yeah, he could drive up the coast, or worse, up the five and hit Eugene in a little over an hour, but those encounters didn’t repeat.

When he’d first moved to River Bend the last thing on his mind was women or what he might be missing from a big city. He’d grown up just outside of San Francisco and had his share of traffic, crime, and noise to last a lifetime. The best memories of his life were those from when he was young and his parents had taken him and his little sister on camping trips to Sequoia or the Redwood National Park. The quiet and calm grounded him and reminded him of happy times. He vowed that as soon as he acquired a trade that would set him up with a nice, comfortable living in a small town outside of the state of California, he’d find one and move. A simple place that didn’t require him to drive through a desert to reach an airport.

That was five years ago.

A general contractor license was complete overkill for a small town where no one cared if you were licensed and bonded so long as you showed up when you said you were going to . . . and did the job as promised.

The nuance of small town living became obvious the first time he’d done a simple plumbing job for a widow who lived just outside of River Bend. Mrs. Kate offered a pot roast and an apple pie as payment.

He’d really thought that only happened in movies and novels.

Apparently not.

Having a deep respect for an older woman, especially a widow in her late seventies, Wyatt enjoyed the pot roast, ate the pie, and took the rest home that night at Mrs. Kate’s insistence. To this day, he made a point of stopping by Mrs. Kate’s on the first Sunday of every month with a toolbox and an empty stomach.

Unlike Mrs. Kate . . . Miss Gina offered horizontal naked favors as payment. With one look of hell no, Miss Gina offered a wink and cut a check. The woman still flirted like she was thirty and he was a teenager, but she never took it any further.

Thank God!

Mrs. Kate and Miss Gina were worlds apart and yet only a few miles away from each other. Wyatt appreciated both of them.

Wyatt turned down Miss Horizontal Naked Pot Lady’s B and B drive and dodged a pothole before the pavement turned into ground-up asphalt that resembled a driveway.

He recognized Jo’s Jeep and Miss Gina’s VW van in a vintage teal and white paint with a tuck and roll interior that looked like it just came off the showroom floor. Miss Gina loved her throwback from the sixties vehicle more than anything . . . and even after a storm the van appeared as if Miss Gina had been out polishing the thing the moment the precipitation dried up.

Wyatt didn’t bother walking into the inn. He stepped around the west side of the old Victorian and dragged his largest extension ladder with him. He knew months ago exactly where the roof was going to fail, but Miss Gina didn’t want to fix it until after the cosmos told her it was time.

The previous night’s storm was Miss Gina’s sparkling sign.

With a tool belt secured around his hips, he climbed up onto the roof of the three-story house and pulled himself higher on the brittle composition shingles.

The recent warm summers and lack of maintenance had blown free a good five-foot section the night before. This close to the coast, the weather did a number on every house. Miss Gina’s stood taller than most, had a decent ocean view from the widow’s walk on a clear day, and therefore took the brunt of every storm nature delivered.