Forbidden Falls (Virgin River #9)(38)

“I’m not worried, Ellie. That room hasn’t been let in a year or more. It’s nice to have someone use it again. And I happen to like children.”

“It’s a wonderful room,” she said. “If I’d had a room like that growing up, I would’ve felt like a princess. I love it.”

“I decorated it myself,” Jo Ellen said.

“Have you lived around here all your life?”

“Since I got married,” she said. “I met Nick when he was in the air force, stationed in Florida, and fell madly in love, married him, and when he got out of the service we moved here. He’s from these parts.”

“Oh, gee—is your family back in Florida?”

“Just a sister, her husband and my nieces. We don’t see too much of each other. But I have friends here now. Women friends. This is a good little town.” She laughed. “Real little.”

“I like it,” Ellie said. “The only thing that would make it better for me is if I had my kids with me.”

“And where are you from?”

“Eureka. I grew up and went to high school there.”

“And is your family nearby?”

“There’s no one except the kids,” she said. “My grandmother raised me alone and she died a couple of years ago. That’s it. No brothers or sisters.”

“Are your parents dead?” Jo asked cautiously.

“No, no. My mother is kind of a whack job…. Okay, not kind of—she’s pretty nuts. She had me when she was real young, never would say who my father was, and just left me with my gramma. She’s all over the place, traveling, constantly moving. She visited now and then when I was growing up, sends postcards sometimes, but when my gramma died, I couldn’t even find her. I haven’t heard from her in a long time and, really, that’s okay. The last time she visited, my daughter was totally confused about who she was. They knew my gramma as gramma and my mother was horrified to think she was a grandmother! She pretty much ran for her life.”

“Oh, what a shame. I’d love to have a daughter with children.”

“Well, like I said, she’s pretty nuts. But I’m not, I swear. Well, I have been known to marry stupidly, but I’m working on that.”

“It’s amazing how much we actually have in common,” Jo said. Ellie went alert, wondering if Jo was about to tell her how she’d married stupidly. But she said, “Two women, transplanted to this little town, with no real family.”

Ellie almost said, But you have Mr. Fitch! But then, she’d met Mr. Fitch, so she didn’t say it. Instead she said, “Tell me about Virgin River, Jo. I hardly know anything about it, but I really like it.”

An hour later, after talking and laughing and asking each other questions, Ellie headed for a long soak in the tub and Jo finished raking up her flower beds. Ellie wanted to get to her room before crossing paths with Nick; she thought it best to give that man a wide berth. And if she wasn’t totally mistaken, Jo felt the same way.

But before they parted, they made a date to have lunch together next week. Jo offered to make them sandwiches to eat on the back patio when Ellie took her break from the church. Ellie felt a rush of unexpected warmth coming from the woman, a feeling she welcomed.

Noah met with Paul Haggerty for a couple of hours, discussing what Haggerty Construction could do to help out with the renovation in the church. Noah had a lot of ideas about how he could save money by doing some of the work himself, like installing the basement flooring, refinishing the sanctuary floor, putting new glass in the windows, painting the offices, texturing and painting the basement walls.

“The first thing you have to do is paint the outside, Noah,” Paul said.

“I thought maybe I could put that off, concentrate on the interior first.”

“Nope,” Paul said. “No one will see the inside if you don’t spruce up the outside. You can’t expect to draw a crowd if it looks like the same old broken-down church. In renovation, even do-it-yourself renovation, you want to start with what people see first.”

“I never thought of that. I guess you’re right.”

“I’m right. Here’s what I’m going to do for you, Noah,” Paul said. “I’m going to get some measurements and get an itemized bid ready for you—one that shows the cost of a complete remodel, from ceiling to floor, including the outside. The big issue is going to be time—if you’re in this project, we can’t get started until you’re done sanding in the sanctuary and replacing window glass. We can’t have sawdust in the paint, or scratch it up during window replacement. If you look at the numbers and decide you still want your own hand in it, I’ll be happy to loan you a sander and other equipment, no charge. But, if you want us to do the whole remodel, we’ll get in and out of here pretty quickly. While we’re at it, we’ll check all the plumbing and wiring and roof, at no extra cost to you. And I’ll give you my best church price. And my best church scheduling.”

“That would be great,” he said. “That’ll give me some good choices.”

“I can deliver the bid by next week. Now, I have to measure.”

So while Paul got about the business of measuring, Noah went to his office and began returning the phone calls he hadn’t gotten around to earlier.