AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"How's the house coming?" Liam asked as Molly put a bunch of mint and some sugar into a cocktail shaker. She took what looked like a small baton and pounded it lightly into the bottom of the shaker.
Colleen had heard that Molly and her husband, Brady, who was the chef Adele's, were in the process of building a house on a piece of land a little ways out of town.
Molly rolled her eyes. "I just hope we're able to move in before this little sucker pops out." She gave her belly a pat. "Everything takes so much longer than we think it will."
"It always does. Let me know if I can help. I can probably get some of my guys out there in the next couple of weeks."
"That would be awesome," she said as she slid their drinks in front of them. "I just can't wait for it to finally be done."
Molly excused herself as another customer signaled her for a drink. Colleen closed her eyes as she took the first minty sweet sip of her mojito.
Liam drank nearly half his whiskey in one gulp and followed it with a deep, satisfied sigh.
"I'd ask how you two are holding up but it's written all over your faces," Molly said as she reappeared to refill their water glasses. "It must be so hard. Your dad was such a great guy. I can't imagine how much you must miss him."
Colleen nodded. "We sure do, especially Mom." Then, her lips loosened by the generous pour of rum in her drink, she continued, "And to add insult to injury, he left behind a massive pile of medical bills for us to deal with."
"Hey," Liam said gruffly. The scowl he gave her would have been intimidating if Colleen hadn't clued in ages ago that her big brother was all bark and no bite. "How about you don't go around sharing our personal business?"
"What?" Colleen said and sucked the last of her drink through her straw. "Molly's a friend. Besides, it's Big Timber. There's no such thing as personal business. Anyway," she said, turning her attention back to Molly, "We're just having a bit of a sulk—"
"I'm a thirty-four -year-old man," Liam interjected. "I don't sulk."
You do so sulk, Colleen thought as she rolled her eyes. "Fine, I'm having a bit of a sulk, trying to figure out how we're going to help Mom pay for all of it."
Molly topped off Liam's whiskey and took Colleen's glass to refill. As she muddled more mint and sugar, she gave Colleen a contemplative look. "You used to bartend over at the Grande, right?"
Colleen nodded. She'd bartended at the historic hotel during the summers after her junior and senior years, and worked at a bar in Bozeman during the school year. "Yeah, why?"
"Just thinking we could really use some more help around here a couple nights a week." She topped Colleen's drink with a sprig of mint and set it on the napkin in front of her. "I want to scale back, and of course take off several months entirely once this little critter gets here."
Colleen's heart twisted as she watched Molly stroke her hand lovingly over her rounded belly. She swallowed hard and told herself the tightness in her throat was just tension from everything they had going on.
"And Lord knows Ellie has her hands full with two kids."
"Yeah." Colleen tore her gaze away from Molly's midsection and forced a smile on her lips. "I've seen Anthony twice at the ER since I started working there. Speaking of which, once I up my hours to full time, I should be bringing in enough to cover the payments. But thanks for the offer."
Molly shrugged. "It was worth a try. Let me know if you change your mind. With the summer tourist season gearing up, you'd make great tips."
The next day Colleen spoke with the Nancy Johnson, the Chief Nursing Officer at the medical center and asked her how soon she could start full time.
Nancy pursed her lips and fiddled with the chain that held her reading glasses around her neck. "Surely, dear, you don't want to spend so much time away from your mother?"
Some would have balked at the familiarity of a supervisor calling her "dear," but since Nancy and her husband had been friends with Colleen's parents since high school she could get away with it.
Despite her loose lips while talking to Molly last night, if her mom hadn't already told one of her oldest friends about her financial issues, Colleen didn't want to be the one to spill the tea.
Instead she said, "Mom's doing better lately, and she's trying to get out more. And I think it would be good for both of us if I got back to work full time. I'm fine doing nights and weekends or covering for people last minute." Anything to get her bank balance to grow.
Nancy sighed and pressed her lips together, saying nothing. The silence stretched over several seconds, long enough to make Colleen shift uncomfortably in her seat.
"I'm afraid I don't have enough room for you to go full-time, honey."
Colleen's eyebrows snapped together. "What do you mean? Everyone's always complaining that we're understaffed, especially the nurses."
"I know, but unfortunately with the recent budget cuts, there's not enough funding to bring in another nurse at your level full-time. Honestly, as it was I had to shoehorn you in to get you scheduled even half-time."
Colleen listened as Nancy promised to try to give her extra shifts if anyone was sick or went on vacation, and to give a glowing reference to anyone else interested in hiring her.
