She waved her hands around. “The Broken Hearts Beach Club—still brokenhearted and now coming to you from Winston’s room—in a tropical storm.”
The wind howled outside.
“It’s so us, isn’t it?” Blair asked.
Sienna let out a laugh. “The vacation will go up from here, right?”
Emily put one arm around Sienna and the other around Blair. “I can’t imagine it wouldn’t.”
FOURTEEN
By midafternoon, as the storm raged on, they’d all had enough small talk. They’d played Candy Land, tic-tac-toe, and The Game of Life with Winston; Emily had colored with him in his coloring book; and Blair had tested the obstacle courses he’d built with blocks for his Matchbox cars while Julia finished the laundry, taking advantage of the power still being on.
“I’m bored,” Winston said, climbing into Patrick’s lap on the sofa.
Patrick had been on the phone for quite a while, checking in with his crew. He’d called the building team to be sure they’d safely dismantled the remaining scaffolding and secured the dumpsters; then he’d jumped right on another call, asking if they’d sandbagged all the low-entry points, telling them he’d gotten all the furniture and equipment to higher ground himself. Once the restaurant was taken care of, he alerted a couple of clients that he’d have to reschedule their events due to the storm. It was clear the locals had all been through this sort of thing before, every move seemingly done like clockwork.
After his calls, Patrick had clicked between baseball games and The Weather Channel all day. He turned away from the third inning of the Phillies and Reds to respond to Winston.
“Sorry, bud. There’s not much we can do with all of us stuck in the house. Wanna draw or something?”
“I already did that.”
“What about your Legos?” Julia offered, walking through the room with a laundry basket full of folded clothes.
Winston made a face.
They were going to have to get creative. Emily stood up. “I’ve got an idea. Want to play a game?”
Winston brightened.
“I’ll need some supplies from your room. Is that okay?”
He nodded.
“Be right back.”
She went into Winston’s room and looked through his shelves and toyboxes, collecting small toys. In a few minutes, she’d gathered another Matchbox car, an action figure, a small parachute man, a large marble, a bouncy ball, and a slew of other items. She came back into the living room and dumped them on the table.
“What’s all that?” Winston asked, catching the runaway marble.
“It’s going to be part of your scavenger hunt.”
He gasped. “Scavenger hunt?”
“Yep. All I need to make it is a piece of paper and a pen. Know where I can get those?”
Winston scrambled off Patrick’s lap and ran over to the desk at the back of the living room. He retrieved a pad and pen from the middle drawer and ran back over to her, holding them out.
“Now, you can’t look at what I’m writing,” she said. “It’s a surprise.”
Winston giggled with anticipation. He went back over to Patrick and sat next to him. “This is gonna be fun!” he told his uncle.
Patrick chuckled.
As Emily wrote, she glanced at Patrick. His attention was on her with an interest she hadn’t seen before. She dared not meet his eyes again because when he looked at her like that, it sent her heart pattering.
She created the scavenger hunt, and Patrick made small talk with Winston about the baseball game, explaining the different pitches and why one of the players stole second base. Sienna looked on curiously while Blair’s attention moved from Emily to scrolling on her phone.
