Page 22 of The Accidental Innkeeper

As I smoothed the sheets, my traitorous brain decided this was the perfect moment to picture Dust-guy.

Him standing there next to the bed. Watching. Standing there watching with no clothes on. Standing there watching with no clothes on with his hard man-wand pointed at me.

Yup. I was horny and seriously delusional.

I fluffed the pillow harder than necessary. Nope. Not today. I was not thinking about Dust-guy while making a bed and imagining our bodies doing some horizontal tango.

I stepped back and took a deep breath. The room smelled faintly of lavender now.

Next stop: bathroom.

First, I pulled the water bottle from my bag and drank half of it in one go, trying very hard not to think about all the historical nasties I’d inhaled today—dust, skin cells, possibly a ghost. I’d read somewhere that probiotics were essential for gut health. At this point, I was pretty sure my immune system deserved a medal.

At the very least, I probably wouldn’t be constipated.

Hydrated and mildly reassured, I went to war with the bathroom. Even though I watered down the bleach from one of the spray bottles, I still made a makeshift mask out of a hand towel because I couldn’t afford to fry my brain tonight. I needed every last functioning brain cell to survive this inn.

Thirty solid minutes later I stepped back and surveyed my work.

Clean. Clean-ish. Clean enough that no one would immediately contract something.

“Finally,” I said, already imagining hot water pouring over me and washing away the sweat, the dust, and the trauma. It felt like heaven, like forgiveness, like the universe saying, “You suffered enough.”

I peeled off my clothes, wincing as my shoulders protested. I felt like I’d been hauling bricks uphill all day, not dragging one suitcase up two flights of stairs and scrubbing one bathroom.

I stepped into the clawfoot tub, pulled the curtain closed, and turned the knob.

The pipes coughed, literally coughed.

Then the shower sputtered and blasted out a stream of brownish-orange water, like the inn was vomiting rust directly at me.

“Ah!” I screamed and jumped back, nearly slipping and smacking my head on the tub. Death by Victorian clawfoot tub, naked, was not a good look. I twisted the knob off. “Absolutely not. We are not doing this.”

I stood there in panic, dripping with rust-colored water I didn’t want to think about where it had been. My imagination immediately volunteered several horrifying options, so I took a breath and forced myself to calm my ass down.

“This is an old house,” I told myself. “Old pipes. Not used in a while. Totally normal.”

I reached for the knob again and turned it back on, retreating to the end of the tub and staring at the orange-tinted water splashing out of the showerhead. Slowly, suspiciously, the rust cleared, and the water finally ran clean.

Okay. Fine. Crisis averted. Minor rust incident. I could live with that.

I stepped under the shower water.

Ice.

Motherfracking ice cold. Arctic. Polar bear-approved.

I shrieked again, scrambling as I twisted the knob the other way. Nothing happened. I tried again. Still ice.

I glared up at the showerhead. “Listen,” I said, pointing at it. “I’ve had a day. I breathed in a century of dust. I stared at a man’s crotch. I stripped a haunted bed. Give me hot water, for fuck’s sakes.”

The pipes answered with a groan, like they were considering it. Then, without warning, the water surged back on—boiling.

“Ah!” I yelped, danced sideways, and slammed the knob shut again, my heart pounding. I stood there, naked, shivering, and furious. “I hate this place.”

I took a deep breath, braced myself, and tried one last time, slowly and carefully.

The water settled into something warmish and tolerable.