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“Just a rough one,” she replied, and urged her horse alongside his. “He wrote that none of his proposed designs will cost much if we do the work ourselves.”
“I can get some of my buddies to help,” he said confidently. “Jason is a carpenter, and he owes me for helping him move house in a snowstorm last April. Rick’s a plumber. And Evie’s a genius when it comes to using power tools.”
“And I’m sure I can rope in my brother and a few cousins to help paint and lay new flooring,” Summer said. “I’d call Winnie to help with this project, but she and Geoff are working all-out right now to wrap up the Dream House renovation project before their wedding in November. Apparently, all kinds of problems have cropped up. Last I heard, all of their interior doors and kitchen cabinets are back-ordered and might not arrive before the scheduled reveal.”
“Sounds like a real nightmare,” Brock commented. “Are they really gonna live in that house, or is it just some fake TV bullshit?”
“They’re planning to live there,” Summer confirmed. She offered Brock her phone. “Here, take a look at the designs. I sent Geoff the measurements and photos of the dining room interior, and he created three different computer-generated mock-ups. What do you think?”
As the two horses walked sedately side by side, Brock swiped through the mock-ups, expecting the worst. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Summer watching him closely, as if she were worried about his reaction.
But what he saw surprised him in a good way. As Summer had promised, all three designs maintained the spirit of the current diner.
“Hey,” he commented out loud. “These are pretty good.”
Summer beamed at him. “I thought so, too. Which one’s your favorite?”
He swiped back through the designs, studying them.
Then her phone buzzed. A text message preview from someone named Maggie popped up.
Hey. You alive? Just checking to see if you’ve nailed down the reopening date for ST yet.
Well, damn. He’d nearly forgotten that Summer was heading back to San Francisco in a few weeks.
Last month, he couldn’t wait to get rid of her pushy ass.
Now he looked forward to their daily arguments. He enjoyed working with her. And doing other things. He wasn’t ready for their string of one-night stands to end so soon.
He handed back her phone. “I like this one.”
Mock-up #2 showed the dining room with pale green walls and floors that looked like weather-beaten wood planks. The breakfast counter was now marble-topped, and the booths had been transformed into high-backed padded benches built against the dining wall. All of the seating was upholstered in dark green. The backbar and breakfast counter were both paneled with reclaimed wood, and vintage barn lamps hung on long cables from a ceiling covered in old-fashioned whitewashed tin tiles stamped with a pattern of leaves and squares.
The mock-up even retained the diner’s current cowboy-themed memorabilia, just a lot less of it and neatly organized on the dining room’s walls and open shelving.
“Oh, that’s the one I liked best, too!” she exclaimed. “So, we’re agreed?”
Brock nodded. “Yeah. There’s a lot of wood, which is great, but isn’t the reclaimed stuff expensive?”
Summer shrugged. “There’s an old barn here on the ranch that looks about ready to fall over. I’m sure Dad wouldn’t mind if we salvaged wood from there.”
She swiped again, and Brock saw a bulleted list appear on her phone. “Looks like everything else is doable, too. A few gallons of interior paint. Geoff is recommending vinyl plank flooring, which is half the cost of hardwood, and a lot easier to install. Hm… let me see… Lighting—I’ll bet you that Autumn knows a place in Bozeman where we can find vintage lamps with the right look, and really cheap. White quartz or natural stone for the countertops—Geoff suggests asking around if anyone has any remnants from a finished project that they’d be willing to give us for free or next to free. And Winnie will know where we can order upholstery fabric for the best price.”
“Sounds like you have it all figured out,” Brock commented. “Since you’re the brains, I guess I’m the brawn?”
She shot him a flirtatious glance. “Youknowhow much I like your brawn.”
They continued discussing the renovation project as they began the ascent into the hills. Then the dirt road narrowed into a path, forcing them to ride single-file.
Forty-five minutes later, they arrived in a small, beautiful hollow tucked away behind the first line of hills. A small lake sat in the center of the hollow like a sparkling gem, with a hot spring unfurling long banners of steam from a rocky outcropping on the shore.
Brock spotted a single-room log cabin surrounded by cherry trees heavy with fruit a few yards from the lake shore. A rough-hewn table stood on the cabin’s roofed porch, along with a collection of five or six rickety-looking chairs.
“Wow,” Brock commented as Scout made his way towards the cabin. “This is really nice. Ever spend the weekend out here?”
“Yes,” Summer replied. “I’d really love if Winnie renovated that cabin before it falls down. We used to ride out here for sleepovers when we were in high school.” She smiled and added wistfully, “But of course, Winnie’s really busy these days. She hardly ever leaves Seattle anymore.”
“So, picnic, or do you want to go for a swim first?” Brock asked. “Doesn’t look like there’s anyone around to catch us skinny-dipping.”
