Page 6 of A Beach House Beginning

“There you are,” Lacey exclaimed. “I thought you started work at eight.”

He looked at his watch that read eight oh five. “I had a neighbor with a dead battery. It took me a minute to get the car started. What’s up? Have you been waiting for me? You could have called.”

“I know. But I had to run next door anyway to pick up something at the hardware store after I dropped off Brielle at school, so I figured I would stop here first to talk to you while I was out.”

He really hoped she wasn’t about to tell him her husband had been transferred again, after only being moved here a year ago to become manager of a chain department store in a nearby town.

Wes liked it here in Cannon Beach. He liked running on the beach in the mornings and sitting in the gardens of Brambleberry House in the evenings to watch the sun slide into the water.

He liked his job, too. He had worked in a neighborhood auto mechanic shop all through high school and summers during college and definitely knew his way around an engine, motorcycle or car.

Did he want to do it forever? No. As much as he had admired and respected the neighbor who had employed him—and all those who worked with their hands—Wes didn’t think working as a mechanic was his destiny. He still didn’t know what he wanted to do as he worked toward rebuilding the life that had been taken from him. But for now he had found a good place, working with honest, hardworking people who cared about treating their customers right.

It paid the bills and was challenging enough not to bore him, but not overwhelming as he tried to ease back into outside life.

“What’s going on?”

He could see his boss, Carlos Gutierrez, and his brother Paco watching them through the small front window of the shop.

“You know you don’t always have to cut to the chase, right?” Lacey looked exasperated. “We’re not having a quick conversation between prison bars anymore. A little small talk would be fine. You could say,Hi, Lacey. How are you? How’s the house? How’s the baby?”

Wes worked to keep his expression neutral. He might have agreed with her, except their marriage hadn’t exactly been filled with small talk, even before his arrest.

“How are you feeling?” he asked. He had learned a long time ago it was best to try humoring her whenever possible.

Lacey was a devoted, loving mother to their daughter and he still considered her a dear friend. If circumstances had been different, he would have tried like hell to keep their marriage together.

Still, he couldn’t help being more than a little grateful her sometimes volatile moods were another man’s problems these days.

“I’m good. Huge. I can’t believe I still have ten weeks to go before the baby comes.”

They had been divorced for two and a half years. She had remarried her childhood sweetheart a year almost to the day their divorce had been finalized and was now expecting a son with Ron Summers.

Wes was happy for her. When he had little to do but think about his life, it hadn’t taken long for Wes to recognize that his marriage to Lacey had been a mistake from start to finish. He had been twenty-one, about to head off overseas with the Army and she had been eighteen and desperate to escape an unhappy home life, with an abusive father and neglectful mother.

They hadn’t been a good fit for each other. He could see that now, though both of them had spent years trying to deny the inevitable.

One good thing had come out of it. One amazing thing, actually. His nine-year-old daughter, Brielle. She was his heart, his purpose, his everything.

“That’s actually why I’m here. Ron has the chance to take a last-minute trip to Costa Rica for work. He’ll be gone ten days and he wants me to go with him, if I can swing it. This is my last chance to travel for a while, at least until the baby is older.”

“Sounds like fun,” he said, trying to figure out where he came in and why she had accosted him at his workplace to deliver the news.

“The problem is that I can’t take Brie. She doesn’t have a passport and there’s no way to get one for her in time.”

Ah. Now things were beginning to make sense.

“Is there any chance she could come stay with you while we’re gone?”

A host of complications ran through his head, starting with the building just beyond her. The Gutierrez brothers had been good to him. He couldn’t just leave them in the lurch to facilitate his ex-wife’s travel plans.

He worked full-time and would have to arrange childcare. Brielle was nine going on eighteen and likely thought she was fully capable of being on her own while he worked all day. Wes definitely didn’t agree. But he couldn’t bring her down here to the garage with him all day, either.

He would figure that part out later. How could he turn down the chance to spend as much time as possible with his daughter, considering all the years he had missed?

“Sure. Of course. I would love to have her.”

Lacey’s face lit up with happiness, reminding him with painful clarity that it had been a long time since they had been able to make each other happy.

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