Page 22 of Wait for Me

When they rode the tour bus to go to their other excursion today, Logan was reconciled with his phone. Suddenly, his brain could function again.

Lunch hadn’t taken very long, but he was glad that Marie had hinted at his helpfulness. All he had done was secure three seats at a table and carried lemonade for everybody. Hardly anything earth-shattering like the new business deal he was trying to sort out.

Once again, his cousin Jared had done it. While in London visiting his girlfriend and their child, Jared had played golf with one Colm Cargill, who had known him through mutual friends in Savannah, Georgia. It had turned out that Cargill Internet Communications would like to open a new branch in the United States, and was looking for investors.

Now Jared wanted Urquhart Enterprises to drop the steel merger in favor of software.

Earlier, at the salmon bake, Logan had been in the middle of texting his thoughts to Jared, when Marie yanked his phone out of his hands. Now that he had gotten it back, Logan realized that it was almost seven o’clock in London, and Jared was at dinner with his girlfriend.

Across the bus aisle, Marie and Jonas sat together. It was way past Jonas’s nap time, but they weren’t going back to the cruise ship docked at the port of Juneau until later this afternoon. So there he was, his head on Marie’s lap, taking a power nap. His knees bent, shoes pushed against the wall of the bus at the window sill.

Logan was glad that Jonas had decided to sit with his mom instead of with him. He had to catch up on all the emails he had missed the last ninety minutes they had been at the salmon bake.

There was so much to do.

His corporate attorney was waiting for his reply. He wanted to send an email to his cousin. He had to find out more about the Cargills. Of course, Logan’s cousin would have his Ruttledge Yamada Urquhart Commercial Properties build the new Cargill-Urquhart software buildings in the USA.

Logan made a mental note to call his cousin to see if there had been any prospective land in metro Atlanta. Or Fulton County. Or Hall County where the property taxes were low—

The screen blacked out.

“No, no, no!” He should have recharged the battery overnight. He knew it has been red for a while, but he was confident he wouldn’t run out of juice.

He let out a growl.

Someone tapped his shoulder. There was Marie’s outstretched hand, offering him a battery pack.

“Lifesaver.” Logan plugged it into his phone. “Thanks.”

Marie simply nodded. On her lap, Jonas was sleeping, his long legs looking for a place to stretch. That boy would probably grow up to be as tall a Logan—or taller.

“What else do you carry in that purse?” Logan asked.

She smiled but said nothing.

Chapter Eleven

When the tour bus stopped at the dock, Jonas bounced right out of his seat after his power nap. Now he wanted his daddy to carry him. Marie didn’t like to hear him whine.

“Whose bright idea was it to go from a salmon bake to whale watching?” Logan frowned.

“Yours, brilliant one,” Marie said.

“I’m going to be so wiped out by the time we get back to the ship. Not sure if I can eat dinner.”

Marie said nothing. She and Logan were different there. When Logan was tired, he chatted non-stop. When she was tired, she didn’t speak.

Which also meant she wasn’t in the mood for a conversation.

In fact, at this moment, her eyes looked longingly away into the distance, toward the row of cruise ships at the nearby port. She could skip the whale watching trip, get a taxi cab or Uber ride back to their ship, go to her stateroom, and take a nap.

This jet lag was making her groggy at all the wrong times of the day.

Still, they exited the bus, looking like a proper family.

Logan carried Jonas on his shoulders, and led the way down the steps of the dock to the double-decker catamaran. The boat was crowded, mostly with cruise ship passengers.

Marie recognized a few faces from their ship’s dining room, poolside, and children’s play area.

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