Page 274 of The Parkers' Handsome Holiday
Kayla was great, always good for a laugh, but she worked as one of the front desk assistants, on a team of people, and she really didn’t understand the idea of a working lunch. Everywhere else on the mountain, things ran on a specific schedule and people went out for lunch or ski breaks. There was no one to really cover for me while I ate, though, and the best way to get ahead was to plan my lunch time with things like this; getting ready for the afternoon’s work. Any little thing that I could do to get ahead.
“Are you coming to the afternoon meeting with the new owner?” Kayla asked.
I nodded as I took another bite of my soup. “Gretchen wants me there,” I said, and I couldn’t resist rolling my eyes.
Kayla laughed. “Why the look?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Got enough on my plate at the moment without wasting time in meetings,” I said.
“Aren’t you curious about who it is, though?” Kayla asked.
“If they had enough money to just up and buy this place with no warning, they’re probably a dick,” I pointed out.
“Oh, agreed,” Kayla said. “I’m just wondering how many times this new owner is going to get in over their head this winter. You know what people like that are like. They won’t understand when we say that we can’t put in a new ski lift in the middle of a season, that kind of thing.”
“They’ll be sure there’s a more efficient way to run the existing lifts too,” I added, shaking my head. “A way that doesn’t involve there being lift operators, probably.”
Kayla laughed. “Yeah, next thing you know, we’ll be importing robots from Asia to take over all our jobs. And then when that doesn’t work and they still have to keep all of us on payroll, this new guy will bail.”
“It’s sad because it’s so true,” I said, grimacing. “But at least if they decide to go the robot route, I’ll still have a job as a mechanic. Speaking of which…” I looked pointedly at my plans, and Kayla shook her head.
“Don’t work too hard,” she cautioned me as she got to her feet.
“If I didn’t, this whole place would shut down,” I reminded her.
She shook her head again and left. I glanced at my watch and hurriedly finished my lunch so that I could stay on schedule. Hell, maybe I could get ‘so engrossed’ in fixing the old four-person chairlift here at the base that I could ‘forget’ all about the meeting with the new owner that Gretchen wanted me to go to.
She was sure to give me shit for it afterwards, but she’d get over it, and it would be worth it if I could fix the stupid starter. Lately, it seemed like every time we had to do an emergency stop on the lift, which was frequently since this lift served all the beginner terrain on the front side of the resort as well as taking more seasoned skiers up to the other lifts, the thing stalled out for more and more time on the restart.
This afternoon, we had closed down the lift and provided alternatives for our guests, but since it was a Tuesday, things weren’t too busy anyway. I had free reign to do whatever work I needed. I was just swinging down the ladder from the bull-wheel, ready to test-start the lift and stop it a couple times, when I heard someone calling my name.
I turned around to see a man whom I hardly recognized at first. Then, I took a closer look. “Ian?” I asked in surprise. I probably wouldn’t have been able to recognize the other man at all if it hadn’t been for Mike saying the previous day that the new owner of the resort was a Peters. But Jesus, it had been a long time since I had seen Ian Peters.
“Shit, are you the new owner of the resort?” I asked, suddenly putting two and two together.
Ian laughed. “Nah, I’m still in the casino business,” he said, shaking his head. “Things are going pretty well for me down in Vegas.” He shrugged deeper into his coat. “Plus, it’s too damn cold here.”
I snorted. “This is a balmy afternoon,” I told him. In fact, I was stripped down to just a flannel and a t-shirt, but then again, I was up in the stuffy upper part of the lift, working hard with my tools to get everything in perfect running order again. “So, what the hell are you doing here?”
Ian shrugged. “Just came up for a couple weeks, like we used to do. Haven’t seen you in forever, though. Actually, weren’t you just about to get married last time I saw you?”
I tried not to wince. “Uh, yeah, sounds about right,” I told him. Ian and I had been surprisingly close whenever he came up to Park City to visit. Inseparable, really. Always up to some sort of prank or other antics. I knew that Ian’s dad had had money, but he always seemed so down-to-earth compared to some of the other kids that came through there.
Ian had been shocked when I’d told him, at twenty, that I was planning on marrying Beth. But I couldn’t imagine my life with anyone else. And now, well. Things were different. That was life.
“And what, you’re still kicking it around Park City?” Ian asked.
I shrugged, only realizing as I did so that I had grease all over both my palms. And probably my face too, because I knew that I had swiped at beads of sweat more than once while I was working up there. “Yeah,” I said. “I’m maintenance and mechanics. Whatever they need, really.”
“Huh,” Ian said, and I could tell from the way that he said it that he wasn’t too impressed with me. He probably knew I wasn’t getting rich working for a resort like this. But fortunately, he didn’t say anything disparaging about it. “Actually, my sister Bailey is the one taking over the resort. So I guess she’s your new boss.”
“Oh, wow,” I said in surprise. Bailey was younger than Ian, I remembered. Maybe by about eight years? She had been twelve or thirteen the last time that I saw her, and to be honest, it was hard to think of her as the new owner of the resort. She’d be in her mid-twenties now, but I couldn’t picture her like that.
“Yeah, she decided that the casino business wasn’t for her, and for some reason, she thinks that this is.” Ian’s tone told me what he thought about that as well. But I could also hear the fondness in his voice, and I remembered that the two of them had always been close. Actually, I was pretty sure that young Bailey had resented how close Ian and I were when he was there. I used to get the feeling she was used to being the only one that Ian wanted to spend all his time with, despite the difference in their ages.
It made me smile even now, just thinking about it. Ian had turned back to the lodge so didn’t see it. “That’s her over there now, actually,” Ian said, pointing towards his sister.
I had to admit, she didn’t look quite like the rich, spoiled brat that I had been picturing as our new resort owner. Nor did she look like the twelve-year-old kid she had been the last time I had seen her. No, she had grown into quite the woman, beautiful in a long blue coat that accentuated her curves. There was still a certain cuteness to her in the way her hair was braided in pigtails, a beanie jammed down on her head.
