Moonlight on Butternut Lake (3 page)

Mila looked at him questioningly. He blew out a long breath, and she knew whatever he was going to tell her next was something he didn't really want to tell her. “I know I said before that my brother isn't the easiest person in the world to get along with, but I think I might have understated the problem. It's why we've had trouble keeping home health care workers. Two of them, in fact, have quit already.”

“I know that,” Mila said. “The agency told me.”

“Did they?” Walker said, surprised. “And you still agreed to come all the way up here?”

“A job is a job,” she said simply.
And a job two hundred and forty miles from my old life was just too good a job for me to pass up.

“Well, some jobs are worse than others,” Walker said, with a wry smile. “But I'm glad you feel that way. And I'm glad we had this talk, too. It was my wife, Allie's, idea. She suggested we try to prepare you for the worst. You know, ‘forewarned is forearmed'? That kind of thing. It was also her idea to give Reid an ultimatum this time. She's telling him—right now, in fact—that if this falls through, we'll have to send him back to the rehabilitation center he was in after the accident. Obviously, though, we're hoping things turn out differently this time. Because between my wife and me, we have two children—one who is an infant—and two businesses. And to say that we're holding our own right
now would be to give both of us too much credit. Most of the time, we're barely keeping it together. And that's on a good day.”

As he said this, Mila felt a wave of sympathy for him. She knew what he was talking about. “Barely keeping it together” had become her stock-in-trade recently. But Walker Ford didn't need to know about that. What he needed to know was that she could help him.
Help them.
Because if she couldn't help people, she'd need to find a new career.

“Look,” she said now. “Don't worry about your brother. Let
me
worry about him. I'm good at getting along with people.”
Or I used to be, anyway
. “I'll find a way to make this work,” she continued, smiling her encouragement. “And that way, you and your wife can concentrate on the rest of your lives, all right?”

He looked surprised and relieved. “Thank you” he said simply.

“Now, is there anything else I need to know?” Mila asked, feeling, for a moment, like the competent person she had once considered herself to be.

“You mean, is there anything else you need to know about my brother?”

“Or about the job. About my responsibilities.”

“Well,” he paused. “We've already discussed his medication. You'll give that to him, right?”

“Right.”

“And, let's see, what else . . . Well, there are a few things my brother can do on his own now. Fortunately, the cabin he's staying at right now—it's where my wife and children and I lived before his accident—already had doorways wide enough for a wheelchair. But we've also installed an entrance ramp, and a hospital bed, and retrofitted his bathroom, so he can handle his basic needs.”

“What about bathing?” Mila asked.

“Oh, I help him with that.”

“Well, I can take over now.”

But Walker shook his head. “I don't think so. He won't let anyone but me help him.”

“But are you trained to help him?”

“Trained?” Walker repeated, looking sheepish again. “Not really. I just kind of, you know, wash him up.” He made a washing gesture with his hands.

“All right, well, I'll wait to broach the subject with your brother. But ultimately, I think I should be the one doing that. Now, what about the cooking? What will that involve?”

“Nothing on your part. We've hired someone to do the cooking and the housekeeping. Her name is Lonnie Hagan. She comes every day, from 8:00
A.M.
to 4:00
P.M.
She brings Reid his breakfast and lunch—he prefers to have them in his room—and she also prepares his dinner before she leaves. All you'll have to do with it is heat it up and take it to him on a tray, then collect the tray when he's done.”

Mila almost asked,
Why are you taking him his meals on a tray, instead of having him wheel himself in to wherever his housekeeper or his home health aides are having their meals, too?
But she didn't. Still, it was her opinion that if Reid wasn't a complete invalid, he shouldn't be treated like one.

“Okay,” she said. “No cooking or cleaning. But there must be other things you need me to do?”

“Well, Allie and I have been taking him to his doctor's appointments, but I'm hoping that Reid will eventually let you take him, too. Same with his physical therapy appointments. Those should start as soon as he gets his long leg cast off, which, unfortunately, is still several weeks away. In the meantime, though, we'll need you to pick up his prescriptions and run an occasional
errand. Oh, and check his vital signs and monitor his general health. But that's about it, I guess.”

“I can do all those things,” Mila said, “and I'll still have plenty of time left over to provide companionship for your brother.”

“Companionship?” Walker echoed skeptically.

“Uh-huh. Taking him for walks in his wheelchair. Playing board games. Or even just having conversations.”

“Conversations?”

“Yes, you know, talking,” Mila prompted.

“Yeah, about that,” Walker said, looking worried. “Maybe I didn't really make myself clear before. But Reid doesn't do the whole . . . companionship thing. He doesn't do the conversation thing, either.”

“You mean he doesn't talk?”

“I mean he doesn't
like
to talk. Not since the accident. He likes to be alone. In his room.”

“What does he do in there?” Mila asked.

“Nothing,” Walker said. “We've offered to put a television in there. Or a computer. But he said no. I even bought him an iPad, which I couldn't get him interested in. Honestly, I don't know what he does all day. Stares out the window, I guess. Except he doesn't do that, either, because he likes to keep the shades down. It bothers me, actually,” he added, “that it's so dark in there all the time.”

“Well, then I'll add raising his shades to my to-do list,” Mila said determinedly. “It will come right after confiscating his medications.” But something else was bothering her now. “Mr. Ford—”

“Walker,” he corrected her.

“Walker,” she amended. “If I'm not providing companionship for your brother, I'm not . . . I'm not going to be very busy. I
mean, the responsibilities we've discussed will take, at most, a couple of hours a day.”

“That's probably true.”

“But you're paying me to work full-time.”

“That's definitely true,” he smiled. “Is there a problem with that?”

“No problem, except that what you've described, it's not a full-time job. I'm not even sure it's a
part
-time job.” Even as she was saying this, though, Mila was regretting saying it. Because what would she do if he decided not to hire her to live in, full-time? And where, exactly, would she go? There was no backup plan. Not for her, anyway.

“Look,” Walker said, shifting in his seat. “It doesn't matter how many hours a day you'll actually be working, especially when what little time you spend with Reid will probably seem like much more time than it actually is. What matters is that you'll be there if he needs you, especially if he needs you at night. If you can be that person for him, Mila, you'll be giving my wife and me our peace of mind back, and right now, honestly, I couldn't even begin to put a price on that.”

Mila hesitated, still uncomfortable with the idea of working only a couple of hours a day. She had a formidable work ethic, and so far, this job description was not jibing with it.

Walker sensed her ambivalence but misunderstood the cause of it. “Look, don't worry about being bored this summer,” he said. “Especially if you like the outdoors. The cabin is right on Butternut Lake, and it's beautiful, really. And when Lonnie's there, during the day, you're welcome to explore the area, on foot or in one of the boats we own. Then, on your days off, you can borrow one of our cars and go into town. There's not much to see there, of course, but it should provide a few distractions. It's got a good
coffee shop, for one thing, and a handful of other stores, some of which even sell things you might need. It's not exactly the Twin Cities,” he added, with a smile. “But we like it.”

“I'm sure it will be fine,” Mila said quickly. “I don't need a lot of entertainment.” And besides, she was planning on spending as little time as possible in public. The cabin's secluded location suited her just fine. It was the perfect place to get lost. Or at least to not be found.

“All right, then,” Walker said, with obvious relief. “I think we've covered everything.” He glanced at his watch. “We're late,” he said, shifting the pickup into drive and pulling back onto the road. “I kept you too long. We were supposed to be at Pearl's, the coffee shop I mentioned, fifteen minutes ago. Are you ready to meet Reid?” he asked, stepping on the gas.

“As ready as I'll ever be,” Mila joked. But she found herself wishing that Walker had been a little less forthcoming with her. The more she heard about his brother, frankly, the less confident she felt that she could do the job.

H
ere they are now,” Allie said, watching the front door at Pearl's. She shot Reid a warning look and, in the next moment, composed her face into a welcoming smile. Reid followed her eyes to his brother, Walker, and the young woman with him, as they threaded their way through the coffee shop's tables.

“Hey,” Walker said. “I'm sorry we're late. My meeting ran over at the boatyard, and I found Ms. Jones waiting in the rain.”

“Walker,” Allie said reprovingly. And then, to the young woman with Walker, “You must be Mila.”

The young woman—Mila—nodded her assent, but there was something about hearing her name said out loud that seemed to unnerve her. She cringed, almost imperceptibly, and glanced
furtively around. Reid frowned. That was odd. He watched her thoughtfully as Walker made the introductions. She wasn't unattractive, he thought. Far from it. She was petite and slender, with straight shoulder-length brown hair, watchful brown eyes, delicate features, and fair skin. But there was something about her that Reid found slightly unsettling. Maybe it was because, when she and Walker joined them at the table, she chose a chair that faced the front door and then looked up every time it opened and the little string of bells above it rang. Or maybe it was because of the way she sank down, ever so slightly, in her chair, drawing her slender shoulders together, as if she were trying to make herself smaller. As if she were trying, he realized, to hide in plain sight.

All this was interesting to him. For about two minutes. And then it was just annoying. Because this was the trouble with bringing virtual strangers into your home. They didn't just bring their actual baggage with them, they brought their personal baggage with them too. All their problems, big and small, not to mention all their annoying personality quirks and irritating habits.

Mrs. Everson, for instance, who'd been his first home health aide, had brought with her a fondness for cheap red wine, though she'd been careful to drink it only at night, and only in her own room. Reid hadn't mentioned it to Walker or Allie. He'd figured her habit of drinking herself into a stupor every night gave him a modicum of privacy he wouldn't have if she were sober. But he'd wondered, idly, what would happen to him if there were a nighttime emergency, as Allie and Walker worried there might be. A fire, or a tornado. In either of these unlikely events, Reid knew, Mrs. Everson—lying facedown on her bed, snoring lustily into her pillow—would be useless to both of them. Still, as much as Reid had enjoyed speculating about how Mrs. Everson smuggled all those empty wine bottles out of the cabin without attracting
the notice of Lonnie or his brother, he still hated having her there. Because the truth was that for someone who liked to drink so much, she was surprisingly little fun, and once Reid made it his mission in life to make her quit, she was really no fun at all.

Mrs. Bolger, the home health care aide who replaced Mrs. Everson, didn't have a drinking problem. But she did have a grating tendency to have long, one-sided conversations with Reid, most of which were about her relationship with her daughter-in-law—which was lousy—or about her beloved collection of china dolls, which she referred to as if they were actual people. Add to that her constant, tuneless humming, and the cloying, too sweet odor of her perfume, and, within three days of her arrival, Reid found himself longing for the return of Mrs. Everson.

And now, he thought, watching Mila Jones as she tentatively sipped the iced tea she'd ordered, now someone else would be living with him. Someone who was acting as if she'd robbed a bank and was waiting for federal marshals to catch up with her.

“Isn't that right, Reid?” Allie said, interrupting his thoughts.

“Isn't what right?” he asked, entering into what he imagined would be an interminable conversation.

“Mila's welcome to use any of the recreational equipment in the boathouse. The kayak, for instance, or the Jet Ski.”

But Reid barely grunted.

“Oh, that's not necessary,” Mila said quickly. “I'm sure I'll find plenty to keep me busy.”

“Don't count on it,” Reid mumbled, under his breath.

Allie shot him a warning look and then turned her attention back to Mila. “Mila, what do you like doing in your free time?”

Reid watched her hesitate for a moment and then shrug. “I'm not used to having a lot of free time,” she said, her eyes cutting to the coffee shop's front door again. Reid felt another wave of
annoyance. His promise to Allie, he knew, was about to go right out that door.