LITMIR.BIZ

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kids, with its sprawling couches, chairs and cushions. Matt knew the room was bigger than some of the apartments the kids lived in.

      Dana walked into the center, slowly taking it all in. “Nice. Did this furniture come with the place?”

      “A lot of it was donated but we did find some bargains at thrift shops.” There was a slight twitch of her nose at that and Matt felt his face heat up. Sure, some of the pieces were obviously well used, but personally he thought they added to the charm of the room.

      “Some of it was left behind,” he went on, determined to ignore her lack of interest, “like that sideboard on the far wall.” He pointed. “The door next to the sideboard leads to the dining hall and the kitchen is just off that. There’s a Ping-Pong table over there in the far corner.”

      She followed his gesture with her eyes, then turned to face the opposite end of the room. “Is that a reading area?”

      “Yeah. We call it the library. Those bookshelves made that section a done deal when we reconfigured the room. Much of this space had already been set up for multipurpose use.”

      “How did the previous owners use this place?”

      “I think it was a very large summer home for someone originally, but I heard that the couple who willed it to the town set it up as a lodge.”

      “People came here for a vacation?”

      Clearly not her kind of getaway place, Matt thought. “It’s smaller than most vacation lodges but yes. The offices down here were also used as bedrooms, I believe. Plus, there was one sleeping cabin and the outdoor washroom buildings.”

      “So, people didn’t have their own bathrooms.”

      “It was an affordable place for families. Everyone needs an escape from the big city in the summer,” he said, seeing her flush as she picked up on his implied gibe. “The tables across from the library are for quiet time or rainy-day activities. People have donated a number of board games and jigsaw puzzles.”

      She gave it a cursory glance before saying, “The offices. Are they for all the staff?”

      “Basically. Kristen, Sandro and I share the largest one. Then there’s one that the rest of the staff can use. It’s got a couple of desks, two computers and a landline. Maria uses it as her office, but anyone can check email on the second computer.”

      “Though people probably use their cell phones. What’s the reception like here?”

      “It’s good. We’re not far from the town, but we don’t have Wi-Fi. Besides those two rooms, we also have one we call the sick room.”

      “Do you have medical personnel on staff?”

      “Unfortunately, the budget doesn’t extend that far. We do have a board member who’s also a nurse practitioner and she’s available for a few hours when the camp is running through the summer.”

      “What kind of liability insurance do you have?”

      This was the lawyer speaking now, Matt thought. “We’re covered—don’t worry.”

      She raised a skeptical eyebrow that he ignored.

      “Okay, well, let’s put your backpack in my office and then we’ll check out the cabins and the grounds. You can change your shoes, too,” he added, hiding a quick smile.

      By the time they’d made it to the new sleeping cabin, Matt guessed that Dana might bow out of her offer to help. If so, he’d go with his plan B and have the new worker at KidsFirst take over for Dana on the weekend. But he didn’t feel like letting her off the hook just yet.

      Her smile when she took in the freshly painted girls’ cabin with its new windows and screens was refreshing, but it disappeared when he showed her the broom-closet-sized room that would be hers.

      “Not much storage space,” she commented, staring bleakly at the two-drawer chest between the two cots.

      Matt laughed, “You’ll only be here on weekends, Dana. And as I told you, this weekend is a short one. Just Saturday night, so you’ll be supervising on your own. Plus, there’ll be fewer girls.”

      “I was thinking of the two people who’d be in here all summer,” she snapped.

      He wanted to tell her that wasn’t her concern but had to admit she had a point. He surveyed the room. Maybe there’d be just enough space for one of those DIY wardrobe kits. “Well...I’ll get Maria to check into that.”

      As irritating as her observations were, Matt knew he and the team hadn’t worked out much in the way of staffing for the summer. Then the cabins, each with a full complement of twenty kids, would need two night supervisors. The problem was, now that the town was reviewing the lease agreement, things were up in the air. It was a stressful situation, but Matt knew he needed to be patient.

      “Shall we walk down to the lake, or would you rather do that after you’ve made up the beds?”

      Dana glanced at the stack of clean linens on one of the new bunk beds. “A walk would be nice.”

      Matt figured he could do that job himself if necessary. He paused outside the cabin, inhaling deeply.

      “The air is different out here, isn’t it?” Dana said as she came up beside him.

      He took another deep breath. “It is.” He waited a moment, then said, “I’ll show you the other cabins.”

      He led the way to two other wood-frame buildings. “These were built a few years after the couple who owned the place bought it, so they’re at the top of our list of necessary repairs.” He thought he saw a slight shiver as she eyed them. “They’re not too bad inside. The newer cabin we were just in was for the girls, and that one there is for the boys. The washroom cabin behind them is divided into girls’ and boys’ sides. All the necessary conveniences but just—”

      “Outside.”

      “Well, it is a camp,” he pointed out.

      “Shall we get to the lake?”

      “Fine. Let’s get to the lake.” And get the day over with. He strode ahead, circled behind the lodge, trotted down the slope and stopped at the graveled edge of Maple Lake. The still, glistening water helped calm him. You can end this right now, he told himself. It was a dumb idea. Accept that and get on with things.

      He waited for her to catch her breath when she caught up to him. “I was going to say that you don’t owe me anything,” he began, “because, to be honest, this whole idea of your helping out here was impulsive. I never really expected you to take me up on it and there’s no shame in simply telling me you’d rather not do this. We can call it a day right now and I’ll drive you back to the city. Okay?”

      A band of red rose up from the base of her throat into her face. She turned away, but not before he saw her swallow hard, tightening her jaw and blinking. Matt bent down to pick up a couple of smooth pebbles and skimmed one across the water. He figured he ought to have told her all that earlier, on the way to the camp. But then he’d still had some hope that she’d rise to his challenge.

      “That day,” she finally said, her voice settling into a steady coolness, “I was on my way to Oak Park to see our old house. The one I lived in until my mother died.”

      Matt dropped the second stone.

      “I’d just transferred to a new school and...and things weren’t going well. It was the third school in a year and my father... Well...he was running out of patience. There’d been an incident that morning. Some girls were spreading stories about me. I’d planned to confront them and tell them how mean they were. But one of them started to laugh and I cried instead.”

      The naked emotion in her face made him look away. He suddenly thought of Rosie and the trouble she’d had at school years ago, when she’d been newly diagnosed.

      “So

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