The Single Dad's Redemption

She was still standing at the window, frozen in place, when her friend Beth Stone, owner of the bookstore down the street, waved at her from the sidewalk and came inside.

“You look a bit shell-shocked. Is everything all right?” Propping her umbrella in the entryway, Beth tucked a stray strand of chestnut hair behind her ear and scanned the shop. “But of course not. This is Edna’s last day. Is she already gone?”

Keeley blinked, still reeling from the cowboy’s unexpected appearance. “She came in earlier to say goodbye and is well on her way to Florida. The store already feels empty without her.”

“She was always such a hoot. And she was so cute—always imagining herself a matchmaker but never quite getting it right. She was certain her nephew Ken was just the man for you.”

Keeley stifled an inward cringe. For all her wonderful qualities, this had been the one small catch when working with Edna.

She and her elderly cronies in this small town enjoyed arranging introductions and pushing their prey along the road to wedded bliss. But Ken was bald, paunchy and old enough to be Keeley’s father, with four wild teenagers and—the biggest barrier of all—he wasn’t a believer.

Edna had tried to work her matchmaking skills on Keeley and Ken for the past two years, but it was so not going to happen.

“She always had a good heart, trying to make people happy,” Keeley said tactfully.

Beth chuckled. “So true. I’ll miss that, and I’ll miss teasing her about her beloved Wisconsin Badgers. So...any prospects for her replacement?”

“I did have a drop-in of sorts, just before you arrived.” Keeley felt the back of her neck warm. “A cowboy stopped in—”

“A cowboy? Here?”

“From Texas, apparently. He’s heading for Detroit but had car trouble and will be around for a while.”

Beth’s gaze drifted to the lace displays. The glass case showcasing antique jewelry. The pretty dried-flower arrangements. “This is the most girlie shop in town. You really found a guy who’d be good at this sort of thing?”

“Not exactly.” Keeley managed a wry smile. “You and I both know how bad I am at hiring people. The only time I ever got it right was when I found Edna.”

She’d wanted to hire a replacement early so she and Edna could both work on training the new clerk before the annual Aspen Creek Antique Walk next weekend—the busiest sales days of the year and the crucial beginning of spring tourist season.

But her first hire had failed to show up. The second had found making correct change an impossible feat and saw customers as a bother when they interrupted her personal phone calls. The third had lasted two days and then walked out for good—apparently with a number of lovely antique rings and bracelets in her pocket.

And since then not one person had answered her advertisement in the paper. Not one.

Keeley shuddered, remembering all the reasons why she desperately needed help, and soon. Long-term. Temporary. Anyone. The first honest, dependable person she could find.

That brought her thoughts right back to the tall, dark and unwilling cowboy.

“So this guy stopped in. And?” Beth prompted.

“I’d just finished praying. I’ve been so frustrated trying to find a new employee that I just turned it over to God and promised to hire the very first person who walked in—if they wanted a job.”

Beth’s eyes sparkled. “And?”

“The cowboy came in to escape the rain, and it was such perfect timing that I thought maybe it was a sign from above. But he wasn’t interested.”

Beth’s face fell. “Too bad.”

“Exactly. I need to be here to run the store, but you know what it’s like with my dad these days. I might have to leave at a moment’s notice, if he needs me. Know anyone who wants a job?”

“Believe me, I would send them right over. It took me three whole months to replace my last assistant manager.” Shaking her head in commiseration, Beth set a small white bakery box on the counter by the cash register. “I brought this for Edna’s farewell, but she’s already gone. So if it’s any consolation, here’s something from Sweetie’s Bake Shop. Nothing like a nice sugar overload to lift your spirits, right?”

“At this point, I sure hope so. Can we share it?”

A heavy roll of thunder vibrated the oak flooring beneath their feet and Beth frowned. “I’d better get back to my store before the deluge starts again. Have you heard the severe-weather warnings on the radio?”

“Rain and more rain. A chance of flooding for the next five days. Just what we need.”

Beth laughed at that as she headed for the front door and picked up her umbrella. “I’ll be praying for you, Keeley. Hopefully your next applicant will be perfect.”

Chapter Two (#u6ad09821-0572-5b6e-a3f4-0a1dccdd97ab)

Keeley North hadn’t been kidding.

By five o’clock Connor knew that looking for a job in Aspen Creek and actually finding one were two different things. He’d walked every block, checking store windows for Help Wanted signs. If seasonal jobs had been available this spring, they’d already been snapped up.

The lodging situation wasn’t any better.

He hadn’t bothered checking out the B and Bs in the grand old homes, but even the handful of seedy strip motels in town were too expensive. At least the campground would be cheap. Set along the banks of Aspen Creek a mile north of town, according to the tow-truck driver, it was just five bucks a night and even included a building with showers.

He could pitch his one-man backpacking tent and manage on basic fare cooked over his camp stove for the next two weeks, no problem there. He’d already done the same and enjoyed the open sky for two nights on the road while on his way to Detroit. Even a primitive campsite was better than prison walls.

Now he sat hunkered over the classifieds and a cup of coffee in a truck-stop café at the south end of town, looking for any opportunities he might have missed. He’d passed some beautiful horse-breeding farms and training facilities on his way here—rolling hills, white fences, fancy barns. One, the Bar-B Quarter Horse Ranch about fifty miles back, had made him long to saddle a green colt once again. Those were the kinds of places where his background would be a perfect fit.

But none of them was advertising for help.

The only jobs listed were those he wasn’t suited for. Nurses. Home health aides. Day-care providers. A nanny for infant triplets.

The last one made him shudder.

He glanced heavenward, a rusty prayer forming in his thoughts. Then he just sighed, dropped a couple of bucks on the table and stood.

The kind and loving God of his childhood Sunday-school days sure hadn’t bothered to answer his prayers whenever he’d really needed help, and Connor hadn’t been on speaking terms with God for a long, long time. Why would He care now?

Connor shouldered his duffel bag and headed north on Main toward the campground, thankful that the rain had stopped.

He pulled to an abrupt halt.

Across the street, an old black New Yorker sedan pulled away from the curb and lurched to a stop in the middle of the street. Then the elderly driver laboriously backed up over the curb and swung across the sidewalk, apparently planning to execute a slow-motion three-point turn using the empty lot next to Keeley’s store.

But the car kept going back.

And back.

Until it bumped into a tall wooden ladder propped against the flat roof of the two-story building.

Then the car lurched forward into the street and lumbered away, the driver clearly oblivious to the destruction in his wake as the ladder teetered...then crashed to the ground.

Connor shook his head in disbelief. Did that old duffer even have a driver’s license? At least no one had been on the ladder, which now lay in splinters.