Page 9 of The Beachside Rental

“It’s nice to meet you.”

And so, together, they worked on cleaning up the mess.After the larger pieces of glass were picked up, he wiped up the spilled water with some paper towels while she retrieved the vacuum.

When everything was cleaned up, he said, “Can I do anything else?”

She shook her head.“Sorry about the music.I’ll make sure to turn it down.”She held up a pair of noise-canceling headphones.“Problem solved.”

“Thank you.I appreciate it.”He stepped outside and headed back to his place.

Gus met him at the top of the steps.He ran his hand over Gus’s head.“Hey, boy.Everything is good.Go back to sleep.”

He settled back in his deck chair and stared at his keyboard writer.The cursor blinked at him, but he wasn’t going to let it torment him this time.

His fingers rested on the keys as he searched for the first sentence.From there the words poured out of him.It was like the dam had broken, and the words came spilling out.

And then he heard something.His attention was drawn to the sweet-sounding voice.It was his neighbor again.She was singing a country song, but it wasn’t the lyrics that drew him in; it was Jenna’s voice.

There was no music—just her voice.She must have been wearing the noise-canceling headphones.He smiled.

And then he went back to his writing.From that point on, he wasn’t sure anything he wrote was any good.He was constantly distracted by her singing.Still, he kept writing.It felt good putting words on the screen.He would worry about whether the words were good enough at a later date.

Chapter Four

Shewasn’tsurewhatto make of him.

The next morning, Jenna found herself thinking about Simon.She was quickly finding out that there were many layers to him.On the outside, he was stiff and grumpy.But as his layers were peeled back, he was kind.

There was a part of her that wanted to know more about him.But how was she supposed to do that?Knock on his door and say,Hey, I want to know more about you?She didn’t think so.

Besides, she had to get to work.She had the early shift, and before that she had a meeting.Her brother Neil had called the group meeting to discuss the prior month’s performance and what they needed to do to improve things.In other words, it was just the same old, same old.

But when the meeting was over, she intended to corner her brother.She hadn’t given up on her idea of how to improve things at the checkout registers.And now that the peak business season had arrived, the congestion at the registers proved that changes needed to be made.

She rushed through her shower.She pulled her dark curls up into a ponytail like she did most every day for work.It kept her hair out of her way, and in the summer it was cooler to have it off her neck.

After applying a little makeup, she went downstairs.She grabbed a clean apron from the laundry basket full of clothes that she didn’t get around to putting away after her cleaning marathon the day before.

She hurried out the door, but when she paused to lock the door, she realized she’d forgotten her keys.She put down her coffee and apron on the chair next to her front door.She searched her pockets.They weren’t there.

She must have forgotten to pick them up from the kitchen counter.She opened the door and hustled back inside.Her keys weren’t on the counter.And then she realized that when she was cleaning, she’d put them where they actually belonged, on the small rack of hooks.And that’s where she found them.

With the keys in hand, she headed out the door again.She stepped onto the front porch to find her new neighbor standing there.He was dressed in a white T-shirt and blue shorts like he was getting ready to go for a run.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Morning.Off to work?”

She nodded.“I am.Off for a run?”

He nodded.“I am.”

“Well, have a good day.”She turned to pick up her things but only one of the two items was there.How could that be?

She looked all around for her apron.It was dark green, and it was all rolled up.Had it rolled off the chair?

She knelt down and looked under the chair.It wasn’t there.How was that possible?

She turned to Simon, who was doing some warm-up exercises.She felt really silly saying this, but she was desperate to find her apron and be on her way.“Did you happen to see my apron?”