It Takes Two

by Judith Arnold

  That was about all the sentimentality Will could stomach. He grinned, said good-bye, and ducked back into his car.

  A couple of minutes later, he’d reached the Brogan’s Point Library. Like the current Town Hall, it was an old, pillared Colonial-style structure, exuding an aura of history and erudition which seemed suitable for a building that contained a lot of books. Will parked and entered the building.

  He wasn’t sure what he’d expected, but neither Davenport nor Brianna were stationed near the cork board that held drawings of their two buildings. He was glad Davenport had decamped but disappointed that Brianna wasn’t there, drumming up enthusiasm for her design.

  Of course she wouldn’t be there. He’d barged in on her barely an hour ago, when she’d been in her office, busily doing whatever it was that architects did all day. He couldn’t have expected her to drop everything and come running to Brogan’s Point, even if the drive would have taken her only ten minutes.

  He acknowledged that his desire for her to be in the library had more to do with him than with her and her design. He’d wanted to see her again. He’d wanted to believe he could merely hint that she ought to be here, and she’d be here.

  But she wasn’t here. The rendering of her design for renovating the old Town Hall building looked respectable, displayed beside Davenport’s on the cork board. His looked flashier, sure, but hers looked solid. Professional. Decent in a way Will couldn’t quite define.

  He stared at the two drawings, glanced at the table beside the cork board that held two folders, each one containing details and specs, and shrugged. All right, so she wasn’t here. Will had kissed her, she’d sent him packing, and that was that. Whether or not his mother would welcome his advice, Brianna clearly hadn’t welcomed it. She’d have to handle her bid on her own, without any help from him.

  Pivoting on his heel, he strode to the door and outside. The Faulk Street Tavern awaited him. His mother would appreciate his help, he knew. Maybe she’d appreciate his advice, too.

  Chapter Seven

  Thirteen million?

  Last night, Rollie had told a room full of concerned Brogan’s Point citizens that his fancy new Town Hall building would cost twenty million dollars. Now Brianna stood in the Brogan’s Point Library, holding the folder containing Rollie’s specs and reading his budget for the building. Somehow, miraculously, he was now claiming he could bring in the project for seven million dollars less.

  She was not in the mood for his sleaziness. She’d had a long morning of going back and forth between the granite supplier and her clients, trying to find a slab of granite they would accept for their kitchen counters. Pale green was a nearly impossible color to locate, according to the supplier. Would they consider something more in the brown family? Maybe a mustard-hued slab? Or possibly gray?

  No, they had their hearts set on green, the color of a lush, healthy lawn. Brianna had phoned several other dealers, including two in New Hampshire and one in southern Maine. They all said they would see if they could find a color the Louvelles would find acceptable.

  She spent a little time reviewing the new wall placements for the Louvelles’ kitchen, the cabinetry, the design she’d come up with for a butler’s pantry connecting the kitchen with the dining room, and then sighed. Sitting at her desk, waiting for phone calls from granite dealers, didn’t seem like a wise use of her time. A much bigger commission—for the Brogan’s Point Town Hall—loomed in her future, if she could win it.

  So she drove down to Brogan’s Point, prepared to face off with Rollie at the town’s library. As it turned out, he wasn’t there. But his proposal, with its surprising new price tag, was.

  She studied his drawings, his specs, his description of the building. Nothing was different from what he’d presented last night at the town meeting. She couldn’t see how he planned to bring his visionary modern building to completion for thirteen million.

  It was a con. Not an uncommon one; she knew more than a few contractors who would bid low on a project, win the contract, and then say, “Oh—you wanted knobs on the doors? That’ll be another fifty thousand dollars. And double-pane windows? Another two hundred thousand.” She’d never seen anyone doing that when she’d worked at Cahill and Associates, but she’d been the most junior of architects there. If any of the architects were low-balling prospective clients that way, she would not have been privy to it.

  A stew of anger, indignation, and anxiety simmered inside her. Had Will suggested that she come to the library specifically to see for herself how Rollie had doctored his bid? Had he wanted her to find the discrepancy on her own so he wouldn’t have to be a part of it? Of course he wouldn’t have to be a part of it—he would be three thousand miles away by the time ground was broken on the project.

  She wanted that project—more now than before. She needed that project, if she hoped to be of value to Michael and North Shore Designs. She had to get that project, just because she was so pissed off at Rollie.

  She sank onto a chair beside the cork board where the two proposals were on display, and tried to clear her thoughts. Should she report this to the town board? The town manager? The local town newspaper? She didn’t know the political dynamics of Brogan’s Point, where to start, whom to contact, what to say. She didn’t want to come across as a whiner, a tattle-tale, trying to wheedle her way into securing the commission. She just wanted the town to know that, if they did decide they wanted a huge, dramatically modern new Town Hall, they ought to vote for it with Rollie’s original cost estimate in mind.

  She walked out of the library, then pulled her cell phone from her bag, thinking she should call Michael and ask him for advice. A brisk wind tugged at her hair as she contemplated what to say. The more she thought about it, the less she wanted to call him. He had told her this was her project. She didn’t want him to think he had to hold her hand throughout the process. He wanted to regard her as his partner, not his trainee. Mentoring wasn’t his thing.

  But to call the town manager and criticize Rollie behind his back…was that good business strategy? Good politics? She really wanted to bounce her thoughts off someone before she acted.

  The only person she knew who had a sense of the town was Will Naukonen.

  She hunched her jacket more snugly over her shoulders and sighed. He had said she might find him at the Faulk Street Tavern, but did she really want to find him? If she saw him, she would remember his kiss. She’d relive it. It had been so…intense.

  And so wrong. Brianna didn’t make a habit of kissing men she had no relationship with—at least, not kissing them that way.

  But this wasn’t about relationships, or kissing, or kissing that way. It was about alerting Brogan’s Point to the possibility that Rollie was fudging his cost estimates, and it was about persuading the town to opt for her proposal. Winning the commission was important.

  Important enough to shove her discomfort about Will to the back of her mind and seek his advice.

  Resolved, she strode to her car and drove to Atlantic Avenue, the main road that ran parallel to Brogan Point’s shoreline. A sea wall bordered the beach, but beyond the wall she could glimpse the ocean and the sand, an expanse of dark blue-gray glittering with diamond-white dots where the sun reflected off the tips of the waves. If the wind died down a little, she wouldn’t mind walking along that beach. In the spring, the water would be too cold to swim in, and it would remain too cold for another couple of months, but the sand looked inviting, silky and pale gold, the wind etching ripples and swirls across its surface.

  No time for beach dreaming now. She had to find Will and ask him who would be the best person in the town’s hierarchy to approach with her concerns about Rollie’s proposal.

  She had no trouble finding a parking spot near the tavern. Steeling herself, she swung open the door and stepped inside.

  The place was relatively quiet. Two elderly couples, casually dressed and comfortably paunchy, filled a booth, a flatbread pizza on
the table between them. A thin, middle-aged woman in skinny jeans nursed a festively frothy drink by herself at another table, and a mildly disheveled man slumped on a stool at the far end of the bar, gazing blearily at the steaming mug of coffee in front of him.

  Behind the bar, Will and a brawny, dark-haired fellow were busy emptying racks of glassware onto shelves. They grinned and chatted, clearly quite comfortable with each other. “What we need,” Will was saying, “are some of those overhead racks for hanging wine glasses. That would clear the shelf space for other stuff.”

  “As long as you don’t bang your head on the glasses.”

  “We’d hang them high enough that that wouldn’t be a problem.”

  “Too high, and a short bartender wouldn’t be able to reach them,” the brawny guy said. “Not everyone is as tall as you and your mom.”

  “You know what we ought to do?” Will said as he lined up some cone-shaped beer glasses on the shelf. “Start a Faulk Street Tavern basketball team. We could play at the Community Center. I think the police have a team. We’d cream them.”

  “You and your mother, maybe. You both played in school, right? Some of the servers, though, they’re kind of petite.” The brawny fellow winked. “They’re cute, but can they jump?”

  Will laughed. Then he noticed Brianna hovering near the door and his smile softened.

  It was a beautiful smile. He had beautiful eyes. God help her, she wanted to kiss him again. She wanted to do more than kiss him.

  She sucked in a sharp breath to clear her mind, then shaped a smile she was sure wasn’t anywhere near as beautiful as his and marched across the room to the bar.

  “Hey,” he murmured, his voice a velvet purr, as if they were all alone in the tavern.

  The brawny fellow shifted his gaze from Will to Brianna and back to Will again. “I can finish this,” he said, gesturing toward the rack of glasses. Peering over the bar, Brianna noticed that there were two more racks waiting to be emptied onto the shelves.

  “You said we,” she said stupidly. “We ought to start a basketball team.” As if he was planning to stay in town long enough to organize and play on such a team.

  He looked unsure about what her point was, but then shrugged. “Manny and I talk sports,” he explained. “Right, Manny?”

  “You talk sports. I talk about the cute waitresses.” Manny lifted one of the racks and carried it closer to the shelf, apparently wanting to give Will and Brianna a little privacy.

  Not that they needed it. “I came here for advice,” she said.

  Will snorted a laugh. “Maybe I should get my mother.”

  Maybe he should. As a longtime small business owner in town, she might know more about the dynamics of Brogan Point’s politics than he did.

  But Brianna didn’t want to talk to Will’s mother. She didn’t even know his mother. “I appreciate your giving me the heads-up about Rollie this morning,” she said, proud of herself for keeping her voice level, even as her pulse thrummed loudly in her ears. Standing so close to Will, with only the width of the bar between them, unnerved her. She could smell his fresh scent. She could reach across the bar and ravel her fingers into the soft waves of his hair, if she dared.

  She didn’t dare.

  Instead, she continued speaking. “I was just over at the library, and I noticed that Roland Davenport amended his proposal. He’s reduced the price significantly.”

  “Really?” Will’s eyebrows rose. “That’ll probably win his design some more votes.”

  “Yes. But there’s no way he can build that design for the price he’s estimating now. It’s a false number. He’ll win the commission and then jack the price back up to twenty million. Either that, or he’ll use cheap materials, scrimp on things, and put up a shoddy building that will need expensive repairs down the road. This just isn’t right.”

  Will nodded. “Okay. What am I supposed to advise you about?”

  “I think I should alert some of your town representatives that Rollie has changed his proposal from what he presented last night. But I don’t want to sound like I’m trying to undercut him.”

  “Even if you are.” Will winked. “You don’t want it to look personal.”

  “Exactly.”

  “The ex-girlfriend, getting revenge.”

  “Right.” Even though Will was probably the only person in Brogan’s Point who knew she and Rollie had once been a couple.

  “I’m not sure what advice I can give you,” he said.

  “I don’t know how things work in this town. I didn’t know Rollie was going to hang out at the library all morning, talking up his proposal. I don’t know how to play the game.” Saying the words forced her to acknowledge how truly inept she was at the sort of gamesmanship Rollie was engaged in. “Who holds the reins in your town government? Who oversees these things? Do I go to the Board of Selectmen, or social media?”

  “I’ve got a friend on the police force,” Will said.

  “Rollie isn’t doing anything illegal,” she said. “Sleazy, yes, but as far as I know, he isn’t breaking any laws. He’ll insist he crunched some numbers overnight and realized he could bring in the project for much less money. He can’t, but he’ll say he can. And afterward, if his design is chosen and the contracts signed, and it’s too late to back out, he’ll crunch the numbers again and say, ‘Oops, I miscalculated.’”

  “But if you point that out…”

  “I’m just someone with an ax to grind,” she completed his sentence. “I’m someone who looks like I’m willing to say anything to sway the town’s decision in my direction.”

  Will nodded again. “But I’m someone who can just happen to have gone to the library this morning and noticed that the guy is messing with what he told the town meeting last night. I can contact the town manager. No one would accuse me of a personal vendetta, right?”

  Brianna hadn’t expected Will to volunteer himself for this battle. She was so touched that he was willing to do this, she wanted to leap over the bar and kiss him.

  Well, she wanted to do that, anyway. “I guess it’s always handy to have a friend on the police force, too,” she joked.

  “More than a friend. He wants to be my stepdad.” Will lifted a dish towel and wiped a splash of water from the bar’s polished surface. “He asked me to convince my mother to marry him. You think he’ll tear up all my speeding tickets in exchange for my help?”

  “How many speeding tickets do you have?” she asked.

  He laughed. “Not enough. I’ve got to start driving faster.” He draped the towel over a rack and called to his colleague, “Hey, Manny? I need to run an errand for Brianna. You okay for now?”

  “I’m always okay,” the man called back. “The joint is dead at the moment. Go do your errand.” He shot Brianna a glance. “Recruit her for your basketball team. She looks like she can jump.”

  Brianna smiled politely and shook her head. She enjoyed skiing and playing catch with a Frisbee, but jumping? No.

  Will emerged from behind the bar and joined Brianna. “Let’s head over to Town Hall now. I’ll see who’s around and do the indignant citizen thing. You can wait somewhere out of sight so no one suspects you of having anything to do with my complaint.”

  She was relieved that he understood her hesitancy about being associated with the revelation that Rollie was playing fast and loose with his numbers. She reminded herself yet again that whichever design the town chose would have no direct bearing on Will. He wouldn’t be in Brogan’s Point by the time the decision was made. He wouldn’t be paying taxes to fund the construction. But he was still willing to do this for her.

  For her. That was why he was doing it. “You’re very kind,” she said.

  He let out a laugh as he escorted her to the door and out. “I’m not kind,” he argued. “I’m doing this because I expect something in return.”

  She glanced up at him, feeling a twinge of anxiety. What did he expect? Another kiss? Mo
re than a kiss?

  “You’re going to help me figure out how to talk my mother into marrying her cop boyfriend.”

  Another twinge, this one relief mixed with a dash of disappointment, and also amusement. Maybe she could help him. Maybe not—she didn’t know his mother or the cop boyfriend. But she could be a sounding board. She could offer a female perspective.

  Sometimes it took two to solve a problem. Or two problems: hers and Will’s.

  Chapter Eight

  Will sauntered into the old Town Hall building, leaving Brianna seated on a bench on the town green across the road. As he climbed the broad steps to the pillared entrance, he recalled her presentation last night, her description of the new entrance she would create on the side of the building. It wouldn’t be anywhere near as grand, but it would allow people in wheelchairs or parents pushing strollers or just anyone with aching knees to enter, without having to deal with the barrier the steps created. Will knew that by law, public buildings had to provide access for the disabled, and the Town Hall currently had a jerry-rigged ramp at the back of the building. Not exactly welcoming, it relegated people who couldn’t navigate stairs to feeling like second-class citizens.

  Still, the front steps and the pillars lent the Town Hall a kind of majesty. Maybe it shouldn’t be replaced by Davenport’s flashy new building.

  What was he thinking? He loved new things. He loved innovation, the visual celebration of high-tech design. A stodgy old building like this one celebrated the past, not the future.

  As he swung open the door, he glanced back at the town green, where Brianna sat in solitude on the bench, gazing at him. Or, more likely, gazing at the building and imagining what she would do with it if she won the commission. If she was looking at him at all, it was only because she viewed him as her agent, marching off to make her argument on her behalf.

  He couldn’t hope for more from her. She’d made it clear that he’d crossed a line that morning. And he couldn’t blame her—not only because he had crossed a line, but because he was a short-timer in Brogan’s Point, and she didn’t strike him as the type to pursue a passing fling with a guy.