“Then you’re moving to your own cabin.”
Ben still smiled. “That’s fine. I’m going to have to bring in some office equipment, so a separate cabin would work better for me. Like you, I have a business to run. But I’ll be taking my meals here.”
She opened her mouth to protest, but Ben continued. “And you, Michael, will stop coming straight home after school. You’ll stay and play some basketball. Or hang out with the guys. Flirt with the girls, and get into trouble if you have to. But you’re going to get into teenagetrouble—not confrontations with Crazy Larry, the FAA, or the Highway Patrol. Understood?”
Emma jumped up from the couch. “Are you implying that I’ve kept Michael away from his friends?”
Ben took hold of her shoulders and sat her back down, smiling with all the confidence of a man who knew he was finally in control of the situation. “No, I’m not saying any such thing. Michael has kept himself isolated because he’s too old for his own good.”
He straightened and looked at his son. “I don’t care if you’re smarter than Einstein, Mike. You’re going to burn yourself out if you don’t start learning to kick back a little. It’s time you started being fifteen, not fifty.”
Ben could tell that Mike wanted to say something, but his very intelligence kept him silent. And probably a little shock.
“And just what will you be doing while Mikey is getting into trouble and I’m not selling my camps?” Emma asked.
“I’m going to be running my business and dating you.”
“What!” She stood again, her face red, her hands balled into fists.
“I think I’ll start by taking you to the dance next Saturday night,” he continued.
Ben ducked the suddenly airborne ice pack, winking at Mike as he headed for the kitchen. “Go clean yourself up, Em, while I make breakfast. Mike and I are hungry. We’ve been up all night doing your work.”
“Hey, Dad?”
Ben stopped and turned. “What?”
“Is that a piece of moss I see sticking to your shirt?” the boy asked.
Emma gasped so hard, she started coughing.
Ben looked down at his shirt, but didn’t see anything.
“Don’t worry about it, Dad. A little moss never hurt anyone.”
Chapter Eight
F or the last fourdays, Mikey hadn’t come home until after nine at night. God only knew what the
boy was up to. Emma had fretted over Ben’s revelation that her nephew didn’t have friends his own age. But fifteen-year-old boys usually had more hormones than brains, and she was afraid Mikey’s would awaken before she had The Talk with him.
“Something sure smells good in here. You got enough for one more, Nem?”
As if her thoughts had conjured him up, Mikey walked through the kitchen door with—Ohmigod—a girl in tow.
“Ah, sure. There’s plenty.”
“Nem, this is Jasmine. Jass, this is my aunt, Nemmy.”
“Hello, Jasmine.”
“Hi.”
“Come on, Jass. I’ll show you my computer,” Mikey said, leading the girl through the kitchen.
Her spoon suspended over the stew, Emma stared at the retreating kids. Should she be letting Mikey take a girl to his bedroom?
This was Ben’s fault! He should be here supervising the problem he’d created. Emma marched out of the house and up onto the porch of cabin six. She used the wooden spoon to knock on the door, then used it to point at Ben. “Your son brought something home that he wants to show you. He’s in his room.”
Ben plucked the spoon out of her hand and sniffed it. “That’s not moose you’re cooking, is it?”
“Hurry up. You’ve got to go see Mikey before … well, just get going.”
“I’m right in the middle of a conference call to Singapore, Em. Can’t it wait?”
Emma pushed past him and found the phone on a desk that took up the entire main room of the small cabin. She pushed the red button that was flashing.
“Hey!”
“Being a father takes priority, Ben. Go see Mikey. Now.”
“That was an important client you just hung up on, Emma. What’s Mike got that won’t keep a few more minutes?”
“A girl. And the blouse she has on is probably outlawed in all fifty states. Enough said?”
With a muttered curse, Ben was out the door and halfway to the house before she’d finished.
Since she was here and he was gone, and dinner was probably going to be postponed a bit, Emma decided to snoop. Her quaint little cabin now looked like the command center for the United Nations. A map of the world was tacked up on the back wall, over a table of office machines that could be on a spaceship headed to Mars. One of them was whirring and spitting out papers faster than Emma could read them. She looked more closely at the map.
There were little pins stuck in it all over the world, mostly in the water. Some were at coastal cities, some far out to sea. Some were red, some were green, and all of them were on little black lines running back and forth across both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Purple pins were stuck inland, at what Emma realized were major airports.
Tidewater International was huge.
And Ben was trying to run it from Medicine Creek Camps?
Emma sat down in the big executive chair and stared at the map. Why hadn’t Ben taken his son home already? Trying to work here couldn’t be easy.
She wrapped her arms around herself. She’d made a mess of this whole thing—for everyone but Mikey, it seemed. For the last four days the boy had been walking on clouds—whenever he was home—and whistling his way through his chores. Whistling!
Well, she was glad for him. The poor kid had been so confused when his mother left, and Emma worried that he’d blamed himself. So she had spent the last ten years trying to make up for Kelly’s treachery.
She had no idea how any mother could simply walk away from her child and not even bother to contact him again. A letter would have been nice, or a birthday card or even a postcard, from wherever she was.
But then, a postcard would give them a way to track her down, and Kelly obviously wasn’t ready to be found. More than once, Emma had been tempted to hire a detective, just so she could walk up to her sister and slap her face. She hated Kelly for what she’d done, and she was never, ever going to forgive her.
Emma jumped when the phone suddenly rang. She stared at its blinking lights and many buttons, and finally picked up the receiver. “Tidewater International. No, Mr. Sinclair is not available at this time. What? A check? For howmuch! No, I don’t think that’s correct. You’re way too high … I don’t care if you’ve already delivered it; you can just come take it back. I see. Well, then you’ll have to accept a check for two thousand less. No … No … One thousand, then, and not a penny more. Thank you, Mr. Coffin.”
“Me? Oh, I’m the … vice president in charge of acquisitions. Yes, Tidewater International will be sure to do business with you in the future. Good-bye.”
Emma’s smug grin suddenly disappeared when a tall, ominous shadow fell across the desk.
“Well, Miss Vice President. Make any good deals lately?”
“The phone rang, and you weren’t here, so I answered it.”
“Thank you. I think.”
Emma started straightening the papers on the desk. “Money must grow on a tree in your backyard, Ben. You paid way too much for that sissified truck parked outside.”
Two hands, palms flat, settled on the papers she was straightening. “Did I?”
“Well, not now. I got you a thousand dollars off. Remember that when you write out the check.”
“I surely will, Miss Vice President. Take any other calls?”