Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 131387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
That was Lug.
Good people.
“On them. No. You have occasion to turn right rather than left and do a drive by Mabel’s every once in a while, I would owe you a marker. She’s right next door to them. North side.”
“Brother, I know you find what limited downtime you give yourself with a guitar in your hands and you don’t care where you’re playing it. But The Link would go bust if I didn’t have Hutch nights. You don’t owe me dick. I’ll keep an eye.”
“Thanks, man.”
“Don’t mention it. Later.”
“Later.”
They disconnected, and Hutch called Harry to tell him what Lug told Hutch.
“So rumor spreading around town is true,” Harry said. “You’ve shaken off that mess with Bree, and you’ve found somebody.”
Yes.
And no.
“She had a worse breakup than me before she hit Misted Pines, Harry. We’re feeling our way along.”
That wasn’t all the truth, but it was enough of it.
“I liked her when I met her,” Harry informed him. “Didn’t know at the time you two had hooked up, but thinking on it, she suits you. Though, gotta admit, Rus and I were wondering. When we met her, I gave her your name, and she didn’t mention she knew you.”
“Can we leave that at ‘it’s complicated?’”
“You don’t owe me any explanations, brother. We can leave it however you want.”
Good man, Harry.
“Speaking of Mabel, you know who runs the Misted Pines Community TikTok?” Hutch asked.
“No, but I can ask Meg. She’ll probably know.”
“Just tell her to tell whoever does it that they should get consent from the people they’re posting videos about. They put up one of me and Mabel, and not only did Mabel’s ex find out where she lives now, something she didn’t want him to know, they didn’t blur out the faces of the minors they put on that video.”
“Jesus, yeah,” he said irritably. “Not okay. And do we have a problem coming our way with Mabel’s ex?”
Hutch considered the annoying conversation he had with the man the day before.
“Likely,” he said. “Though, Mabel is no pushover. She’s done with his shit. And she has me.”
“Yeah.” Harry sounded a lot better. “She has you. At least we got some good news if Enstrom’s reined in a maverick.”
“Yeah,” Hutch agreed.
Just as long as it wasn’t Lord of the Flies.
TWENTY
Not Even Close
Hutch
“They don’t have any mommies?” Emma asked sadly, standing with feet on one fence post, nose over the one above it, peering into the orphaned moose pen.
If nothing, the last hour confirmed what he already knew.
Brett and Abigail Buckner were fine people.
And good parents.
Abigail proved that further right then.
“Stuff happens in the wild, honey,” she told her daughter, leaned over her and stroking her back. “That’s why it’s so good we have places like Mr. Hutch’s sanctuary, so someone can look after them, and then, like he told you, when they’re ready, they can take them back to where they were born to be. Into the wild so they can live their lives how they’re supposed to.”
“And they do have mommies,” Brett added. “Human mommies and daddies who look after them and help them become big and strong so they can take care of themselves when they’re back home.”
Emma gave the orphaned moose pen a good long stare before she hopped off it and looked up at Hutch. “Are you a moose daddy?”
He smiled down at her. “I’ve given my share of moose babies a bottle.”
Her face lit. “Can I give a moose baby a bottle?”
He kept smiling. “They’re bigger than you, sweetheart, even when they’re born.”
Her face got stubborn. “But I’m not a baby.”
“You aren’t,” Brett said. “But I don’t want my baby girl run over by a baby moose who wants his bottle.”
Emma turned her stubborn to her dad.
Liam edged up to Hutch’s side and tentatively took his hand.
Hutch wasn’t tentative in holding it.
He also didn’t miss the expression on Mabel’s face when he did. An expression that said she wanted to jump him.
Christ, this woman.
“Can we see the owls, Mr. Hutch?” Liam asked.
“You bet,” he told him.
He took them to the aviary next, and although they had a kickass aviary, the birds in it didn’t have as hopeful a future as the orphaned moose, because all of them had been wounded to the extent they’d never be released to the wild.
But he didn’t share that.
“I like the one with the really fluffy head!” Emma cried.
“Not so loud, baby,” Abigail said. “We’re in their home. We need to be polite.”
“I like the one with the really fluffy head,” Emma repeated in a little-kid whisper.
“That’s a boreal owl,” Hutch told them.
“Its name is Boreal?” Liam asked.
“No, bud. That’s what owls like him are called. His name is Otto.”
“Otto,” Liam murmured and looked back at the bird.
After they were done with the owls, they kept walking through the sanctuary. And that day was a good day, considering Ursula, their lame Canadian lynx (right hind leg injury), who didn’t come out very often, showed herself to both Liam’s and Emma’s, not to mention Abigail’s and Mabel’s delight.