Angel's Touch (4 page)

“That you’re building a spa? That’s the word around town.”

“Glad to know my networking worked.”

“Better than you expected?”

“It hasn’t landed me a spa manager yet, so no.” Kira gestured for her to follow her back to the lobby.

A spa manager, right. That’s what Svetlana had said, that the new owner of the Starfish Hotel was asking around, looking for someone to run her spa. Megan couldn’t imagine why you’d want to open your own spa and not want to run it yourself.

“The spa’s going to be in a separate building.” Kira led her behind the intact check-in desk, through a door at the back, and into an office. There were stacks of paper piled everywhere—on the desk, on the file cabinets, on the floor. Kira took off her hard hat and shook out her hair like a dog after a dip in the ocean. Her close-cropped hair was so dark brown it was almost black, with a spray of premature gray above the center of her forehead.

“Sorry about the mess. Let me make some room for you to sit down.” Kira balanced her hard hat on top of one of the piles on the desk and lifted a stack of papers off the faded pseudo-baroque upholstery of a beat-up hotel lobby chair crammed in the corner. She stood there with the stack of papers in her arms, looking a bit lost, trying to locate an unoccupied surface where she could set it down.

“I don’t need to sit,” Megan said as Kira started to lower the stack to the floor. “You need all the floor space you can get.”

Kira smiled ruefully and hefted the papers back onto the chair. “I do, don’t I?” She plucked an oversized sheet of paper from the top of a file cabinet and pressed it against the wall—since there was no room on her desk—for Megan to see. It was a sketch of a single-story building. “This is where the massage rooms are going to be.” She pinned the sketch against the wall with one forearm and pointed. “Sauna. Showers. Waiting room. I learned some spas call it a relaxation lounge, but that seems a little over-the-top to me. I think it’ll be more relaxing without the cutesy name.”

Megan looked more closely at the sketch. It was refreshing to meet someone in the relaxation business who thought the word “relaxation” was over-the-top.

“Indoor swimming pool, fitness room, yoga studio,” Kira continued, her finger moving over the layout. “I want live music—piano or harp—in the waiting room, so I need to get someone in here to tell me how much soundproofing I need. I’m also going to need someone to advise me on the size of the massage rooms so they’re cozy but not cramped.” She paused. “Is there any other furniture that needs to go in the room besides the massage table?”

“You’ll want storage space for towels and sheets—like shelves or cabinets. And you’ll need a place for clients to hang their clothes, unless they’ll be changing in a dressing room and putting on a robe.”

“That’s exactly what I need to know. Let me write that down.” Kira draped the sketch over the mess on her desk and backed away with her arms held slightly in front of her, commanding the piles of paper to stay. Satisfied, she pulled open a desk drawer and found a pocket-sized spiral notebook and a pen and jotted down Megan’s suggestions.

“So you don’t have a blueprint yet?” Megan said. “You started construction before figuring out what you wanted?”

“Slight miscalculation on my part. But it’s a separate building—it’s no big deal. I didn’t want to hold things up, so I got the crew started on the hotel renovations. They’ve got plenty of work to do. Fixing up the hotel’s going to take a while.”

A slight miscalculation? Well, okay, it was nice to know airy-fairy helping professionals weren’t the only ones who didn’t always have everything planned out. With a project this size, Kira had to have a lot of money on the line. She would have expected her to be more organized.

Kira drummed her pen on her notepad, then stopped abruptly, as if she had made a decision. “Would you be interested in working for me?”

Yeah, right. Megan had to admit it was fun to imagine her opinions might shape what this spa ended up looking like, but give up her private practice? To manage a spa? Absolutely not.

“I did some research,” Kira said. “Your competition says you’re the best.”

“I wouldn’t call them my competition,” Megan said, dismissing the compliment. Kira had been asking about her? She suddenly felt at a disadvantage. “We’re all friends.”

“I really want to make this spa a success, and I want to hire the best people to help me. I’d love for you to come work for me. Run the massage side of the business.”

So all that talk about taking her out to dinner had been…a business meal? Wow, that was sobering. Kira wanted to hire her. Megan couldn’t remember the last time her intuition had been so wrong.

“I’m flattered, but no. I already have a great job.”

She almost expected Kira to protest—people always did. Amelia never believed her when she said she was too tired to go out. Clients with fibromyalgia insisted on deep massage when that was the worst thing for them. Even her super-nice, long-term clients begged her to squeeze them in when she was already booked. Everyone wanted something from her, expected something from her.
Demanded
something from her. Demanded she fix them or help them or accommodate them.

But Kira was a class act and didn’t press.

Not a single word. Just nodded as if she didn’t expect anything less. Like she was going to walk away because Megan had said no. Like she respected her.

And that got to her.

No one was going to give up their practice to work at a brand-new spa, not if they were any good at their job, and a recent graduate wouldn’t know enough. It was too bad, because it would be great to have a lesbian spa in Piper Beach. And if Kira didn’t get someone soon, her construction schedule was going to be a mess and cost her money she might not have. It had been kind of fun, giving her advice. So she relented.

“I don’t mind helping you out a little bit, an hour here and there. Answering these kinds of questions isn’t hard.”

A spark of hope leapt into Kira’s eyes.

“Just questions, though,” Megan added, deciding she’d better lay down some ground rules. Kira had said she was looking for someone to actually run the spa, not just help design it. “I have my own business to run, so anything that interferes with that, I won’t have time for. That means no interviewing, no hiring, no management duties.”

“You’ve got it,” Kira said without hesitation, obviously relieved to get any help at all. “I’ll pay—”

“Don’t pay me.”

Kira’s eyes widened. “What?”

Yeah, Megan was kind of asking herself the same thing. Did she really have the time and energy to take on volunteer work? She could already hear Svetlana snickering at her motives. But it didn’t feel right to let Kira pay her. Not when she had the feeling that if she didn’t help Kira with her spa, she’d find some other excuse to spend time with her, and that excuse would be embarrassingly flimsy.

“I don’t know as much as you think. I’ve never worked at a spa. I’m sure there are all kinds of details I don’t know about running one.”

Kira didn’t look like she was buying it. “You’re just going to help me out. Me, your competitor.”

“I don’t think of you as my competitor.”

***

Not her competitor? That wasn’t the response Kira was expecting. Then again, Megan was probably so good, she didn’t have to worry about anyone stealing her clients. “I’m not a threat, huh?”

“I like to think there’s more than enough business to go around. Anyway, you’ll be catering to tourists. I don’t do tourists.”

“Why not?” Weren’t tourists the only business in this town? How could Megan run a successful business without them?

“They’re unreliable.”

Kira wondered if she herself was included in that dismissive remark. She wasn’t a tourist, but she didn’t plan to stay forever. Get this spa up and running, sell it, and move on to the next project, which, chances were, would not be in tiny little Piper Beach. That was the plan. Some people were good at starting businesses and other people were good at running them. Not that she’d ever tried hanging on to a business for long, but there was no reason to believe she’d be good at both. Guess that made her unreliable.

She really didn’t want Megan to think of her that way.

And how fucked up was that? Megan
told
her she didn’t want to go out to dinner with her. She was lucky to be talking to her at all. And extremely lucky to have her agree to give her advice about the spa, which would likely involve being in the same room with her on a regular basis.

“I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this,” Kira said. “And I insist on paying you.”

“No. If you pay me you’ll start expecting me to spend a certain number of hours working for you, and I don’t want to want to get tied up in that.”

Geez. Massage schools should teach these minnows better business skills. Megan made her feel like a shark.

***

Megan picked her way around Kira’s piles of paper and headed for the door, eager to do something more productive than argue about money. “Let’s see where you’re going to build this spa of yours.”

Kira followed right behind her, locked her office door, and directed Megan down the hall and out a side door.

“Where to?” Megan asked.

“The wooded lot next door.”

“That’s where the spa’s going to go? You bought that?” Not that she was surprised. Kira Wagner didn’t strike her as the superstitious type. Or maybe, being new in town, she hadn’t heard the story about the neighboring woods.

A brief walk through the hotel’s side parking lot brought them to a brick wall about waist-high that separated the parking spaces from the overgrown lot. Kira sat on top of the low wall and swung her legs over. She held out her hand to help Megan over. Megan ignored her and scrambled over the wall unassisted, tucking the skirt of her cotton sundress around her thighs with an ingrained move honed by years of practice at avoiding flashing people with what her mother called her unladylike antics. On the other side of the wall, a rough path disappeared into a veil of overgrown vines that strangled everything in sight—pines and oaks and unidentifiable shrubs.

“Come on,” Kira said. “I’ll show you the spot I picked out.”

Megan didn’t know how anyone could bounce in those heavy work boots, but Kira managed it. She was like a little girl who skipped and ran when she was excited and played hopscotch on imaginary chalk lines when she was bored, unable to stand still. Megan followed more slowly, making sure she didn’t step on any poison ivy. Her sandals weren’t going to protect her if she did something stupid. She was so busy watching her step she didn’t see the massive fallen tree blocking their path until Kira clambered over it.

Kira waited for her on the other side of the tree trunk. “Need a hand?”

Again? There she was, ready to steady her or maybe even haul her over by the waist if necessary. That was definitely not happening. Not in this lifetime.

“I’m fine. I’m not wearing the right shoes for this, but I can handle this.” Megan planted both hands on the tree and waited for Kira to get out of the way.

Now all she had to do was get herself over this thing without snagging her sundress on a branch. Next time she came over here she was wearing jeans. She pressed down harder on the tree, lifted her body weight onto her hands, and vaulted over. Sure, she balanced longer than necessary, but she wasn’t going to feel bad about showing off. Kira needed to understand that just because she was wearing a dress didn’t mean she had no upper body strength. Not that Kira gave any sign of noticing.

The path didn’t continue beyond the fallen tree, but it didn’t matter because everything was more open, and you could safely pick your way around the trees without worrying so much about what unpleasant surprise you were about to step on in the underbrush. A beautiful stand of loblolly pines filtered the sunlight.

Continuing on, they came to the edge of a hidden grove where Kira stopped by a yellow surveyor’s marker. “Here’s the spot. A spa in the woods, with big picture windows. It’s going to be awesome.”

“The woods aren’t as trashed as I thought they would be,” Megan observed. “No empty beer bottles. The local kids must be too scared to hang out here and drink.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Everyone avoids this place. The real estate agent didn’t tell you?”

“Tell me what?”

It didn’t seem fair not to have told her. Megan wondered which agent had sold her the lot. “The story is that back when the Starfish Hotel was first built, a woman staying at the hotel was raped and murdered here in the woods. Somehow she managed to stab her attacker with his own knife before she died. Right under the ribs. Killed him with his own weapon.”

“Good for her.”

“Yeah, except that she ended up dead, too.”

“So now everyone thinks these woods are unsafe.” Kira didn’t look too concerned.

Wasn’t she even just a tiny bit superstitious? Megan looked around, wondering where, exactly, the bodies had been found. The hotel wasn’t far, and neither was the road. You’d think someone would have heard them. “No one wants to be next.”

“No wonder I got such a good deal.”

“People have talked about building something on this lot for a long time, but nobody local would buy it.”

“Lucky for me, then.”

“You don’t care about the creepy vibe?”

“You think there’s a creepy vibe? If you’d never heard that story, would you honestly think this place was scary?” Kira gestured toward the trees. “I like this place. It’s sad about that woman, but I don’t think her ghost is hanging around. Not that I believe in ghosts. It feels good here. It feels like…” She rolled her eyes. “Like clean air and ocean breezes and all that wonderful clichéd stuff I’m going to put in my ads. Not like rapists are hiding behind the brush.”

She was right, actually. From the outside, it did feel creepy, but here it felt completely different. In all the times she’d walked by on the street, she’d never suspected there was such peaceful, undisturbed wilderness hidden back here.

And Kira was going to clear-cut these beautiful old trees and destroy their magic. So she could build a spa. What a waste. If she wanted to create a healing environment, all she needed to do was preserve what was already here. Get rid of the invasive vines and clear a nature trail.