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Exhausted, Kip sank down onto one of the chairs in the waiting room and prayed no one else would come in for the next half-hour so he’d be able to close early. Who would have thought that after not working in the spa for the past eight months, one day would have been this tiring?
It wasn’t as if he’d sat on his ass for eight months. When he and his four friends, Anook, Spencer, Cass, and Axom had decided to all pool their money and talent together to take Mystic Pines from a basically abandoned ghost town and turn it into a resort town that catered to the LGBTQ community, none of them had sat back and waited for things to happen. Sure, due to none of them having worked in construction before, they’d left the building of the resort to the professionals, but Kip and the others had still worked their asses off.
Right after they’d arrived in Mystic Pines and moved into Anook’s childhood home, it had required a lot of repairs. Needing the construction crew they’d hired to start on the hotel and spa, it had been left to the five of them to do everything from patch holes in the roof, to fixing broken plumbing, as well as more minor things like a new coat of paint.
When the house was done, they’d started working on the various buildings in the town itself to help the few remaining residents who still lived there but couldn’t afford to make any necessary repairs. Since the homes and businesses weren’t for them, they had asked the construction crew at times to help in order to keep things to code, but they still had done a lot themselves.
After that, they moved on to the buildings in town that were empty. Some had to be torn down as the elements had done too much damage to save them. But there were still quite a few of them that were able to be repaired.
It was only in the past month that things had slowed down somewhat when it came to manual labor as they all started to prepare the final touches to make Mystic Pines into the resort town of their dreams. Well, maybe not quite their dreams. There was still a long way to go to get to that point, but they were getting there.
“Oh good, you’re not busy,” Axom said as he came in and went right to the counter.
Kip tried to stop him, but it was too late, for there on the granite surface were the brochures Kip had decided to use for the spa. He really should have told his friend he wasn’t using the ones Axom had created. To Kip, they hadn’t been... professional enough. This was supposed to be a resort spa, not some home spa in the backwoods.
“What are these?” Axom sounded like he’d been wounded. The hand over his heart told Kip exactly where Axom had been hurt the most.
Damn, he really should have explained about the brochures before. “I told you I was looking at prices to have professional brochures made.”
“Professional?” Axom looked at Kip with a pained expression. “I’ll have you know I’ve been making brochures for every business in town. Including this hotel.” Axom’s voice wavered as if he were ready to cry. Not something Kip wanted to deal with, especially after his long day.
“Even Rogue asked me to make his brochures,” Axom told him. “Apparently, friendship doesn’t mean the same thing to someone like you.”
Taken aback, Kip sat up straight. “What do you mean, someone like me?”
But Axom just shook his head and left without another word.
It was then that Kip had actually looked in the direction of the door and saw Rogue standing there. “My mother asked that I come and apologize for my behavior yesterday. To keep the peace, I agreed to do so, but now that I’ve seen how you just treated Axom, who is supposed to be one of your best friends, I think I was right about you all along, sweet cheeks.”
“Stop calling me that.” Kip hated that term. It made him sound like a superficial idiot. “And I don’t need you to apologize.” Anger infused Kip to be called out for what happened with Axom. It wasn’t his fault that Axom’s brochures weren’t professional enough. “Hell, I don’t want anything to do with a killer.”
What he’d expected Rogue to do when he said that, Kip wasn’t entirely sure, but he damn well knew it hadn’t been for the man to stride over to him, put his hands around Kip’s upper arms and pull him up to his feet. Nor was it feel as if the man’s touch were burning him alive.
His cock twitched as he stared into those deep brown eyes, willing Rogue to move in even closer than what they were now, which was nose to nose. With lips as dry as the desert with the need for a kiss, Kip’s tongue darted out to wet them.
That gaze fixed on Kip’s tongue. Hope surged within him that Rogue would pull him until their bodies were touching, but other than to tighten his grip on Kip’s arms, Rogue didn’t move a muscle.
With each inhale, all Kip could smell was the man’s scent. The mix of musk and the cold air from outside surrounded him. Was it wrong to want to bottle it so he could bathe in it later? It was. It had to be. Rogue was a hunter. The complete opposite of Kip, who wouldn’t hurt a fly.
Yet, he found himself leaning forward just a bit so he could take more of the man’s aroma into his lungs. Mentally cursing himself for being so damn weak, Kip almost missed Rogue’s words.
“You are a selfish asshole who has no clue how the world works.” Kip followed the way Rogue’s mouth moved as he spoke, wishing the man would stop talking and just kiss him. “You are so wrapped up in yourself that you never seem to take into consideration the lives of anyone else.”
Rogue’s dark brown eyes stared into Kip’s and for a moment, Kip swore the man could see right into his soul. Worse, Kip was sure Rogue found him lacking.
The need to lash out when once more someone decided he was unworthy, Kip said, “At least I’m not sick enough to kill innocent creatures.”
Rogue took his hands off Kip, turned on his heel and headed for the door, and damn if Kip didn’t want to beg the man to come back.
But Rogue wasn’t done with him. He faced Kip before he pulled open the door and said, “No, what you do is far worse. You step on people’s feelings as if they don’t matter. Axom was just trying to be supportive and show you how much he cares about you and your business becoming a success. Those glossy brochures I saw the other day, were just that, a glossy façade. What Axom created was something real.
“I may not have seen what he did for the spa, but what he made for me showed the world the heart and soul of my business. I’d rather people accept me for who I am, and not some altered version that I wish I could be.” After that cutting remark, Rogue left, not once looking back.
Kip wasn’t entirely sure he could blame him either.
Was Rogue right? Had Kip wanted things to be... perfect instead of real? He hadn’t thought so. Yet, he had to admit, with each new idea he found online at various spas that gave them an edge up in the world, Kip had done his best to include it. Even when there really hadn’t been room.
Who had ten different spa rooms for guests to get a different experience? It wasn’t necessary. Nor were the six different types of mud. He should have just stuck with one or two. Sure, there were a few different factors for easing pain with each type of mud, but two or maybe three would have been plenty.
Shaking his head, Kip went to the door and locked it. No way was anyone else coming in and ruining the day he had. Yes, he was tired from working long hours, but everyone had loved their time in the spa. He hadn’t been wrong.
“Stop second guessing yourself because of one asshole,” Kip said out loud, hoping it would sink in instead of him worrying about it the rest of the night.
Cleaning up, he went to the counter where the brochures were spread out. Axom. Kip hadn’t meant to hurt his friend. It was one of the reasons he hadn’t told Axom about using the ones he ordered from a professional company.
Smiling, he stared at the glossy pages of people enjoying a few of the services Kip offered. He had no idea who the people were or where they were taken, but it didn’t matter. What was important was the message of tranquility it inspired.
Putting them into a neat stack, Kip went into each room and wiped them down once again. He’d already done it after each time one of the rooms was used, but in a spa, there was no such thing as too clean. Entering his favorite room, the ‘Ocean Waves’, Kip sat on one of the guest chairs, leaned back and stared at the mural on the wall.
A giant blue whale was in the center with several other kinds of sea life surrounding him. The blue of the water offered him the peace he needed after his long day. This was what his spa was about. Allowing the guests to unwind from the stresses in life.
Sitting up, his mind flashed to what Rogue had said. Rushing back to the front he grabbed one of the brochures and flipped through the five pages. Not one had that wall anywhere on its pages. Not that it would since he hadn’t sent any photos of his spa to the company to use.
Opening the cabinet where he’d stashed Axom’s brochures, Kip opened up the three panel brochure. It was much smaller than the one Kip had decided to use, but across the front, in the background, was that mural. When he turned it over to the back, there was his second favorite room, a scene of the woods with bears peeking out between the trees, to squirrels chasing each other up a tree.
Shoving it back into the cabinet, Kip refused to admit Rogue might have been right. No way was a killer going to change his mind about his business.
