D. Graham - Put It Out There

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HarperCollins Publishers

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www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by Harper Impulse 2016

Copyright © D.R. Graham 2016

Cover images © Shutterstock.com

Cover design © Books Covered

D.R. Graham asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © June 2016 ISBN: 9780008145163

Version 2016-06-02

For Morgan

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page Put It Out There Britannia Beach D.R. GRAHAM A division of HarperCollins Publishers www.harpercollins.co.uk

Copyright Harper Impulse an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk First published in Great Britain by Harper Impulse 2016 Copyright © D.R. Graham 2016 Cover images © Shutterstock.com Cover design © Books Covered D.R. Graham asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins. Ebook Edition © June 2016 ISBN: 9780008145163 Version 2016-06-02

Dedication For Morgan

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Keep Reading …

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by D.R. Graham

About the Publisher

About HarperImpulse

Summer was officially over, and even though all the families who spent their vacation at the Inn had packed up and gone home, the dining room was crowded for our famous homemade breakfast buffet. Thirty-six guests, all excited for a week-long wilderness retreat. It was our first corporate booking, and I was feeling pretty impressed with myself, since they found us through the new Britannia Beach Inn website I developed for my granddad. He originally hadn’t wanted the Inn to have an online presence because he didn’t have the staff to handle more guests. We needed the extra revenue to afford repairs on the hundred-and-thirty-year-old building, though. When I made the decision to move back to Britannia and promised to help out before and after school, he finally gave me the go-ahead.

Fully aware of how late it was getting, I sped to restock the pastry basket with warm cinnamon buns and poured fresh-brewed coffee for a table of non-outdoorsy-looking women, decked out in expensive hiking gear. It was already seven-thirty. The only bus from Britannia Beach to Squamish in the morning stopped in front of the Inn at seven forty-two. I needed to catch it if I wanted to make it to school. As I rushed to clear another stack of dirty dishes from a table, my granddad stepped up to the buffet table and scooped fresh scrambled eggs into a warming tray. “You better get going, sweetheart. You don’t want to miss the bus.”

“You mean, you don’t want me to miss the bus.”

He chuckled. “True. I am a little too busy to drive you into Squamish today.”

I kissed his cheek and removed my apron. “I’m going.”

“Don’t forget the meeting with the real-estate agent is at five o’clock today if you want to be here.”

“Oh.” I stopped and spun around, surprised. “I thought you were going to cancel that.”

As he stirred the pot of oatmeal with more attention than it needed, he glanced up to gauge my reaction, which he likely knew wasn’t going to be supportive. “I want to hear what he has to say.”

“Why? If I can keep attracting corporate retreat bookings, you’ll start making a profit again.”

“That’s a big if , Derian. I appreciate all the work you’ve done on the website, and I couldn’t have run things around here all summer if you hadn’t moved back, but you only have two more years of high school. I need to plan for when you leave for university. There’s no harm in hearing what he has to say.”

No harm? Except that living with my mom in Vancouver had been a disaster, and I had nowhere else to live, and selling the only place that still held good memories of my dad was something I couldn’t deal with on top of all that. “What if it gets bought by a company that just tears it down and redevelops the entire village?”

“There might be a buyer who will renovate the Inn and keep the heritage houses in the village.”

I glanced at the yellowed antique clock again. I needed to leave, but I also desperately wanted to talk him out of the meeting before I left. “We can renovate it just as easily as someone else.”

He sighed and seemed hesitant to break it to me, “It’s too expensive.”

I swept my arm through the air for emphasis. “Look at how busy we are. Our corporate retreat clients will generate extra income in the off season.”

“This is the one and only corporate booking we’ve had. We have to explore our options. Sorry, sweetheart.” He turned, holding the empty pancake tray, and retreated into the kitchen.

He was right, but I wished he wasn’t. Deflated, I turned and headed through the lobby. My bedroom was on the first floor at the end of the hall. I zig-zagged past the guest rooms, trying to avoid the floorboards that creaked—not that it mattered since my door squeaked loudly enough to be heard back in the dining room.