thrill of figuring things out, and matching the accent together with the town was like sliding a puzzle piece into place. She still had no idea why a woman from Boston, Massachusetts would be in rural Idaho, but that would be the next mystery to solve.
“Right,” Carla said, trying to figure out how to word this next part as delicately as possible. “Well, this probably isn’t a thing in Boston, but here in Sawyer, there’s a lot of hard physical work that needs to be done. Feeding cows, stacking hay, moving water, castrating and branding calves…it isn’t that girls aren’t hard workers and aren’t willing, but quite often, they lack the muscle necessary to pick up a 90-lb hay bale and toss it into the back of a truck. Teenage boys – the ones worth talking about, anyway – tend to get snapped up real quick. There are some teenage girls who will help out on a farm or ranch, but they mostly stick with babysitting, working at the grocery store…things like that. Mr. Burbank,” (who was rude, but Carla decided to keep her thoughts to herself on that topic), “is right – it’s the middle of summer. These teens have already been working at their summer jobs for a couple of months. I promise you, there isn’t an available teenage boy in town who you’d want to hire.”
Just then, the front door to the shop opened and Carla turned, automatically sliding her professional smile into place, until she saw it was Autumn coming in, and then it melted into her friendly smile instead. It was so fun to have Autumn as a business partner. Instead of being alone in the shop, alone in the decisions that she had to make, she had someone else to run things past. She hadn’t realized how much she’d love that until it happened.
Autumn shot Keila a harried smile and then pulled Carla off to the side. “I’ve got Mrs. Hoffmeister wanting to talk to me,” she whispered, “about the flower arrangements for the retirement party for her husband, but she wants to go through every detail of every flower, and…I tried to tell her that it’d be best to call you, but she keeps claiming she can’t find your number.” She rolled her eyes dramatically. “Can you call her? She’s driving me crazy.”
“Yeah, of course.” They moved over to the front counter so Carla could scribble a quick note and stick it to the computer screen. Otherwise, she’d never remember to call the client back. Mrs. Hoffmeister was a difficult woman on the best of days, so it’d be all too easy to “accidentally” forget she was supposed to call her.
Finishing up, she looked at the two women. “Keila, this is Autumn. Autumn, this is Keila Wilson. Keila just bought the Roberts’ mansion and is looking for help to clean it out. Autumn has a small office here in my shop that she uses to run an event planning business out of.” She couldn’t help the note of pride in her voice at that. It had been one of her finer ideas, if she did say so herself.
Keila put her hand out to shake Autumn’s, and then Carla turned to the newcomer, snapping her fingers, a huge grin spreading across her face. “You know who you should hire?” she asked rhetorically. “Christian’s sisters!”
Keila gave her a blank look, and Carla realized belatedly that that wouldn’t mean much to her new Bostonian friend.
Autumn chimed in. “Oh, that’s a great idea! Rosa was just telling me the other day that her younger sisters were on the hunt for a job.”
“Christian,” Carla explained to Keila, “is my…boyfriend.” She stumbled over the word, not sure if her tongue was going to handle it or not. Such a weird word to use. Boyfriend…boyfriend…were they boyfriend and girlfriend? He hadn’t asked her to be his girlfriend, but she also wasn’t sure what the etiquette on that was. Did he have to ask? Or was it just assumed?
If she’d had more experience with this sort of thing, she would know the answer to those questions. Alas…
“Anyway,” she hurried on, feeling a blush stealing into her cheeks, “Christian has six younger sisters. He’s the oldest, and there are no other boys in the family.”
Keila just stared at her like she’d grown a second head, and Carla laughed.
“I know, right?” she said dryly. “Seven kids in one family. Welcome to Idaho. Anyway, most of them are married and have plenty to keep