“Anyway, I washed my hands of it all,” Leo says. “But I do remember Loftville fondly. I hope you two kids do something great with that space.”
“Thanks so much for your help,” I say to him.
“Anytime. Good luck.”
I hop out and Dean follows. When Leo’s out of sight, I turn to Dean, the huge folder tucked under my arm and laugh.
He laughs back. It’s like we can’t stop. We laugh together and I throw myself against him. He wraps his big arms around me and holds me tight.
“My uncle…” I manage to gasp. “He was a crook… Oh my god… such a crook… and he still is!”
My sides hurt from laughing. Eventually, we calm down enough to go inside.
“Let’s go home,” he says. “I’m tired of being on vacation. I want to get back to work.”
“I agree.” I lean against his strong shoulder. I’d never be able to do any of this without him. “Loftville isn’t so bad.”
“No, it’s not so bad.”
I take his hand and can’t stop smiling.20DeanI sit in the middle of the warehouse with the contents of the folder spread out around me and I feel almost a little dizzy.
Leo wasn’t kidding when he said he had everything. There are receipts for orders from fifteen years ago mixed in with personal memos. Everything’s just shoved in the folder with absolutely no filing system at all.
Lora lies on her back, throwing a ball up into the air and catching it again. “How’s it going?” she asks.
“Same as it was five minutes ago,” I grumble. “You could help, you know.”
“Okay, okay,” she says, tossing the ball aside. She crawls over and lays her head on my shoulder. “Can I just nap here?”
“You’re killing me.”
“Sorry.” She grabs a stack of papers and start to read.
We lapse into silence. Right now, we just need to find the permits so we can figure out what to do next. I got a hold of a local lawyer that explained the permitting process to me, and basically, if we have an original permit, even if it was in a different person’s name, we can renew that permit without much trouble at all.
The zoning is another issue, but even that can be fixed, the lawyer said. It would just take time and money, and fortunately, we have both.
“When this is all over,” she says, her voice soft, “what do you want to do?”
“What do you mean?” I ask, glancing through some memo about handwashing and food handling.
“I mean, with us.”
I look up, frowning. “We’re having that conversation, huh?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe. We should probably think about it.”
“Well,” I say slowly. “I don’t need to think.”
She frowns at me. “That’s not super helpful.”
“I already know what I want from you,” I say.
“Yeah? And what’s that?”
“You.” I shrug. “Plain and simple. I want you. All of you. And you’re mine. That’s all I need to know.”
She laughs and shakes her head. “How can you think it’s so simple? I mean… it’s just not.”
“I think it is. I know we come from different worlds and your family is this big rich institution, but none of that matters. You’re all that matters.” I laugh and put down the paper I’m looking at. “I mean, shit, I quit my job. I bought a truck for your uncle. You see that I’ll do anything for you, right?”
She bites her lip. “I know you will.”
“And I think you’ll give me whatever I ask for. But all I’ve ever asked for is you.”
She nods a little and looks away. “Okay. Yeah.”
“Happy we had this conversation?”
She laughs and nods but doesn’t answer.
I move over to her and pull her against me. I kiss her cheek and hold her tight. “Now,” I say. “Let’s stop the bullshit and get back to work.”
She nods. “Yes, sir.”
“That’s what I like to hear.”
I get back to it and she joins in a minute later. We read through pages, moving them from the unread pile to the read pile. It takes us about an hour, meticulously flipping over page after page, before we finally find what we’re looking for.
“This is it,” Lora says, her voice quiet at first. “Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck, Dean. DEAN!” She grabs my arms and screams.
“Wow,” I say, laughing, and take the paper from her hand. I give it a quick skim and sure enough, she’s right.
It’s a permit for commercial use, signed by the registrar and Leopold Archer.
I collapse onto my back and stare up at the ceiling. “I really didn’t think this existed,” I say.
“Yeah?” She leans her head against my chest. I wrap my arms around her and hold her tight.
“Really. I thought… I thought it was all bullshit. And we were just wasting our time.”
“What was your plan if that were true?”
“I don’t know,” I admit. “Break into my dad’s office. Torch his dealership.”