Arizona Homecoming. Pamela Tracy

      “For how long?”

      “Maybe for good,” Jane said. “The inspector was on the phone with his boss. He sounded a bit surprised. I’m wondering if Baer’s getting fed up. I mean first it’s you protesting, then it’s a skeleton and now this.”

      Emily should have felt elated, should have jumped for joy, but all she could picture was the brown-haired man who’d walked in the hot sun for hours picking up an old shoe and plenty of beer cans just because she’d asked him to.

       Chapter Five

      Donovan called it a day. Even with the evac cooler, it was too hot to do much more than complain. It annoyed Donovan that he, out of everyone, did most of the complaining about the heat.

      The floors were scheduled for next week; he’d call to reschedule. Surely Baer would come to his senses soon. There wasn’t a house in Apache Creek that didn’t have radon levels. The inspector had even taken the phone and spoken to Baer personally.

      But George Baer said to wait. And, Donovan heard something in the man’s voice that hadn’t been there before. A subtle annoyance, the slapping of hands, sounding very much like a silent I’m done.

      Donovan very much wanted to be done. He wanted to get back to the life he’d planned for himself: traveling, building the types of structures he wanted to build, adventure. But the phone call he’d made to Nolan Tate hadn’t changed Donovan’s situation. According to Tate, there was no place to put Donovan, so he could just wait.

      Great. Every day he worked for Nolan Tate was one step closer to paying his debt to the man. Being out of work meant no debt eliminated and Donovan working for the man longer than he wanted to.

      Turning on the camper’s generator, he stepped inside, shed his clothes and hopped into the tiny shower.

      Looking for evidence had been hot and tiring. Emily hadn’t been bothered by the heat at all. She’d managed to look as if being outdoors, slow roasted, was an everyday occurrence. He’d checked the weather in California, the location of his next scheduled job if Tate didn’t change his mind. If everything worked out, Donovan would be there at the end of July, beginning of August, about the time Apache Creek, Arizona, went from slow roast to extreme grill.

      And there was nothing else for Donovan to do for over a month until the California project.

      He wanted to laugh. It was almost too funny. He’d had to take this job with Baer, had compromised his talent for money and now was stuck in small-town Arizona living in his camper.

      He’d need to find an RV park soon, now that he was no longer employed. June in Apache Creek, that shouldn’t be a problem. Snowbirds—those who sojourned in this part of Arizona because of the mild winter weather—didn’t start arriving until late September or early October.