33. Mattias

"Dinner is at six, and breakfast at nine," I informed the businessman who'd unexpectedly checked in for the next three days. When we'd gotten back from our picnic, there'd been an email with a last-minute reservation, and he'd shown up less than an hour later.

He was weirdly buttoned-up for someone in Cider Landing, let alone someone vacationing in Cider Landing, but I wasn't going to judge. His five hundred dollars was as good as anyone's, and it might be able to pay Peter and Everett to fix the air conditioning. I doubted it, and I still had visions of little dollar signs dancing in my head. A new unit would run into the five figures, and I could never afford that, no matter how much Connor paid in utilities.

The man made a face at me. "Only at nine? That's a little late."

"We're used to vacationers, and I'm the only one running the kitchen." I tried to be patient and apologetic, but I wasn't going to bend over backward and change my whole schedule for one guy. "I can have coffee and some danishes set out earlier, but I can't cook breakfast and run the desk and clean rooms at the same time."

His expression went even more sour at that, but he finally shrugged and nodded. "I suppose that's acceptable."

I gave him a smile, albeit a strained, small one, and left him alone in his room. I was glad I'd given him the tern room, even though it had the worst view at the inn. It was the only bedroom in the house with no view of the river at all, including my own.

I'd mostly given it to him because it was the farthest from the heron room, and I didn't want him to hear Connor and me having sex later, but still.

Jerk.

Five hundred dollars, I reminded myself. It could be the difference between air conditioning and no air conditioning.

I just had to keep hoping it would be enough.

I went back to the front desk, reclaiming my seat behind it and trying to roll the tension out of my shoulders before picking up the book Connor and I were both reading. It was a fun thing about a young man learning to be a dragon rider, and a good distraction from the problems of the day.

Which was honestly why I couldn't complain about the inn being so quiet. At least I got a lot of reading done, even if I wasn't sure I could fix the things that went wrong.

The front door opened and closed, and I looked up to see who it might be, but there was no one there.

Weird.

I mean, it'd have been weird to have two people check in within an hour of each other on a random Monday in April, but the door hadn't just opened itself.

I was so busy staring at the door that the loud thunk a foot in front of me almost startled me out of my chair. There was a giggle at that, and I looked down to see a golden-haired cherub standing in front of the desk, one hand slapped over their mouth, bright blue eyes shining with amusement.

My heart almost stopped. It had been three years, but surely my mind wasn't playing tricks on me, was it?

On the desk in front of me was a thick gold coin with a leaping frog on it. As I watched, the frog turned to look at me, and fucking winked. Then, it turned into a dragon.

What.

The.

Actual.

Fuck.

Was I high? Was there a gas leak, and I hadn't noticed the smell, but I was hallucinating?

The angel in front of me reached up and tapped on the coin. "I'm s'posed to pay you to keep my things, right? Is that enough?"

Suddenly parched and almost ready to cry, I cleared my throat before even trying to talk. "A room. You, um, you pay for a room. And you keep your stuff in there, yeah. It's, um, it's Jessie, right?"

Their eyes lit up, and they grinned at me, one tooth missing on the top right. Just like three years ago. "Yeah, I'm Jessie! You have my stuff?"

"I do," I agreed. "Your room is all ready and waiting. Your Daddy went out to get my Grandma, but he'll be back in a little bit."

They gave a pleased hop, wriggling with joy in a way that reminded me of Peanut. "I knew it. He said he'd always come back for me. I remember now."

I slapped a hand over my mouth and squeezed my eyes shut. Then I had the mad notion that if I didn't watch them every moment, they might disappear, so I opened them again. Jessie was still there. "Want to go check out your room?"

"Yeah," they agreed. "Daddy bought me a Froggo suitcase. Want to see?"

I almost jumped from behind the counter, nodding enthusiastically, though I'd seen the suitcase hundreds of times over the years already. "Jessie my friend, I can honestly say there's nothing I want more in the whole world."

They giggled, covering their mouth with their hand, and it was the most musical, perfect sound ever to exist.

I stuck out my hand for them, and without hesitation, they grabbed it and followed me up the stairs. We got in Mr. Button-up's way on the way up, since he was waiting at the top of the stairs to come down, but frankly, I couldn't have cared any less if I'd tried.

I loved the inn more than any other building on the whole planet, but the place could literally crumble around me and in that moment, I wouldn't give a fuck other than to grab Jessie and escape.

We went to the heron room, and the moment I unlocked and opened the door, Jessie was rushing over to their suitcase, rushing to unzip it and show me the contents. "See? Froggo! And it's got my clothes and my notebook and my Switch and my... Froggo!"

The big stuffed frog took up almost a quarter of the suitcase, and was enormous enough that when Jessie pulled it out and hugged it to their chest, their face was partially obscured. But none of that mattered. Nothing mattered.

Jessie was home.