Loving The Country Boy (Barrett's Mill Book 4) by Mia Ross Read Free Book Online

out of air. Being Barretts, neither of those was likely to happen anytime soon.
    Filling her lungs, she yelled, “Hey!” That didn’t make an impression, so she tried again. “Shut up!”
    Nothing. Exasperated beyond belief, she recalled the advice her grandmother had given her earlier and went for broke. “If you two morons don’t cut it out, I’m calling Gram.”
    That one got through, and her ears rang in the sudden quiet. Shaking her head to clear them, she went on. “Will you please tell me what has you guys at each other’s throats?”
    They started in together, and she held up her hands. “One at a time. Start with explaining to me why the saws aren’t running.”
    They glared at each other, but fortunately, Jason backed down. “You’re older. You go first.”
    “As you can see,” Scott began with a dismissive motion toward the archaic equipment, “everything went haywire. Paul’s the only one who knows how to fix this relic, so I think we should call him.”
    “And I don’t,” Jason chimed in, his jaw set with determination. “He needs to be with Chelsea right now, not worrying about this place.”
    “You’re both right.” While she relayed her brief conversation with their big brother, she watched as their obstinate expressions gave way to worry. “Isn’t there someone else on the crew who can help with this?”
    “Hank and Joe are gone all week for their annual fishing trip,” Scott replied. “We’ve got part-timers starting up next week, but we can’t run any more raw material without the saws. If we can’t figure out how to get them running, we’ll have to close down till one of those three comes back.”
    Tess was hardly a manufacturing expert, but she understood that losing even a day or two of production this time of year would be a major setback for any business that was so reliant on the holidays for their annual revenue. Judging by the spreadsheets she’d been working on, profit margins at the sawmill were razor-thin as it was. If they lost any ground at all, the company her family had fought so hard to resurrect might very well end up back in bankruptcy.
    It wasn’t only the Barretts who relied on sales of the custom furniture for their income, she knew. While the small staff of carpenters and assemblers worked only part-time, for many of them the extra money they earned made the difference between living comfortably and barely scraping by.
    “You’re the college girl,” Jason teased her with a grin. “Any ideas?”
    “No, I—” Inspiration struck, and she snapped her fingers. “What about Heath?”
    “Mechanical genius,” Scott agreed, “but he’s got a job, remember?”
    “Maybe I can talk Fred into giving him the afternoon off. You know, as a favor to us.”
    “I’m married to his niece,” Jason pointed out. “So I’m practically family. I can go into town right now and ask him.”
    His older brother vetoed that idea with a firm shake of his head. “You’ll stop by to have lunch with Amy, and I won’t see you the rest of the day. I can’t run this place by myself, y’know.”
    Considering how they’d been going at it just a few minutes ago, Tess expected that to start another argument. To her relief, Jason conceded with a sheepish grin.
    “Okay, you got me there,” he admitted. “Guess that means it’s up to you, Tess. Meantime, we’ll go outside and get some fresh lumber ready to go.”
    In the time she’d spent getting to know the Southern branch of her family, she’d learned that was the Barrett spirit. They took their best run at Plan A, but if that didn’t work, they regrouped and tried something else. While she headed back to the office, it occurred to her that she must have inherited some of that natural resilience, too. If she could find a way to tap into it, maybe it would help her reboot her life. Solving this particular problem might not be a huge deal to some people, but for her it was definitely a step in the right