“Think you can do it?” Sue crossed her arms under her generous boobs. The Syracuse printed on the front looked like yracus.

Jen pulled her hair back into a ponytail and took a seat. “I think so. Yes.”

Sue frowned at her before leaving, as though she’d had hundreds of other event planners lined up around the block to take this gig for free, and Jen still had to prove herself.

The thing was, she would prove herself. To Aimee, who’d been so clearly disappointed in Jen’s absence the past decade. To dear Aunt Bev, whose love and encouragement had brought her to Gleann and changed her life for the better. To Leith, who’d been so hurt and angry when she’d left. And to her mom, who’d laughed when Jen said she wanted to go to college.

Jen spent the next two hours flipping through old files and memorizing spreadsheets, committing totals and rearranging numbers in her head. There were very few resources, even less money, and practically no organization or innovation. No wonder the society was about to pull out. The timeline to pull this thing off—and to make it better than in years past—would be extremely tough. She couldn’t turn the games into the grand affair she’d like to, but there were lots of small, special things she could add to or improve in the time allotted that would make a nice difference.

She needed to take inventory. She needed to contact vendors and perhaps wrangle some short-notice sponsors. She needed to learn how the hell to run a heavy athletic competition or get someone to do it for her, and, in looking at the scant number of entrants, attract more athletes. She needed—

Her phone rang. Aimee.

“Hel—”

Screeching and sobbing filled her ear.

“Calm down, Aim, I can’t hear a thing you’re saying.”

“Oh my God, the whole place, Jen!” There was splashing and squishing in the background. “The toilet or the bathtub or something up in your room. Something must have burst. Water everywhere. Totally flooded.” A sob, a sniffle. “It’s dripping through the floorboards, into the main room downstairs. Oh my God! I don’t know what to do!”

Despite her earlier vow to give this thing her all for the next two weeks, Jen’s first instinct at hearing Aimee’s panic was to run. To swim like hell far, far away from her sister’s mess. Why the hell was her sister calling her now? Ah, of course. Because Jen was here, and when Jen was here, she took care of things.

All her clothes and toiletries were in that room, sitting right outside the bathroom. Probably floating down the hall by now. Crap.

She ground fingers into her temple. “Maybe you should, I don’t know, turn off the water at the source and then call a plumber?”

“What? No.” More crying, more splashing.

“Why the hell not?”

“Because I can’t call him.” It came out like hiiiiiiiim, and Jen finally got it. Aimee had probably slept with whoever hiiiiiiiim was and they hadn’t moved past the After-Sex Awkwardness.

Lovely. Jen Haverhurst to the rescue.

“Just hold on, Aim. Be there in a second. Can you at least find the water shutoff?”

“Okay. Yes. I think so.”

Jen hung up and sighed. She pushed back from the table and poked her head out of the conference room door. “Mrs. McCurdy?”—because she could never, ever bring herself to call her Mayor Sue—“Know of any places in town I can rent? Like, today?”

Chapter

2