Page 2 of Oops I Fell For The Electrician Next Door

"Cabin Four just lost power in the bedroom," I tell him. "They share part of the older service."

He reaches back into his truck and lifts his tool belt from the seat. "Show me."

The command comes naturally to him. So naturally, in fact, that my feet nearly obey before my good sense catches up.

"I have an electrician I use."

"Good. Call him." Marc buckles the belt around his hips without taking his eyes from the cabin. "Until he gets here, show me where the panels are. I won't touch anything without your permission, but I can tell you whether your guests need to get out."

There is a significant difference between a man taking over and a man helping me protect my guests. I know that. My pride knows it too, although she is slower to admit it.

I pull out my phone and call the electrician who has worked on Eight Pines since before I bought it. The call goes straight to voicemail. My second call reaches his wife, who tells me he is forty miles away finishing an emergency repair at a feed store and cannot get here for hours.

When I lower the phone, Marc waits without giving me a single I-told-you-so look.

"You can inspect it," I say. "Nothing beyond that until we know what we're dealing with."

"Your property, your call."

Those four words loosen something between my shoulder blades.

We stop first at Cabin Four. I relocate the Lawsons to Cabin Two, carrying their bags while Marc checks the receptacle and the small subpanel inside the utility closet. He asks before removing the cover. He explains what he sees without speaking to me as if I am a child, and when I tell him which circuits were updated last spring, he listens.

"The outlet isn't the source," he says after several minutes. "It may have taken the blame because it was under load when the voltage dropped. I want to see the main service point."

That is located beyond the last cabin near the narrow maintenance dock, hidden behind a cedar privacy screen because nothing ruins an idyllic lake photograph like a gray electrical cabinet. Marc follows me along the shoreline, carrying a meter and flashlight while I explain the layout. Cabin Eight, my home, sits on the far end of the curve. Cabin Seven is next to it, sharing a short stretch of lawn and the best view of the old dock.

"You live on-site?" he asks.

"Three steps from work. Four if I need coffee first."

"That often?"

"Every morning. Sometimes again at noon."

He breaks into a full smile. It changes his entire face, softening the stern line of his jaw and putting shallow creases beside his eyes. I nearly miss the uneven board beneath my boot because I am looking at him instead of where I am going. Nearly. I catch myself on the dock post and keep moving.

The maintenance platform extends a few feet over the water behind the privacy screen, allowing access to the conduit that runs along the reinforced shoreline. It is solid enough, but one of the outer boards has been marked for replacement since early summer. I know exactly where it is.

Unfortunately, Marc does not. "Stay toward the center," I warn as he steps around me. "That outside board is loose."

He immediately shifts his weight. The board does not break beneath him, but the toe of his boot catches the raised edge and sends his large body toward me. I throw out both hands on instinct. Marc catches my waist, twists to keep from crushing me, and turns what might have been a simple stumble into a surprisingly graceful fall off the side of the dock.

The lake closes over my head before I manage a complete curse word.

Cold water rushes beneath my shirt and into my boots. Marc's arm remains locked around my waist as we surface, his other hand gripping the edge of the dock. I drag in a breath and push wet hair out of my eyes, prepared to inform him that qualified electricians are not generally supposed to throw their clients into bodies of water.

Then I see his face.

He looks horrified. Completely, sincerely horrified.

Laughter bubbles out of me before I can stop it. My laugh is so robust, so loud that it scatters two ducks near the reeds. But I’m helpless enough that I have to clutch Marc's shoulder to keep my mouth above water.

"Are you hurt?" he asks.

I shake my head, still laughing. "No. Are you?"

"Only in ways my health insurance won't cover."