“We have to finish loading the pine tables into the van before five,” Paige said, pulling the pencil from behind her ear to check off her list.

“The restaurant owner wants them installed before the dinner shift.”

“I’ll get the ratchet straps from the back room,” Caroline said.

She tucked the white note into her pocket and picked up the canvas tool roll.

At six o’clock in the evening, the main dining room of the Anchor & Pine restaurant down by the harbor was filled with the smell of boiled potatoes and fresh oil paint.

Caroline knelt on the floorboards beneath the fourth trestle table, tightening the corner bolts with a socket wrench until the pine leg locked flush against the apron.