Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 131387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
“Anytime,” Liam chirped.
Hutch turned to me. “I gotta get back to the tent. See you Monday.”
I nodded. “Okay. Later, Hutch. And again, that was awesome.”
Another chin jut before he offered a high five to Liam, who enthusiastically gave it to him, then one to Emma, who missed his hand completely and melted into more giggles. He dipped his chin to Abigail, and he and Hannibal strolled away.
As Emma and Liam (and I) stared longingly at his tall, departing body, Abigail again sidled up to me.
“Don’t start,” I said out of the corner of my mouth before she could begin. Then I offered, “He’s Tonks’s trainer.”
“I have never once questioned my decision to marry my beloved husband, but still, in another universe, I wish that man would train me,” she replied.
She had no idea.
“So…” she drawled. “We don’t have a dog. I’m unaware. Is it etiquette to throw yourself at your dog trainer after he performs a miraculous feat for a three-year-old?”
I turned to her and deadpanned, “Yes. A miraculous feat is a miraculous feat.”
She gave me a knowing look and bumped me with her hip.
“Full story later,” she declared, then, before I could demur, she called, “Right, kids, who wants to take a go at a pottery wheel?”
Emma raised her hand, bopped repeatedly, and even though it was likely she had no clue what a pottery wheel was, she yelled, “Me! Me! Me! Me!”
“The good thing about all of this, tonight, they’re gonna crash so hard, Brett and I can play high school basketball stud and his cheerleader,” she said under her breath to me.
I snorted.
“Can I hold Tonks’s lead?” Liam asked me.
“She’s my new baby, and I’m happy for you to do that, but only if you let me help,” I replied.
“I can let you help,” he said.
We shared Tonks’s lead.
And I did everything I could not to search out the Stony Bluff Animal Rescue tent so I could catch a look at Hutch again.
I did not best that feat and saw him talking to yet another criminally handsome Misted Pines mountain man. This one had a baby on his hip, a mini-me little boy at his side who looked to be about ten or so, and a gorgeous blonde tucked to his other side with his arm slung around her neck.
They seemed really friendly.
I couldn’t imagine grumpy Hutch with friends.
Then again, I couldn’t imagine him whooshing twenty basketballs for a little girl.
And he did.
He also sang beautiful, sad songs.
Honestly?
I didn’t know what to do with that guy.
Everything he said shouted, Back off!
But everything he did said something else entirely.
I wasn’t going to come up with any answers standing there stupidly staring at him across a big parking lot.
And anyway, he might catch me stupidly staring.
So instead, I got stuck in and then I got muddy.
Hours later, after Abigail and I got down to business and talked three artists (one who made the most beautiful glass nightlights, another who stitched gorgeous quilts, and the last who wove remarkable baskets) into stopping in the shop to consider our vendor contract, the Buckner family walked me to my truck.
Emma’s little girl butt was on her daddy’s arm, she was flat out against his chest, head on his shoulder, drooping.
Liam still had some steam, but he was powering down.
So I got a big hug from their mom, a one-armed one from their dad, and finally, a curious look from their mother after she glanced into the driver’s side window of my car.
“Fun day, guys, see you later,” I called as they moved away.
Emma waved at me from over her father’s shoulder.
“Bye, Miss Mabel,” Liam called.
Abigail gave me the thumb-and-pinkie-extended hand to her ear, call me gesture.
I turned to my car and froze as I looked through the window.
On my seat was a paper bag, I knew, filled with a big M&M caramel apple.
I checked my door. It was locked.
“How did he—?”
It didn’t matter.
I didn’t care.
I opened the door, shifted the bag out of the way, dropped my other bags with it on the passenger side floor, snapped my fingers at my dog who popped into the cab before me, and hauled myself in.
I did this smiling.
FOURTEEN
Honey
Mabel
I was at my kitchen island making a turkey sandwich.
It was afternoon the next day.
I’d started it with homemade Nutella crepes with toasted almonds.
Then Tonks and I moved out to do our perimeter walk, and annoyingly, but necessarily, whenever we were going along the south wood line, I got tense and more alert, which meant Tonks did too.
But now it had been over a week since my neighbors left that note and…nothing.
Maybe it was a blip.
After our walk, Tonks and I got stuck in at the workshop.
That week, full out of summer and careening headlong into fall, therefore likely the waning days of yard sales (and, thankfully, I’d hustled my ass off all spring and summer so we had plenty of vintage stock, and I’d picked up every cute (or cool, I thought) cast-off Christmas decoration, so we were good to go for that season), I’d not only scored an awesome shelving unit I was refinishing, but also three old, neglected Coach bags I knew I could bring back to life.