Page 116 of Merry Mended Hearts

“Boone—wait. You can’t do that.”

“Don’t even think about stopping me. This is all your fault. Yours and that stupid radio’s and Grace’s, too. I can’t keep living the way I have been. I’m not a nice person anymore. I’m constantly grumpy—and those times you’ve called me out on it only made me grumpier because I knew you were right. I haven’t been happy, Junie, but I haven’tallowedmyself to be happy. And I think it’s time I did.”

Junie blinked at me as if I were insane.

Maybe I was. But I would fully accept the diagnosis.

Then a smile spread over her lips as well. Redness blotched her cheeks the way it always did, and she laughed, too. Soon, the two of us were a pair of hyenas in the foyer of Harper’s Inn. Laughing.

A woman stepped out of the living room. “Everything okay?” she asked.

“It’s perfect!” Junie threw up her hands.

I pulled her into a hug. I felt lighter than I had in years.That’ll make the flight go by faster,a sarcastic thought added. I’d never been a fan of flying, but I’d do what I had to if it meant fixing what I’d ruined with Grace.

Junie slapped me hard against the chest. “Now that you’ve come to your senses, my dear cousin, you can’t run off to Arizona.”

“I can’t?”

“No,” she said, straightening the collar of my wool-lined coat like a mother attempting to make her son look presentable. “Not without meeting our newest employee first.”

I knew Junie relied on me a lot, but this was taking things a little too far. She wanted me to do what, train whoever this person was?

“Did you hear what I said? You’ve been pushing me to go after Grace for weeks now. I tell you I’m doing that, and you want me to meet your employees? I promise, I’ll come back. I’m not abandoning you here.”

I couldn’t grasp any other reason why she might want me to stick around.

“Will you stop talking?”

Junie yanked my arm, towing me behind her as she led the way to her office. Willing but confused, I allowed it. Rather than entering first, she stepped aside, opened the door, and shoved me through it.

I staggered in, colliding with the brunette standing between the door and the desk. The scent of her shampoo and a floral perfume wafted from her hair.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, placing her hands on my sides.

I grunted, apologizing as I grasped her shoulders, attempting to pry myself away from her. That was all I needed—to bowl the new employee over or worse, break her toe or something because I accidentally stepped on her foot.

“Sorry. Junie’s usually the klutz, not me—oh.”

The concept of a heart stopping wasn’t anything I regularly experienced, but this time, the shock of seeing this woman’s beautiful face gazing up at me was enough to send me into cardiac arrest.

Grace, crashing into her, had the full effect of an electric charge. She was a lit match, igniting me, energizing me with a single glance.

Her long brown hair swept past her shoulders in loose waves, the way she’d worn it the last time she was here. She wore a pink cardigan over a white shirt, and her blue eyes were wide an emotion I couldn’t name.

Fear? Dread? Anticipation?

“Hi, Boone.” She gave me a timid, irresistible smile that I wanted to kiss off her mouth.

My heart struck my ribs like a bucking horse, and I gasped from the effect. I’d forgotten all about Junie for several seconds, but the reason I came in here came back to me in a rush.

My hands were still on her shoulders. Now that I was touching her again, I couldn’t seem to stop.

“Grace?You’rethe new employee?”

When? How? And why didn’t Junie say anything?

Actually, I was glad she hadn’t. I would probably not have been ready to hear it.

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