Page 30 of A Touch of Spring Magic

She nodded. Sipped her chai and wondered where to start. If he was going to bring in equipment maybe she didn’t have to tackle the pond today, and she tried to stamp down the relief.

And as she stared at him wondering if he was even remotely serious and beginning to play with the idea that he just might be, a hint of a smile graced his full lips, and she saw a hint of a dimple before it was gone.

“We’re burning daylight,” Storm commented. “Ma’am.”

She pulled the gardening gloves from her back pocket and slapped them against his arm.

“No ma’aming,” she reminded him.

“Yes, ma’am.” He caught the gloves and to her shock fed her hands into them. “Boss ma’am. Get to work.”

And then Storm Stevens had the audacity to wink at her.

*

A few hourslater Jessica dragged herself away from the garden and back to the house. Storm had returned with the equipment he needed to drain and scrub out the pond, and even with her earbuds in and some Taylor Swift songs on low, she was tired of the machine hum and slurp of filthy liquid.

She washed up in the outdoor sink and slipped off her gardening boots.

She’d never eaten breakfast, only downed two coffees, so she was ready for food, but as she stood at the fridge pulling out her homemade bread and sandwich fixings, she tried to be practical. She needed to eat. Storm needed to eat. There was nothing lunch date about it. Sandwiches weren’t a subliminal message that she wanted to turn their verbal sparring verging on flirting into a true flirtation.

And panic again.

No she’d been practical. If a bit high-handed. Okay, a lot. And she’d regretted her aloof dismissal for far longer than Storm had likely thought about her.

“No romance here,” she murmured but couldn’t help wondering what were his favorites. Should she ask or would that seem…intimate?

No. Feeding people doing a job was in the Maye blood. Grandma Millie had owned the mill diner as had her mother before her.

‘Food is love,’ Grandma Millie would often remind them. Jessica glanced at the book, out on the counter again—Storm must have looked at it, again. Her gaze lingered on the title. Maybe she was being too literal. Food was love so cooking it for friends, family and employees was an act of love.

“Huh.” Jessica reached out to trace the letters, but jammed her hand back in her pocket.

Maybe the book really was a family heirloom and Grandma Millie was trying to send her a message that it was safe to return to her roots, that she was making the right decision and would succeed. But wouldn’t she have told them?

Shaking off her questions, Jessica made two chicken salad sandwiches, added coleslaw, pickles, apple slices and oatmeal raisin and pecan cookies. She hesitated. The plate, complete with a fork and linen napkin and glass of sweet tea looked glaringly domestic. Had she become one of the still-single women in town who’d line up, family casserole in hand, whenever a new, uncommitted man moved to town? She couldn’t imagine how many women had greeted Storm’s return with a ‘family dish’ and their number to return it.

Her stomach jumping with unaccustomed nerves, Jessica ventured back outside to the now quiet garden and walked toward the pond area.

Storm strolled toward her with an empty wheelbarrow.

“Got most of it,” he said cheerfully. “And I’ve started a new impressive compost pile by one of the former berry fields, if you ever plan to rescue and rehab those and farm again. Jams and jellies and sauces would fly off the shelf of the nursery.”

In all her spare time.

“That’s a future Jessica decision,” she said, startled by how much he had accomplished, and the fact that his suggestion had seemed natural, casual, not a judgment that had her defensively ready to verbally pounce back.

Instead she pictured an antique or vintage baker’s hutch with jams, jellies, pickled vegetables—colorful and practical impulse purchases. But that was down the road. She wouldn’t have time for that and neither would her sisters, but for today’s Jessica, the pond was empty, and though not clean, it no longer looked like something that would spawn a horror movie creature.

“I don’t even want to know what you found in there.” She shuddered.

He watched her for a moment that felt electric.

“What?”

“Yesterday you were in the pond nearly thigh-deep, skimming out years of debris,” he reminded her.

At least he hadn’t reminded her of her full-body dunk. “Skimming was not the word I’d use.” She crossed her arms and touched her still sore biceps. “What can I say? I like to get dirty.”

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