Page 39 of A Touch of Spring Magic

If Rustin came out of the Wild Side kitchen and saw his Chloe crying he’d probably jump in his truck and come barreling over, full of fire to curse her out. He was so protective of his ‘Clo Beau.’ He’d been protective of his family as a kid—often getting in fights when someone thought it would be fun to mock his mother or siblings or in-and-out-of-jail family members.

“I’m just so happy,” Chloe said. “But lately all the stuff I tried to pretend didn’t bother me has been burbling up like a backed-up sewer.”

“Lovely image.” Jessica made a face, happy to see the ghost of a smile on Chloe’s face. “You should have seen the pond Storm and I finally murderously cleaned and sanitized.”

“So you’re getting along?”

Jessica laughed. “Hold off on the wedding bells, Clo. And stop bringing that book around.”

“I haven’t.”

“Ha! And don’t worry about your genes unless it’s something a doctor recommends or something you and Rustin want to do together,” Jessica barreled on. “Heck, maybe all of us should do it as a party game for your bridal shower.”

She thought Chloe would laugh; instead her light dimmed again.

“About the party.” She picked at her cardigan. “Do you think we should have one?”

“Of course. This is a big moment, Chloe. Why wouldn’t we have a party to celebrate you and Rustin getting engaged and married?”

“I just…” Chloe nervously fiddled with her jeweled nostril piercing. “I heard Grandma Millie arguing with Elizabeth Katherine about the party. Your mother was refusing to come and said that it was a waste of money and that she and Sean Patrick didn’t want that spectacle,” Chloe whispered, biting her bottom lip, and her eyes welled again.

“Elizabeth Katherine said she didn’t want any more gossip, and that Grandma Millie was pushing her luck too far.”

Jessica stared at Chloe’s shuttered face, stunned to silence by her mother’s cruelty. It was true her parents had often acted as if Chloe didn’t exist. They hadn’t included Chloe in anything, except Grandma Millie had treated all four of ‘her girls’ the same. Jessica remembered once that her mother had pushed back, saying that ‘Chloe had been Grandma Millie’s choice, not hers,’ and later, when Chloe had been three, Jessica’s parents had built a massive home on Cramer Mountain and moved the family out of Belmont’s historic home district, where they’d lived with Grandma Millie in the Maye family mansion, which had housed four generations of Mayes. Grandma Millie and Chloe had lived in the house alone together after that.

Anger flared bright.

“Chloe, we are having a kick-pootie party for you and Rustin. Meghan and Sarah and I will cook whatever party food you want. We’ll choose it together and decorate the garden so that it looks like a fairyland or whatever you want it to look like, but it will be beautiful and magical and an engagement party and bridal shower that will be talked about for years, and Elizabeth Katherine and Sean Patrick can go on a Caribbean cruise for all I care. We’ll have a blast without them.”

“Really?” Chloe smiled and bounced in her chair a little. “Are you sure, Jessie? It’s not too much trouble?”

She saw Storm approaching her and steel straightened her spine. “I’m certain,” Jessica said, her voice ringing out like she was back on the sidelines exhorting her team to victory. “I am committed to launching my niche nursery and the rehabbed garden with the inaugural event of your and Rustin’s party. Storm is on board, and he even has a crew with him today. And you’ve got Meghan and Sarah, so yes, Chloe, the party is on, and it’s going to set a new standard, so dry your tears because I will need all of my sisters to help.”

“Really?”

“Count on it. Now I have to get back to work.”

She hung up just as Storm got close enough so that she didn’t have to yell. She walked toward him.

“Chloe’s excited?” Storm was at her side, smelling of earth and water and fresh air with a spicy, woodsy tang that must just be him as she didn’t imagine he wore a cologne to work all day outside.

“Yes. It’s complicated, but yes.” Jessica tried to shake off how unsettled the call made her. “Are you done for the day?”

“We’re going to finish wheeling over the plants that survived. It will go faster if you tell us where to put what. Not as many grow lights broke as I suspected, so were going to set up a new home base and start bringing over the plants to the barn for a few days, but it looked like most everything survived.”

“Yes.” Jessica pumped her fist in the air and ended up high-fiving a startled Storm. “Things are turning around,” she predicted, willing it to be true. “I can feel it.”

Chapter Eight

Storm sent theteam home a little after six, and she and he worked in companionable silence for another hour. Jessica felt like his assistant as she helped Storm finish hooking up a temporary irrigation and lighting system.

“And I’m called over-protectively maternal about my plants,” she noted as the time ticked past seven.

“You love what you love,” Storm said.

That caught her up short. She thought of Storm as an athlete. A physical man. A builder. But if he wanted to gear his business more toward landscape design, he must love plants as much as she did.

“Plants don’t let you down the way people do,” she murmured without thinking.

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