Page 33 of A Whisper of Summer Magic

Chapter Seven

“Why are weputting sugar in the oven?”

The word we warmed her in a way it shouldn’t. Meghan had always loved canning and pickling with Grandma Millie and Jessica. When she’d been trying to think about a hobby so she could have more than her career, making jam had always been her favorite. She’d loved pickling as well because she loved pickled vegetables, but jam had always felt magic—nature meeting chemistry. Beautiful colors, rich scents, sweet tang and savory and Meghan had always had a sweet tooth. And jam on biscuits or sandwiched between shortbread… yummy.

“Warming the sugar up helps it dissolve easier.”

She was surprised how curious Jackson was. He followed each step, didn’t get distracted, and was quick to get her what she needed. He was also an enthusiastic berry masher.

“Looks like we’re cooking up blood and guts,” he said cheerfully as he mashed and waited for the mixture to boil.

“Someone watched a lot ofCSIgrowing up.

“Guilty,” he pleaded. “Why are you adding dried lavender to the sugar?”

“I did this for Chloe’s party, and it added a pop of veraciousness to the jam, and cardamon adds an unexpected depth—I just want a tease,” she said. “I want to accentuate the taste of the fruit, not overwhelm it.”

“Ver… what? Doesn’t that mean truth?”

Meghan laughed. “I feel like it fits because the fruit taste and texture is honest—how you hope it will taste. An ideal.”

“How do you know how much lavender and spice to add?”

He stood so close she could smell him. Fresh laundry scent, some kind of woodsy-pine soap that reminded her of the annual trek she and her sisters would take up Crowders Mountain. It was only about thirty miles or so from Charlotte—even closer to Belmont. Hopefully, now that they were all living in the same town they’d get together more.

“I just have a feeling,” she said after wondering if there was a more precise answer. “And it’s not like I’ve made this before except as the party favors for Chloe’s engagement party.”

“You’re going rogue?”

She laughed. “I like that image,” she admitted. “Going rogue in more than one way, I imagine,” she said thinking about her meeting with Elise this morning. “I’m coming home. I’m moving in with Jessica. I’m joining Greggor and Associates, and I’m going to start a little side hustle with Jessie.”

“There’s my rogue agent with the super stealthy life hack.”

She wasn’t really sure what that meant, but Jackson was smiling, and he high-fived her, and for a moment, she felt like she’d won something—or maybe it was the giddy flash when the nerd girl, briefly, is noticed by the popular boy.

Not in high school.

And when she was in high school, Jackson had been… she didn’t want to think about it. Jackson continued to mash the berries, staring at them fiercely as if his eyes had laser beams that could shoot out and make the mixture boil quicker.

“I didn’t realize you were so conscientious,” she said slowly.

“How could you? We were kids.”

“Not a kid anymore,” she stated the obvious and wondered if she should shut down this feeling, this synergy, snappy chemistry that hummed between them, making her feel like a hot wire buzzed through her body.

Elise had encouraged her. But if she did, and Jackson was only funning, she’d embarrass them both. So, she kept her mouth shut and mixed in the dried lavender with the sugar and sprinkled in ground cardamon, looking at the color, texture, waiting for it to feel just right.

“It’s a little spiritual,” he said softly, his voice near her ear.

“What is?”

“The feel you’re waiting for. It’s like waiting for a message from the universe—yes, that’s just right,” he said. “I met this man near the end of the time in Afghanistan who was a water diviner. He had the same expression on his face. What’s it like to feel a message is close?”

Meghan felt like the air in her lungs compressed as her body heated up. She wasn’t sure why, but people—at least no one she knew except Grandma Millie—talked like that.

“Ah.” She blinked back the hot stinging in her eyes.

“Hey.” He paused in his stirring. “Why does that make you sad?”

---