Page 77 of Three Rules I'd Never Break

“Pretty good. I have a shipment to unpack, but I’ll deal with that later. In ten minutes, I’m going to flip that sign, and we can go.”

“Since you said you had something important to discuss, I thought maybe we could go out to our favorite oak tree at Granddad’s place.”

“I’d like that.” I’d gotten word back that the house needed a new foundation. This was the perfect opportunity to get Eli’s input about possible changes to the floor plan. I had a few ideas.

He picked me up and kissed me, chuckling at my surprise.

“A customer could come in!” What I said didn’t match what I did. Wrapping my arms around his neck, I kissed him again. “You’re in a good mood.”

“Yep.” He set me on my feet. “And I’m curious about what it is you want to discuss. Should I be concerned? Is this a ‘we need to talk’ sort of thing?”

“I think you’ll like the conversation, but I don’t want to talk about it here.” With my back to the door, I patted his chest. “I do have one ‘we need to talk’ topic.”

“Uh-oh.” He lifted his eyebrows.

“Why did you tell Tessa our secret knock?” I’d thought about it so many times but hadn’t asked. I wasn’t mad about it. The whole knock thing was funny, but it was our knock. I didn’t want the whole world knowing about it.

His eyes narrowed. “That was weeks ago. You’ve been stewing about this for weeks?”

“Stewing isn’t the right word, and stop trying to change the subject. I thought it was our secret.”

“I was extremely distracted when Tessa asked me about the knock. I didn’t exactly tell her what it was, I just responded with ‘The E?’ And she figured it out.” He grinned. “When Tessa and I got in trouble as kids, my mom would put us in time out in separate rooms. I’d be in my room, and Tessa had to sit in the sewing room on the other side of the wall. We’d tap out secret messages to each other.”

“Secret messages?”

“Kinda. Mostly we’d just call each other names in knock code. Dork. Nerd. And other words I won’t take the time to tap out now.”

“You are a dork.”

He nodded. “But I’myourdork, and that makes me happy.”

“Me too.” I pulled out of his arms and flipped the sign to closed. “I’m ready.”

“Perfect. We’ll pick up Sherlock on the way to Granddad’s place.” Eli pushed open the door. “Don’t forget to set the alarm.”

“Right!” I ran back and punched the code into the keypad. “Now I’m ready.”

We stepped out onto the sidewalk, and he locked the door before clasping my hand.

While I was a tad nervous about asking Eli to help me decide on the new floorplan for the house—only because it sounded suspiciously close to a proposal—I wasn’t going to miss the opportunity to make the house perfect for both of us.

* * *

Eli parkedbeside his granddad’s house.

“We aren’t at the barn.” I unbuckled my seatbelt and looked around.

He shook his head as he got out of the truck. “Figured we’d take the mule instead of riding horses.”

The mule? In my vision of our perfectly romantic evening, a mule didn’t seem to fit. “Um... he keeps it here?” I didn’t even see a fence.

“He uses it to get around the property.” Eli opened the garage and pointed at a beefy looking golf cart. “The Mule.”

“Oh! I was picturing the donkey kind of mule.”

He laughed. “Nope. This will get us there quick, and it’s easier to take Sherlock along.” He reached into the bed of the truck and lifted out a cooler and a blanket.

“You brought a picnic.” I’d been so focused on talking to him, I hadn’t even thought about eating.

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