He sounded just as annoyed as she did. But again, she knew they weren’t presenting a very good example for the people around them.
“All right. Fine. We can practice half as many times as what I originally proposed.”
“Three times a week and two hours on Saturday?” he said, his eyes narrowed.
“If you feel that’s sufficient. But I do want it to be known that if this is not a complete and total success, it is all your fault.”
That seemed a little unreasonable, but at the same time, she would practice for hours upon hours, just to get every little detail right. He on the other hand was much more likely to wing it, counting on his natural talent and intelligence to get things right.
It was frustrating to her that all through their school years, he’d stayed close in competition with her, without putting in nearly the effort that she had. Maybe that was part of why he was so annoying to her.
But that seemed petty and small, and she definitely didn’t want to think that about herself.
“They always did have this rivalry going on between them,” someone said. It was a lady’s voice, but Nelly didn’t turn to look. Her tiredness had been forgotten, and all she wanted to do was win the argument with Roland.
“I know. Nelly always insisted on winning, but…sometimes I think Roland just let her win.”
She almost turned and snapped at whoever had even insinuated that.
Even though she had just pretty much thought the exact same thing herself.
But she collected herself and tried to speak rationally to Roland. “We can start—we can announce this on Sunday, recruit the kids, and start practices Monday. We’ll have them Monday, Wednesday, Friday and for two hours on Saturday morning. Does that sound okay?”
He nodded. “That’s fine. I’ll help however I can.”
He didn’t look enthused about it at all—in fact, he looked like he couldn’t wait to get away from her, which made two of them.
Why in the world would he have volunteered to do anything? Didn’t he know that she always volunteered for this? She’d headed it up for the last eight years, ever since she’d gotten out of college. And before that, she’d directed it in high school too.
She even helped the person who had done it during her college years. It was ridiculous that he would even volunteer, unless he was secretly planning on sabotaging it?
She couldn’t rule that out, although she didn’t think Marjorie would be included in that kind of plan, and she didn’t think that Roland would do something so sinister and break his mother’s heart.
Still, without his mother there, she thought he was perfectly capable of it. Sadly.
She tried to push all of that out of her mind as she walked slowly home. More to get her mind off Roland than anything, she thought about the helper that she now had, or seemed to have anyway, for her Secret Saint activities.
Now, she would not mind trying to figure out who in the world it could be. Possibilities exploded through her mind, and she blissfully forgot, for just a few moments anyway, that she was going to have to work with Roland McBride for the next few weeks on the Christmas program. Ugh.
In fact, she thought, as she walked along, maybe she should initiate contact with the other Secret Saint. He seemed pretty interested in a partnership, and they had shaken on it that they would not reveal their identities. Plus, she had several things that she wanted to do, but she couldn’t quite do by herself. Perhaps… Perhaps a little camaraderie was in order. A pleasant camaraderie, unlike what she was going to have to deal with with the Christmas play.
The thought made her smile, and she began to plan out exactly how she could relay her message to someone she did not know the identity of. She thought she could figure it out.
Chapter Eight
Roland pulled a box of wrapping paper, bows, and ribbons out of his pickup and shut the door with his elbow.
He was careful not to slam it, careful not to make any more noise than absolutely necessary.
He had made a delivery a few days earlier to the Roberts family with groceries and a few items that he had found out were on the children’s Christmas list. Then, from his sister Terry, he found out that they didn’t have money to buy wrapping paper to wrap the gifts.
Hence, his second delivery tonight.
He was always hesitant to go to a house two nights very close to each other because if it were him, and he really wanted to know who the Secret Saint was, he would be keeping an eye out for someone to show up.
So, he was extra cautious.
But he did wonder whether he would meet the other Secret Saint tonight.
