“Yes, ma’am, but I can’t wait that long to see you. I’m on my way to Devine—just passing the city limits sign. Think we could go get some ice cream when you get finished with your meeting, or are you too tired for that?” Travis asked. “If you get sleepy, I’ll be glad to let you sleep on my shoulder.”
“We’re just finishing up here at the church. First one on your left as you come into town. I’ll be waiting on the porch for you,” she told him and tossed the keys to her SUV to Sarah. “Travis and I are going for ice cream. Don’t wait up for me.”
Sarah caught them on the fly. “There’s a motel in Hondo, if you want to be discreet.”
“Isaidice cream,” Grace told her as she was walking out the door.
“You might need some ice cream to cool down,” Macy teased. “And remember, you are not like Cinderella. You won’t turn into just a doughnut maker at midnight, and we will watch over Raelene and Audrey until you get home.”
“Thanks,” Grace said as she closed the door behind her.
The parking lot didn’t have many vehicles in it, but even if it had, Travis would have been hard to miss. He had turned on his headlights, and when she stepped off the porch, he got out of his SUV and started toward her. She didn’t care if she seemed too eager as she met him halfway and walked right into his open arms.
“I have missed you so much,” Travis whispered into her hair. “Miz Grace Dalton, I think I could fall in love with you.” He tipped up her chin, looked deeply into her eyes, and kissed her.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and leaned into his body. The kiss said as much as—or more than—his words. “Me too, but...”
“Nobuts today, darlin’,” Travis said. “We can take it slow and be sure.”
“Then there are nobuts. However,” she said with a smile, “just how slow do you want to go?”
He returned her smile. “Your foot is on the gas pedal. You tell me. I’ve got a feeling you won’t be one bit bashful.”
“You got that right.” Grace wished that she could take him by the hand and tell him to drive to the motel in Hondo. But their first night together shouldn’t be at the end of a long day when she was worn out. It should be something special. “Right now, let’s go get ice cream. After those kisses, I do need something to cool me down.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said and drew her even closer for another kiss.
Chapter Twenty-Three
This is going to be a long day,” Sarah said as the three of them made their way from the house to the shop that Monday morning.
“Yep,” Macy agreed.
“Are you pouting because our new hunky preacher didn’t come to dinner yesterday?” Grace asked.
“I believe she is,” Sarah teased.
“I. Am. Not. Pouting.” Macy punctuated each word with a stab of her forefinger toward Sarah. “I understand that it is tradition here in Devine for the outgoing preacher to take him to dinner to celebrate his last day and Jimmy’s first day in the parsonage. Let’s go make dough and get our minds off dreams of dark-haired angels and con men.”
“Youare dreaming about that little girl?” Grace asked.
“No!” Macy snapped. “Sarah is, though.”
“My biological clock is ticking, and Angela has been surfacing in my dreams. I want a family and a baby,” Sarah admitted.
“What about you, Macy?” Grace teased. “Are you dreaming about little redhaired boys?”
“I’m not talking about my dreams,” Macy said as she unlocked the door and flipped on the lights. “I need to be busy, so let’s get our hands in some dough. And”—she paused as she set up three bowls—“I got to admit, I’m hungry for one of our doughnuts, too.”
Sarah put two cups of warm water into each bowl. “Do y’all feel change in the air?”
Grace added half a cup of sugar and two tablespoons of yeast to each bowl and used a whisk to mix them well. “I do, but then we’ve always been open six days a week, and we’re talking about cutting it down to four. That’s a radical change. I bet Claud and his cronies won’t like the idea at all.”
“Probably not,” Sarah said, “but I’m looking forward to it, and I wouldn’t even mind if we were only open Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.”
“What would we do with all that free time?” Macy asked.
“Well”—Grace added flour to the mixture in one of the bowls—“on our days off, for the first six months, I would sit in Mama’s rocking chair out on our porch.”
