“Oh, I’m so glad to hear that. Yes, she does deserve that, but so do you. There can be a really special bond between a daddy and his little girl. I hope the two of you find that now.”
“I hope we do, too.” Will wanted to say more, but wasn’t sure exactly how to put it into words. But then the moment passed.
“Well, I need to go. I told my mom I’d call her tonight,” Amy said. “So you’ll come by tomorrow, you think?”
“Yes. I’ll drop Isabella off at Laurel’s and then come over before I go into the office. Will that be okay?”
“Hopefully we’ll be done with breakfast by then.”
“Oh, I forgot about that. How about I come out around ten instead?”
“That would work much better. And don’t forget your credit card.”
Will laughed. “Spoken like a true woman. I won’t forget.”
As he hung up the phone, Will tried to analyze what hewas feeling. The lighthearted conversation with Amy had been just what he’d needed. But he didn’t know if the other feelings swirling around in his heart had to do with what had transpired with Isabella or something more.
~*~*~
CHAPTER NINE
The next morning Amy was up early to make breakfast for the wedding party members and family who had already arrived. Thankfully Lance was there to help. He was amazingly adept in the kitchen, which Amy enjoyed teasing him about.
“I figured learning to cook would look good on my husband resume,” he said with a grin as he flipped the French toast. “Of course, in the end it didn’t matter. Jessa didn’t know I could cook until after I proposed. Lucky me. She was willing to take me on whether I could cook or not.”
“Well, I’ll be sure and ask any guy I’m considering marrying if he can cook. I think it’s a definite asset.”
As the guests began to show up, Amy and Lance worked to get the rest of the food onto the table. It was a full house, and though Amy hadn’t minded the cooking, the clean-up wasn’t going to be fun. But Lance stayed until the meal was done and helped with the clean-up as well. Sometimes Amy wondered why they needed her, though she wasn’t complaining. It just seemed that Lance really had it all in hand, and Julia was a big help as well.
Shortly before ten, Amy went to her room to freshen up. As she stood in front of the mirror, she took a couple of deep breaths. Though she kept telling herself to just put aside what she was feeling until God made it really clear that this was what He wanted for her, Amy found herself attracted to this Will in ways she hadn’t been to the Will of eight years ago. That was making it much harder to ignore her feelings.
When she went back downstairs, Will had arrived and was talking to Lance in the kitchen. It sounded like it was business related stuff. She set her notepad and pen on the table and retrieved her phone from where she’d left it earlier.
“Ready to go?” Will asked when he saw her.
“Yep.”
Lance glanced back and forth between them. “Where are you off to?”
“I’m taking Will to a spot I found that I think would be perfect for Isabella’s forest fairy party.”
“Forest fairy party?” Lance looked at Will.
Will held his hands up. “Don’t look at me. It’s all your cousin’s idea. I’m just along for the ride. And the use of my credit card.”
“Brave man,” Lance murmured as he moved toward the fridge. “I’m just going to take some juice up to Jessa before I head to the office. I’ll have Julia stay with her until you get back.”
“We won’t be too long,” Amy said. “It’s not far.”
As Lance headed for the stairs, Amy went out the back with Will following.
“How did you find this spot?” Will asked as they followed a narrow path into the woods.
Keeping an eye on the path, so she didn’t trip, Amy said, “I took the girls exploring a couple of days ago, and we happened to stumble across it. It was actually Julia and Isabella who gave me the idea. They started pretending to befairies.”
“That sounds familiar,” Will said. “Isabella has been in love with fairies ever since she saw some Tinkerbelle movie.”
“I hope she’ll like what we do for the party.” Amy lifted her hand to hold back some branches.
