@PastorNateNHC:“Man shall not live by bread alone.” But if he must, it should at least come with a side of mashed potatoes. Just saying.
@TGDPub:Ah yes, because nothing says “restful” or “classic” like a sandwich you have to eat with your pinky up.
@TeaThymeNC:@TGDPub It’s called presentation. Some of us believe in making meals memorable.
@TGDPub:@TeaThymeNC Oh, don’t worry, luv. I fully intend to make this very memorable.
@WisteriaWeekly:In other news, Lindsay Monroe and Travis Langston were seen at the inn again, and overheardconversations hint at a catering debacle. Let’s hope love still blooms for Wisteria’s favorite famous daughter and her beau. Drop your thoughts below.
“I’ve heard there’s been quite a stir in town about the new pub owner.”
Daphne glanced over at Pastor Nate as she sat her green bean casserole on the table beside Granny D’s famous corn bread stuffing, schooling her features to keep any annoyance—or interest—concealed.
Which wasn’t an easy feat with Rosemary staring a hole in Daphne’s profile from the end of the table.
Nate wasn’t just the youngest pastor in New Hope Church’s history—he also had the highly inconvenient gift of being alarmingly perceptive. Worse still, he’d grown up running wild with her brother, Jack, which meant he had an inside track on all her weaknesses.
Having Pastor Nate in Granny D’s hundred-year-old farmhouse for Sunday lunch wasn’t a surprise. Granny had given him an open invitation, like with Jack, Daphne, and Rosemary, and many times strongly encouraged acceptance in her Southern matriarch sort of way. (Which meant no refusals or something bad might happen, like being forgotten at Christmas or—heaven help them all—being volunteered to help with the church’s annual live nativity, complete with a real donkey and an itchy burlap robe.)
Rosemary’s family lived in town, so she didn’t come as often. But the trio of Jack, Nate, and Daphne remained fairly consistent Sunday lunchers.
At the current direction of the conversation, however, Daphne wished she’d made other meal plans for today.
She trained her attention on her task and away from the “annoying brother” vibes she had to endure from the preacher. New folks usuallystirred up town gossip, but Nate’s overt implications in her direction made her hackles rise.
She busied herself aligning the casserole dish with mathematical precision. “There usually is with new folks.”
Nate hummed in response, exchanging a look with Jack across the room. A look Daphne hated almost as much as liver pudding.
Jack, the traitor, grinned as he leaned against the counter, arms crossed like he was just settling in for a show. “Yeah, but this one seems to have caught a certain someone’s attention.”
“You mean Rosemary?” She waved toward the end of the table, but Rosemary only offered a wrinkle-nosed (and fake) grin back at her.
“Nice try, sunshine!”
Daphne exhaled through her nose. “I hope y’all aren’t referring to me, because the only thing that’s caught my attention lately is how Granny D almost started a riot at Papa Malone’s Café when they ran out of Duke’s mayo.”
Nate laughed, plucking a green bean straight from her dish like the audacious bean thief he was. “Oh, we heard about that too. The mayo mutiny made it into this week’s prayer chain.”
“Mama Malone may never recover,” Jack added, completely deadpan.
“But nope,” Nate continued, as if he and Jack shared one brain cell between them. “We’re talking about you. More specifically, your habit of accidentally running into one Mr. Finn Dashwood.”
“I even heard you were... courting.” Jack shrugged, the absolute menace.
Daphne nearly lobbed a biscuit at his head. “Who even uses that word anymore, dork?”
“I do,” Granny D announced, sweeping into the room with a bowl of mashed potatoes like it was her stage entrance. “But they ain’t courtin’, boys.”
Finally! Sanity.
“They’re just in the early phases of playful bickering.”
Rosemary snorted into her napkin.
Daphne closed her eyes. Surrounded by traitors. All of them.
“I think that’s called ‘banter’ in modern terms, Granny.” Nate raised a brow in Daphne’s direction before sliding down in the chair. “Isn’t that a sure sign of budding romance, Jack?”
