“Are you kidding? You kept the whole party going tonight. Every time I looked over, you had a crowd around you and everyone was always laughing about something.”
She envied that about her mother. Sylvia could make conversation with anyone. She was always the life of the party.
“Leave the dishes for me to do in the morning,” her mother said. “I can’t do much but I can stand at the sink with my leg on a chair and do the washing up.”
“Sure,” she said, though both of them knew most of the dishes would go through the dishwasher just fine.
“Let me help you to your place,” she said, setting down the bag of trash. “It’s dark and I don’t want you to stumble.”
Her mother must be tired, Rosie thought. For once, Sylviadid not argue, she simply started making her slow way to her cottage.
Rosie moved ahead of her, clearing from her path a few toys the children had left out.
At her mother’s door, she hugged her.
“It was a lovely party,” Sylvia said. “It’s always fun to get together with our neighbors.”
“I’m glad you had fun, Mom.”
Her mother might be frustrating sometimes, stubbornly insisting on doing her own thing, whether it was wise or not. But Rosie was deeply grateful for Sylvia’s constant love and support.
Her mother had upended her own life after Gary died, moving in to help however she could. Rosie would never be able to repay her, though she knew Sylvia would insist that was simply what mothers did.
That was what she wanted to do for Emma. Help her daughter in any way Emma would let her.
“Well, Dottie,” she said after she was alone in the yard again. “I guess it’s just you and me and the chickens.”
The dog snuffled, then jumped up on one of the padded lawn chairs, where she circled a few times before settling down to watch Rosie work.
On one of her trips inside, Rosie grabbed her earbuds and set her phone to play the audiobook she had been listening to earlier in the day. She was clearing away the rest of the food containers, keeping an eye on the storm clouds that had begun to gather, when a deep male voice came out of the darkness, rising above the sound of her book.
“Do you need a hand?”
She yelped in surprise and whirled, spatula outstretched reflexively.
“Oh no. Please don’t scoop me with that thing,” Andrew Morgan said in an amused tone as he moved under the café lights.
He looked gorgeous, all lean and sculpted and... Andrew.
She set the spatula back in one of the bowls, feeling foolish, and pulled her earbuds out, returning them to the charging case in the pocket of her sweater. “You scared the life out of me.”
“I’m sorry. I thought you heard me come back into the yard.”
She shook her head, holding up her earbud case. “I didn’t hear anything. Earbuds.”
“Good music?”
“An audiobook. It’s the latest from one of my favorite authors. A mystery.”
“So mystery novelsareyour jam?”
She winced, reminded again of their conversation earlier in the kitchen. She was still mortified that he had overheard her talking smack about his books.
“Yes. I love just about everything. Mysteries, romance, historical fiction. Sometimes even nonfiction if it’s a subject that interests me.”
“Just not fantasy.”
She sighed. “I still can’t believe you heard that. I’m so embarrassed.”
