He froze and pointed to the grove of trees behind us. I heard branches snapping followed by an insistent “Shh!”
“Mommy?” Zara sounded forlorn. “How long do we have to watch Auntie Charlie and Mr. Malloy kissy-face? Also, Dane just ate the last carob chip.”
EPILOGUE
I had seen very few sunrises in the previous ten years but, even so, the one that spread across the sky above Forsythia Farms that Saturday morning had to have set some kind of record for captivating beauty. The last three months had been crazy-busy, between canceling the movers and finding a new apartment and convincing Alain that I really was not returning to L’Ombre. I’d fully acclimated to getting a full night of sleep and not staggering in the door just before dawn. I’d made a fairly seamless transition from constantly harried to only occasionally neurotic. Still, the slower pace of my new life and perks like getting to watch the sunrise had the power to stop me where I was and make me take notice.
“Staring directly at the sun causes permanent damage to your eyes, you know.” Kai ducked under the white canopy he’d built for the little baked goods stand we’d cobbled together with an old farm table, stepladders for shelving, and big bunches of wildflowers. He handed me a steaming cup of apple cider, one stick of cinnamon bobbing along the caramel surface. “I’ve always thought your eyes were rather pretty, so I’d hate for you to go blind. Especially during the last market day of the season.”
I sipped my cider. “Thank you for your thoughtfulness.” Pointing to the sky, I said, “Is this kind of divine showing off a normal sight for people who don’t work from noon until two in the morning?”
Kai stepped back, appearing to evaluate the sunrise on a sliding scale. “Yep.” He nodded. “This is normal. Spectacular, but normal. I have to say, it reminds me, again, that I’m so glad you quit that job. Smart woman, you.”
I rearranged a stack of chocolate-pecan cookies that formed a neat line along the front of the table. “At least for a while. Maybe I’ll get super bored with jaw-dropping sunsets and you’ll have to push me into a cab and send me to the nearest high-pressure commercial kitchen.”
“Like an intervention,” Kai said.
“Exactly. An intervention. Maybe too much rest and general well-being will make me crazy. You never know.”
He didn’t speak for a few moments, and I looked up from where I had squatted next to a ladder. My hands were on a tall glass rectangular jar filled with a tower of scones.
“There are different kinds of crazy,” he said, looking at me over the rim of his mug. “Lucky for you I’m helping you with the ‘can’t handle it when one scone is two centimeters to the left’ kind of crazy. That’s a particularly scary kind, but I feel you are making progress.”
I narrowed my eyes at him as I rose. “I never would have agreed to help out at your little family market this fall if I’d known the kind of workplace harassment I would have to endure.” I could hear the smile in my voice as I tucked my cold hands into the warm folds of Kai’s coat and let them settle there.
He leaned down, offering parts of sentences between each kiss. “Garrett, you have no idea (upper lip) the kind of harassment (lower lip) I can inflict on arrogant pastry chefs (moving resolutely in the direction of my neck).”
A chorus of clearing throats made me jump backward, knocking the farm table hard with my rear end. Dahlia, Gemma, and Tom Breyon stood just under the canopy. Tom laughed.
“It’s barely daybreak, young lovers,” he said with a wink. “We have a long day of hard work ahead of us.”
“All the better reason to fortify oneself,” Kai said as he wrapped his arms around me from behind.
Dahlia’s lips were set in a line, where they had stubbornly remained since I’d arrived during the first weekend market at Forsythia Farms eleven Saturdays ago. I watched her intently, hoping today would be the day that would thaw her distrust of the woman who had publicly broken her brother’s heart and had even gotten paid for it.
“I brought you two some blankets, in case we have a light crowd and the sun doesn’t warm us up for a few hours.” She set a stack of blankets on a nearby chair.
Gemma nodded at Tom as she spoke. “I’m going to guess they won’t need any extra heat.” The two giggled like school children until Dahlia groaned.
“All right, prepubescent teens. Back to work.” Leading the way with a determined stride, Dahlia herded Tom and Gemma back to the barn, where visitors would soon arrive to buy donuts, cider, and the remaining bushels of apples from the family orchard. Gemma turned around and caught my eye. She smiled and then rolled her eyes at Dahlia.
I smiled in return but felt my shoulders sag.
Kai noticed. “Dahlia still loves you,” he said, his arms still around me. I leaned my back into his warmth. “She just has to punish you for a while so you know she cares. Give her time.”
“How much time, would you guess?”
“When I put the pages of her diary through Dad’s paper shredder, she didn’t forgive me for roughly one calendar year.”