Bloom of Love (Long Valley #10) - Erin Wright Page 0,38
not sure if she bought this story. After weeks of dates every weekend and sometimes during the week, she’d finally convinced herself that Christian really did like her – something that was mind-blowing, to put it mildly – but a guy coming into her store and falling in love with her on the spot…
If he were telling this story about falling in love with someone else at a single glance, she would’ve eaten it up with a spoon and sighed over the romance of it all. But after many years of singledom – 37 years, in case anyone was counting – she just couldn’t believe it was true.
“Yup. For a baby girl, by the way.” He handed her a plate and began filling up one of his own. “I pulled the ‘Congrats!’ balloon out and the little pink baby rattle off before handing it to my mother. Can you imagine what she would’ve thought if I’d given that to her for Mother’s Day?”
Carla burst out laughing. “I think she would’ve had some questions,” she said dryly.
“Her and me both,” Christian grumbled, and then shot Carla a wink.
Maybe…
Maybe it really did happen that way.
She’d never caught Christian in a lie before now. She didn’t have any reason to think he was lying today. Only that the idea was so bizarre; so strange for someone like her. She was the one who watched everyone else fall in love.
What was that saying – always the bridesmaid, never the bride?
Not, of course, that Christian was proposing marriage to her. But still…
“This food is amazing,” she mumbled around a mouth full, making the conscious decision to decide on the truthfulness of his story later. For now, she was going to dig in and enjoy the food. She’d long ago given up eating like a bird while on a date, pretending that she wasn’t hungry and then eating again when she got home. It wasn’t like she was fooling anyone anyway. She was fat, but somehow Christian liked that about her, and she was ready to just own it already. She swallowed some potato salad. “Don’t tell me you made all of this.”
She’d thought her tractor date and the picnic spread she’d brought that day was pretty good, but looking at this one…
She’d been beat but good.
“Oh hell no,” Christian said with a laugh. “I can cook okay – I haven’t starved to death yet, anyway – but this is all the work of Carmelita. Do you know her? Stetson’s housekeeper?”
“Of course!” Carla said, slathering a homemade roll with thick huckleberry jam. “A real sweet lady. Loves Stetson like her own son, from what I can tell.”
“And now, Stetson’s son, Flint. I watched them together the other day – Carla, you should’ve seen it. I don’t know if Flint has Carmelita wrapped around his little pinky, or if Carmelita has Flint wrapped around her little pinky. Maybe they’re just wrapped up together.” He laughed. “Carmelita keeps dropping not-so-subtle hints to Jennifer that they should have another kid. A girl, if she wouldn’t mind. Jennifer keeps telling her that that part’s up to Stetson.” He laughed again, harder this time. “There’s little Carmelita, barely coming up to Stetson’s shoulder, giving him his marching orders. She told him the other day that she is getting too old to take care of babies, so he better get to it. God bless anyone who dares to stand between Carmelita and what she wants.”
They laughed together at that – the diminutive housekeeper ruled the Miller home, and everyone knew it.
And better yet, no one seemed to mind. Jennifer was happy to have the help with the household, considering how busy she was with the accounting firm, and Stetson wouldn’t know how to cook anything beyond toast if his life depended upon it.
But if Jennifer does get pregnant…oh, what that would do to Iris’ heart.
Iris was married to Stetson’s older brother, Declan, of course, and for her sister-in-law to have not one but two kids when Iris couldn’t even manage to get pregnant the first time…
Iris would be happy and pretend everything was fine, but it’d kill her to do it.
“—Carla!” Christian snapped his fingers in front of her nose, and she blinked, startled. “There you are,” he said with a chuckle. “You disappeared on me.”
“I…I did?” She hadn’t meant to.
“Yeah. What were you thinking about?”
“I…I can’t tell you.” He looked at her, surprised, one eyebrow cocked. “It’s nothing to do with you,” she hurried to assure him. “It’s a client-florist confidentiality