One Snowy Night (Sweet Home, Alaska #1) - Patience Griffin Page 0,23

let herself think about it, she just hurried back to the kitchen and grabbed the sketch off the table and her phone from the counter. She rushed to the front door and slipped on her coat and boots. Bill was the only quilter on the street and he was still awake.

There was no doubt about it, Bill was gruff. But Hope had gotten used to him. She’d also given him a pass because anyone who could quilt like he did and be so generous with his beautiful Alaskan quilts had to have a soft spot under all that grizzle. And Piney cared for Bill, which said a lot about him.

Hope’s boots crunched in the snow as she hustled next door. When she got to Bill’s porch, she hesitated. This is stupid. It’s late. Surely he doesn’t want me bugging him. But she was already here and his light was on. Finally she got up the nerve and knocked anyway, then waited nervously as she heard grumbling and shuffling on the other side of the door.

Bill slung it open and peered at her. “What do you need?”

“Can I come in? I want your opinion on something.”

He stared at her for a long moment . . . with his usual frown deepening. Finally he stood back. “Well, since you’re already here.”

Hope crossed the threshold, looking around. Though Bill had lived in Sweet Home for two years, she’d never been inside his cabin. It was so small it made hers look like a sprawling ranch. It was just one room with a small kitchen area tucked at the back and a twin bed nestled into the front right corner. Bill’s bulldog, Mangey, acted as if he were older than Bill, barely lifting his head an inch to stare at her before dropping it back down on the quilted dog bed at the foot of Bill’s bed. The rest of the room looked like Elsie Stone’s sewing studio at the lodge. Hope couldn’t believe that Bill had a small longarm quilting machine taking up most of the left side of the cabin. The rest of what should’ve been the open area was instead filled with a large table holding a sewing machine at one end and cutting mats everywhere else.

“I love what you’ve done with the place,” she said, smiling. “It’s kind of a quilter’s dream.”

He grunted impatiently.

She handed over the drawing. “I don’t know if you know this, but my sister died when I was seventeen. I want to make a quilt out of her clothes and this is what I came up with.”

Bill pulled glasses from his pocket and put them on, making him look like Grizzly Adams getting ready for story time. He laid the paper on the table and, grabbing a pencil, immediately started making changes.

Hope stood back, trying to get a glimpse of what he was doing, but his hand covered his work.

Finally, he glanced at her. “The trunk is too short and the branches too chunky.” He looked down at the picture again. “What do the fabrics look like?”

She pulled up the photos, then handed him her cell phone. “This is how I laid it out.”

“You’ve got a good eye for color,” he grumbled. He handed her phone back and then her updated drawing. “Anything else?”

Since she had already been bold enough to come over here uninvited, Hope pointed to the chair in the corner, which was neatly stacked with quilts. “I’d like to see your collection sometime.”

Without answering, he walked to the door and opened it.

“Not tonight, of course,” Hope said, backpedaling. “But sometime.” She headed for the door, glancing at the drawing. He had indeed made it better. Much better. He’d added half-square triangles where she had used only squares. And he framed the whole picture with Bear Paw blocks, alternating them with moose.

She stopped at the threshold. “Thank you for this. Good night.”

He shut the door behind her without saying a word.

She hurried home, eager to redraw the quilt, incorporating Bill’s suggestions. He’d made the picture more interesting, more Alaska-like, without taking away from Izzie’s Memory Tree. She wondered what she could do to repay him.

At her kitchen table once again, Hope worked on the drawing until she could barely keep her eyes open. She finally put the colored pencils back in the box and stood, stretching. She treaded to her room and slipped on her blue flannel pajamas.

As she crawled into bed, she thought she’d be too tired even to pull up the kuspuk-inspired