Travis's Gift (Riley's Pride #3)- Sandra R Neeley Page 0,32
have to put the leftovers away, then I’ll get back to painting. Ya’ll go ahead, I’ll be right behind you,” Libby said.
“Alright,” Travis said, before walking over to her and placing his fingers beneath her chin. He gently turned her face up to his. Then while she watched him wide-eyed, he pressed his lips to hers. “Thank you for lunch, Libs.”
Libby swallowed audibly. “You’re welcome,” she rasped out.
“I’ll see you in a bit,” Travis said, pecking her lips again before he and Roman left the house to go trim the lower hanging branches of the trees and to shape wherever needed.
When Travis stepped out onto the porch with Roman, he couldn’t help but notice Roman’s grin. “What?”
“Never seen you this happy,” Roman said. “I’m happy for you and Libby.”
“Thanks,” Travis said. “I still have a lot of work left to do, but at least she’s spending time with me. She let me kiss her, and she’s not scowling at me anymore. I think she can see I’m changing. I’m different than when I first got back.”
“I think she can see it, too. Anybody can,” Roman said. “And she cooked for you. Women don’t cook for you if they don’t care about you. She might have made you a sandwich, but she wouldn’t have cooked you a meal. It’s gonna be just fine,” Roman said.
“I think you’re right,” Travis said.
“Let’s go get those trees done,” Roman said, patting Travis on the back.
Not ten minutes later Libby walked out of Travis’s house and turned toward the work shop. She grinned when she realized for the first time in a long time, she was actually anticipating seeing him.
The first thing she did was paint the back of the arch as she’d told Travis she would. It only took about fifteen minutes to get it finished, white background with a green Christmas tree person complete with arms, legs, and a huge smiley face, and lettering in red inviting their customers back for next year’s fall pumpkin celebration. Then she moved on to the frames and began to paint them, too. Next she began cutting the spools of quarter inch red and green ribbon into ten inch pieces for use on the ornaments. She poked around the work shop a bit and found some old wicker baskets to put the ribbon in. Once that was done, she used another of the baskets to put the larger, two-inch-wide spools of ribbon in, along with the glue guns they’d bought, and the fake sprigs of holly and berries they’d decided to get. She used the last two baskets to hold the array of paints, glitter, sequins and paint brushes they’d bought for the ornaments.
By the time she was finished, the back of the arch was about dry, so she sealed the paint on it the same as she had the front to be sure it could stand up to the weather. She looked around herself and decided to straighten and organize the work shop since they’d managed to place things on every available surface while they’d been busy creating. Once done, she took another look around and satisfied that she’d done all she could for now, considered going out to help Travis and Roman with the trees and looking for boughs suitable for the wreath making. Her part of the preparation was basically on hold until it was time to put all the tables outside and lay out everything that was to go on them. Libby shrugged to herself. “I guess I could bake,” she said. “Yeah, I think I’ll get started on the baking,” she said, heading back to the house with a smile on her face. She was happy to be here, happy to be helping Travis, and very happy to be a part of all of his and Scotty's new plans. “Please let it work out,” she whispered quickly with a glance to the sky.
~~~
Travis and Roman worked until just before dark. They trimmed, shaped, and collected boughs for wreaths until they had a pile of boughs taller than Travis, and almost as tall as Roman. When they’d had enough of that for one day, they went into the workshop and found that Libby had finished the arch. So, they’d put that up and also attached the giant candy cane cutouts to the supports for the arch on either side of the entrance.
“What else do you have to do?” Roman asked, standing back and looking at their handiwork.