Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 141951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 473(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 473(@300wpm)
The brewery’s corporate meeting room had a long river table with the company’s colors accenting the inner lights that made the middle glow between two thick slabs of cherry oak. That was delicate work. He appreciated the style.
“I’d love to see something if you’ve got anything in the works,” Lucas said, genuinely interested.
“We’re doing a wall piece with rock maple that’s just about done,” Malachi offered with a shrug, standing from the table.
Lucas followed the same path. “Let’s see it.”
*
Lucas held the truck in park while Gracen still leaned into the passenger’s side window where she hugged Delaney for dear life. The man standing a few feet behind her offered Lucas an apologetic widening of his arms as if to silently say what can you do?
Apparently, it had been a while since the two women spent time together, and as he learned over the passing morning as the day neared noon, Gracen and Delaney’s friendship went way back. The high school days and years of living together had long been in the rearview mirror for the two, but the many photographs of them together that he noticed throughout the farmhouse said it was a friendship that would undoubtedly last.
Christ.
They practically grew up together.
“Okay, okay,” Gracen said, finally releasing a laughing Delaney and stepping back from the truck. Her gloved hands remained wrapped around the door frame, not yet ready to let go. “If you don’t make it back down this way before you head back to Freddy—”
“I’ll call as soon as I’m home,” Delaney reassured.
“I guess I’ll call Bexley?”
At that comment, Delaney only rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe she actually called you.”
“Give her a break. You didn’t explain much.”
“I didn’t give her much to tell,” Lucas clarified.
He didn’t mind taking the heat.
It had been his fault.
Delaney only shook her head his way, but otherwise, she didn’t broach the reason why the two of them found themselves in this particular part of New Brunswick. If he were being honest, Lucas had done his very best so far not to think about Jacob and the lonely, painful reality waiting for him back home.
He’d get there.
Not yet, though.
Gracen’s stare affixed to him behind the wheel, and she offered a kind smile that he returned. “It was nice to meet you, Lucas.”
“And you,” he returned. “You’ll see me again. I definitely want one of those wall pieces of my own for the cabin. Malachi sketched out something for you. He said you do all the color work, apparently.”
She peeked over her shoulder at the grinning man waiting there. Malachi winked back, and the gesture sent her head spinning back to Lucas.
“I guess so, huh?” Gracen asked. “Drive safe, guys. It’s supposed to drop a foot of snow tonight.”
“They’ve got lots of time before that starts,” Malachi assured in the background.
Delaney waved, whispering love you to Gracen as she rolled up the window. The woman in the driveway mouthed the words back as Lucas shifted the Chevy into park, and pressed a light foot onto the gas.
He reminded himself to thank Malachi again for doing a quick sweep with sand over the driveway so the long, winding road up wouldn’t be a problem. Before they had even reached the crest, Delaney unbuckled her seatbelt and scooted over to the middle of the bench seat next to him behind the wheel. His hand found her warm, jean-clad inner thigh while she buckled herself in once more, and her head found the side of his arm.
“Who’s cooking when we get back?” he asked. “Me or you?”
“Well, I,” she stressed, “wanted to make a soup.”
Lucas perked at the news, considering the different ingredients she had picked up at the store. A large can of tomato juice had been the only thing that could act as a base, in his head, and he could already taste it. “I’m game for that. Anything else?”
He felt her grin against his arm before she kissed the same spot overtop of his parka. “Don’t forget to stop at the store.”
Right.
There was that, too.
Chapter 23
The fire back at the cabin had sizzled down to nothing but a bed of coals by the time Lucas and Delaney walked through the front door with arms loaded up with bags. After the two got the bags in order on the floor where she directed them to be put, he restocked the old wood chief and moved the kettle to the middle where it could boil while his quiet companion unloaded bags, and searched the small pantry of cupboards for the items she needed.
Lucas shed his coat and scarf at the hooks by the door where Delaney had already hung hers.
“Onion powder will have to do,” she muttered under her breath, pulling the ingredient in question out of the cupboard.
The old spice, yet another thing the cabin had a lot of because it didn’t go bad in a handful of months, joined the pile Delaney had already collected on the island. Fully engrossed in her task and not the least bit interested in the way Lucas had come to sit at the far side of the island to watch her work, he reveled in the homely silence of the small cabin other than the muted shuffle of Delaney’s current task.