Jack's Heart by Patricia McLinn

Author:Patricia McLinn
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Romance
ISBN: 9781939215444
Publisher: Craig Place Books
Published: 2021-01-09T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“Good heavens, Jack. Looks like you’ve turned the back of my truck into a garden.” Matty called out from the porch of the Slash-C’s main house. She’d come outside as they pulled up, with Brennan on her heels.

Jack swung out of the driver’s door as Val extricated Addie. “No dents or damage, so you shouldn’t have any complaints.”

“I’m not complaining. I’m delighted. Sure looks better than bags of feed or a load of tools. But what’s the occasion? Did you get these for Val?”

“What? No,” she said quickly. “They’re for you, Matty. We — Addie and I — brought you some flowers as a small thank you for all you’ve been doing for us, all the dinners, and letting stay here, and that party.” Better not to pursue that topic. “I hope you like them.”

“There’s absolutely no need for that, Val. You’re great to have around and you and Addie entertaining Brennan has been priceless. But I sure appreciate you thinking of this.” Matty peered over the side of the truck bed. “What are they? Look sort of like snapdragons, but the bloom’s so much bigger.”

“Monkeyflower,” Jack said. “She bought an acre’s worth of monkeyflower.”

“No,” Matty said in disbelief.

“Yup,” Jack confirmed with dour pleasure. “Just what you’d want along a fast-moving stream that was cutting away at mountain that was there first, minding its own business.”

With that he turned on his heel and headed toward the new office.

“What was that about?” Matty asked.

“I have no idea. The woman in the shop didn’t say anything about fast-moving streams or mountains. She did say they’re called common yellow monkeyflower. Mimulus guttatus.”

“Huh.” Matty stared at the plants, hands on hips. “Monkeyflower can be a pest in the ditches and such if we have a real wet stretch. But they are kind of cheerful.”

She grabbed onto that. “They are. The woman in the shop said they can spread across the top of the soil to make new plants, but she swore they wouldn’t be invasive unless conditions were ideal.”

Matty snorted. “Fat chance of that.”

“I thought I’d plant them for you by the trough where you’ve had such trouble getting anything to grow.”

“Oh.” Matty turned her head to look at that offending patch of muck, then back to Val. “You know, that might be a really good idea. Well, let’s see how they do.”

*

Matty stood, brushing off her hands, head tipped as she surveyed their work. “I like it,” she declared.

“You should have let me do all the planting.” Val nested the now-empty pots together.

“No way. Especially after being kind enough to get me these flowers. You all were a great help,” she added, extending her smile to their pint-sized not-so-helpful helpers. Then she spotted a familiar figure cutting across from the office toward the horse barn. “Hey, Jack, come see what we’ve accomplished. Thanks to all of us, we’ll now have pretty yellow monkeyflowers to enjoy every time we use the pump, instead of a bed of mud.”

Val watched Jack stop, then change the angle of his path to come toward them.

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