Retreat by Noelle Adams

Author:Noelle Adams [Adams, Noelle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2017-10-24T18:30:00+00:00

Seven

The next evening, Cecily felt as jittery and excited as a teenage girl on her first date.

As she dressed to go out with Zeke, she tried to remind herself that she was a mature, responsible woman and there was no reason to expect this thing with Zeke—which seemed to have sprung out of nowhere—to lead to anything permanent.

But she couldn’t help but be excited.

Really excited.

She had no idea what to wear—since she didn’t know what Zeke had planned. She was sure it wasn’t going to be fancy though, so she finally decided on a casual skirt—a long flowing one rather than the pencil skirts she normally wore—and green top that brought out the color of her eyes with a matching cardigan. She looked at herself for a long time in the mirror and decided she looked as good as she was going to look. Surely this was appropriate for most of the possibilities Zeke would have planned for the evening.

She grabbed her little bag and walked outside. She was a bit early, and there was no reason for Zeke to come and knock on her door. That would feel strange, unnatural. Better just to meet him outside.

She wandered out onto the path that led to his cottage and paused when she saw one of the beds along the fence had been weeded today.

She knew it had because she’d noticed a couple of stray weeds in Zeke’s usually immaculate beds this morning and reminded herself he was on sabbatical, so it would be Monday before the weeds got pulled when the local guys she’d hired came to work on the grounds.

The weeds were gone.

She knew exactly what happened to them.

When she heard a voice say from behind her, “Hey, I was just coming to get you,” she turned around to see Zeke.

He looked as dressed up as she’d seen him in over eight years—which wasn’t particularly dressed up. He wore a pair of khaki trousers and a shirt with a collar. The shirt was a very loud orange-red color, but still…

He’d definitely made an effort.

She frowned at him, despite the flutter in her chest. “Have you been weeding?”

His eyes shot down to the bed, and his lips twisted slightly.

“You’re supposed to be on sabbatical,” she continued at the confirmation in his expression.

“I like to work.”

“But you’re on sabbatical.”

He scowled. “You’re saying I can’t do anything?”

“Don’t you want to take some time off?”

“No. I hate lazing about. I like to keep things nice. Can’t we call it a hobby?”

She couldn’t help but chuckle. “I guess you can do a little. But make sure it’s just a little. I’ve hired a crew to come a couple of times a week, and there’s got to be the big jobs left for them to do. You can pull a few weeds, if you really can’t help yourself.”

“Good.” They smiled at each other for a minute. “You ready?”

“Yeah.”

“Come on then.”

She was smiling again at his terse and very unromantic invitation, but she walked beside him as they headed for his pickup truck.

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