Home At Last by Anna Schmidt

Author:Anna Schmidt
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Steeple Hill
Published: 2009-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Sleep was not an option. Jo paced the small rooms of the cottage trying to make sense of the evening.

Okay, he kissed you. You kissed him. It was mutual.

“It was the moon and the beach. There cannot possibly be any mutual attraction between you and Daniel Armstrong.”

Why not?

Jo ignored her inner voice and continued the conversation with herself aloud. “He is—You have nothing in common.”

Except the fact you were both raised on cranberry farms in small New England communities.

“And moved on to totally different lives. It was a freak thing—could have happened to anyone under the circumstances.”

She was sure that’s the way Daniel was seeing things, if he was thinking about it at all. Once the kiss had ended, he had murmured something about the time and needing to get back and she had rushed in to assure him that she needed to get an early start.

“I found fruitworm eggs in one cranberry bed today,” she’d told him as they had walked back to his car, and that change of subject had generated enough questions from him to keep the conversation flowing during the ride home.

“Will you spray?”

“Ella would rather I didn’t, but we may not have a choice.”

“What, then?”

“There’s a product that can be applied through the irrigation system that should take care of the problem. It’s expensive but Ella told me to go ahead. ‘Nip it in the bud,’ were her exact words.”

“How does it work?”

Fortunately, her overly detailed explanation of the effectiveness of a biological control agent developed in the lab where she’d worked prevented them from getting personal for the remainder of the ride. At the cottage, she’d practically leapt from the car. “Tell Jazz I’ll get to work on those invitation samples tomorrow,” she said, and by the time she had completed the sentence she was already at her front door. “See you.”

“See you,” she mocked herself now. “And then what?” Just how awkward would it be going up to the farmhouse for breakfast and seeing Daniel?

But whatever she might have imagined her next encounter with Daniel might be, she was definitely not prepared for him to greet her with, “Mom’s therapist came early, so she’ll have to postpone your daily meeting until lunch. Just let me finish up with a couple of calls and then I can help you with the pest treatment. Coffee’s still hot and Mom’s aide made blueberry muffins.”

Jo opened her mouth to say something—anything—but thankfully his cell phone buzzed at the same moment. “I have to take this,” he said and flicked the phone on as he moved outside to the porch.

Daniel was still on the phone ten minutes later after Jo had filled one of the travel mugs Ella kept in plentiful supply and headed out to the beds. She couldn’t help noticing that his entire demeanor had changed. When he’d taken the call, his voice had been pleasant and all business. But when she passed him, he had one foot up on the porch railing and was running one hand through his hair.

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