Chapter 31
thirty-one
M ission jogged the last few steps to his front yard and kept hurrying across the now-dormant lawn to his front porch.
Rich had called to say he’d seen something dripping out of the back window of Mission’s cabin as he’d walked by that morning.
The bathroom window, and Mission expected to find his whole cabin flooded when he opened the front door. He’d just finished their morning meeting on the harvest and everyone’s role in it when he’d gotten Rich’s text.
He really didn’t have time for anything to go wrong right now. Harvest time on a farm was the busiest time of year, as everyone tried to get in everything they’d been carefully cultivating for months.
Travis had so much alfalfa this year, he’d hired extra hands just to get the job done. Mission had done the same, as summer had been so good to them and this final crop of hay couldn’t be lost.
He also didn’t want their squashes, corn, apples, or peaches to go to waste. Molly usually headed up the farm stand that sold their extra produce, but Hunter had asked her to pass the job to someone else.
Britt and Gemma had taken it on, and Mission needed to get them another trailer full of corn for the stand that day.
He so didn’t have time for a leak or flooding his home, especially today, as he and Kristie had planned to sneak away from work an hour early to have chocolate cake for their birthdays.
Hers was actually today, and his would arrive in another four days.
“If her gifts got wet….” Mission shoved his way into his house, ready to take on the world so he could get back to work and wouldn’t miss his date that evening.
He expected to smell something moldy or damp. Step into an inch or more of water. Something.
His cabin sat in stillness, the morning sunshine filtering through the open blinds and highlighting the dust motes in the air.
There was no flood. No smell of something gone wrong.
He came to a stop at the corner of the wall and looked down the hall. No evidence of water at all, and he growled as he scanned the kitchen.
His breath caught in his chest when he saw the chocolate cake on his dining room table.
“That’s not a leak,” he said as he moved along the island and bar to the table. Someone had been in his house all the same.
Not just someone.
Kristie.
This looked like a normal chocolate cake, though it stood three tiers tall, and Mission had never had such a large cake made just for him. Granddad usually bought an ice cream cake, and the two of them sat on his back deck and enjoyed the dessert together.
A note had been placed next to the cake, and Mission recognized Kristie’s handwriting from her veterinary records and invoices.
Happy birthday, cowboy! I hope this chocolate cake meets your standards—its official name is Triple Chocolate Chip Cake with German Chocolate Coconut Filling.
She’d added a smiley face, and Mission chuckled at the ridiculously long name of the cake.
Cut into it, and you’ll see all your favorites. I used the good, flaked coconut and semi-sweet chocolate chips, according to your preferences.
Can’t wait to see you tonight, and don’t eat all the cake, because I want to taste it too.
She’d drawn a heart and signed Kris , and Mission lowered her note, his heart expanding into a bigger version of itself with every breath he took.
As he stood there and gazed at the chocolate-frosted cake which concealed so many things—including the attention and care Kristie had paid to his likes and dislikes—he knew he’d fallen in love with her.
“You can’t tell her on her birthday,” he lectured himself as he turned to get a knife. The “flood” in his house had clearly been a lie, and Kristie had clearly staged things with Rich.
He pulled a knife from the block on the counter, grabbed a plate from the dish drainer, and opened the drawer to get out a fork.
Kristie knew he was in the middle of the harvest and didn’t have much time. She’d been extraordinarily busy this autumn too, as she dealt with an outbreak of a cattle illness on several farms, something she claimed happened when the weather changed.
But there was always time for Triple Chocolate Chip Cake with German Chocolate Filling.
He cut into the cake and removed a triangle to the plate, delighted with the rich chocolate cake on the bottom layer, the checkerboard pattern of chocolate and white cake in the middle layer, and the white cake with chocolate chips on the top layer.
As promised, a rich, coconutty German Chocolate filling rode between each layer, and Mission grinned at the cake so hard his face hurt.
He quickly pulled out his phone and took a selfie with the slice of cake, then pulled out a chair and sat down to take the first bite.
He snapped selfies of himself as he reacted to the perfectly moist cake, that nutty filling, and the rich, creamy, smooth frosting. He swiped his finger through it and took a picture of that.
He ate the whole slice of cake without wolfing it down, and then he took a few extra minutes to send Kristie every picture he’d taken, complete with captions.
I am so happy right now.
This is the best cake I’ve ever eaten.
This filling? I could bathe in it.
My new favorite frosting!
Thank you so much, kitten. I can’t wait to see you tonight .
Then, the urgency to get back to work pressed down on him, and Mission quickly pressed a piece of plastic wrap to the exposed parts of the cake, left it on the kitchen table, and headed back out to the farm.
Worry accompanied him, because now his simple gifts and dinner plans for Kristie’s birthday might not be good enough—and it was actually her birthday today, not his.
He’d already texted her that morning about it, and he told himself—not for the first time—that he couldn’t be anyone but who he was.
If a bracelet and a new set of mixing bowls wasn’t good enough for her, he’d rather know now.
She should break up with him and move on if dinner at her favorite restaurant didn’t make the cut.
She could find someone else who could pull out all the stops, because all Mission had done was ask Jocelyn to make her a birthday cake and have it at her house, with candles, by eight p.m. that evening. He’d planned to surprise her with the treat after their birthday dinner celebration.
“If that’s not good enough….” Mission let the words die there, but they continued to simmer and fester inside him as he made it back to the barn and pulled on a pair of gloves so he could get out to the corn fields and get the cobs coming in prettied up for their farm stand.
If that’s not good enough …then Mission wasn’t good enough.
Later that day, Mission stood on Kristie’s front steps with her gifts, his hopes up in the clouds, and a leather jacket warding off the evening chill. She answered the door wearing a dark green dress that glittered in the light, and Mission’s mouth went dry.
“Hey, cowboy.” She stepped back to let him enter, and she toed a cat out of the way.
She had a runner, so Mission stepped into the house and cleared his throat. “We have time for presents, don’t we?”
“You’re the one who made the reservation.” She followed him into the kitchen, where Mission set down her gifts and then turned back to her.
“You are a gorgeous woman,” he murmured as he found his voice. He drew her into his embrace and leaned down to kiss her. Yep, he totally loved this woman, and as he kissed her, he realized he’d never felt like this about anyone else, ever.
Still, he kept the kiss slow and simple before he pulled away and smiled at her. “We have time.” He picked up the mixing bowls, the box bigger than the amazingness of the gift inside.
“Don’t expect anything amazing,” he said, practically thrusting the box toward her.
Kristie held his gaze as she took it. “They’re wrapped amazing.” She flicked a look over to the smaller box still sitting on the counter. It had been wrapped in silver, glittery paper very unlike the pink and white striped box in her hand. “And there are two.”
“Does the number matter?” he asked.
She shook her head, her curls softly swinging back and forth as she did. “Not usually.”
He swallowed and nodded to the gift in her hand. “I did my best.”
“Mish.” She sank into the nearest dining room chair and started ripping paper off the box. She pulled in a breath when she recognized the box, and her gaze flew back to his. “The mixing bowls.”
He’d had to go to three different stores—and the city—to find them, but he kept that tidbit to himself.
“These are sold out everywhere,” she said, finally clearing the paper and standing to open the box. “Are they really?—?”
She squealed when she saw the box did indeed hold the bowls advertised on the outside.
“I must’ve gotten lucky, then,” he said. Persistent was more like it. Unyielding. He’d made calls and sent Tucker to get these, because he couldn’t get there on time.
“Thank you.” She pressed into him and kissed him again. “You liked the cake?”
“It was incredible,” he whispered. “Just like you are.”
“I noticed you didn’t have a cake with you.” She gave him a playful smile.
He chuckled and shook his head. “The night is young, kitten.” He picked up the second gift and handed it to her. “Again, I did my best.”
She smiled as she plucked the wrapping off the box and lifted the lid of the black jewelry box inside. She inhaled sharply and didn’t look away from the bracelet inside.
“Mission.”
“It’s just something simple,” he said, suddenly embarrassed. “They’re not even real diamonds.”
He couldn’t afford such things, and he suddenly wanted to blurt that out so she’d know. She had to know, didn’t she? He worked someone else’s farm, for crying out loud. Of course she knew.
“It’s moissanite,” Mission said, reaching to lift the bracelet from the cotton where it rested. “It is sterling silver, though, so it shouldn’t turn your wrist green.”
He undid the clasp so he could put the bracelet on for her. “I know you don’t wear much like this, but I thought it would only add to your beauty when you go to church or meetings or…when we go out.”
She dutifully held out her hand, and Mission draped the bracelet over her wrist and clasped it on.
She admired it, the real diamonds in her eyes. When she looked at him again, her smile sent shivers of love running through his whole body.
He was so going to fail at his personal promise not to tell her he loved her tonight. But he couldn’t tell her right now, because she eased into his personal space, cupped his face in her hand, and kissed him again.
Mm, yep. Mission had fallen, and fallen hard, and he wouldn’t be able to keep his feelings to himself for much longer.