Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Maddie and Leo sat opposite each another at a table in the corner of a quaint little sandwich shop near Abbott College.
The fact that this lunch felt very date-like to Maddie was an aberration brought on by her own wishful thinking. He’s your deceased friend’s husband. We’re here to plan the garage sale! Nothing more!
“Are you sure your parents won’t mind hosting our garage sale at their house?” Maddie asked. They’d already determined that her apartment wouldn’t work and that his house, which was situated ten minutes outside of town, was too remote.
“I’m sure,” he said. “I talked it over with them. Their house is in town, and they have plenty of room on their driveway and in their garage. My sisters will help. It should work out well.”
“Okay, perfect.”
Their food arrived. Since she was celiac and couldn’t eat gluten, she’d opted for a soup, salad, and chips combo. Her mouth was watering, especially due to the potato chips. Potato chips were her favorite food group. She took out her phone.
“Are you taking a picture of your lunch?” Leo asked with bemusement.
“I am. I’m a fan of Instagram. Are you?”
“No.”
“Are you on any of the social media platforms?”
“I have a Facebook account that I haven’t checked since 2016.”
She felt her dimples crease her cheeks as she adjusted her phone, trying to achieve just the right lighting and angle. “Well, I love looking at pictures on Instagram and sharing my own. Since I don’t get out that much and since this lunch is so very pretty, this photo is too good to pass up.”
“I see. Do people like looking at pictures of food?”
“Indeed.” She ended up having to stand and hover over her lunch like a praying mantis in order to capture the right shot. “Got it.” She lowered into her chair.
He was looking at her as if entertained. “Are you going to post that now?”
“No, no.” She waved a hand. “I’ll post it later.” She realized he hadn’t made a move toward his food. “Please don’t let me hold you up.”
He picked up his sandwich. A man who ordered a ham and Swiss on rye with lettuce and tomato was a very reliable type of man.
Also, looking into his gray eyes was muddling her thoughts and tempting her to imagine that they were on a date.
You’re not!
But it sure would be nice if they were . . . if he’d never been married to Olivia and she was someone he’d just met, instead of a friend of his wife’s he’d known for years.
As they ate, they talked through their plans for their garage sale.
Once they’d covered everything, Maddie decided to venture a personal question. A this-isn’t-a-date type of personal question. “When you moved to Merryweather last summer, I assumed that you did so to be near your parents and Olivia’s parents. Is that why you moved?”
“Yes.” Leo sat back a few degrees in his chair. “Soon after Olivia died, I realized that it would be best for Charlie and me if we could live near his grandparents, but Abbot didn’t have any openings in my field at the time.”
Abbott College had been founded in the mid-1800s. Its campus brimmed with historic buildings, jade lawns, and the rarified air of advanced education. It was the pride of Mason County.
“A year ago, they finally posted a position that I had the qualifications for. The search committee called me in for an interview last February.” He ran a hand through his sandy hair, which left sexy furrows.
“I wanted the job for Charlie’s sake, as well as mine, so I was nervous going in.
Afterward, I worried that I might not get it. ”
“I’m so happy that you did, Leo.”
“Me too. Abbott’s enrollment is less than fifteen hundred so most of my classes have fewer than twenty students, and they have on-site day care so I can go over between classes and push Charlie on the swings.”
She ate a bite of pickle. “How’s it been living near Olivia’s parents and yours?”
He regarded her with his straightforward, alert gaze. When talking with Leo, she never felt that his attention was anywhere else. Having all that IQ focused on her was so heady that it made her stomach tingle.
“Better than I’d hoped,” he answered. “Charlie gets to hang out with Olivia’s parents and her brother’s kids, and my parents and sisters. They’re all more involved in his life now.”
“Your younger sisters are both teachers, too, aren’t they?”
He nodded. “Both are pursuing their masters at the moment.”
“Degrees seem to run in your family, Leo.”
“Except for Audrey, who is totally unlike the rest of us.”
“Is she still working in the theater world in Los Angeles?”
“Still is.”
Olivia had once told Maddie that Leo had been raised in a family similar to that of Belle from Beauty and the Beast—brainy, creative, and just a little bit scatterbrained.
“There are books everywhere,” Olivia had said with fond confusion, “being read by everyone all the time.” Other than Leo, Olivia had related to Audrey best. The rest of the Donnellys, while certainly friendly, had perplexed her.
“Is Brandon still working as a bartender?” Leo asked.
Leo had only met Maddie’s family members a few times, and always at highly attended occasions like weddings. Yet he remembered everyone’s first name, plus details about them. “Yes, for a few hours a week. The rest of the time he’s a professional slacker.”
Leo gave one of his subdued smiles, and it set off fireworks within her.
Holy cow. Get a hold of thyself, Maddie.
“He graduated, didn’t he?” Leo asked.
What were they talking about? Ah. Brandon.
“Yes, he pursued the six-year plan and received a degree in video game design last spring before moving in with my parents. Since then, he’s been playing video games, but he hasn’t been designing any.
” Her younger brother was as content as he was shiftless.
“My dad has no idea where he went wrong with Brandon and me.”
“You’re not in the same category as Brandon. You have a great job.”
“I think so, but my dad’s not as convinced.” Her father had once had aspirations of etching Dr. Maddie Winslow and Dr. Brandon Winslow into the frosted glass of his office door beneath Dr. Thomas Winslow.
Instead, she ran a chocolate shop. Brandon slept late, ate everything in her parents’ pantry, and yelled instructions to professional athletes during games as if they could hear him. “My dad was hoping that, at the very least, I’d become a high-powered executive in San Francisco.”
“San Francisco?”
“I took a marketing job there right after college. I was miserable. I sat in a cubicle doing work I hated for a man who wasn’t very nice. I didn’t like the pressure or the anonymity or any of it. I was lonely.”
“So you came home.”
“I did.”
Until that time in her life, she’d thought she wanted to be a high-powered executive. Those two years had taught her differently. What she actually wanted was to live a simpler, more slow-paced life, surrounded by people she knew and cared about.
Maddie was an achiever, but she wasn’t motivated by money. What motivated her far more? The challenge of building Sweet Art into the best little chocolate shop it could be.
“You’re content with what you do, aren’t you?” Leo asked.
“Yes. I can post as many Instagram pictures as I want while on the job.” She grinned.
“Being a doctor or a high-powered executive is overrated.”
“You’re a doctor, Professor.”
“So I should know.” He looked into her eyes, and her muscles clenched with yearning.
The Saturday following her non-date with Leo, Maddie arrived at Carmichaels Christmas Tree Farm. Carmichaels, a local institution, was everything a person could want in a Christmas tree farm. Red barn in the center. Kindly farmer and his wife manning the property. Hot apple cider.
When Maddie and Leo had asked Kim what Christmas decorations they could supply, she’d informed them that she had plenty. Her only decorative need: a tree.
Happiness tugged at Maddie when she spotted Leo and Charlie waiting for her by the hot cider stand. It didn’t look like Kim and her girls had arrived yet.
Charlie ran to her on his short, robust legs. Leo had dressed him in corduroys, tiny Adidas sneakers, and his navy coat. “Hi!” he called, extending his hand as far into the sky as it would go.
Maddie knelt down to greet him. “Hi yourself. You look extra cute today.”
“You look cute today, too.”
“Why, thank you. What a gentlemanly thing to say. Are you ready to go shopping for Christmas trees?”
“Yes. Daddy says I can pick out a tree for our house.” Olivia’s blue eyes peered at her from Charlie’s mostly angelic, yet ever-so-slightly mischievous face.
Olivia’s eyes. Would there ever be a time when she’d look at Charlie’s face and not experience a twist of grief? Grief for Charlie, grief for Leo, and grief for herself?
“I’m sure the one you choose will be perfect,” she told Charlie as they made their way to Leo. “He tells me that you’ve given him permission to pick out a tree for your house,” Maddie called.
“I did. I like living dangerously.” Leo’s tan canvas jacket complemented the gold and light brown shades of his hair. His classic black Ray-Bans reflected back an image of herself standing before him, surrounded by a cool, overcast morning.
Charlie scampered off to receive a mug of cider from Mrs. Carmichael.
“You’re not worried he’ll pick out a twenty-foot-tall tree?” she asked, voice pitched low.
“I don’t intend to show him any of the twenty-foot-tall trees.” His lips curved. “Experience has taught me a few things.”
Maddie smiled back. “I’m planning to pick out a tree for my apartment today, too.”
“So we’ll be shopping for trees for three households?”
“Correct. However, since the church hasn’t given us funds for the Huntingtons yet, I want you to know that I’ll pay for the Huntington’s tree. I don’t want you to think I expect you to open your wallet and start covering Mission:Christmas expenses right off the bat.”