Epilogue
The first fall breeze stirred her hair as she walked down the sidewalk of Phantom Bayou.
Weird, because she didn’t see any trees moving, didn’t hear the chimes hanging outside Allison’s shop.
She kept her phone out as she walked, documenting the changes going on in town—the shelving being placed in the new grocery store, the pots of bright yellow mums in planters outside the front door of the diner with its shiny new windows, the long wooden sign going up over the space beside Allison’s shop.
Guillory Hardware.
Pastor Dan stood outside supervising, pride softening his expression as he leaned on his cane. He glanced over when she walked up beside him.
“Sam’s not here to see this?”
“He’s on his way, said not to wait.” He gave her arm a gentle squeeze. “Thank you for this. It’s going to be good having him home.”
“That was his decision, not mine.”
“But you gave him that option.”
Sam’s truck rumbled up. He parked on the wrong side of the street behind the crane, hopped out and pulled Erielle in for a kiss that made his father clear his throat in mock disapproval. Grinning, Sam kept his arm looped around her neck as he turned to gaze up at the sign being lifted in place.
“I like it. Nice clean lines, easy to read. Good call, Guillory,” she said.
“And it fits in with the design of the town,” he said. “Looks like it could have been here all along.”
She lifted her phone to capture it all, from the upturned faces of the Guillory father and son to the sign, recording until it settled into place.
Then she tucked her phone away and looked up at Sam. “Did the new scroll saw come in?”
“You came down to ask me that?” He feigned injury with an exaggerated frown.
“I didn’t, but I did want to see if I can get a lesson on it soon to replace the gingerbread on the porch.”
He lifted her hand to his lips, rolled her new engagement ring against the base of her finger with his thumb. “We are not risking these precious hands. I’ll make it, however you want it. But yes, it’s here.”
She glanced over his shoulder at his dad, who was talking to one of the crane operators. “Can you show it to me?”
His brow creased for a moment, and he led her into the shop through the wooden doors he’d built to fit.
He led her back to the scroll saw, out of sight of the windows, and lifted her onto it, stepping between her legs.
A little sizzle passed through her fingers, lifting a few strands of his hair, just before she threaded her fingers through his hair to pull him close for a kiss.
“I love you, my little witch.”
That evening, back at the house, she opened her phone and the video she’d shot of the town earlier, uploaded it to her socials.
“Dear Fellow Foodies,” she typed. “You will never guess what I’ve been up to.”
Another sizzle went through her as she looked at Sam, watching her, and she took his hand to go upstairs.
In the workroom, beneath the shelves, the warning Sam had scrawled in black marker on the painting began to fade.