Page 80 of Enchanted to Meet You

None of this was good. None of this was good at all.

It confirmed what he’d already realized that morning, wakingin Jessica’s bed—Pye a dead weight on top of him, a gentle rain pattering down on the roof above him, Jessica sleeping there so peacefully beside him. This was the happiest he’d ever felt in his life.

All signs pointed to the fact that West Harbor was about to suffer another of its ninety year calamities. In forty-eight hours—maybe less—this town would be underwater, on fire, or possibly simply a gaping hole. And because the population of this sleepy village was now so dense, this time the death toll would be staggering.

Yet he could not remember ever feeling this happy.

How was he supposed to do his job if he couldn’t be impartial?

He’d thought that dragging himself out for a run in that cold, stinging rain would cure him, smack some sense into him, bring him back to reality.

But the only thing that happened was the rain stopped, he saw the neighbor, and then he saw the object of his happiness herself, standing outside her house in her robe, and his heart seized up—until he realized she was safe.

That’s when he knew that he wasn’t going to be able to run away from the happiness he was feeling. Worse, that he wanted to stay. He cared. He actuallycared. He wanted to come home to her like this every day.

Except that unless something extraordinary occurred, she soon wouldn’t have a home.

This awareness pressed down on his heart more heavily than a hundred Pyes.

Not that there was anything he could do about it at the moment. Jessica had gotten over her perfectly legitimate fear that Rosalie had somehow booby-trapped her new car almost as soon as she got behind the wheel.

“I never thought I could love any car as much as Bluebell,” Jessica said later, after their shower (and subsequent return to bed). They were sitting inside Wake Up West Harbor, at a table where she could gaze at her new car through the window. “But I think I could learn to.”

This became even more evident when the server who’d brought them their breakfast suddenly let out an expletive after attempting to run Derrick’s credit card to pay for breakfast—they were on paranormal business, Derrick reasoned when Jessica tried to argue with him that they should at least split the bill, so he should pay.

“Internet is down,” Stacy, the server, groused.

Jessica reached immediately for her bag. “Ugh, again? I know how you feel. The Internet goes down at my shop all the time. But that’s okay, I have cash. We really have to go.” She wanted to get back into her new car as quickly as possible, to drive it some more. They were delivering more gowns she’d hemmed, including Gabby’s.

“Yeah, but this time the Internet’s down all over town.” Stacy shook her head. She’d picked up her phone and was scrolling her texts. “Online school is canceled today. God knows what my kid is up to instead.”

Jessica instantly snatched up her own phone.

“Oh my God. It’s true.” She leaned forward to show Derrick a text from Dina. “The king tide from last night took out a chunk of the road where, in their infinite wisdom, they laid the Internet cables.”

Derrick knit his brow. “So what does that—”

“Sal’s declared it a day of community service. He wants all the kids from the high school to go over to the village square to help clean and paint in preparation for tomorrow’s festivities since they can’t be in class.” She shook her head so forcefully that her curls swayed. “Ha! Good luck with that.”

Derrick considered this. “It might work to our advantage, though.”

“How?”

“Now is the time for me to be training Esther—and you—for the fight ahead.”

Anxiety creased Jessica’s forehead at the word “fight,” but she lifted her tea. “Let’s go.”

Which was how, a few hours later, they ended up standing in a barren field in front of a line of pumpkins Derrick had balanced along a wooden fence several dozen yards away.

“You can’t be serious,” Esther said, after Derrick had explained to her what he wanted her to do.

“Just try it.”

Jessica was leaning against the hood of her car. Of course she knew the farmer who owned the field. She’d supplied his wife, daughters, and one son with clothes for all the important occasions in their lives—proms, graduations, weddings. Farmer Frank was more than willing to give her some of his more misshapen pumpkins that were unlikely to sell. He’d also allowed her to park on his back field for what she’d called “a little target practice.”

“But I don’t want to hurt you,” Esther protested.

“They’re pumpkins, Esther. And they’re fifty feet away,” Derrick pointed out. “And you didn’t hurt anyone yesterday in Jessica’s office.”