Page 145 of Just One More Thing

She looks at me for another second anyway, like she’s deciding whether she believes that. Then, quietly, “Can I stay awhile?”

My hand slides from the back of her neck down to her waist. “You can stay as long as you want, Mo.”

And God help me, I mean it in every possible way.

CHAPTER 35

JAKE

There are two kinds of people in this world.

People who go to the grocery store with a list.

And people like Emory Donovan, who walk in with no written plan.

I’m standing beside her in On The Bay Market, holding a basket that has, at some point, become my entire purpose in this operation while she studies a display of tomatoes like she’s judging a county fair.

“You’re overthinking it,” I tell her.

She doesn’t look up. “No. I’m selecting with intention.”

“You’ve been holding the same tomato for a full minute.”

“That’s because I care about quality.”

“I care about quality too.” I shift the basket to my other hand. “I also care about not growing old in produce.”

I grab one to move things along.

She takes it right out of my hand, replaces it with another, then drops the rejected tomato back into the pile.

“This one,” she says. “That one’s too firm.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Her mouth twitches.

That’s become one of my favorite things lately. That split second where she tries not to smile first. As if giving in too quickly means I somehow win.

She huffs out a laugh and drops two more tomatoes into the basket. “Now we need basil.”

“We have basil.”

“You have basil that looks like it lost the will to live three days ago.”

“It’s hanging on.” That earns me a look over her shoulder.

Evening light pours through the front windows across the old plank floors. On The Bay Market has been here longer than half the houses in town. Part grocery store. Part general store. Part place where people come in for milk and somehow leave with muck boots, strawberry preserves, boiled peanuts, and a personal update on three relationships.

The old Coca-Cola sign above the vintage bottle machine rattles every time the door opens. It’s been doing that since I was a kid. Nobody’s ever fixed it. Probably nobody even hears it anymore.

Miss Esther’s behind the deli counter, slicing meat with the concentration of a surgeon. A little boy in a Superman cape is dragging his exhausted mother toward the candy jars. Near the flowers, some poor bastard is asking if a bouquet can make up for forgetting his wife’s birthday.

It cannot.

And Mo’s standing in front of the herbs in shorts and a thin long sleeve tee, hair loosely pulled back, looking more at home here than she probably realizes.

I have to shift the basket again just to stop thinking about that too hard.