Page 21 of Pumpkin Spice Promises

Beau’s expression softened, and I became aware that I was still wearing his jacket. I pulled the front more tightly around myself instead of removing it.

“I worked at Marigold Ranch one summer,” he said. “Your Pops taught me how to back a trailer without taking out half a fence.”

“He taught me the same thing.”

“Did you take out the fence?”

“Twice.”

His smile came easily then, warm enough to change his entire face. “I only did it once.”

“That he told you about.”

The smile widened.

There was an ease to him I hadn’t noticed while he was ordering me toward heaters and handing me water. It made him look younger than the seriousness he wore while working, though there was nothing boyish about the shoulders filling out his coveralls.

I turned away from him before I spent too long noticing.

“The milk,” I said, remembering why the truck had been on the road in the first place. “Was any of it damaged?”

“Most of the crates stayed upright,” Jax said. “They were covered, but I don’t know how long they can sit.”

“Not much longer.”

“I can put them in the shop refrigerator,” Beau offered.

“There are twelve crates.”

He glanced toward the miniature refrigerator beside the desk. “Not that one.”

“We have an industrial refrigerator in the parts room,” Jax explained. “Dad bought it when Clover started bringing enough food here to feed every mechanic in Georgia.”

“Clover?” I asked.

“Our sister,” Beau said. “She works at Sugar and Pine.”

“June’s bakery?”

He nodded. “If June is one of your deliveries, Clover can take it when she leaves work. She usually stops here before heading home.”

“I can’t ask your sister to do that.”

“You didn’t,” Beau replied, “I offered.”

“But you haven’t even asked her yet.”

“She’ll say yes.”

“You sound far too confident.”

“You clearly haven’t met my sister then.”

Jax carried the first crate inside before I could object again. Beau followed him, leaving me alone with Pops’s photograph and a problem that was somehow being solved around me without my permission.

The sensible response would have been gratitude.

Instead, unease tightened my stomach.