Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 75683 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75683 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
“Let me guess,” she said, shooting me a knowing smile. “She is embarrassed about it because it was your brother.”
“You know your daughter well,” I said, grabbing a handful of clover and tossing it into the five-gallon bucket I’d found at the side of the house. It was already more than halfway full of plucked weeds.
“I do,” she agreed, moving herself down to the very edge of the garden bed. There wasn’t much left to do. I’d been taking my frustration out on all the damn dandelions, clover, and creeping Charlie plants. When she was done with the weeds on the end, though, she stood up, gathering her kneeler, likely set on the beds in the backyard. “Can I say something, Nino?” she asked, head cocking to the side a bit as she looked down at me.
“Sure,” I agreed, nodding.
“I think I know my daughter well enough to know that she is letting you take care of her not because you are forcing her, but because she likes you,” she said, nodding for emphasis. “And I don’t know what is holding you back, Mr. Grassi, but I think you should make it clear that the feeling is mutual.”
And with that, she was spinning around, and disappearing to the dark at the back of the house.
Leaving me to sit there on my knees in the grass, wondering if I was reading way too much into what she said.
No.
Not what she said.
The emphasis on two particular words.
Mr. Grassi.
Was it just me, or did she say it in a way that suggested she knew exactly who I was? And what I did?
But if she knew, why didn’t Savannah?
CHAPTER TWELVE
Savannah
“Mom!” I yelped when I stepped off onto the back porch to see her sitting there, already cradling a cup of tea between her hands, rocking in one of my chairs, looking the picture of calm and happy.
While my thoughts raged out of control.
Mostly about Nino.
And his brother.
And the whole, you know, incident.
He could try to sugarcoat it all he wanted; I was well aware of what a fool I must have looked like to his family.
I was never someone who stressed so much about making a good first impression. But that was also likely because I’d never been so serious with a guy that I got to the ‘meeting the family’ stage.
I mean, not that I was serious about Nino.
Well, yeah, you could draft up a pretty good argument about my sexual feelings for Nino being pretty damn serious. And, fine, yeah, I was even pretty into the guy. Especially after sitting across from him over a meal and listening to him talk about his life and his family.
He would laugh and smile.
And, yes, get those sexy little eye crinkles while he did so.
I liked him.
But we weren’t, you know, dating.
He was just a nice guy who felt guilty about me getting shot.
“Good morning, my sweet angel child,” she said, making me let out a little snort as I sat down in the chair beside her, taking a greedy sip of my coffee.
I know I’d promised Nino I would rest. And while I had kept my butt in bed, I hadn’t exactly been sleeping. I’d busied myself with my little projects and some light reading to try to quiet my mind. But when I kept screwing up my stitches and sketches and having to re-read the same page fifteen times, and still not absorbing any of it, I gave up, slid down in the bed, and tried to sleep.
I failed miserably at that, too consumed with thoughts of a man who didn’t seem to want anything serious with me, until eventually, my pain medicine kicked in, and I passed out.
“You really shouldn’t have weeded. This is too much. You’re going to burn out,” I insisted.
“Oh, I didn’t do all of it,” she said. “Nino did the front bed,” she added. Light. Breezy. Like she hadn’t just dropped that little bomb.
“Wait… what? Nino?”
“Yes, darling. When I got here this morning, he had already finished the front bed. He did a good job too. I don’t think he accidentally pulled a single flower of yours.”
“His mom used to make him weed her garden,” I told her.
“So, you’ve talked about his mother, have you?” she asked, and I didn’t quite understand the tone she was using. That was weird, since I’d lived and worked with her my entire life. I thought I knew all of her tones.
“Yeah. He talks about his family a lot. They’re all very close.”
“That’s nice,” she said in that same odd tone. A little tight, tense around the edges. And my mother was never tense.
Maybe it was all the work starting to get to her.
She was doing too much.
I needed to find a way to do a little more without hurting myself any further.