“Sugar, you’re going to be done awfully fast, there’s no stock to be put away.” She comes around and points. “It’s all done. It was done four days ago.”

“But?”

“I came in to check on things so I could get the stock room cleaned before you go back to school, but . . .” Mama looks around the store with a smile. “It was already done.”

For the first time since I got here, I actually look around, and my mouth drops. Everything is done. It’s all put away, there are bins holding the overflow with it all in order. I go over each row in the back room with so many things racing in my head.

Only Wyatt knew how bad things were. Surely, he wouldn’t . . .

Would he have told his brother?

I don’t even know what to say.

Trent is the only one who would’ve done all this. It would’ve taken him hours to figure out all the boxes. This would’ve taken me a week, and he did it without me askin’.

“Trent?” I breathe as a smile stretched over my lips.

“He was here the other day and asked me not to say anything. He did good,” Mama remarks.

“Yeah, he did.”

Mama pats my back. “I think we should talk, sugar.”

This might be the time to tell her about my concerns with the store. She’s just so stubborn, and I know this won’t go well.

“Sure, Mama. I wanted to talk to you about somethin’, too.”

“Go on and sit, honey.”

We move around to the two chairs, and she takes my hand in hers, which is something she has always done. She used to say it was so she felt connected. It’s probably why I do it as well. Her dark blue eyes that mirror mine are filled with worry.

Fear starts to build as she doesn’t say anything. She’s usually very forthright, so her hesitation starts my mind reeling with what could be wrong. Considering what the Henningtons are dealing with, I start to worry and bite my bottom lip. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, I’m just fine,” she says, laughing. “It’s nothing like that, I’ll be around for a long time. I’ve been thinkin’, and you see, Macie, Becca, and Vivienne are all retired now . . .” A rush of relief courses through me, this is even better. It’s her idea, and now I don’t have to be the bad guy. “And I just would like to be able to do coffee dates and card games with them. With Rhett’s treatments startin’, we’re all going to help during the day. I know you work, but maybe you can take over the store and hire people to manage it?”

I do my best to hide my emotions and look a little disappointed. “Well, it would be an undertakin’.” Her grip tightens a little. “But you and Daddy need to enjoy your time.”

She scoffs. “Who said I wanted to spend time with him? I see him so much now that I’m surprised I haven’t beaten him with a rollin’ pin.”

I burst out laughing. “Oh, Mama.”

“You wait, Grace Louise. You just wait. Spend fifty years with the same man and then come back to me. I’m a damn saint, and that man is the devil some days.”

A saint? Oh, dear Lord.

“Whatever you say, Mama. I’ll take over the store. Don’t you worry.”

Her eyes tighten a little as she tilts her head. “Hmmm.”

“What?” I ask.

She leans back and taps her chin. “What was it you wanted to talk to me about?”

“You know, I can’t remember.”

Crap. She’s on to me .

“Right.”

“Well, let me know how you want to handle all this. I’ll start lookin’ for a manager and some workers.”

There are a lot of kids who are trying to save, and this would be the perfect job for them. I hop up, knowing she’s about to pry into what I wanted to talk to her about when we sat. “I love you, Mama.”

“I love you, too, sugar.”

Phew, that was close.

I spend the rest of the day preparing the store before I have to start back at school. I put a few flyers outside to advertise that we are hiring and call the local paper so I can put an ad in tomorrow’s edition. Mama may drag her feet a little, but knowing her best friends are all pushing her, she won’t doddle too much and I can rest easier about the future.

* * *

I t’s finally Friday . Trent has been messing with me all week about what we’re doing today. He’s been at his parents’ all morning, and I’m on pins and needles.

“Hi, darlin’.” My father says as I saddle Lightning.

“Hi, Daddy.”

I walk over and kiss his cheek before watching him shuffle over to his workbench and take a seat.

“You’re goin’ out on a ride?”

“Trent is supposed to be meeting me,” I explain.

He smiles. “I heard somethin’ about that. You women are more confusin’ than that confounded cube thing we used to try to make line up. Remember that?” I nod. “Damn thing made me so mad I peeled the stickers off and won. Anyway, so Trent is who you chose?”

“I think you knew I was going to choose him, didn’t you?”

“Did I ever tell you the story about how I decided I loved your Mama?”

“I’ve heard Mama’s version.” I abandon the leather straps I’m trying to tighten and move to where my dad sits.

“She don’t tell it right.” He waves his hand dismissively. “It wasn’t like one of those books she likes to read.”

My mother has always been creative in her storytelling. Daddy is always more realistic, but as a kid, I loved her version. It was filled with undeniable love and magic. Who the hell wouldn’t want that?

Maybe that’s my damn problem.

“We were only seventeen when we met, two weeks before my eighteenth. I just enlisted and was leaving in a month for basic. All I wanted to do was serve my country. Your granddaddy was a Marine, his daddy was a Marine, and by God, I was going to be, too. She was the prettiest thing I’d ever seen, and she was dating some idiot from another town.”

Here’s where my mother would tell me that he fell head over heels in love with her the second their eyes met. And he walked over to her, told her they were going to get married, and she was going to love him because he loved her already.

“I told her he was a fool, and if she would go on one date with me, I’d show her what a real man was like.”