Page 21 of Hers By Summer’s End

“All right,” she muttered to it.

Hustling to the empty sideboard, she deposited the dahlias into the empty vase with much less ceremony than normal. Head Nurse Thelma poked her head from the children’s playroom, eyebrows climbing as Cecelia sailed past.

“Sorry about the Maurice Rivoire,” she called over her shoulder. “I’ll replace it tomorrow!”

Then she was back outside, hustling down the sidewalk. Where had they gone? She turned one way, then the other, before finally spotting them farther down the road. Still together. Still walking close together as if they were the closest of friends…or more.

She took a step in their direction, then another. Strictly speaking, she wasn’t following them. She merely happened to be walking down McGraw Street in precisely the same direction at a determined pace that may or may not occasionally take advantage of the stealth offered by a mailbox here and a box shrub there.

A dozen sensible reasons told her to turn around, but none could match the devouring need to know.

Why would Drew walk out with another woman scarcely a week after telling her that he meant it? Had she imagined the whole dreadful, wonderful thing? Had his declaration been nothing more than kindness, or worse, pity? Had he meant something entirely unrelated, and she’d simply agreed because she’d wanted it to be what she thought it was?

When the pair turned north onto Fourteenth Street, a growl of disbelief burst from her. There was only one reason to go to the northwest edge of the hill. Drew was taking Nurse Mary home with him. She crept forward, unable to stop watching how Drew took the nurse’s arm and directed her up the short walkway. And when he laughed softly, Nurse Mary’s perfect tinkling giggle joining his, Cecelia’s midriff sobbed.

It wasn’t fair.

She wanted to be the reason he laughed like that.

She waited until they disappeared inside the modest clapboard house before sneaking up the front path. She gritted her teeth against the acute knowledge that some may view her actions as trespassing or espionage. It was not. It was verification. Hypotheses required evidence, and she would have her answer, no matter how painful it turned out to be.

Hugging the side of the house, she carefully stepped between two lush hydrangeas. The glossy leaves and white lacecaps rustled as she pressed her nose against the nearest window. Drawn curtains! The coward. She pressed her ear to the pane, but the thick fabric swallowed any conversation within. Very well. She would just slip around to the back, find one more window, and then she could abandon this whole humiliating endeavor. Except when she rounded the corner, the back door stood open.

Her gaze swept through the yard, flitting over the cold frames overflowing with colorful swiss chard stalks and ripe red tomatoes, to the wooden greenhouse. Its door, too, was open. She made the connection in time to see the tail of Drew’s coat disappear inside.

A red haze clouded her vision.

Not only had he brought Nurse Mary home, but he’d invited her into his personal greenhouse. The most sacred place a gardener possessed. She stormed down the dirt path and entered the greenhouse with all the delicacy of a charging boar.

Drew whirled around. “Cecelia? What are you…?”

Some distant, sensible corner of Cecelia's mind suggested she pause. Breathe. Assemble a coherent sentence that didn’t paint her as a complete imbecile.

“I thought you meant it,” she hissed instead.

His eyebrows climbed to his hairline. “I did.”

“Then perhaps we should have clarified what, precisely, you meant, because” —her jittery hands took to waving wildly through the air— “at no point did I imagine it included inviting Nurse Mary into your greenhouse when you’ve never invited me!”

Drew stared at her, utterly flummoxed.

Oh Lord, what would Nurse Mary think of her outburst? Cecelia sought her out, only to realize with horror that she wasn’t there.

Her arms fell limp at her sides. No wonder Drew bore that look. It was the one that sprang into place anytime she toed—or merrily hopped over—the lines of propriety. Whenever she spoke too boldly, questioned too freely, or forgot to make herself smaller. Whenever she was simply…herself.

She was on the cusp of accepting defeat when the corners of his mouth twitched. Within seconds, he was grinning so broadly she could nearly count every last one of his teeth. Hope and irritation warred for first place within her.

“You were following me,” he said. “You were worried I was courting someone else.”

“Well, I⁠—”

“You think I'd all but pour my heart out to you one day, then bring another woman home the next.”

“Well, I⁠—”

“You, Cecelia Townsend” —he propped one hip on the edge of a potting bench and folded his arms over his chest with far too much satisfaction— “are feeling a bit jealous.”

“There’s no bit about it,” she flung back. “I am extremely jealous.”