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“This is delicious,” Levi said, dabbing at his mouth with a napkin Grace had handed to him from the basket in the center of the table.
“We’re glad you could make the trip up here today, Levi,” her father said with a friendly smile, one Grace knew was genuine. “Tell me more about that new sprinkler system you mentioned.”
Grace tried not to roll her eyes as her father and Micah talked farming with Levi. She cleared away the empty dishes, setting them in the portable dishwasher with a butcher block top, refilled tea glasses, then gave her mother a look that caused her to smile in understanding.
“You can talk farming another day, Mike,” Jo-Ann Marshall declared to her husband. “Let the poor boy get on the road before it gets any later.”
“You sure we can’t talk you into staying, Levi?” Mike asked. “If you’d be more comfortable, there’s a hotel in town. It’s a little run down, but the rooms are clean.”
Levi glanced at Grace, and she poured all of her silent pleading for him to stay into that one look. He winked at her and nodded his head. “I suppose I could stay one night, but I’ll get a room at the hotel.”
After he thanked her parents for their hospitality, she walked with him out to his pickup, kissing his cheek since Jason pulled up with a carload of relatives, stealing what moments of privacy they may have had.
“Come for breakfast, and then we can go to church together.”
“I’ll see you then, Grace.” Levi squeezed her hand before he got into the pickup and drove off, taking her heart along for the ride.
“Ma!Youdoknowyou don’t have to feed everyone all by yourself, don’t you?” Levi asked as he packed a huge platter full of sliced watermelon out to the tables set up in their backyard.
Every Fourth of July, his parents hosted a barbecue for his mother’s relatives. To Levi, it seemed like she had hordes of them, but for the most part, he’d enjoy the day. Everyone would arrive shortly before noon, and they’d eat until they felt like their stomachs would burst from all the good food. After lounging around for an hour and visiting, anyone who wanted could join in a baseball game held in the pasture, where there was no chance of a stray ball breaking a window.
He and his dad had spent part of the morning setting up tables and chairs. Levi had cleaned up the baseball equipment and hauled it out to the pasture, which he’d mowed with the swather last week.
The past few days, his mother had nearly run his legs off, asking him and his dad and some of their hired hands to help get the place “ready for company,” as she called it. They’d hosed off the outside of all the buildings, washed windows, and mowed the lawn and edged it, all while Stella Gibson had barked orders like a general in the Army. When she wasn’t in the kitchen cooking for the holiday, she was pointing out where she wanted new plants placed or mapping out the exact location for the tables and chairs set around the backyard.
Grace had come out yesterday when she’d gotten off work and helped Levi hang patriotic bunting along the front and back porches. She’d even helped his mother make flower arrangements for the tables and offered a few ideas for additional decorations.
Levi was excited to spend the day with her, and he was glad she’d talked Cindy into coming along. Since the holiday fell in the middle of the week, the girls didn’t want to try to make a quick trip to Holiday. Levi was more than happy to invite them to join in his family’s day of festivities.
When he heard gravel crunch, he jogged around the corner of the house and waved as Grace parked her car down by the barn, out of the way. She and Cindy hopped out, each of them carrying food as they headed toward him.
Levi waited at the edge of the yard, savoring the opportunity to watch Grace move. She was, as her name implied, full of grace. Today, she wore a navy and white polka-dot mini dress nipped in at the waist with a red belt. As she walked, though, he realized the slits in the front of the skirt were to show off a pair of red and white polka-dot shorts worn beneath the top.
Her luxurious brown hair bounced in curls cascading from the top of her head where she’d pinned it.
“Pie!” he called, making her roll her eyes and Cindy laugh.
Cindy held up a pie dish. “How did you know I was making a strawberry pie?” she teased, fully aware he referred to Grace by the abbreviated nickname he’d given to her. Sometimes he called her Pie, other times, it was Meripie. Often, it was Miss American Pie, but it was always said with love.
His attendance at her cousin’s wedding a few weeks ago had shifted something between the two of them. It was as though the effort he’d made to be there for her and the approval he’d received from her family had somehow deepened and strengthened their relationship.
Levi still had no idea what his future might hold, especially when it came to Grace, but he’d decided for now to enjoy a summer of being in love. Of holding a beautiful girl in his arms, his heart, and his dreams and not worrying about what would happen later.
Today was more than enough.
“Hi,” Grace said, leaning in to kiss his cheek.
At the last second, Levi turned his head so the kiss landed right on his lips.
Grace blushed as she stepped back, aware of his parents watching them from a distance.
“What did you bring?” he asked, looking at the plate she held covered by a tall cake dome.
“Sock-it-to-me cake.”
“A whozeewhatzit cake?” he asked, pretending not to understand her.
Grace elbowed him in the side, making him grunt with feigned injury. “I found the recipe in a magazine last week. I don’t know where the name came from, but it’s basically a buttery Bundt cake with pecans and a caramel swirl, topped with more caramel glaze and nuts. I seem to recall someone around here has a fondness for pecans.”
