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“We will.”
Her mother’s shoulders sagged with relief. “Great. I really need to attend this class. C’mere and give me a hug.”
The moment of being wrapped in her mother’s arms ended all too soon for Willow. However, the whirlwind of emotion churning through her had settled a bit with her mother’s hug. She was able to think more clearly. As the driver went to shut the door, Willow took a big step forward and called, “Hold on a second. Mom, one thing. Why is a last-minute drawing class in New Mexico so important to you?”
“Ask Noah.”
“Noah? Noah Tannehill?”
“Yes.”
Now Willowreallydidn’t understand. “What does he have to do with any of this?”
“He has everything to do with this. Ask him to explain about my passion. The tock is clicking. Let’s go, Mark.”
The driver shut the door. Her mother smiled and waved through the window as the sedan pulled away from the curb.
“Passion?” Willow watched the car depart, a sense of disbelief rolling through her. “What could Noah possibly know about my mother’s passion?”
Chapter Eight
WHEN NOAH FELL INTObed the night of Jake Prentice’s wedding, he was done with people. He slept in on Sunday morning and did chores around the house that afternoon. Monday morning, he started a new project in his workshop. By the time the crunch of tires warned him of an approaching vehicle on Wednesday afternoon, he’d had his recluse hat firmly back on his head. He hadn’t left his property once.
Whatever was coming up the lane wasn’t big enough to be a delivery truck. Noah scowled down at the piece of balsa wood he’d painted a rich purple.
“Now what?”
At the sound of his voice, Marigold lifted her head from her bed in the corner. Her big brown eyes stared at him balefully. None of her six three-week-old actively nursing pups were distracted from the business at hand.
Noah debated his next move. He could rise from his workbench seat and investigate the intruder. He could stay right where he was and wait to be found. Or he could escape out the back door and hide in the woods.
That last wouldn’t work. Mari would shake off her pups and lead the interloper right to him. He might as well wait for the trespasser to track him down or leave. Besides, he had a niggling suspicion about who might be driving the car whose engine had just shut off in front of his house.
This time, it only took Goldilocks about four minutes to track him down in his workshop. Of course, the open door and music from his stereo provided some hard-to-miss clues. Noah wasn’t surprised when Willow Eldridge walked into his workshop. She looked… well… how to describe her? Gorgeous went without saying. But she was a Viking queen, tall and regal, and judging by the heat flaming in her eyes, ready to go to war. Despite being somewhat forewarned, the first words out of her mouth flabbergasted him.
“Are we dealing with a Mrs. Robinson situation here?” Willow asked, her arms folded and her toe tapping.
Noah dragged his gaze away from the way her arms pillowed her breasts. “Excuse me?”
“The Graduate.The movie.”
“Uh… Dustin Hoffman?” Noah sputtered a laugh. “From, like, the seventies?”
“Nineteen sixty-seven. I looked it up. My mother wasn’t even in kindergarten yet at the time. As a modern woman, I should be able to say,You go, girl, but I’ll be honest—I’ve never been a fan of the age-gap trope.”
“Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Hold on just one minute. Are you seriously accusing me of sleeping with your mother?”
“Yes! No! I don’t know,” she said as she paced back and forth just inside the workshop doorway. Sunlight beaming through the opening caught a glimmer of fire in her hair that he hadn’t noticed before. A little strawberry in that blond. How had he missed it? He’d always had a thing forstrawberry blondes. “What the hell, Noah? You should have told me you were dating her.”
“Dating her! Did she tell you that?”
“No, but—”
Exasperated, Noah interrupted. “Something put that idea into your head.”
“Not something. Someone! Okay, maybe I don’t really think y’all are role-playing classic movie characters, but something happened at the wedding.”
Noah ran his hand down his face as he put some clues together. Talk about a minefield. He exhaled heavily. “Willow, don’t get me wrong. Your mother is a lovely woman, and I don’t know what anyone has tried to tell you about what they think they saw at the wedding, but—”
