by Ava Miles
“Indeed,” she said, “and that was my plan.”
He laughed. “If you knew what my plan was tonight… Let’s just say yours was so much better. Now, I need to see this Japanese quilt Paige told me about. I have strict instructions to help you believe you’re an artist.”
“Really, Riley…” she said, ducking from his gaze.
“No ‘really, Riley,’” he answered, lifting her chin until she met his eyes. “I mean it. Show me the quilt, Sadie.”
“Fine,” she said, taking his hand and leading him upstairs, “but this is really personal for me. Your opinion means so much.”
When they reached the room, he stopped in the doorway. “Is that it?” he asked, pointing to the half-made quilt on the bed, a quilt unlike any he’d ever seen. It was more like a painting. From this angle he couldn’t see how she’d made the sky look like it was a windy day—he only knew that it did. Whatever her technique, it showed a magic and an artistry that awed him.
“Yes, that’s it,” she said, clearing her throat.
“My God,” he managed to say. “Sadie, it’s…it’s…I need to compose myself. Can I touch it?”
When he ran his fingers over the precise stitching, he shook his head. “I can feel the wind blowing. Sadie…this is…one of the most beautiful pieces of art I’ve ever seen. The blue and gray hues you used for the sky, the stitching…it feels alive to me. My God, I never knew. Sadie, this tops anything I’ve ever created.”
“Oh, don’t say that,” she said, her face stricken. “I didn’t mean for your feelings to be hurt.”
He looked over and smiled at her. “Oh, they aren’t. I’m great at what I do, and I love it. But some people’s artistic vision and ability is out in a…different stratosphere…like Beethoven or Warhol or Chagall. Your work is going to go in a museum someday. Mark my words.”
“Huh?” she spurted out.
He almost laughed. “Sadie, you shouldn’t be selling your quilts in the craft store anymore. You need a bigger audience. Heck, you should be charging a buttload for something like this.”
Her chest rose with a huge breath, and she looked like she was going to have a panic attack at that thought.
“Okay, let’s leave those last points for another chat,” he said, holding out his hand. “Come here and take a deep breath.”
She clasped it and stood next to him, calming herself. “I called it ‘The Promised Land.’ It’s where all things are possible.”
“I like that,” he said, aware of the biblical reference. It wasn’t heavy-handed though. She was conveying an idea he could relate to—a place full of purity and warmth and comfort. He wanted to live in a land like that.
“I’m glad you like it,” she said.
“I more than like it,” he responded, facing her. “I want to take a picture and text my brother because his mind is going to explode, and then you’ll have one more person telling you the truth. Sadie, you’re an artist.”
She ducked her chin. “I just do what I love.”
Okay, he was going to have to be a little tougher. “Yes, but I want you to do something for me.”
Her smile was immediate when she met his gaze. God, she was beautiful. “Every morning and every time you start quilting, I want you to say, ‘I’m an artist.’ Will you do that for me?”
Because if she needed to start there until she could do it for herself, that was totally fine in his book.
“I’ll try,” she said, “but—”
“Remember what Yoda says,” he interrupted. “‘There is no try.’”
She leveled him a look. “Seriously, did you have to bring a Yoda reference into this moment?”
“It’s who I am,” he said with a shrug.
“I think you need to kiss me,” she said, her lips twitching. “To help convince me I’m an artist.”
“I can do that,” he answered, kissing her softly on the lips. “How long do you think it’s going to take for you to believe it?”
“A pretty long time,” she whispered.
Oddly, he was more than okay with that.
Chapter 15
“Here we go,” Paige heard Mark say beside her as she scanned the row of people waiting to welcome her on the simple front porch.
“I didn’t expect this…” she said, gesturing to the welcoming committee.
Her sisters were standing next to their men, save Sadie, who was holding a newborn, likely Tory and Rye Crenshaw’s. When her eyes found Rye, she wanted to shiver. My goodness, he was compelling in person. Pull it together, Paige.
Two kids broke away from J.P. and ran toward their car. Paige knew they had to be Rory and Annabelle, and she couldn’t help but smile. Both of them were adorable, the little boy dressed in a white dress shirt with a red bow tie and the little girl in a yellow dress dotted with hearts. In her hand was a princess crown, and somehow Paige knew it was for her daughter. How sweet!
Haley jumped out of her booster seat. “Oh, they look so nice. Can we get out of the car yet?”
Mark chuckled and patted her knee before opening his car door. Haley didn’t need an invitation to burst out after him. When Paige opened her own door, she realized her seat belt was still on.
Her husband gave her a knowing look and waited until she was standing next to him. Taking her hand, he squeezed it once before turning his attention to the children.
“Hi there!” the little girl fairly shouted as she ran up to Haley. “I’m Annabelle and this is my brother, Rory. We’re your cousins, and we’re so happy to meet you. This is your crown. Sadie told us you like to be a princess. Me too!”
Haley gave the younger girl an inquiring look as she took the crown. “Are you going to wear one?”
“Yep,” Annabelle said, putting her hands on her little hips. “Mama said we can wear princess outfits later, but she made me put on this dress first because you’re company. Do you want to see our tree house? Aunt Susannah painted the inside, and there’s a prince and a princess.”
“Welcome to our home,” J.P said, coming down the sidewalk at an easy pace.
He shook hands with Mark and then gently kissed Paige on the cheek.
“It’s good to see y’all. I see you’ve already met Rory and Annabelle. They’ve been eager to meet you.”
“Do you like dogs?” Annabelle asked her daughter.
“I like small ones,” Haley said.
“You need to meet Barbie,” Annabelle told her. “She’s my dog. Uncle Rye gave her to me when we moved here.”
“Annabelle, give her some space,” Rory said. “There’s plenty of time for her to meet the dogs. Haley, if you need anything, you just let me know. Dad asked me to watch out for you today.”
Although Sadie had told her about the awful man who was Rory’s biological father, it was wonderful to see the affection between the boy and J.P. Clearly J.P. had become his father in every way that mattered.
J.P. sent Haley a wink. “There’s a lot of people, and Rory knows where everything is. Haley, do you want to put your princess crown on?”
She lifted her shoulder. “I’ll wait until Annabelle does, thank you.”
“Annabelle, run along and get your crown,” he told her. Turning back to Paige and Mark, he said, “I think you’ve met almost everyone.”
“They haven’t met me.” Paige watched as Rye Crenshaw ambled forward. “Hi, I’m Rye.” He shook hands with Mark, patted Haley on the head, and then pulled Paige in for a hug. “Everyone else seems to be observing some crazy welcome wagon rules. I might not be your blood kin, but this brother of yours is my brother just the same. I hope you’re prepared to share him because I can’t do without him.”
His big hit, “Cracks in the Glass House,” had gotten her through some tough times. Maybe she could tell him someday. “You’re in my phone.” Wait. Had she really just said that?
Rye barked out a laugh. “I heard that flustered you a touch. You’re welcome to holler at me anytime if you need something. Despite what some people
might say around here, I’m pretty responsible.”
“No you aren’t, Uncle Rye,” Annabelle said. “You let the dogs out all of the time and—”
“Hush.” Rye plucked her off the ground. “You’ve been listening to your Aunt Tory. Well, come on, y’all. There are more people to meet. Vander! You’re the newest member of this here family. Come on forward and meet our new kin.”
Paige felt her nerves tighten when she heard Vander’s name. He was the one who’d helped her siblings find their father. He’d talked to him. And being a private investigator, she imagined he knew every sordid detail there was to know about her mother. She felt Mark lean in, sensing she needed extra support.
Shelby marched forward, hand in hand with a striking man. Vander.
“Rye, only you would upset the apple cart,” Shelby said, giving him a little shove. “We talked about the introductions.”
“Y’all are over-complicating things,” he said, “and making these nice people more nervous.”
Her nerves had to be fairly obvious, Paige realized with some chagrin. She’d barely said two words since leaving the car.
“Hi, Shelby,” she muttered, coughing to clear her throat.
“Don’t mind Rye,” Shelby said, giving him a look. “This is my Vander, and trust me, he’s always responsible.”
“Nice to meet you,” Shelby’s fiancé said in a flat Yankee cadence, his eyes steady on her. “I’m really happy this has turned out to be such a happy reconciliation.”
She had to cough again. No doubt he’d seen some unpleasant reunions in his line of work. Thank God her daddy had cut and run from them. She never wanted to meet him.
“Hey, y’all,” Susannah said, coming up behind the couple. “This is my husband, Jake.”
The handsome man gave them a kind smile. He was quietly magnetic—the complete opposite to Rye’s larger-than-life persona. “Good to meet you. Welcome. You let me know if you need anything too.”
“We’ve listened to you on the radio,” Haley said to him, tapping her crown against her leg. “You too, Mr. Crenshaw.”
“It’s plain ol’, Rye, sugar,” he insisted. “Clayton, get on over here. Now, you’ve already met my sister, Amelia Ann. Her husband, Clayton, is my manager.”
“And then some,” a tall man in a white cowboy hat said. “Nice to meet y’all. We’re happy the McGuiness clan found you. Sadie surprised us some with her gumption.”
“I always knew she had more than she was letting on,” Rye said. “Come and meet my baby boy, Boone. He’s the light of my life.”
Along the way, they stopped to hug Tammy, who was on her way into the house. Tory came forward and welcomed them warmly.
“I see you have the best seat in the house,” Paige said to Sadie, her eyes zooming in on the little miracle swaddled in a white blanket. “Oh, he’s so beautiful.”
“Hi, Paige,” Sadie said, that baby-glow on her face. “Hi, Mark. Hi, Haley.”
“Mama, can I see him?” Haley asked, rising on her tippy toes.
Mark picked her up, and she reached out a hand to touch him.
“Gently now,” Mark told her. “Y’all have a beautiful boy there.”
He gave her a look. When she’d gotten her period again yesterday, he’d told her they’d just keep trying and wrapped her up in his arms. Her heart pinched with worry. Would they ever have another baby?
“We think he’s the most beautiful baby in the world,” Tory said, “but we’re partial.”
“Takes after me,” Rye drawled, rocking forward on his cowboy boots and touching the baby’s soft cheek.
“In some areas,” Tory said, elbowing him in the gut. “You’d think Rye had invented babies from the way he goes on sometimes.”
“Well, sugar, I did invent this one,” he said with a slow smile. “With your help, of course.”
She shook her head. “Tammy probably has the whole meal laid out by now. Let’s find you some drinks.”
“Amelia Ann went in to help her,” Rye said. “What can we get y’all? A bourbon?”
Rye Crenshaw was offering them bourbon?
“I’ll have one,” Paige found herself saying.
Mark swung his head to look at her, but he was smart enough not to say anything. “Will you now? I’ll have some tea.”
“Can I have a lemonade?” Haley asked.
“We always have that stuff around here,” Rye told her. “Sometimes with rosemary, although for the life of me I can’t imagine why. It grows like a weed at our house.”
“It’s an herb,” Tory told him in a flat voice. “Like you’d know.”
Mark started to laugh before he cut it off. Clearly they both found Rye entertaining.
When the country music legend took her elbow and steered her inside the house, she nearly jumped out of her skin. “Let’s get you that bourbon, Paige. I like a woman who drinks during the day. I mean, my mama named me after a smooth rye whiskey, after all.”
“That is so not true,” Tammy told her brother.
Rye sent Paige a devilish smile. “Caught me. It’s such a good story though. It’s a shame to let it go.”
When Rye poured himself a drink so he could toast her, she had to take a deep breath to keep from feeling lightheaded.
“To family, new and old,” he said, clinking their glasses together. “I heard you had a difficult spell with your own, and well, so did I. Happy to say it’s all behind us now. We’re all glad you’re here, Paige. These here McGuinesses are pretty wonderful people.”
“Yes they are.”
“Let’s shoot it, shall we?”
“Shoot it?” she repeated, noting he’d given her a healthy pour.
“Down the hatch,” he said, and then he tipped his glass to his mouth and drank the bourbon in one fell swoop.
She bit her lip and thought, Oh, what the hell, and tossed her bourbon back the way he had. Fire shot down her throat. It took effort not to break into a fit of coughing.
“That was a nice toast,” she rasped out.
“I thought so,” Rye declared. “Now, I’m going to take my son back from Sadie. I never get to hold him at a family gathering. I swear, it’s like the women in this family become wolves, passing my kid on from one hungry woman to the next.”
He left the room, and this time she touched her throat and coughed out the last of the fire coating it.
“You actually drank the bourbon!” Susannah exclaimed from the doorway of her brother’s study. “I mean, I know Rye has a powerful effect on people. He’s like a tidal wave.”
“Were y’all standing outside the study, watching?” Paige asked, finally seeing the group of people gathered in the doorway.
“You think we’d miss the show?” Shelby told her. “You get points. Personally, I loved seeing the look on Mark’s face,” she added, coming into the room. “I thought he was going to lose it.”
Paige looked down at the empty glass in her hand. “Where should I put this?”
Clayton came forward. “I’ll take this off your hands and get it to the kitchen. Good job there. You need to call Rye’s bluff every once in a while.”
She stared at his back as he left the room. “Does he mean Rye was joking about the bourbon?”
“Who knows?” Susannah said. “But probably. None of us women drink it.”
“Why don’t we get you something a little smoother?” Shelby said.
“Nothing smoother than bourbon,” Vander said, his lips twitching.
“I can’t believe you drank bourbon with Rye!” Sadie said, coming inside and grabbing her by the arms. “You aren’t drunk or anything, are you?”
“My wife handles her liquor pretty well,” Mark said, resting against the doorframe and smirking at her.
“I haven’t done shots since we were in college.” That hadn’t gone so well for Mark. She’d drunk him under the table, so much so she’d needed to then take care of him. He’d been so embarrassed the next day.
“Tequila,” Mark said in
a deep voice. “Not my finest moment.”
“Tequila is the devil,” Shelby said, shuddering.
“So is Southern Comfort.” Susannah grimaced.
Jake pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her. “You did shots of SoCo, honey?”
“I know,” she said with a sputtered laugh. “It was at a tailgate party. What was I thinking?”
Everyone was laughing, and Paige crossed to Mark. She leaned against him and looked at her new family. Everyone was smiling at her like she’d hung the moon.
“They’re pretty great,” Mark whispered in her ear. “Way to go, tiger.”
She was still beaming when J.P. offered to show her the chocolate garden and sweet-talked Tammy into turning the last preparations for dinner over to Susannah and Shelby so she could join them. Holding Mark’s hand as they strolled though the gardens under a sunny sky, she was conscious of how happy she felt—and what a precious feeling it was.
“With fall coming in, the garden isn’t quite as it was a few months ago,” Tammy told her. “But it’s still beautiful.”
Tall grasses the color of chocolate blew in the breeze next to a plant Tammy identified as Chocolate Drop sedums. Rory ran over and joined them, and J.P. encouraged the boy to tell them the story of the chocolate fairies. According to Rory, the fairies looked out for the families who planted chocolate gardens and made them chocolate each night as a thank-you. Her lips twitched when he pulled her aside and whispered that he knew the chocolate fairies weren’t the ones who put chocolate under their pillows every morning. Annabelle didn’t know yet, so she and Mark had to keep the confidence.
Both she and Mark promised the little boy, and when she caught J.P.’s loving smile, her heart seemed to soak in all of the magic around them. This family—her new family—was becoming almost as vital to her as Mark and Haley, and Riley and Jess for that matter, something she’d never imagined happening.
“Are y’all finished with the garden tour?” Rye shouted from the back porch. “Some of us are starving!”
“There are appetizers in the kitchen,” Tammy yelled back. “I swear that man eats more than a teenage boy.”
