Page 48 of Sweet Surprises

His stomach twisted a little as he thought about the reasonhefelt okay. What would Iris think of him falling in spite of himself for a girl Allie’s age? Was this him finally healing, or was it a betrayal?

“Oh wow,” Charlotte breathed.

Big lazy snowflakes had begun swirling down from the sky, graceful as dancers. The first one landed on his cheek like a cool kiss against his heated skin. Then another touched down on his nose.

Charlotte started laughing, trying to catch them on her tongue as Chance and Olivia skated toward them with wonder in their eyes.

Tag watched them all, his throat aching like he wanted to cry. He was a sensible man. He didn’t believe in signs, or in messages from the beyond. The only magic he chose to believe in had been taught to him in a Sunday school classroom.

But there was something about seeing their happy faces in the gently falling snow—the joy of Chance flinging his arms around Charlotte’s waist, and Olivia casually wrapping an arm around her shoulder, her head tilted back, laughing like no one was watching, like he hadn’t seen her do in years.

It made him feel like he was home again.

14

CHARLOTTE

Charlotte spent the week after the ice skating adventure in a happy blur of work and plans.

She still hated the idea of being a burden on the family, so she tried to roll up her sleeves every day and dive into whatever needed doing. She had a feeling they all sensed her need not to be treated like a guest. And it was a relief to be allowed to participate in the family’s activities.

She had also started getting up early each morning with the kids, so Tag could start his chores earlier. Once they were dressed and ready, they all headed over to the stone farmhouse for breakfast and then off to the bus.

After the kids were on their way, she helped out around the farm, spending her time with whoever needed a hand—whether it was in the kitchen, the creamery, the stable, or the hen house.

In the afternoons, she took her car to town and spent a few hours working at the shop before picking the kids up at school and bringing them home so they didn’t have to wait for Allie. They hung out during snack time, and then she would sit at the table with them while they did homework, working with Chance when he needed it, so that by the time Tag was finished with thesecond milking and Allie was home, the homework was already completed.

Things were going well at the shop. Tag had been right about Ellis Johnson. The electrician was more than happy to help out with the electrical work right away, and for a fair price, too, from what Tag said. The young man with the flashing blue eyes and longish blond hair worked hard at the shop all day, managing to climb and crawl around the tightest spaces in spite of his big frame.

And all of Charlotte’s plans for the shop were coming together nicely, in large part due to the fact that Ellis had taken down the entire first floor ceiling to work. He’d been able to rewire all the lighting easily after that, and there were only about a dozen holes in the walls of the shop, each one roughly the size of a man’s fist.

“You know these have to be patched and painted, right?” he asked her one afternoon.

She had been sketching on the walls using her laptop hooked up to an old classroom projector Allie had loaned her. But that was the first day she had gotten out her paint brushes.

“I have a plan for that,” she assured him, grinning when he shook his head at her mysterious words.

Ellis was spending his days up on the second floor by the time she finished up on Friday, so there was no one to celebrate with her when she stepped back to take a look at the results of her labor.

“Good job,” she told herself as she looked around at the newly decorated space and a little shiver of joy went down her spine.

She was still kind of nervous about showing it to Tag, but even if he hated it, the whole thing had only taken her a week to do. It wouldn’t be that hard to undo.

And besides, ever since that night under the twinkling lights of the rink, she had felt a bond tightening between the two of them. She didn’t really think he’d be unhappy with her work here. In fact, she was pretty sure that he would like it even more because she had been the one to do it.

When she closed her eyes, she saw him gaze across the table at her at dinnertime last night, and she could still feel the way his hand brushed hers when he handed over her car keys this morning, muttering something about it having a new oil pan gasket.

When she thanked him and offered to pay, he just grumbled that Rob at the shop owed him a favor and strode out the back door as if to tell her the conversation was over, leaving her watching after him, stunned.

“We’re all grateful to you for everything you’re doing here,” Maggie had said quietly after he was gone, looking up from the runt kitten of one of the barn cats she was feeding. “He just doesn’t know how to tell you in words.”

But he had thanked her in words last weekend. And Charlotte was grateful, knowing it cost Tag more than most to speak what was in his heart.

There was no time to think about it now. The old clock on the wall said that it was time to pick up the kids.

She headed for the car, humming to herself at the happy thought that she didn’t need to check the oil before getting in this time. The engine roared to life and the radio came on, the cheerful notes of “Jingle Bells” making the frigid space seem instantly warmer.

She pulled up at the school a few minutes later, in plenty of time to find a good parking spot and make her way to the lawn before the bell rang. Olivia was already in her usual spot by the big tree, so Charlotte joined her.

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