Page 76 of Hidden Nature

“Oh, Sam. You’re the sweetest man in the world.”

“It’s easy to be sweet to you, babe.”

Sloan took another day, then another. She borrowed her mother’s car and drove into town. Christmas shopping headed her list, but she wanted to take stock during the trip. Of herself during the walking, standing, choosing, carrying. Of the town with its hilly streets, chatty shopkeepers.

She wanted to evaluate, weigh, compare objectively. If she went forward with Travis’s offer, this would, once again, become her home base.

She found objectivity challenging, as Heron’s Rest pumped out the charm in all its holiday finery.

Garland wrapped the posts of the old-timey streetlights, wreaths hung on doors, and trees stood in windows with their smaller cousins nestled in pots along Main Street.

When dusk came, lights would twinkle around windows, along roofs, down porch posts and doorways.

If you looked for small-town Christmas, you’d find it right here.

By the time she drove home, she’d talked to at least a dozen people she knew (and felt undecided on pro or con), racked up a few thousand steps walking inside and out, and considered her Christmas shopping complete.

In the kitchen, she heated up a bowl of soup, eating while she sat at the counter updating her spreadsheet, her pro and con list.

She studied both of them, reread Travis’s answers to her questions before she sent him her decision.

The right one, she determined, for her. For this time, for these circumstances.

At dinner, she listened to her parents’ easy replay of their day. Her mother had restocked books and puzzles in two vacation units, placed and decorated a tree in another, as requested by an incoming guest, inventoried linens, culled out those she felt needed replacements.

Her father and Jonah had completed the refresh of one of the apartments in town.

According to her father, the Fix-It Brothers’ work proved more than satisfactory, so they’d contract that team to overhaul the kitchen in another.

“I need the final measurements,” Elsie told Dean. “I’ll go to the suppliers, choose the new counter surface, new cabinet doors, hardware, lighting, and the rest tomorrow. I’ve got a look in mind.”

“You always do. I’ll get you the measurements.” He gave her a look. “And the budget.”

“You always do. You’re quiet tonight, Sloan. Is everything okay? Did you get your walks in? The temperature dropped again, and it’s windy with it. But that’s never stopped you.”

“Yeah, it is, and yes, I did. With more steps added. I’m quiet mostly because I was listening. You know, when I was a teenager, and the two of you would talk about work, I always thought: Boring. It’s not. It’s genius.”

Dean laughed. “Never boring to me and your mom, but I don’t know if I’d lift it to genius.”

“No, it is. The way you both focus on your strengths, but still blend the work. The fact that you can and are professional partners and still have a loving, solid marriage—and a life outside the work. That’s the genius.”

“Take the ‘genius,’ Dean.” Elsie toasted with her water glass. “She’s not wrong.”

“Add that one of your daughters joined that business, with her own strengths, opinions, perspectives, and she gets professional respect from you, but is still your daughter first and last.”

“There are times—plenty of them,” Dean said, “when I wonder how we managed without her. Drea’s got her own genius. But so do you, baby. And you’re first and last our girl.”

“I know it. I’ve always known it.”

And maybe, she thought, taken it, at least a little bit, for granted.

“But I think coming home this way brought that, well, home. When I told you I was going to join the NRP, you didn’t try to talk me out of it. You didn’t pressure me when I decided to move to Annapolis. You asked questions, good ones that made me think. But you never tried to change my mind.”

“That’s never been the easiest thing to do, has it, Elsie? Add the fact you think things through. It’s a rare thing for you to take a jump without calculating the distance, time, wind velocity. So when you decide, you’ve decided.”

“You’ve decided something.” Elsie folded her hands together under the table. “Something important.”

“Yes, I have. When Travis came to see me a few days ago, he told me his sergeant was retiring in February. He offered me that position. I’d have to file an application, take the written exam, the oral, pass. I’d have to leave my unit, relocate.”

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