Romance Grows in Arcadia Valley (Arcadia Valley Romance Book 0) Read online

“And?”

  “Don’t you see?” She was fairly bouncing up and down.

  “No, actually, unless you’re excited that our new neighbor can’t find anyone to put up her fence …” He shook his head. “Sorry, pumpkin. It’s not our place to go into someone else’s yard.”

  “But Papa,” she said, grabbing his hand, “don’t you see? It will make up for Bunnicula’s bad behavior. We’ll just go over and put it up. If you ask her if you can help, she’ll just say ‘no’ to be polite.”

  “Or maybe she’ll say ‘no’ because she wants someone else to do it.”

  Elena sighed. “You just don’t want to put up her fence.”

  Nico rubbed a hand over his face. The afternoon was getting on, but there were hours before sunset. Of course, he didn’t even know what kind of fence it was. It could be a huge job. “Yes, maybe that’s true. Maybe I don’t want to put up her fence.”

  Elena let go of his hand and sank back into the rocker. “Jesus said we’re supposed to love our neighbor like we love ourselves. Well, I’m trying.”

  “That’s not what he meant, exactly. It’s not the same kind of neighbor. It’s actually…”

  She fixed those brown eyes on him and waited for an explanation.

  He sighed. As a parent, he wanted his child to follow Jesus more than anything, and here she was leading him. “Ok, let’s go look and see what’s there. I’m not promising anything.”

  “Thank you, Papa!” She threw her arms around his neck.

  “If she gets mad at us, I’m blaming you,” he said into her hair. After a full day of work, there was only one person who could convince him to put in another couple hours of labor. She had him wrapped around her finger, just like her mother had.

  A familiar ache went through him at the thought of Laura. He’d never understood why people went on and on about romantic love until he’d met his wife. Everything had changed, then. Love changed him. But the world was still a broken place full of disease and heartbreak. Love wasn’t enough to keep every nightmare away. It wasn’t a promise there would be a happy ending for the two of them. He’d always be grateful to have Elena, but Nico wished, even now, that his love could have counted for more.

  Because if his love could have saved Laura, she would have lived forever.

  * * *

  “I’m disappointed that you still haven’t sent pictures,” Sahil said.

  Charlotte turned off the car and angled out from behind the wheel. “I’m not going to crawl through the lilac bushes and wait for him to walk by.”

  “You could always say you were chasing the rabbit.”

  “Which could be somewhere else entirely. No, that’s not the way mature people handle things like this.”

  “You’re right. But this is how I would handle it.”

  Charlotte couldn’t help laughing. “I’ve got a very important meeting with very important people so we’ll have to fight about this later.”

  “Library board?”

  “You know me so well. Please tell me you’re coming to visit. I know I’m repeating myself but I’m just going to keep pestering you until you get here.”

  “We’ll see. Maybe if you send pictures.”

  “I’m hanging up now.”

  “I’ll have to stalk him myself,” Sahil said.

  “Good luck with that. These people aren’t in news articles and all over blogs like Jarrod. They’re quiet, humble types.”

  “Who skin rabbits in their backyards.”

  “That, too,” Charlotte said. “I have a feeling he’s not a very social guy, online or in person.” She said goodbye and headed into the meeting with a smile. The only thing that could make Arcadia Valley better would be showing Sahil all of this in person. Not Nico, of course. That wouldn’t be on the itinerary. Unless he just happened to pop up somewhere, of course. Charlotte realized she’d been standing in front of the door for several seconds without moving and rolled her eyes at herself. Light-hearted teasing to pass the time was one thing. Spending real time and emotion on her neighbor was another. She had to be careful she didn’t become infatuated with him just because she was lonely and bored.

  * * *

  “Papa, won’t she be surprised?” Elena called over. She had opened the coop and was watching the chickens peck at the grass.

  “She sure will, baby.” Nico wiped the sweat from his face and stopped to catch his breath.

  “My name isn’t ‘baby’,” Elena said but her usual scowl was only a shadow, an afterthought to her words.

  “Sorry.” Baby, he almost added. It was a hard habit to break. She’d always be his little girl. He felt a sharp pain of wistfulness as he wondered how Laura would have taken this stage. Probably with grace and humor. She had been the better half of their partnership and although he’d stopped wishing long ago that God would have taken him instead, he couldn’t help wishing Laura could give him advice from heaven.

  He swung his arm in an arc. It had been a while since he’d pounded fence posts and he was feeling his age. His brothers always teased him refusing to take up running or lifting weights. He’d always said cutting bison steaks, lifting whole sides of beef, and pushing cartons of twenty different kinds of sausages around all day were enough. Now he was wondering if they were right after all. He just turned thirty-two and his shoulders felt like they belonged to a geriatric patient. Then again, not many people put up a half acre of fencing all in a few hours.

  “You better give Charlotte lots of eggs. And no pecking her ankles.” Elena had her hands on her hips and was lecturing the hens in a stern voice. “And don’t make her chase you back to the coop. Just go right in like you’re supposed to.”

  He smiled at the little “mother hen” and her advice. Normally he wouldn’t be happy with Elena taking to someone so quickly. But he knew Charlotte was different. She may not stay in Arcadia Valley for long, but the time she was here, she would treat Elena with care.

  Nico picked up the sledgehammer and swung it hard, connecting with the top of the wooden post. It didn’t move more than an inch and he figured it was ready for the gate attachment. For some reason, he wanted to swing it several more times, not to set the post, but just for the satisfaction. It was odd, this feeling of being unsettled, these waves of wistfulness that had been hitting out of nowhere.

  Nico set the gate against the post and attached the hinges. It was all probably due to Elena growing up. It had nothing to do with Charlotte McGregor at all. It couldn’t be. They barely knew each other. As much as his mother wished he would fall madly in love at first sight, Nico knew himself. He didn’t work that way. His heart took longer than a few minutes to be drawn to a woman.

  Chapter 6

  “I like this place and could willingly waste my time in it.”

  ― William Shakespeare

  “I just want to thank you, one more time, for keeping our part-time genealogy gal on staff. I know the library needs money right now,” Ron Taylor said. The library board member’s white hair was cut short but his beard was Santa Claus worthy. Charlotte had almost giggled when Ron had told her he owned a Christmas tree farm. She wasn’t in a laughing mood now. Budget discussions were more stressful than a trip to the dentist.

  “You’re welcome, Ron, but there’s no need to thank me. Local history is important,” Charlotte said.

  Elise Camden squeezed Charlotte’s shoulder with a surprisingly strong grip for such an elderly woman. “I can tell you’re just like one of us.”

  Charlotte smiled but she knew Elise was just being kind. Maybe in a few years, she could pass as something other than a city slicker.

  “Don’t worry, Charlotte. We’ll find a way to raise the funds for the summer reading program. We’ll have that money in no time,” Ron said.

  “I hope so.” As much as Charlotte wanted to believe the reassurances of the two oldest library board members, her plans for the summer reading program were slipping away. When she accepted the job, she had no idea the usual grants weren’t going
to come through. When old Mrs. Duncan passed away, the grant applications had sat on her desk until the deadlines had long since passed.

  “We can hold fundraisers. A festival, maybe. Depending on when we hold it, I can donate the watermelons for a watermelon feed. Or a corn feed. Or squash feed.” Elise paused. “No, that last one probably won’t bring in much of a crowd.”

  “How do you like the Martin place?” Ron asked. Charlotte had motioned for the others to exit the library but Ron had turned around and stood right in front of the main doors, blocking the way.

  “It’s wonderful. I’m still settling in, but it’s a beautiful piece of land. From what I understand, the older Mr. and Mrs. Martin weren’t farmers?”

  “Oh, no, they were. Those eighty acres were the main farm. When their son took over, he built the big farm house.”

  “The one Marjorie lives in?” Her landlady was sweeter than pie. She’d asked Charlotte to come over one morning for coffee and they’d slipped into it like the most natural routine. But even though she was nearing ninety and physically fit, her memory was failing.

  “That’s the one,” Elise said. “Poor Marj hasn’t been the same since Bill passed last winter. Now that Mrs. Duncan is gone, she’s been at loose ends. They were best friends. You’ve been real good for her. She likes watching you work in the garden.”

  “I’m trying to keep it looking as nice as it did when I moved in.” She hadn’t realized Marjorie could see her from the main farmhouse. The woman must use binoculars.

  “And have you met your neighbors yet?” Ron asked.

  “I have. I caught their rabbit in my garden.” Charlotte knew what was coming next and she moved toward the door.

  Elise shot a look at Ron. “And what did you think?”

  “Of the rabbit? He was very big and very hungry,” Charlotte said. Poor Nico. The man was probably being fixed up with every woman in town.

  “How about the owner of that big rabbit?” Elise leaned closer, blue eyes twinkling. “He’s quite a looker, eh?”

  He also probably thought she was a half-wit who couldn’t figure out which way to plant a turnip. “He was covered in rabbit blood when we met, so I’m not really sure about that.”

  “Ah, he was probably butchering some of Sam Packer’s rabbits. Sam’s almost a hundred, won’t let anybody help him out but Nico. Lives in a cabin way out of town. Breeds some rabbits for meat but is getting too weak to spend the day butchering and wrapping them for the freezer. In the winter, we don’t see him for months. Nico goes out to bring him oranges or good coffee, and see if he needs more wood.”

  Charlotte felt a pang of guilt for looking down on the scene in the bloody shed. But she couldn’t give them any encouragement or Nico would be saddled with a round of marriage rumors. “His little girl is adorable, I’ll give you that.”

  Rather than putting them off track, Charlotte saw them exchange another meaningful glance.

  “And you like children,” Ron said matter-of-factly.

  “I’ve always thought being married to a butcher would be wonderful,” Elisa said. “You get the choicest cuts of meat.”

  So that was what Nico did. She couldn’t quite see him in the back of local grocery store, grinding hamburger and wrapping pork chops. “I’m not interested in getting married.” Right now, she added silently.

  Their disappointment was almost comical and Charlotte would have laughed if she hadn’t felt bad about their dashed hopes.

  “You got yourself a fella back in California?” Elise asked.

  “Something like that,” Charlotte said. It wasn’t quite a lie. She hoped God would forgive her. She was trying to save Nico from their nagging.

  “Well, too bad. But you can still enjoy deli sausage, I guess.”

  Charlotte frowned. Megan had said something like that, too. She’d assumed it was some strange teen phrase but old Elise wasn’t likely to be using slang. Maybe the whole town was obsessed with deli meats.

  “Have a great evening,” she said, as Ron and Elise finally stepped through the door. “See you next week.”

  Charlotte locked up behind them and let out a sigh. Elise and Ron were very sweet to try and engineer a romance, but she wasn’t Nico’s type. And even though she’d just hinted to Elise that she had a boyfriend, she certainly wasn’t Jarrod’s, either. He’d called again after lunch and said he missed her. He missed the idea of her, maybe. Or the comfort of knowing she was always available. But he didn’t miss her.

  Charlotte turned off the lights and headed for her car. The sun was nearing the horizon and Charlotte considered buying some dinner on the way home. She passed a few diners, a busy-looking Chinese food place, and then a little yellow building called Demi’s Delights. It had outdoor seating, a brightly colored awning, and the sign was shaped like a coffee cup. Of course it was closed at that hour, but she made a mental note to pop in when she had a chance.

  As she followed the road south toward the canyon, she felt the tension of the long meeting as a dull ache in her shoulders. Slowing to a leisurely pace as she turned on the dirt road, Charlotte gazed at the cows. Mr. Bodkin worked in town as an electrician for the city, but he also had a small herd of cattle and several acres of carefully tilled land. She could only imagine what would soon be growing in those long, perfect rows.

  Further down the lane was the Black farm. They had a little of everything: goats, donkeys, cows, but the alpacas were Charlotte’s favorite. The long-necked animals looked like something out of a children’s book. Mrs. Black told her that she spun and knit with the hair, showing off a softer-than-air scarf. Mrs. Black also mentioned her daughter, Romy, made fresh goat cheese and offered to teach Charlotte how when she had a free afternoon. Charlotte had agreed with lightning speed. This was why she’d moved to the country. She wanted to be like these people who were engaged in the process from beginning to end.

  She turned into her own driveway and tried to think positively. There was the henhouse she’d inherited with the rental agreement. She had her very own batch of Ameraucanas who laid the most beautiful blue and green eggs every day. As much as she’d failed with the garden so far, her chicken raising skills were acceptable. She’d simply focus on how happy they were in their little coop, with its nesting boxes and bright red door.

  Putting the key in the lock, Charlotte heard voices from somewhere close. She walked to the other end of the porch and leaned around the corner of the house. There were rolls of fencing and metal bars on the ground, unrolled and scattered in small piles. She’d been warned about this already by Mrs. Black when she’d gone to the post office to pick up a package. There were thieves that watched for delivery trucks and stole packages off porches.

  She needed to call the police, but first she’d get a good look at the creeps so she could give a description. Charlotte crept down the little path that ran beside the house. Her heart was pounding in her chest and she fumbled for her cell phone. She should get pictures, too, just in case.

  As she peeked around the corner, Charlotte felt her anger shift to surprise, then confusion. Nico lifted a sledgehammer far above his head and let it fall with a dull clang onto the top end of a green metal bar. It sunk several inches into the soft dirt and Nico repeated the swing-clang until he was satisfied at the height of the skinny post. Charlotte blinked, trying to take in the perfect little fence that ran the perimeter of her garden. Nico was working on a spot directly in the center of the front, where the gate was already hanging on its hinges.

  He hadn’t noticed her standing there yet and she let herself examine him for just a moment. His head was down but she could still see the set of his mouth and the way his dark brows were lowered over his eyes. He’d shaved and he was wearing leather gloves this time instead of the elbow length rubber industrial pair. He had a simple button up shirt, dark jeans, and instead of rubber boots he had battered work boots. But there was something else, a certain light-hearted expression that was different than the stern one he’d worn the day they’
d met. Or maybe it was just the fact he didn’t have his hands full of bloody bunny fur.

  Whatever it was, Charlotte felt a softness rise up in her at the sight of him. Maybe Joey had hired him to install it, but if she had to guess, she would say this handsome Greek man was doing her a neighborly good deed.

  Elena leaped up from the grass, arms waving in the air as if she had semaphore flags. Her pale pink dress had grass stains on the front and her socks were bunched around her ankles. “Do you like it? Isn’t it great?”

  She barely had time to open her arms before Elena hugged her around the waist. Elena looked up, dark eyes sparkling with happiness. Charlotte could see where her two front teeth had grown in but she was missing a few teeth to either side. She looked a little bit like Bunnicula. Charlotte couldn’t help grinning back even as she felt her heart squeeze. There was something magical about this age. The knobby knees and round cheeks, the messy braids and earnest expressions had her melting inside.

  “I didn’t think Papa was going to do it but then I reminded him what Jesus said about being a good neighbor. He’s always helping other people. He helped Mr. Anderson fix the pump on his well and then he sheared Old Jack’s sheep when he got sick, and yesterday he even moved Angie Crocker’s furniture to her new house. Why not you? You’re a real live neighbor. ”

  Charlotte tried not to be disappointed that Nico was here out of guilt.

  “Oh, sweetie,” Charlotte said. “You guys are the best neighbors I’ve ever had.”

  “Come on,” Elena said, taking her by the hand and leading toward the chicken coop. “The hens are out. They needed yard time.”

  “We should talk to your―”

  “No, he likes to finish the job.” Elena tugged her across the lawn. “He doesn’t like interruptions while he’s working.”

  Nico looked up at that moment and met her gaze. Charlotte stopped in her tracks, feeling that she was being impolite and knowing she had already imposed on him, although unintentionally. He nodded, then looked back at the piece of fencing he was attaching to the post. Charlotte let Elena pull her along toward the chickens. Charlotte tried to breathe deeply. Even if he was irritated with her, at least her fence was up.