Read Online One Summer by JoAnn Ross - Free Book Online Page B

Adèle could tell the younger woman was afraid to risk offending him by offering to treat.
    “She’s a lovely girl,” Adèle said as they watched her go back into the bakery.
    “Not going to get any disagreement there.” He turned a chair around, straddled it, and touched his hand to her cheek. “How are you, chère ? Honestly,” he tacked on before she could lie and assure him she was as fine as a fiddle.
    “I had a few nerve-racking moments.” After fifty-plus years of marriage she knew he’d spot a prevarication. “But they passed.”
    “You were lucky the vet was there to help.”
    “I know.” She blew out a breath. “It just gets so blasted frustrating.”
    “I can understand that. Bein’ how you’ve always been an independent female.”
    “A trait you weren’t always so wild about, in the beginning,” she reminded him.
    “I was young. And stupid. And had been brought up to believe a man was supposed to be the boss of the family.”
    And hadn’t everyone she’d known back then? “But you changed.”
    “Got smart,” he corrected with that grin that could still make her weak in the knees. “We’re both hardheaded, independent cusses, Del, darlin’. Which is why I know, as well as anyone could, how you feel since that accident. But Dr. Conway said you’ll probably continue to get better.”
    “I know. It’s just taking so long.” There were times, like today, when she felt as if she had a big red D for dementia stamped on her forehead.
    He linked their fingers together. Lifted their hands and pressed his lips against the back of her hand, which wasn’t nearly as smooth and pale as the first time he’d held it. “Independent and impatient.”
    Unlike him, who appeared to have been born with the patience of Job. Accustomed to always being on the go, Adèle had long ago decided that she’d go crazy within a week of being a professional fisherman.
    “It’s hard,” she said, “always needing to ask someone to go with me when I want to leave the house.”
    “Being with you has never been a hardship, Del.”
    She laughed as another memory suddenly flashed back. Yarn! She’d been on her way to buy yarn. “Why don’t you say that after our trip to the Knitting Nook?”
    “I’d sure enough rather hang out at Mac’s Boat Shop,” he said honestly. “But if that’s what you want, that’s what you’re going to get.”
    “You’re a good man, Bernard Douchett.” It was her turn to pat his weathered cheek. “Which is why I married you.”
    He looked around, to make sure no one was listening, then leaned close, his lips at her ear. “And here I’ve always thought you married me for the sex.”
    This time her laugh was bold and free and banished the last of the clouds caused by her earlier fear. “Well, there is that.”

9
    “They are so sweet together,” Charity said as she and Sedona Sullivan watched the elderly couple through the front window.
    “If I ever found a man I thought would still look at me like that after fifty years of marriage, I’d marry him on the spot,” the baker said as she tied the pink box shut with her signature Take the Cake ivory ribbon.
    “Do you think they even exist anymore?”
    “I like to believe so.” Sedona sighed a bit as Bernard Douchett lifted his wife’s hand to his lips. “Then again, since my parents have been together for thirty-five years, I suspect I’m probably more of an optimist than a lot of women.”
    Like a woman whose marriage collapsed moments before the vows, Charity suspected Sedona was thinking but was kind enough not to say. The truth was, despite her parents’ track record, and her own debacle in Chicago, she was encouraged by Sedona’s parents and the Douchetts.
    “Tell Mr. Douchett it’s on the house,” Sedona said when Charity held out the bill. “And don’t let him argue. That wedding has already brought me so much business I’m having to hire extra help.”
    “Guess that means you’re still too busy to