Read Online The Lullaby Sky by Carolyn Brown - Free Book Online Page B

I’d known, I would have left it at home and gotten someone to drive me.”
    “Marty is going to fall over the edge one of these days and do something really bad to someone. I’m just glad he’s out of your life, Hannah, and it won’t be you or Sophie in front of him when he cracks.” He held up his hand. “Dead end! Let’s go get another cup of coffee and imagine your kitchen painted blue with red-checkered curtains on the windows.”
    “Not red with this shade of blue,” she said. “I’m going to sew them, so maybe pure white in the living room and kitchen. I want lots of sunshine to pour into the house, especially in the morning. I can pull the shades in the afternoon to ward off the heat.”
    Travis’s heart kicked in a little extra beat at her enthusiasm. It might take six months—it might take a couple of years, even—but someday she was again going to be that cute little dark-haired girl with big brown eyes that he’d had a crush on in elementary school. She’d been shy even back then, but there was sparkle in her eyes and a bounce in her step. When he’d come back to Crossing the year before, he’d figured he’d stay in his grandmother’s spare bedroom, but Aunt Birdie had insisted he take a couple of rooms in her house on the second floor. That way he wouldn’t be so cramped. There was already a small sitting room up there and he could have his choice of bedrooms. And he’d have his own bathroom and not have to share.
    At first he thought he’d stay three months and finish the latest novel he was working on, but then the time stretched out and now a year had passed.
    “And”—her eyes started to twinkle—“when we go pick out furniture, I’m going by the fabric store to buy stuff for all the windows downstairs.” She giggled and it came from all the way down inside her heart. “Calvin would call them window treatments, not valances.” She slung her legs over the side of the bed and stood up with the grace of a ballerina.
    “You could call them Hannah’s creations. Want some help painting and getting a bedroom transformed into a living area this week?”
    “I never turn down help,” she said.
    “Good, then, I’ll be here early Monday morning, and by nightfall we’ll have the walls done. On Tuesday we can do the woodwork, and Wednesday you’ll be ready to drag out that sewing machine.” He grinned.
    “How about on Monday, I do some sewing, and we start painting on Tuesday? That way the window treatments”—her eyes twinkled—“will be done when all the paint dries and we can hang them up. Besides, I’m itching to do some sewing now that I thought of it.”
    “You are the queen of this castle, despite Sophie’s take on things.” Travis led the way down to the kitchen. He poured two more cups of coffee and handed one to her.
    Darcy made her way into the living room and fell back onto the sofa, pulling a red-and-white throw over her eyes. “It’s too early to be up. The sun is barely awake. I need coffee.”
    “Rise and shine, Valentine!” Aunt Birdie sang at the top of her lungs as she entered through the kitchen door.
    Darcy peeled back a corner of the throw, glanced at Travis and then at Hannah and Aunt Birdie before falling back on the throw pillows and covering her head again. “It’s June, not February, Aunt Birdie.” She groaned.
    Sophie made her way to the sofa and curled up beside Darcy, yanking part of the pillow over her eyes. “Is it morning? Do we get pancakes with chocolate chips?”
    “Yes, you do, and they are right here on a platter waiting for you,” Aunt Birdie answered. “Already slathered with melted butter and ready for syrup.”
    Hannah hugged Aunt Birdie. “This is so sweet of you.”
    “Ain’t nothing. I made a stack with chocolate chips and a stack of buckwheat and one of plain old pancakes so y’all can mix or match. That way you can get on about the business of buying new furniture.” Aunt Birdie opened the cabinet doors and took