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I accepted it as a sound-based equivalent of “duh” and appreciated his restraint in holding off on the word. I cleared my throat. “As I was saying. A plan. First up, type of appetizers and caterer for those. Then we ask that person if they think they can handle some amazing desserts. If yes, bonus. If not, then we look for a bakery.”
After a moment, Cody nodded. “All right. I can go with that. I still think we ought to try and use Season’s Bounty if we can. Just seems like a good plan to throw business toward the boss’s wife if possible.”
“True. Which takes us back to the original question: do you know what type of food she serves?”
He shook his head and looked at his phone again. “I have an idea. But you can say no.”
“Why does that fill me with dread?”
Cody held up a hand. “It’s not scary. I promise.”
“And still, the dread persists.”
He looked around the store. “Since you’re clearly not overburdened with customers right now, what if you closed early and you and I went to dinner? At Season’s Bounty.”
I wanted to leap out of my seat and shout “yes!” At the same time, it didn’t seem like the kind of thing a responsible business owner would do.
He must have thought my hesitation meant no. “Or I can go by myself. It’s fine.”
“No. It’s not that. I just…” I looked around the empty store. In my experience, it wasn’t going to pick up between now and closing. “You know what? That sounds great. Let me print off a note for the door and get things shut down.”
“Sure. Can I help with anything?”
I looked at him and reminded myself, again, of all the reasons I couldn’t follow through on my desire to hug him. “Nah. It doesn’t take me long, and I have a system.”
“All right. I’ll wait here.”
I picked up my tablet and headed to the register and tried to ignore my awareness of Cody’s presence in the store. We were going to dinner. Just the two of us. Even as a squeal built up in my heart, I squashed it. It wasn’t a date. It was just me, his honorary little sister, helping him out with this fundraiser.
In fact, I should suggest we ask the rest of the group to come along. More opinions was probably better than just two.
But I didn’t want to.
I wanted Cody all to myself. And if I spent a little time pretending that we were an item, I wasn’t hurting anyone.
A girl could dream. Right?
5
CODY
If I never saw another address label and stamp again in my life, it would be too soon. Of course, I was going to have to do this all again in a few weeks with the actual invitations. And those were going to require stuffing, too.
Jackson Trent had stopped by at one point during the day to remind me that I could ask for help. As much as I appreciated that, I also knew everyone else was busy with their own work. And the previous person in charge of this had never needed help.
Of course, it had been her sole job. Or at least the bulk of it.
But still. I could do it. And I was staying on top of the rest of my work—mostly. Regardless, I’d gotten the stuff done and hauled them all out to my car so I could take them to the post office on my way home.
I drove into the lane that would take me by the large collection boxes outside the post office and waited behind a minivan whose driver was having trouble figuring out how to reach the mail slot. She finally inched forward, opened her door, and got out to put the mail in.
I chuckled.
When she drove off, I pulled forward and lowered the window so I could put handful after handful of postcards into the box. I was almost finished when the car behind me started to beep their horn. I gave a cheery wave and continued to drop the cards down the chute. Maybe I’d take the actual invitations inside when the time came. Or I could talk to…someone…about how we mailed out our monthly newsletters. As a nonprofit, there were probably cheaper ways to send bulk mailings. Except with something fancy like this, didn’t it look nicer to use a stamp?
I’d ask Jackson what he thought.
Finished, I pulled away from the box and out into the post office parking lot. The driver with the horn sent me a less friendly, single-digit wave that I caught in my rearview mirror. I took a moment to pray for him. How frustrating must his life be to feel the need to be that way over having to wait a moment in a line at the post office?
