Love Letters From Ladybug Farm - Donna Ball [77]
And Bridget echoed, “Here?”
Cici met their gazes grimly. “He called a real estate broker.”
Bridget stopped folding paper. Lindsay stopped placing CDs in cases. A warm breeze fluttered the lace curtain at the window, a grandfather clock ticked loudly across the room; otherwise all was still. Had there been crickets, they would have been chirping. The three women looked at each other somberly for a long time.
“That,” intoned Lindsay, “is not good news.”
Cici nodded heavily. “You’re telling me.”
Into the grim silence that had fallen over the room a sudden clatter of activity spilled: Rebel’s excited barking, the braying of a goat, the clang of a cowbell. Noah shouted, “Yo! Dog!” Bridget got up and went to the window. “Someone’s coming,” she said, surprised. And then surprise mixed with pleasure as she added, “It’s Paul!”
They reached the front porch in time to see Noah dragging a still-barking border collie away by the collar as Paul’s blue Prius slid to a stop in front of the steps. Paul got out of the car, pushing his sunglasses up into his hair, and they bounded down the steps to meet him.
“Paul! What a surprise!”
“What are you doing here?”
“Where’s Derrick?”
“Why didn’t you call? The house is a mess!”
“You look great!”
And again, “What are you doing here?”
“I have come,” declared Paul, kissing Cici’s cheek, “to solve”—he kissed Lindsay’s cheek—“all your problems.” He kissed Bridget.
“Well, it’s about time someone did,” responded Cici fervently, and he laughed.
“I heard you’d had a few setbacks,” he said. “Where is our little broken princess, anyway?”
“She’s sleeping,” replied Cici. She peered into the car, which was packed to the roof with boxes. “What is all this?”
“No, she’s not!” Lori called from the porch, leaning on her crutches. “Hi, Uncle Paul. What are you doing here?”
Paul called up to her, “I came to see you, of course!” And he added to Cici as he started up the steps to greet Lori, “Be careful with those boxes. Some of the stuff in them is breakable.”
Cici looked after him in astonishment, and Lindsay opened the back door of the car as Noah, having released Rebel in the sheep meadow, came jogging around the corner. Bridget surveyed the packed car. “Is all this for us?”
“I guess so.” Cici pried a box from the top of the stack and handed it to Noah. “Help us unpack this, will you, Noah?”
Noah took the box and cast an appraising eye over the remainder. “Whoa, dude,” he said as he started up the steps with the box. “What’re you doing, moving in?”
Paul turned with an odd, rather rueful smile on his face. “As a matter of fact, I am.”
The boxes were sorted by content between the pantry, the ofhce, and the living room/workroom. Two enormous suitcases were hauled to the guest room. Ida Mae brought tall glasses of iced tea laced with sprigs of mint to the porch, along with the last of the peanut butter cookies, grumbling all the while about how some folks didn’t have the decency to give a person time to change the sheets before he showed up on her doorstep. Paul called after her, grinning, “I’ll change my own sheets, I promise! I’ve been looking forward to it all the way from Maryland!”
They brought extra chairs onto the porch for Lori and Paul, along with a footstool for Lori to rest her leg. Noah relaxed on the steps with his shoulders resting against a column. All of them waited for Paul to speak.
Paul took a sip of his tea, gave the glass an appraising look, and murmured, “Interesting.” He gazed around the porch.
“I’m sure you have your own ideas,” he said, “but I would keep the porch decor simple for the wedding. Satin bows and rose bouquets, natural greenery, swags over the door and windows.”
Noah stretched for a handful of cookies. “If ya’ll are going to talk about that wedding I’m outta here. I’ve got things to do.”
Lori said, “Not me. It took me too long to get here. Besides,” she added meaningfully to Noah, “the good stuff always starts as soon as we leave.”
Lindsay looked uneasy. “Noah, maybe you’d better get back to the