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“If you want your eggs made a different way, I’m happy to do it, but I recall your favorite was always scrambled with cheese.”

Olive set the plate of eggs in front of Doyle who had settled himself down at the kitchen table at her request.

There was no sign of the other woman who had been there last night. Cassie. Olive had made a quick supper of chicken and veggies before she had stolen upstairs with her daughter.

Her stomach rumbled, but she hadn’t talked to Doyle about whether she had to buy her own groceries or whether he provided her meals, and she didn’t want to do that with Cassie hanging around trying to chat with him.

He didn’t seem very talkative, and Olive didn’t try to help the conversation along which died after each question Olive asked.

“These are fine. Whatever you make is fine. I’m not that picky. You know that.”

She did. But she wanted to make him the food that he most enjoyed and wanted. Maybe he wanted a variety and didn’t want to have to think about it.

“If it’s okay with you, I’m going to go to Bible study this morning. I’ll be back in time to put in a full eight hours, unless you wanted me to do more?” She was hoping not. Her recovery from malaria had been slow, probably complicated by the fact that the birth had been difficult and she lost a good bit of blood. It had just been a bad thing all the way around, and while she felt better than she did, she was still not up to her usual energy.

He paused, the fork halfway to his mouth.

“I thought you’re going to sit down and eat with me.” It wasn’t a question, and it wasn’t an invitation.

“We hadn’t said, and I wasn’t sure, and I didn’t want to ask while Cassie was around last night.” There, it wasn’t that she didn’t want to talk to him about it, she just felt like that would be more of a private conversation.

“I was thinking about hiring Cassie to do the housework while you could focus on the cooking.” He looked down at his plate. “I thought that would be easier on you since it seems like malaria really did a number on you.”

He’d noticed. That made her heart smile just a little, and it was absolutely true. But she didn’t really want Cassie around. And she wasn’t sure exactly why.

“It just seems like having two women in charge of the house is not a good idea. Unless you’re willing to be very specific about whose domain is where. It...might lead to turf wars.” She hoped that was enough humor to make it so that her comment didn’t seem unkind. But she didn’t think that she and Cassie would be able to get along. There was something about the way the woman looked at her that told her that she thought Doyle was hers, and she resented the fact that Olive was there.

“If you don’t want her, I’ll get rid of her today.”

Really? He would do that for her? Or did he just not want fighting in the house? And she was the first one he had hired. Although, according to Cassie, she was the first one he had contacted.

“I’m going to be leaving in two months, and then you’re going to be stuck trying to find another housekeeper, so maybe it would be better for you to have her, but if you’re trying to make things easier on me, I’d rather do it all myself.”

“I see. Well then, we’ll try it for a week having both of you, with you cooking and her cleaning. Since you’re going to be leaving, that will make things easier on me, and I do think it will make things easier on you, no matter what you say about turf wars.”

Yeah. She’d been joking, but there’d been enough seriousness under it to show her concern.

“You’re going to Bible study?” he asked, taking a sip of his water.

“Yes. Unless you have a problem with it. There is one every morning on Pastor Garnet’s porch, and I feel like it’s probably a good idea for me to go.” She didn’t say she needed it, but that’s what she meant. She did. She needed it. She’d been away from the Lord too long, and she needed to get back. And Bible study was the best way to do it beyond reading her Bible and praying daily, which she had been doing.

“All right. I’ll go with you.”

She stopped, her mouth open. First, she’d said that she was going to take her car back and he said he’d go with her. Now he was going with her to Bible study?

But the idea that he might have been doing it for her slipped away with his next words. “I’ve been thinking about going, but I kept forgetting about it. Now that you’ve reminded me, I think I’ll go today too.”

She had turned to go back into the kitchen, so he didn’t see her eyes wide open and her brows up to her hairline.

Okay. So it wasn’t that she was shocked that he was a Christian, because she already knew that. Or that he was a strong Christian, because she knew that too. But the idea that he was voluntarily choosing to spend time with her was more than a little surprising. She figured that he hired her out of compassion and pity. And she also figured that he’d be avoiding her as much as he could. Yet here he was going to Bible study with her. He wasn’t trying to avoid her.

“What time does it start?” He startled her, his voice coming from just above her shoulder.

She turned around, remembering again how tall he was and tilting her head. “Seven.”

“I think we’re supposed to take food.”

“I don’t think that’s a prerequisite for being able to attend.”

“It will take ten minutes to get there. Is there something you can make in half an hour?”

“I bought some blueberries for the salad that I was going to make later this week, but we could make a quick fruit salad.”

“I’ll forgo the blueberries in my salad later. But I just gave you more work to do. How about I do the dishes?”

“I thought the kitchen was my domain?” she asked softly, not wanting to push but knowing that confrontation was almost inevitable if Cassie was the kind of person she thought she was. The kind of person who pushed and pushed unless someone pushed back. Olive had never been very good at pushing back, she just left. She wasn’t doing that anymore.

“Yes. The kitchen is yours. Unless you want her to clean it, and then I’ll put that in her duties, but I’ll make sure that she does it sometime when you’re not in it. Perhaps an agreed-upon time?”

“That might be best.” She didn’t want to be accused of taking Cassie’s mop and bucket and cleaning supplies, and she could hardly ask for Doyle to buy her supplies of her own.

It just complicated everything, but she couldn’t blame him for hiring her, because he’d been waiting a month for a housekeeper, and he finally had one drop on his doorstep, but she was going to be leaving soon. The smartest thing for him to have done would have been to get rid of her.

Plus, maybe she had judged Cassie wrong, and she wasn’t going to have the issues with her that she thought she was. Yeah. She should have given her the benefit of the doubt instead of immediately imagining that they were going to have all kinds of trouble. That wasn’t right of her.

“I’m going to have to change Livvy before we go,” she said as she finished putting the fruit salad together and clamped the lid down tight.

He had put the dishes in the dishwasher and wiped the table. He was now rinsing out the rag he’d used and laying it carefully out on the counter so it would dry.

“That’s fine. I’ll text Cassie and see if she wants to go too, but I’m guessing she’s probably not up yet. That was one of the struggles that I had when she worked for me before. I was on my own for breakfast.”

He didn’t seem like he was complaining, just stating a fact as he pulled his phone up and began to text.

She’d forgotten how easy it was to be with him. He worked hard. It was hard for her to think of anyone who worked harder, but he didn’t have the frenetic pace that a lot of hardworking men had, where they didn’t have time for anything but to go directly from task to task and never have time to stop or chat or want to discuss anything but what was on their mind.

He was always willing to take the time to talk to her. Had always been interested in things outside of his little bubble. In fact, the conversations she had with Doyle had been the best conversations she’d had in her life and so much different than living with her parents, who hadn’t wanted to have much to do with her. It was convenient how she had forgotten all of those things. Or maybe pushed them aside.

She couldn’t believe she had given him up because of some misguided idea of needing to travel the world. Even before she’d gotten sick, she wasn’t having that much fun. It was enjoyable, and she loved seeing new things, but it was enjoyable the way eating a candy bar was enjoyable. Empty calories.

“If she answers me, I’ll let you know. In the meantime, we’ll just plan on going without her.”

She nodded as she knelt down by where she had set Livvy on a blanket on the floor. She had been happy and content cooing and gurgling by herself.

“Who watched her while you were sick?” Doyle asked as though the thought had just occurred to him.

“I don’t know. I was unconscious, delirious at times, and too weak to move most of the time. Sometimes I would look over and she would be in a crib in my room, and sometimes she wouldn’t be. A couple of times, I got out of bed to find her, and once I fell down on the floor, cracked my head, and ended up unconscious for I don’t know how long. I don’t remember who got me back in the bed. It was...not a good time.”

To say the least. She didn’t know how Livvy had even survived. But the neglect had made her into a very content baby. Perhaps because she had learned that crying didn’t bring her any attention so it was a pointless and fruitless endeavor. The idea was sad, but it made for an easy baby anyway. She couldn’t go back and change it though. She couldn’t continue to feel guilty for things that she couldn’t undo.

Like leaving Doyle.

“I’m sorry I hurt you,” she said as she carefully closed the tabs of the diaper and started to put her outfit back together.

She hadn’t planned to apologize, but it felt good.

“I don’t think about it.”

Of course he didn’t. It probably didn’t bother him at all.

“I just know I didn’t treat you very well, and that’s weighed on my mind since I left. It’s weighed even harder on it since I’ve come back. You’ve been so nice to me, and I don’t deserve it. I just wanted you to know that I’m sorry. I would do it differently if I could go back and do it again, but since I can’t, I’ll just try not to do anything like that to anyone again.”

“Yeah. That’s probably a good idea going forward.”

There might have been a little bit of irony or perhaps humor in his voice, but she didn’t turn around to check. She snapped the last of Livvy’s snaps and lifted her from the floor, carefully picking up the blanket and shaking it out before she wrapped it around her.

It wasn’t long until she had her tucked in the car seat, and she didn’t need to say anything because as soon as the baby was ready, Doyle picked her up in one hand, held the fruit salad and the spoon in the other, and led the way to the door.

She slipped around him, opening it for them, while he walked out.

“Do you want me to lock it?” she asked, knowing that growing up she couldn’t recall her parents ever locking the door, but times had changed, and perhaps Doyle’s time in Chicago had changed him.

“Yeah. You better. Cassie’s up there, and I wouldn’t want her to get any unexpected visitors. Otherwise, I typically don’t.”

“I thought after living in Chicago...” She allowed her voice to trail off, thinking that he could elaborate on that if he wanted to.

“Yeah. I wouldn’t leave my door unlocked there. It took a little while to transition back to a small town, but it’s nice to not have to worry about whether or not someone unsavory is going to be getting in. Here in Raspberry Ridge, that’s almost unheard of.”

“One of the reasons why I wanted to come back and raise my child here.”

“I think that was a smart decision.”

They got in the car and drove to Bible study without saying anything more. Unlike yesterday though, this silence was not uncomfortable. It didn’t seem as peaceful and natural as the silences she remembered from before, but maybe they were starting to get used to each other.