Sunrise Point

burning daylight.” She zipped up her jacket and pulled on gloves. She went past him to the break room to grab a rain slicker off a set of hooks on the wall that held a dozen or so.
    “Don’t you want a cup of coffee to get your engine started?” he asked her when she passed back through the office.
    She grinned at him. “Now that I’m wealthy, I have coffee at home. With cream!” And off she whirled. He heard her outside as she said, “Hey, Duke, old pal—how are you this morning? Gonna be another wet one, but you like it that way, don’t you? Doesn’t that wet dog smell make it all worthwhile?” And then she laughed.
    She was just the cutest damn thing, he found himself thinking. He wondered what she’d think of stuffed grape leaves… .
    It was a few hours later, the morning fog and mist beginning to give way to a bright morning sun, when Tom heard the bell from the back porch. He had asked Maxie to ring it when Darla was ready to have her luggage carried downstairs. The bell had almost never been used. Tom’s grandfather had installed that bell when Maxie was very, very pregnant. It was one of those old-fashioned things with a strip of rawhide attached to the clapper. He wanted her to use it if she needed him for anything rather than walking up and down a couple of acres of trees looking for him. And what had Maxie done? She had walked through the entire orchard to find Grandpa to tell him, “I didn’t want to bother you, but I’ve been in labor all day and now I think I have to call the midwife. Can you get her for me?”
    Tom laughed to himself. He’d heard the story so many times while growing up. His grandpa had swept his grandmother up in his arms, carried her to the house, up the stairs to the bedroom and sent someone for the midwife. The midwife was from another town, of course—that long ago Virgin River wasn’t much but a few farms. And the midwife didn’t make it, which at the end of the day had been something of a tragedy because Maxie had a few complications that left her unable to have more children. Of course there was no guarantee that getting the midwife there on time would have mattered.
    Even though his grandparents, dead in love till the day Grandpa passed away, said they’d love to have had a baker’s dozen, they were also quick to say they were grateful for the bounty God gave: a son, an orchard and a woman who could bake a decent pie.
    He trudged across the yard to the house. For some reason he had a picture in his head of Nora tromping through an entire orchard rather than just ringing the bell. And then, unsummoned, an image of Darla being carried on a litter by a group of Nubian slaves… .
    He found himself ridiculous—stuck in a box of his own making, rejecting the one who appealed and spending every weekend with the one who was not right for him, though he had desperately wished she could have been. But it was hopeless. She was hopeless.
    She was waiting in the kitchen. “Going to get an early start?” he asked Darla.
    “Since you’ll be busy all day, I’ll get the drive behind me. I look forward to next weekend. It sounds like such fun.”
    Tom mentally tried to calculate how many more weeks she’d be in Davis, close enough to spend every freaking weekend at the orchard. “Let me go up and grab your bags,” he said. “Have you eaten breakfast?”
    “Long ago,” she said with a smile. She turned to Maxie, who was stirring a giant pot on the stove. “Thank you once again, Maxie. Your hospitality is unsurpassed.”
    “Always a pleasure, dear,” she said. “Oh, by the way, the next two weekends? There will be lots of company. I hope you love a crowd.”
    “Oh, yes,” she said.
    “Staying over,” Maxie stressed. “Some of my girlfriends from around the mountains are coming. We’ll be packed in here.”
    “It sounds like fun!”
    “Good, then.”
    Tom, chuckling and shaking his head, headed up the stairs. He managed the four designer bags in two trips, loading up her trunk. He drove her to the gate, opened it while she transferred herself to the driver’s side. She slipped her arms around his neck, stood on the toes of yet another pair of boots to give him a brief kiss. He was planning his email in his head—Darla, rethink this idea of spending the weekend during the apple festival. If Maxie’s friends are coming, you might end up on a cot in the cider works. And if you pick at your food, they might tie you down and feed you. They’re old,