“Me, too.” She bent and kissed him on the forehead. “But now I’ve got to get home or gossip will have it that we did more than sleep. The girls don’t need that when they’re trying to get a new start.”

He pulled her back onto his lap and kissed her on the lips. “I’ll see you Saturday. Is eight too early to pick you up?”

“I’ll be ready.” She nodded as she straightened up.

“I’m free to text now, right?” he asked as she stepped off the porch.

“Oh, yeah,” she said.

She jogged the whole way back to the house only to find the door locked. She rang the doorbell and no one answered, so she hurried to the back door. It was open, and just as she’d suspected, Jody was in the kitchen making coffee.

As Mitzi made her way inside, Paula came into the kitchen from the foyer. “Well, well! So that’s why the front door was unlocked. I couldn’t sleep, so I came down about two for a cookie. I figured we’d forgotten to lock up after the ice-cream party, but now we know better.”

“Graham’s place?” Jody asked.

Mitzi nodded.

“Great!” Paula and Jody said at the same time.

Jody pointed to a chair. “Sit down and tell us all about it.”

“Not much to tell. We’ve got a date planned for Saturday. I get to spend the day with him while the girls do that wedding with Rita. We made out like teenagers. And now I’m going upstairs to take a shower and get dressed for the day.” She crossed the kitchen in long strides.

“We want more details later,” Paula called out as she left the room.

“You’ll have them,” Mitzi answered. She could give them a play-by-play of what she and Graham had said, but she’d never be able to describe the emotions she’d felt when they finally admitted that there was something between them—or the way his kisses made her go weak in the knees.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Three

Shopping, or doing anything alone for that matter, was not something that Jody enjoyed. She’d had Paula and Mitzi to do stuff with her until they graduated. Then Jody had moved in with Lyle. Maybe in six months or a year, she’d be more comfortable with it, but today, when she pulled out a cart alone, she absolutely did not like it.

She made a beeline toward the greeting-card display to buy a birthday card for her mother. Wanda might be a cantankerous old gal, but a person only got one mother. Jody had always sent her a card and, when she could afford it, had the flower shop take a bouquet to her.

“Well, hello!” Quincy said as he rounded the end of the toy aisle.