“What are you hungry for?” Sully asked.

“I think today is the meat loaf special. If it is, that’s what I want.”

Sully closed his menu and set it aside. “Sounds good to me. Two specials coming up.”

They were halfway through the meal when Lovey came sailing by, flashed the poster-board sign she was carrying, and kept walking.

Melissa giggled. “She’s already putting up the Thursday afternoon Closed sign.”

A couple of minutes later, Lovey went back into the kitchen and came out with another sign, which she also flashed at them.

Sully grinned. “She’s really getting into this.”

“Surprise reveal party Thursday night in Granny’s. 6:00 p.m. Everyone’s invited,” Melissa said. “Lord. The last time the whole city was invited to something was Peanut and Ruby’s wedding, and they had to hold it at the city park.”

Sully eyed the size of the dining room. “How big is the banquet room?” he asked.

“It’s bigger than this room,” Melissa said, then pointed to the folding doors on the back wall.

Sully was thinking about how many people the state fire marshal would allow in one place, but then decided Lovey had been at this job for years. She knew what she was doing.

“One way or another, we’re all going to be surprised how this turns out,” he said.

* * *

Following Lovey’s request, Ruby ordered small arrangements and two large floral arrangements—one for the dining room and one for the banquet area. Then she ordered another small arrangement to sit on the front desk, with delivery by 4:00 p.m. on Thursday.

Determined not to make the employees at Granny’s cook and cater on such a grand scale, Lovey told them what was happening and that they were invited to the party as guests, not employees.

She had already contacted a married couple she knew who owned a big catering company in Savannah, asking them if they could do her event on short notice.

Once the caterers found out how casual it would be, and that while the number of people expected was large, all Lovey requested was simple finger foods and one giant four-tiered cake, they readily agreed.

Lovey didn’t blink at the cost and described the cake decor she wanted—small silver Byzantine crosses made from fondant, winding around the cake like a staircase, with a gray-haired woman holding the sign HERE I AM as the cake topper. The caterers would arrive by four and have it all set up by party time.

All the employees knew was that something big was happening, and when Lovey took off work again right after breakfast service on Wednesday to go buy a new outfit at the Unique Boutique, they were in shock. In all the years they’d known her, she’d never done this. Suppositions were flying.

But it was Mercy who finally put an end to the kitchen gossip when she banged a wooden spoon on her metal baking table and yelled, “Hey!”

Elvis, the fry cook, stopped talking. The waitresses all froze. Chet, the dishwasher, jumped and dropped a plate.