“I just told her she has a nice butt.”

“I’d tell you the same thing, but it might be mistaken for sexual harassment, so you can pretend you didn’t hear that come out of my mouth.”

Melissa laughed, and as she did, Sully had his first glimpse of the Missy he’d known—the happy, bubbly girl who was always the first one to laugh at herself.

Sully grinned. “You made a nice choice,” he said, eyeing the late-model white Ford Focus.

“It’s new enough to be reliable, which works for me. You are now officially released from further chauffeur duties,” Melissa said.

He frowned. “But what if I don’t want it to be over?”

She thought of the good-morning kiss. “What do you have in mind?”

“Nothing dangerous, I assure you. How about I follow you back to your place to leave the car, then we’ll have lunch. We can figure it out from there.”

“I’d love it,” Melissa said.

She got in the car and headed home, smiling all the way at the sight of the car behind her.

By the time Sully reached her house, he had a whole new idea about lunch. She was already out and locking her rental car when he pulled up. There was a bounce in her step as she got in.

“I had a thought about lunch,” Sully said. “Does Blessings have a good place to have a picnic? The day is so pretty, I thought maybe we could find a shade tree somewhere and eat there.”

“I would love to do that!” she said. “There are great picnic tables at the park.”

“Do we want to get something to go from Granny’s, or go to the supermarket and get stuff from there, or get something from the Dairy Freeze? It’s fast food, but—”

“Oh, the Dairy Freeze for sure,” Melissa said. “I love their chili dogs and fries.”

“I’ve had burgers from there and they were good, but I forgot to tell them to leave off the pickles. When I was taking them off, it made me remember you always ate the pickles off my burgers.”

Melissa laughed. “I’d forgotten all about that. That’s back when you were still Johnny. But I’m used to Sully now, and it fits you.”

“Then the Dairy Freeze it is,” he said, and drove up the street a few blocks, then pulled into line at the drive-through.

“This is such fun,” Melissa said. “Thank you for this.”

“No, thank you. Being around you has made me realize what I’ve been missing out on in life. I have friends, but I didn’t have anyone that I spent time with like this.”

“I can’t fault you for that,” Melissa said. “I have friends here, but no matter how many times I was invited to things, I rarely went. I had crawled in such a deep hole that I had no idea how to get out.”

The line began to move, and they were soon at the window ordering their food. After it arrived, they took off to the park with Melissa directing the way.