Read Always the Baker, Finally the Bride for Free Online

smoothed the salt-and-pepper bun atop her head and removed the wire glasses from her knob of a nose as she approached him.
    “Have a seat,” he invited, waving toward the chairs on the other side of the desk. “What’s up?”
    “I’m not sure how to begin,” she admitted.
    “Well, Susannah. Nothing good ever starts with
those
words.”
    She chuckled. “I suppose it’s all in your perspective.”
    “After fifteen years together, I would think there’s very little we can’t talk about,” he reminded her. “Just spill it out on the table, and we’ll sort through it.”
    “All right,” she said with a nod. “I would like to retire in the spring, Jackson.”
    He felt the words thump to a landing somewhere at the top of his gut.
    “This
coming
spring?”
    Susannah chuckled again. “I thought I might. After the wedding.”
    Jackson raked through his hair with both hands before leaning back against the leather chair. Susannah looked so expectant, but he couldn’t think of anything to say in reply.
    “There’s time to hire someone else, and for me to train her in the basics of hotel business, and I think—”
    “Retire, Susannah? Really?”
    She nodded.
    “I can’t even remember what I did without you.”
    Susannah smiled at him, one of those maternal, knowing smiles she’d been smiling even before her dark hair entertained notions of silver strands.
    “I won’t leave you in the lurch,” she promised. “I’ll find someone just as accommodating . . .”
    “Not possible.”
    “. . . whose computer skills are top-notch . . .”
    “Well, I’ll need that, won’t I?”
    “. . . with outstanding references.”
    Jackson fidgeted with the pen in front of him while he processed the thought of losing Susannah. When he’d left his corporate career in pursuit of his late wife’s dream of transforming The Tanglewood Inn into a wedding destination hotel, this woman had blindly followed him into the great unknown. He’d once told her that he felt as if the two of them had entered a jungle armed with nothing but machetes and boots appropriate for wading through knee-deep mud. She’d done her fair share of swinging that machete since then, carving out a clear path toward a successful business. Without Susannah, and his sisters too, he never could have come through it with his sanity intact.
    And, of course, there’d been Emma by his side.
    Jackson sighed at the thought of her, and he checked the time on the clock that sat on the shelf by the door. She’d be home from Savannah in a few hours.
    “You’ll have to give me some time to digest this, Susannah.”
    “Of course,” she said, rising to her feet.
    “Can we talk about it again at the end of the week?”
    “We can.”
    “But in the meantime, I’d just like to thank you,” he told her in a hoarse, emotional tone. “You’re a treasure.”
    She paused at the door and smiled at him. “Thank you, Jackson. I’ve enjoyed working for you more than I can tell you.”
    “Glad to hear it.”
    She started to turn away, but she stopped in her tracks. “Oh. Don’t forget you have lunch downstairs with your sister in half an hour.”
    He grinned. “I did forget, Susannah. Thank you, yet again.”
    As he slipped into his jacket and straightened his tie, Jackson wondered if Susannah’s impending departure wasn’t just the first sign that the end of an era approached. Perhaps the sale of The Tanglewood was simply a logical conclusion?
    “I’ll be back in an hour,” he told Susannah as he crossed through her office and headed down the hall.
    Jackson pressed the call button for the elevator, and it rang almost immediately. His thoughts still behind him with Susannah and her retirement announcement, he took a step forward the moment the door slid open. But in the same instant, a small tornado blew out of the car and smacked hard into him.
    “Whoa, whoa there,” he said, taking the little girl by the shoulders. “Watch where you’re going