Billionaire Flawed 1(38)

She pulled back her thick red hair after brushing it thoroughly with 100 strokes and tied it behind her head in a large bun. She pulled on her bonnet over it, then pulled it off and decided she was going without today. She didn’t have to wear a bonnet if she didn’t want to.

She put on her clothes and left the room, leaving the house with fifteen minutes to walk to the sewing shop in town where she worked. It wasn’t far from her room in the boarding house. On the way out, she picked up a ham biscuit from the kitchen. Each morning, one of the other tenants fixed ham biscuits and left them warm for anyone who wanted one. She delighted in them since they were the only meat she got until dinnertime.

Today would be different. Her aunt was sure to have ham or turkey biscuits, with some corn and cabbage on the side and possibly a few other tasty delights. Her aunt, Grace, made the best sugar cookies she’d ever eaten. They were another thing she was looking forward to today.

Joyce smiled as she walked down the side of the street. There didn’t appear to be many people on the road this morning. No horses, buggies, carriages, or wagons passed her on her way. She thought that was a bit strange but after a moment forgot about it.

Her coworkers were already in the shop, sitting around in comfortable cushioned chairs with their sewing work on their laps and their sewing baskets set either at their feet or to the side.

“Good morning, Joyce!” Several of them called out a greeting to her, and she smiled at them.

“Good morning, ladies.”

“Did you have a good sleep last night?” One of them, Ann-Margaret, asked curiously. Without waiting for an answer, she continued. “I didn’t. I heard a dog howling in the middle of the night, and it woke me up. I couldn’t get back to sleep! Can you imagine? Letting your dog howl all night long when other people are trying to sleep.”

Joyce went to a shelf and took down her sewing basket. “Did you go out and say something about it to your neighbor?” She asked as she strolled back to her seat.

“I wanted to, let me tell you that.” Ann-Margaret was shaking her head. “But I don’t like to wander about at night by myself. You don’t know who might be lurking in the shadows.”

“Yes, because there are so many wild dog or Indian attacks here, right, Ann-Margaret?” One of her other coworkers winked at her. The rest of them laughed. Ann-Margaret gave her friend a smile.

“It’s dangerous whether you like to believe it or not, Jane. I could have been attacked by a wild animal. You just never know!”

“Or a mosquito could have bitten you!” Jane said, continuing to tease her. “How tragic! How awful!”

They all laughed, and Ann-Margaret joined in. “Oh, it may be silly to you, Janie. But I just don’t like it. I could even trip or walk into a hole and break my ankle.”

“Well then you would be useless as a horse with a broken leg, wouldn’t you?”

“All right now.” They heard the sound of their boss, Jack Carrigan, come from the back room. He stepped out and smiled at them all. “You can’t get work done if you are sitting around teasing Ann-Margaret about her fears.”

The women greeted their boss jovially.

“Good morning, Jack.” Joyce nodded at him. “I’m not late today, am I?”

He shook his head, moving into the room to survey the work his employees were doing. He was a large, round man with a pleasant demeanor and a quick hand to help anyone who needed it. Like his employees, the woman who worked for him were treated with a great deal of respect and encouragement. He paid them a decent salary and never tried to withhold any money from them. They did good work, and he liked to reward them for their efforts. “Not at all, Joyce. You just didn’t get here early!”

He grinned at her and she returned his smile, sitting to begin her work. She enjoyed the job and had been saving her money for some time now to do some traveling. She wanted to get out of the small Virginia town that had become her home after coming over from Ireland to New York. Her mother had detested New York and moved them South as soon as she could.

The morning went by quickly, as Joyce had hoped it would. She was pulling on a light shawl and heading out the door before she knew it.

Glade Hill was on the other side of the street and down just a bit from the sewing shop. She stopped on the way and took an apple from a cart, flipping the vendor a coin as she went. He snatched it from the air and grinned at her.

“Thank you, Joyce!” He called out, holding the coin up in the air. She nodded at him and took a big bite from the apple.

When she reached Glade Hill, she pulled open a small white iron gate that surrounded the bottom of the hill and went through. A stone path would lead a winding way up the hill, and she set about going up it, looking to the left and right to see where her aunt had decided to sit. She soon spotted her and left the path to walk over the grass to the blanket Grace had spread out for them to sit on.