2. Remi

Chapter 2

Remi

I tapped on Angie’s window. Her head bobbed up and down as she manually cranked it open. People still owned cars with manual windows?

“I’m fine. It’ll start.” She tried again, but her attempts ended with the same results—a dead truck. “No. No. No.”

“Give it another try, Muffin,” Tony said.

Muffin? He’d called her this in the airport too. The flush in her cheeks and the way she shot me a quick glance told me Angie didn’t especially love it.

“And press on the accelerator while you do it.” Nora pointed at the pedals on the floor.

Angie didn’t say anything to them and kept trying until turning the key only resulted in a click. She leaned her head on the steering wheel.

“I can give y’all a ride if you need one,” I offered. I didn’t exactly know how I was getting home, but I’d figure it out. My co-conspirator and best friend, Myles, mentioned he might be able to pick me up, but if he didn’t show, I could call an Uber since the rental car place wasn’t open. If they even had Uber drivers out here.

Nothing but empty fields surrounded the airport. No hotels. No restaurants. No houses. Just vast emptiness, making me feel exposed to the constant wind.

“No, we’re fine,” Angie said.

“That would be lovely.” Nora leaned over her daughter.

“Great.”

Angie narrowed her eyes at my one-word answer and started rolling up her window. I didn’t know what I’d done to earn her reticence.

“Y’all stay out of the wind in the truck. I’ll be back after I return this wheelchair.” The window closed before I finished speaking.

I smiled at her through the glass while she pretended I didn’t exist. Stubborn woman. How hard would it have been for her to say thanks? It wasn’t like she had any other option.

If only I could take away the glimpses of sadness I’d seen in Angie’s eyes. It was no surprise her expressions were tinged with misery. Nora and Tony hadn’t said much about his health, but I caught the words hospice and cancer.

In one plane ride, it wasn’t hard to figure out that the Johnsons were nice and genuine. Why did such awful things have to happen to good people?

I scrubbed a hand down my cheek. Nora and Tony talked the whole way from Salt Lake about Angie. They told me how she supported them, how she’d worked the farm when Tony’s health had deteriorated, and she’d also managed to be the first in the family to graduate with a bachelors. My curiosity about her, which had burned as hot as a Texas summer, cooled in the face of her disinterest in me.

I probably should have skipped all the bridge talk, but I was within miles of a once-in-a-lifetime experience, an unforgettable adrenaline rush.

The wind gusted and nearly took me with it. I turned to roll the wheelchair inside, but it was no longer next to me. My head shot up. The rolling chair blew across the parking lot at record speed like a ghost propelled it.

I sprinted after it. My backpack forced me to run like an awkward college freshmen with a billion books in their bag. I looked back at Angie—she was all-out laughing at me. With the spectacle I made of myself, I wasn’t surprised. I picked up my pace.

A car honked as I ran in front of it. It slammed on its brakes, and the driver got out. I didn’t even pause. The possessed chair was closing in on a black Mercedes, and I couldn’t let it mar the gleaming paint. My fingers closed on the left handle a couple of seconds before it broadsided the sports car. It whipped to a stop, the footrest slamming into my shin.

“Ow!” I yelled and hopped on one foot.

“Hey, Remi.”

Myles? Torrents of air blasted past my ears, making it hard to hear anything. I gripped the wheelchair and faced the driver of the car that’d nearly hit me.

“What are you doing chasing a wheelchair through the parking lot?” Myles wore sweats and a hoodie with his shoulder-length hair pulled back. He stood on the footboard with the door still open and leaned over the roof of the small red car. His door flexed in the wind.

Pushing the wheelchair in front of me, I moved closer to him, so I didn’t have to yell. “I’m returning it for a friend I met on the plane.”

“Sometimes you are too damn social!” Myles yelled and sat back in the driver’s seat. “Let me get parked.” He closed the door and veered into the parking spot to his right. He shut off the car and came to my side.

We clasped hands, and he gave me a one-armed hug around the steel frame of my backpack.

“Dallas isn’t the same without you.” I hadn’t seen him in months.

“Yeah. Well, it’s been rough here too. Sorry I’m late.”

In looks, Myles was my opposite. Straight blond hair. Lighter complexion. Light green-blue eyes. I’d known him since elementary school. After he’d saved my social life all through my growing up years, I’d made sure he had a very comfortable living doing what he loved most. My mom always lectured me on what a proper employer-employee relationship looked like. I was surprised she didn’t call him the help .

I successfully maneuvered the wheelchair to the ticket counter, exchanged pleasantries with the sparse airport employees while Myles remained quiet by my side. He’d been like this since Samantha had broken his heart a couple of months before he’d come here.

“Hey, remember the people I was too damn social with on the plane?” I asked on our way to the parking lot. The automatic doors slid open, allowing the wind to pummel me again.

“Yeah.” Myles’ chin-length hair fell out of his man bun and stuck to his whiskers. He brushed it behind his ears only to have it wisp around his face again.

“Well, I kinda offered them a ride.” I pointed to the truck, the bed loaded with their luggage and the cab still packed full of Johnsons.

“You never change.” He gave a soft chuckle. “I don’t know how we’ll fit.”

“We’ll make it work.” I slapped his back.

“I’ve missed your optimism.”

“And I’ve missed your sarcasm.”

I walked over to Angie and her parents while Myles brought the car alongside their truck. Taking the two carry-ons from the pick-up bed, I introduced the Johnsons to my oldest friend. Both suitcases fit in the compact car’s trunk with ease. I slid my backpack from my shoulders and carefully placed it on top of the two bags. It only had one change of clothes in it, my toiletries, and my Stetson hat my father had given to me the day I started working for our company.

Making sure the case my Stetson rested in wouldn’t be crushed, I lowered the trunk until it latched.

Nora had already helped Tony into the front seat and climbed behind him, leaving Angie and me. I moved to sit on the middle hump seat, and at the same time, she leaned into the car. We bumped shoulders and wedged into the opening.

“I’m ah—” I started.

“I’ll sit …” she said at the same time. “Hold on.”

We both squeezed our way out of our predicament.

She held up a hand. “I’ll go first.” She folded herself into the car, and I piled in next to her.

Being six foot two inches had its advantages. Fitting into the backseat of small cars wasn’t one of them. It took me three tries to get the door to shut. My whole right side touched her. I tried to set my hand down, but it brushed her thigh, so I held it next to my chest.

“You two situated?” Myles looked at me through the rearview; his laughter tacked on every word.

Angie’s chuckle joined Myles’s. “You do know it takes forty-five minutes to get to our house, right?”

My bare upper arm touched her soft skin. I could think of worse ways to spend forty-five minutes.

“On second thought, we’ll find another way home.” Angie shifted, and the side of her breast touched my arm.

My lips lifted into a crooked smile, and I swallowed. The fun meter for this company trip notched upwards by two more marks. Who said business couldn’t be mixed with pleasure?

“At this time in the morning?” Myles backed the car out of the parking spot and sped out of the lot, not giving her a choice. “I’m your best option.”

Angie leaned back against the seat. Thank you, Myles.

“I, for one, am grateful for the ride,” Nora said, glancing toward Tony, who’d finally gotten situated in front of her. The level of effort and the amount of pain it’d taken him to simply climb in the car was a reality I never wanted to live.

The trip had worn on him. Even I could tell the difference in him from when we’d first taken our seats on the plane.

“You are more than welcome,” I answered for Myles and me. The car wobbled in the wind. “Does it always blow like this here?”

“In the spring?” Angie laughed again. “Yes.”

Nora leaned over Angie to talk to me. “We used to tie a sheet to her ankles and wrists and watch her get blown around the yard. She loved it. Didn’t you, Angie?”

Angie braced her forehead in one hand and shook her head. If she could beam out of this car, I had no doubt she would.

“I’ll have to try that,” I said with what I hoped was an understanding smile.

“Better use king-size sheets when you do,” Tony said from the front seat.

“And take pictures. I’ll look you up on Instagram when I get home.” Nora nudged Angie, and Angie sank lower in the seat.

The longer this drive went on, the more I loved this family. I couldn’t help but wonder about the son they mentioned on the plane. Would I like him as much as I did the rest of the family?

I might end up running into him since I was here for as long as it takes, according to my father. Some of the real estate deals I’d worked on had taken over six months to come to an agreement. With Idaho being an outdoor enthusiast’s paradise, I didn’t mind the time I’d spend here getting this job done.

First, I’d BASE jump the bridge. Then I’d go to City of the Rocks to rock climb and rappel. Or I could rent an off-road vehicle and drive up a mountain.

“Y’all ever been to City of the Rocks? Myles and I were going to try to go there next week.” I couldn’t resist asking the Johnsons about the lesser-known treasures in this valley.

“We were?” Myles eyed me in the rearview.

I half-grinned. “I hadn’t told you yet.”

“It’s one of my favorite places in the whole world.” Angie spoke so quietly I almost didn’t hear her.

“We camped there as a family once or twice a year. Maybe we should head up there next week too. What do you think, Angie?” Tony looped his arm over the seat.

His face tightened. Even such a small movement caused him pain. Angie must have also noticed.

“I don’t know if I can, Papa. I have a lot of shifts,” Angie said.

Her comment sat in the car’s silence for a good ten minutes. Both Nora and Tony dozed, and Myles focused on the road. After struggling with my pocket, I pulled my phone out and took it off airplane mode.

It immediately started vibrating with a dozen text alerts. Names flashed across my screen under numbers I hadn’t saved to my contacts. Hey, Remi it’s Kathryn/ Mindy/ Taylyn/ Crystal … the texts would end in some variation of “I had a great time last night.” The rest of the messages were from my parents and brother checking up on my trip progress.

Too late, I shielded my screen from Angie, having no idea how many texts she’d already seen. After typing a quick response to my brother, Matthew, I tucked my phone back in my pocket, pressing against Angie even more, and bumped my head on the ceiling of the compact car.

“What kind of work do you do?” I kept my voice quiet so I wouldn’t disturb Tony and Nora, who were doing the sleepy head bob. She shifted against me again, and I had to restrain from outright admiring her cleavage.

She overtly rolled her eyes and angled away from me as best she could but answered me anyway. “I’m a nurse. I work in the NICU.”

“You save little babies’ lives?” I was surprised by how attractive I found this information.

“When I can. On the good days.”

“That’s pretty amazing,” I said. And then I did the unthinkable. I tucked one of her stray hairs behind her ear.

This never worked in my playbook, which had a ninety-five percent success rate.

Step one: draw her interest, then walk away, forcing her to come to you.

Hadn’t I learned this most basic rule after years of practice? But I’d never felt this kind of instant chemistry with a woman.

She stiffened and turned her wide eyes to me. In her stare, I could tell she felt what was going on between us too. Our faces were mere inches apart. All I had to do was tilt my head toward her and my lips would touch hers.

How wonderful would that feel? It’d compare to the rush of jumping off a bridge, especially if it progressed into my bedroom.

“Where do you live again?” Myles asked, ending the moment.

Angie leaned closer to her mother.

Dammit, Myles.

She rattled off her address. The numbers she’d said sounded vaguely familiar. I rested my hands on my knees. Myles turned onto the small yet well-kept street a few miles west of Main Street. We passed the groomed gardens around the neighborhood sign Mountain Meadows.

Oh. Hell.

Nora lifted her head and opened her eyes. “We’re home.” She smiled. “Sorry you couldn’t have seen our farm a few years ago. It used to be surrounded by endless fields.”

“Then some jerk-off company bought every farm touching ours and planted these ugly houses here.” Tony wrenched his thumb at the identical houses lining the freshly asphalted streets.

“They want to buy our farm too. But we’ll never sell.” Angie’s voice came out as hard as stone.

The car drifted off into the weeds lining the driveway. Myles corrected and rolled back into the center of the lane. His gaze reflected off the rearview mirror and scalded me. My grip tightened on my knees.

I was here to buy a centennial farm that neither the kids nor the parents wanted to sell.

I was here to buy Angie’s farm.