Chapter 13

CHAPTER 13

JESS

A fter my chores were done for the day, I headed back to the house to have a shower and to change. Slate and Dad were still in the living room, knee-deep in stack upon stack of paper. Concentrating so deeply that neither of them even noticed me when I walked past, I considered offering my help, but I had a feeling it would only be disruptive right now.

Maybe later.

They seemed to have found some kind of groove working together and the last thing I wanted was to throw them off balance if they were on a roll. A rock of dread settled in the pit of my stomach as I ascended the staircase soundlessly, really not wanting to interrupt them.

If they were still in there, it meant they hadn't found the paperwork yet and it was afternoon already. After lunchtime.

They'd spent hours in there and so far they hadn't had any luck. Closing my eyes, I sent up a silent prayer that they'd have found it by the time I got home. Then I strode directly to the bathroom and set the water temperature in the shower to cold.

It was boiling out there and I looked like a ball of sweat. Once I was done, I changed into town clothes and headed out to meet up with Sophie, my best friend. We were planning on grabbing milkshakes at a shop off Main Street, and she was already there when I walked in.

She waved me over, a bright, happy smile on her face where she waited for me in our usual booth right next to the ice-cream selection. At just an inch over five feet tall, Sophie was petite, to say the least. Her dainty features were pretty and delicate, her short blonde hair feathered around her face. Big blue eyes made her look like the innocent she was, a girly girl at heart whose dad was the sheriff in town and whose family had come from money.

Where I lived out on the country lanes, she lived in the downtown core of our little town, in one of the nicest houses in Firefly Grove. One of the oldest too, since it had been in her mother's family for generations.

I was mouthy and sassy to her sweet, proper, and charming, and while I'd inherited my mother's curves, she was as small and skinny as could be. It was her dream to open her own boutique in Firefly Grove and she'd been designing her own clothes since we were ten. Meanwhile, I happily wore my overalls every day.

She'd taken it upon herself to make me a few nice items of clothing over the years, but I never wore them unless it was to a wedding or a funeral. Thankfully, she didn't take offense because she knew me better than almost anyone else.

Despite our vast differences, we'd been best friends since we were in diapers. I'd been there for her when her mom had passed and she'd supported me when tensions had been at an all-time high in our house after my brother had decided to go to school to learn finance.

As I sat down across from her, I smiled, always feeling just a little bit better for being in her company. "Hey, you. Thanks for inviting me out today. I needed a break."

"Yeah, I figured," she said, those blue eyes firm and grinning on mine as she leaned forward. "I'm dying to know what the hush-hush operation is that's been going on at the farm. I don't blame you for needing a break from something that intense."

Taken aback, I took a quick look around before hissing at her through my teeth. We were some of the only customers in here at the moment, but I wasn't taking any chances of being overheard. Not about this.

"Who's going around saying there's a hush-hush operation going on at the farm?"

"Tag," Sophie said. "Obviously. What I'd like to know is why he's in the loop when I'm not."

I smacked myself in the forehead. I should've known that idiot would open his big, fat mouth. Taggert was a good guy who'd never intentionally jeopardize this for us, but he was also a dimwit. A loveable dimwit, but a dimwit nonetheless.

Especially when it came to getting attention from the lovely and extremely charming Sophie, whom he'd always had a massive crush on.

Then again, I hadn't shooed him off the property when we'd struck the oil or told him to keep his mouth shut. Both Dad and I had simply assumed he'd know better.

"There is no hush-hush operation going on at Merrick Meadows," I said, a little closer to my normal volume now. "I have no idea what he's talking about. He was probably just trying to get you to notice him."

Sophie's eyes sparkled as she arched a light eyebrow at me. "You do know I can see right through you? Spill the beans, honey. If you're even trying to lie to me about it, then it means it's something big and you could probably use my help. At the very least with making sure Tag doesn't tell anyone else."

I groaned. "For the record, I'm not trying to lie to you. I just really shouldn't be talking to you about this, especially since I don't even know if there's anything to talk about yet. Things are still very much up in the air."

"What things?" she asked directly, thankfully having lowered her own voice now as well. "What's going on, Jess? It's not like you to keep stuff from me."

"No, I know." I sighed. "If I tell you, you can't tell your dad about it yet, okay? You can't tell anyone. The future of the farm could be at stake, so if it gets out…"

She paled. "You could lose Merrick Meadows?"

"Maybe. I don't really know yet. All I know for sure right now is that when word gets out, there are going to be a lot of people interested in our property and we'd like to avoid that kind of attention."

Her brow furrowed, her lips parting as worry narrowed her eyes. "What's going on, Jess? You're freaking me out a little bit."

"Do you remember when I told you that we needed to do something about our water supply if we were going to survive this summer?"

She nodded slowly. "Sure. Is that what's wrong? Is your water supply tainted or—" She stopped abruptly, shaking her head before she continued. "No. That doesn't make sense. You said more people would be interested in your property. Not less. Did you find a natural spring or something?"

"We found oil. " I proceeded to confess all and ended with the awkward moment last night between Slate and me at the bottom of the stairs.

"He was so…" I trailed off, searching my mind for the right word. "I don't know. Unhidden."

"Unhidden?" Sophie laughed. "That doesn't mean anything to me."

"I can't explain it," I said honestly. "Vulnerable isn't the right word. Sleepy isn't either. He was both of those things when we ran into each other, but I've just never seen him without his composure."

She cocked her head at me, her eyes glazed over in thought. "I think people just refer to that as open."

"Yeah, but he wasn't that either," I said.

"You've slept with him, though," she reminded me with a wicked glimmer in her eyes. "He couldn't have been very hidden then."

"You'd think so, but he was. He was in charge, and commanding, and in control," I murmured as I tried to put my finger on a way to describe what I meant. "His suits are always perfect. His hair and jaw are sharp and his teeth are perfectly white. He's almost too perfect to be real, but then, when I ran into him last night, he was in his PJs."

I snapped my fingers suddenly. "That's it, actually. He was real to me for the first time. In his pajama pants with a T-shirt. Bare feet. Tired eyes and a weary smile. His hair was all messy. He was just real."

As I said it, I felt a flutter in my stomach that made it dawn on me that I might just have the hots for the guy. Sure, I'd thought he was sexy as hell at Mira's wedding, but a man in a suit had just never really been my thing.

While I could appreciate a good-looking man in a good-looking suit, I just couldn't see myself developing feelings for that. A guy in his own skin at two a.m. who looked like Slate? Apparently, that was my kink.

Sophie flicked whipped cream at me off her straw and it landed with a soft thwack on my cheek. I started, blinking myself out of my thoughts as I frowned and swiped at the sticky mess. "What the hell, Soph?"

"You weren't listening to me," she said. "What I suggested was that you bring him to the market on Saturday. Show him around. Introduce him to some people. Mainly me. I'd really like to see the boy who finally got your attention."

"I don't know," I said reluctantly, wondering how I'd even approach something like that with him. "You should see him out on the land with his shiny, polished shoes, wearing a bespoke suit. It's ridiculous. He's ridiculous. That's why he has my attention. It's his ridiculousness."

She snorted as she tried to hold back her laughter and failed. "No, girl. Stop lying to yourself. It's not his ridiculousness. You don't think he's ridiculous at all, do you? Not really."

"No, I really do." I thought back to watching him walk around the site yesterday. "He doesn't fit in here at all and it's eating away at me."

"Why?" She stuck her straw between her lips and spoke around it. "I'm not a farmer and I fit in here."

"Yeah, but the best thing I can equate it to would be you showing up at Merrick Meadows wearing stilettos. You know better, and that's because you do fit in. With him, it just makes me wonder what he's really doing here."

"You just told me five minutes ago that Mira sent him here to help you."

"I know, but let me put it this way," I said slowly, once again searching for the words to describe how I felt.

Usually, I was good with words. I didn't do confusion. I knew where I stood on most issues in life and I certainly knew how to voice my opinion, but something about this guy had me bouncing back and forth more than a tennis ball at Wimbledon.

"Mira trusts him and I trust that he's an expert. I know he's worked in this field for a long time and it's not that I doubt his experience. I just can't help but wonder about his own intentions for being here . Expert or not, people have agendas and reasons for doing stuff."

She shrugged her narrow shoulders. "I'm pretty sure his reason for being here is that his sister asked him to come. Mira has been your friend for years, but she just had a baby, so she sent the next best thing. He probably thought he had to do it so she wouldn't feel like she had to."

"That's a good point." I sighed, pulling my milkshake closer and grateful that I had the cold, sweet treat to ground me. "I don't know. I guess he's just got my head all tangled up."

"That's not your head, honey," she joked. "It's your heart, and your vagina."

"Soph!" I blushed beet red, my cheeks turning hotter than the surface of the sun.

Sophie blushed too, but she also gave me another little shrug and a smile. "What? Everyone thinks I'm so na?ve and innocent, but I'm not. Why can't I say the word vagina ? I mean, I have one."

Laughter I couldn't stop bubbled out of me. "Thanks for the clarification, and of course you can say the word. I've just never heard you use it before."

"Maybe I'm broadening my horizons," she said playfully. "You should do the same thing by bringing him to the market on Saturday. You don't have to trust him with your life to show him around a little bit. It might even help you figure out what's bothering you about him. Besides, who knows how long he's going to be in town?"

"Not long," I muttered, but maybe it was a good idea.

Would it really be so bad if he does end up staying for a few weeks or more? He was easy on the eyes and life on the farm could use a bit of spice.

I already knew Slate was real good at providing that. Sophie had made a fair point about not having to trust him with my life just to get to know him a little bit better. It wasn't like she was telling me to propose to him on Saturday.

Finally, I made up my mind and nodded. "Okay. You win. I'll ask him, but Soph?"

"Yeah?"

"If you get so much as a bad tingle from him, you have to tell me about it. It doesn't even have to be a whole vibe. Just anything that puts you on edge, I want to hear about it."

She smirked at me. "You got it, Jess, but for the record, I don't think I'm the one who's going to be getting tingles."

I groaned. "I think I preferred you with limited horizons."

She waggled her eyebrows at me, but as much as she'd surprised me today, I was glad I could talk to her about all this now. Sophie had always had a way of balancing me out, and right now, that was exactly what I needed.