After the tour, Luna went to deal with some issue in the orchards, and Jameson found himself a small corner to work in in the staff break/storage/catchall room, starting the painstakingly slow process to take them into the digital age. In the open like this, he was able to observe everyone moving about. The place was . . . well, fascinating, which was actually the most surprising thing of all.
People came and went, checking the big boards on the wall, which held various schedules for who was where, times of animal feedings, etc. On one hand, it felt messy and unnecessary, because if they had an online global doc, no one would have to stop working to come into the office. But on the other hand, the staff being constantly in touch with each other in person also seemed to make things run surprisingly smoothly in spite of the time lost from leaving their stations.
But for him, working in the busiest room made it almost impossible to concentrate. So eventually he took his laptop outside and sat on a bench in the Square, where two things quickly occurred to him. One, the benches were stone and hard as . . . well, stone. And two, being outside in the stunning sunshine with a brilliant blue sky, puffy white clouds, and pine-scented air so fresh it almost burned his lungs felt like a luxury.
As he worked, guests milled around. A clown made helium balloon animals for the kids who came through. On a unicycle. Personally, Jameson was no fan of clowns, but the unicycle skill was impressive. When he realized he’d been people-watching instead of working for twenty straight minutes, he knew he had to move. Plus, his ass was numb.
He managed to just catch Luna by the hand as she came running through—the woman was always on the move—and asked her which employee was in the clown suit.
She looked over her shoulder and smiled. “Oh, that’s Bill. He’s a volunteer.” Jameson must’ve looked horrified because she rushed to say, “We vetted him, of course. He shows up a couple of days a week for an hour or two. Works for tips.”
“And that . . .” Jameson gestured to the left, where a woman was walking a baby cow on a leash. “Who’s that?”
Luna smiled, her eyes all soft and warm. “Annabelle.”
“Why is Annabelle on a leash?”
Luna gave that magical laugh of hers. “Annabelle’s the human. She’s with the county animal control and brings us animals that need rescuing. The calf’s not only orphaned but also nearly blind, so we’re taking her in, the hope being that our grown cow, Mable, will mother her. We take in a lot of animals with disabilities. They’re dropped off by owners who can no longer care for them, or locals who find them. We’re often their last stop.”
Very sweet indeed, but . . . “How in the world do we get any insurance company on this planet to issue us liability coverage?”
“Hey, people care about this place. Plus, our insurance agent’s kids love it here,” she admitted.
“Seems like everything you do here is related to a connection.”
She smiled. “Now you’re catching on.” She wore no makeup, a slight sunburn on her cheeks and nose. Her hair had been piled on top of her head again, her Levi’s faded to what looked like a buttery softness, a radio on her hip, and a pair of dusty black sneaks with bright pink shoelaces on her feet, making her somehow look both sexy and adorable at the same time.
“It’s the personal connections that make a place like this work,” she said. “We’d be hard-pressed to run at all without the help of caring volunteers and the town.”
Personal connections were a weak spot of his. It went along with his deep-seated fear of being discarded, deserted, or forced out. Which, of course, was a self-fulfilling prophecy because ever since being a schoolkid, he’d held himself apart from others, finding it easier to go it alone than to risk being the rescue mutt who didn’t get picked.
He was no longer a kid, but Apple Ridge Farm was a group of tight-knit people, and he was all too aware of them being a family.
And him being the outsider.
“Gotta go,” Luna said.
“Where to?”
“Payroll. It’s not going to write itself.”
He’d have been horrified that she was doing payroll by hand, but he’d already noted that and had plans in motion to automate that as well. She’d probably kill him, but she had her lane, and he had his. “Why don’t you let me take on all of your bookkeeping roles,” he said. “You’re busy enough.”
She looked at him, surprised. “You’d do that?”
“Of course.” It was, after all, self-serving.
She flashed him a warm, genuine smile that just about stopped his heart. “Thanks,” she said, and started to walk off. “You’re watching my ass as I walk away.”
Yeah, he was. He’d slept with her in his head, where she’d worn those jeans and nothing else, and he’d taken his time peeling her out of them. He’d woken up disappointed to find it’d been just a dream, but also relieved because being with her in reality, complete with her crazy life, would drive him out of his mind.
But he sure wouldn’t turn down another dream . . .
That night, Jameson entered his hotel room exhausted and smelling like goat. He went straight to the bathroom and stripped for a desperately needed shower.
It was heaven, at least for three whole minutes, until he ran out of hot water. He toweled off and dropped onto the bed. Grief was exhausting. And damn, so were the changes in his life. He didn’t miss home, which was really just a high-rise condo in LA that had come furnished and was completely impersonal. Nor did he miss his solo lifestyle. He had casual friends in LA and he dated here and there, but nothing serious in a long time. And he had no regrets about taking the leave of absence from his job to handle Silas’s favor. The work would be there when he was ready to return. He knew this because he was good at what he did. Really good. He liked going into a place, finding the good, the bad, the ugly, and figuring out where the value was.
This didn’t mean he was welcomed. In fact, it was usually the opposite. He’d long ago taught himself not to care. Work was analysis, that was it.
But this project was different. It didn’t feel like just business, it felt personal. Everything he’d ever had, he’d earned from hard work. Silas had taught him the value of that. Nothing had been handed to him. In his experience, people who were handed things never fully appreciated what they had.
And yet he’d been handed 50 percent of this place.
Too tired to think anymore, he closed his eyes, but even then he could still see his new partner, hands on her hips, those pretty eyes flashing, giving him shit. No one ever gave him shit. And there, in the dark, he felt his mouth curve into a smile.
He didn’t want to be charmed by her fierce, protective, passionate nature. He wanted to be neutral. He wanted to have no feelings toward the farm one way or the other. He wanted it to simply be an ethereal attachment to a man he’d considered a pseudo father. Swearing, he got up, pulled on sweats, and left his room, heading down the hall to the vending machine.
He liked to eat clean. Well, as clean as he could seeing as he was on the road 24/7. But tonight called for snacks of the saturated-fat kind. He bought a Snickers bar and started eating it in front of the vending machine while contemplating what else he needed. A pack of strawberry licorice sticks—which, hey, were practically a fruit, right?—or a bag of spicy-hot Cheetos?
“Whatcha doing?”
Turning, he found a little girl in pigtails and footie pj’s, maybe around seven or eight, staring at him. “I’m eating,” he said.
“I wanna eat too.”
He was pretty sure a grown-ass man wasn’t supposed to feed candy to a kid he didn’t know. He looked around, but no one else was in the hallway. “Uh . . . where’s your keeper?”
“She’s coming.”
Good. He put more money into the machine and hit the button for the spicy-hot Cheetos.
They didn’t drop. “Son of a bitch—” He broke off and eyed the little girl guiltily. “I mean darn.”
She grinned. “Son of a bitch!”
Grimacing, Jameson eyed the machine again. It was a shame it didn’t sell booze, as he could use some. Oh well, a pack of licorice sticks it was then.
When they dropped, the little girl jumped up and down, clapping her hands in delight. “I want one!”
“No.”
“I want a candy! I want a candy! I want a candy!”
Jeez, for a little thing, she had a set of lungs on her. “If I give you one, will you let me take you back to wherever you belong?”
She nodded.
“Okay, lead the way.”
“Candy first.”
This kid was going places. “Nice try. But no.”
She threw herself down on the floor and started screaming bloody murder. Like earsplitting bloody murder.
A woman came running out of her room, scooped up the girl, hugging her close as she glared at Jameson.
He lifted his hands, one holding the Snickers bar, the other the licorice.
Her eyes widened. “Were you feeding candy to my daughter?”
“He said no!” the girl sobbed.
The woman lost some of her righteous anger, but still gave him a dirty look as she whirled and vanished with her daughter back inside their room.
Needing the hot Cheetos bad, he tried once more, pumping a fist in victory when this time the bag dropped. He was eating in bed when something thumped against the wall. And then again. And again, speeding up.
Great. The wall-bangers were at it again.
Then the opposite wall started vibrating with sounds of a gunfight from a TV on at full blast. He sighed and, hands laced behind his head, stared up at the ceiling. How the hell had he gotten here? Oh yeah. It’d been the promise to a dead man. And now his immediate future was locked up in Luna and her band of misfits until he could get back to his formerly scheduled life.
At the moment, that couldn’t come soon enough.