Her Heart's Desire (Sunflower Series Book 1) (2 page)

Lia slowed, bumping the truck onto the fresh
asphalt of Main Street and into the afternoon shadows cast by
two-story buildings. She flicked a quick wave at Helen Carter
standing in the window of the Sunflower Café, rolling by without
slowing. Last week, the older woman had cornered her when she went
in to order a birthday cake. Helen insisted on telling her fortune,
which Lia hadn’t wanted to know. Bad news was something she
preferred to read in the paper rather than worry and wait for it to
come true. Like sour milk, it could ruin a day...or a life. She’d
had enough negative news to last a lifetime. But Helen, whose
accuracy rate matched a master sharpshooter at a gun range, grabbed
Lia’s wrist when she offered her credit card to pay. Helen then
proceeded to announce to coffee-klatch customers how Lia would soon
have a man in her life. A man she already knew.

“Yeah, right,” Lia mumbled, remembering the
group’s hearty applause and her own reddening embarrassment. An
irritating flush heated her cheeks. There was only one man she
wanted, but he’d rejected her, avoiding all entanglement except
those resembling a brother-sister relationship. She had a brother.
Didn’t want another one.

She angled the pickup into an empty place in
front of the post office. “A man in my life.” She grunted. “As if
men have been beating down my door.”

Lia stepped onto the truck’s running board,
then hopped down, hoping to make a graceful exit in a skirt. With
the first of three stacks of boxes in her arms, she carried them in
for mailing.

“Afternoon, Lia,” Zoë Marshall, Lia’s friend
since grade school, called out from behind the counter. “How many
this time? Single-handedly you’ve kept this station in business for
the last year.”

“Don’t know. More in the truck.” Lia plopped
the boxes on the counter. A delivery service would pick up at the
farm, but that’s how hundreds of boxes ended up there in the first
place. A service would’ve been easier than hauling boxes to town
each week, but she’d never see a living soul if she didn’t make the
weekly trek to the post office and to church. At the farm, corn
listened well; however, other than rustling with the wind, it never
talked back. Hard to have a conversation even though there were
acres of ears and only one of her.

After Lia stacked the final load of packages
on the counter, Zoë weighed each one, punched numbers into a
machine, totaled the cost, and handed a receipt to Lia. “We need a
girls’ weekend away. Before the cold blows in, let’s go to the
Renaissance Fair in Lawrence.”

“Sorry, you know I don’t like costumes.”

“Well, then, how about that blues club over
in KC?”

“I love their barbecue, but don’t like
smelling like it.”

“Why do you keep putting me off?” Zoë
pouted.

“How about horseback riding? A neighbor will
loan us a couple horses for an afternoon.”

“Lia, we have to do something to get you off
the farm.” Zoë’s tone chastised. “God knows it was awful what
happened to your parents, but dang, girl, you didn’t die with
them.”

Lia flinched. The painful rawness of her
parents’ death had healed, but a tender spot still remained. “I’m
not the wild child I was when we were in high school. The old place
is comforting. Makes me miss my parents less. Besides, you see me
every week, sometimes twice with church.”

“There’s only so much to paint on the
prairie. I thought surely you’d be ready to head back to the city
after a few months.” Zoë paused before whispering, “Of all of us, I
thought you’d be the one to make it out for good.”

She’d thought so, too. Except now, the
rolling hills dotted with farms surrounding Harvest offered her
endless inspiration. The same field, or stream, or copse looked
different with each season. A simple tree dropped leaves in winter.
Sprouted fresh green in spring. Bloomed rich deep green in summer,
then turned red, gold, and orange in the fall. Every season offered
a colorful palette. The fields had character, too. A blue sky
transformed at dusk, glowing pink, gold, and even lavender. The
scent of fresh-cut hay was like the warm embrace of an old
friend.

Sometimes she missed the city, missed her
students more, but here she could breathe deep with the wide-open
sky. Here, she vibrated with life as though the country had tapped
her with a tuning fork and together they pulsed with the same
frequency. It had taken leaving and returning for her to figure it
out.

Zoë leaned over the counter and waved Lia
closer.

“Are you mad at me because that cowboy at
Rockets asked me out for Saturday night?” Zoë whispered.

Lia lowered her eyes and shook her head,
trying hard not to laugh. Good-hearted Zoë, with her dark brown
eyes expressing her every emotion, would be pleased to know she
hoped to wrangle a date with the newest man in town, and the cowboy
in question would never be her type.

“If you’re interested, really interested,
I’ll let you have him.”

“Oh, no, Zoë. I’m doing just fine. Are you
mad at me because you don’t have a place to crash in the city? Is
that why you keep wanting me to leave?”

“No.” Zoë drew back and placed a hand over
her heart as though mortally wounded.

“But?” Lia whispered.

“The cowboy fits the description of the man
Helen said would come into your life.” Zoë furrowed her brow. “I
can’t mess with fate, nor should you.”

“You go on and have a great time with him
tomorrow night. You know, this could be the time when Helen is
wrong. No one’s perfect.”

Zoë gasped and shook her head as if to negate
Lia’s uttered blasphemy.

Lia shrugged. People publicly shied away from
conversations about Helen’s abilities, but they sure lined up
whenever she offered free palm readings or gave away free dessert.
Just one of the anomalies of Harvest. Palm reading and pie.

Lia flashed a wide grin before walking around
the corner to her post office box, the heels of her boots clicking
against the worn linoleum floor. She paused before opening the
small door. Her breath hitched. She hoped just once she’d find a
greeting card or postcard, something personal from someone who
cared, even if that someone turned out to be her brother.

She turned the key in the lock. The small
door opened. She bent to peer inside, only a flyer for pool
products and a gun catalog. A quick stab of sadness shot to her
chest. Happiness had taken a holiday and forgotten to write. If she
wanted snail mail, she’d have to send it to herself. Gee, what fun
that would be...and oh, so pathetic.

At the door, she waved good-bye to Zoë and
hoped her smile appeared convincing.

Driving at the exact speed limit along
tree-lined Main Street guaranteed a green light when she reached
Fifth Avenue, the only intersection in town with a stoplight. The
sheriff and his deputy staked it out on weekends, especially in the
fall, to catch speeders or red-light runners—usually tourists
headed for the only antique and what-not store for miles. They made
exceptions for bus drivers delivering potential customers on their
trips from Kansas City to Denver.

Lia rolled through a green light, passed the
other streets, and turned left on Tenth.

“Townspeople have all day to shop,” she
muttered when cars filled all the parking spaces in front of the
store. Today was the final day of the fall bulb sale. Garden club
matrons wanted the best show of spring color around public spaces,
which made the annual flower sale a big hit. Every year they
planted existing gardens with more bulbs, replacing the ones
squirrels and rabbits had munched on over the winter.

Lia raked her fingers through her shoulder
length auburn hair, then fluffed her loose curls, the result of
struggling with a curling iron. Steering the truck to the rear
parking lot, she spied a too-familiar, battered blue pickup. Dread
dropped free-fall into her stomach. She had no parachute to cushion
the landing.

The last person she wanted to see was Lucas
Dwyer.

****

Nothing but the arrival of his younger sister
or madness would make Lucas brave Mr. Turner’s farm store on Friday
afternoon during the last day of the annual bulb sale.

“Excuse me, ma’am.” Lucas bumped his way
through the long line that began at the cash register and snaked
around bins filled with toy tractors, rolled fleece blankets, and
assorted tools. At six feet, he stood at least a head taller than
the horde of women, mostly blue hairs, all chirping at once like
parakeets in a cage. It reminded him of one of the few vacations
his family took when he was a kid—he’d been lost at Bird World. He
shuddered at the memory.

Near the back of the store, the manager
worked at the key-making machine.

“Hey, Karl,” Lucas shouted over the roar of
the grinding wheel. “Did you have time to fill my order?”

Karl looked up and nodded before bending
again to focus on the key.

Lucas checked his watch. He had time to kill
before Craig arrived from St. Louis. Time to finish errands and
grab a shower. Later, they’d visit Rockets, eat some barbecue, and
hoist a few brews. But Craig would want a full report about Amelia.
Lucas’s gut tightened, twisting like someone wringing an
old-fashioned mop. He’d never kept information from Craig
before.

Glancing at the crowd, he spotted the
corporate farm manager chatting up the very elderly Mrs. Watts. He
wanted to hate the man for managing what should’ve been his farm,
but in the end, the man had no fault. That man hadn’t left his
family and joined the Air Force after college. Guilt stabbed Lucas,
a knife to his heart. He turned his attention to the array of
plumbing supplies, but the pain of losing the farm rubbed like salt
in a fresh wound. While he’d been away on active duty, his dad made
some bad decisions, which over time cost them their farmstead.
Their thousand acres, minus ten, now belonged to a corporation. At
least they still held the title to their family home and the plot
of land—free and clear. He had to remember that.

Karl shut off the grinder. “I’ve got that bag
of stuff in the breakroom in the back.” Karl grinned and looked him
over, old black work boots, faded jeans, and chambray shirt torn at
the elbow. “I never took you for that type of gardener,
Combine.”

Lucas rolled his eyes and followed Karl.
Lucas didn’t care for the nickname the guy had pinned on him. He’d
started a combining company to harvest commercially when he left
the Air Force, but there was more to him than farming. However, it
seemed as though giving people silly nicknames was the only way
Karl could remember who was who in Harvest. It wasn’t that Karl
wasn’t a good guy. He just tried too hard to be country. After a
month, he still oozed with city slickness. Plus, he mistakenly
assumed all his neighbors were hicks—never been anywhere, never
seen anything. Karl liked to jaw about his travels. Lucas had seen
lots during college and nearly thirteen years of military service.
He had nothing to prove. Karl seemed smart enough. He’d figure out
who was who and what was what…or he’d leave, like Mr. Turner’s
other nephew who’d tried to run the farm store and failed to ever
fit in.

In the back storeroom, away from the chaos of
little old ladies and their chirping noises, Lucas paused as Karl
plopped a big burlap bag onto an old wooden table and pointed.

“Crocuses and daffodils. I threw in some
hostas, too. My thank-you to you for sort of teaching me the ropes
about Harvest.”

“They’re for my sister,” Lucas said,
wondering where the urge to explain his purchase came from.

“Sister?”

He’d promised himself to maintain the
homestead like his folks had before they moved to a retirement
community in Arizona. He wanted his younger sister to have all the
comforts of home when she visited from college, including
flowerbeds filled with blooms in spring. To accomplish that
required some replenishing each fall.

“Her name is Megan.”

“Oh, sure,” Karl replied. His smirk suggested
he didn’t believe a word of it. “I haven’t seen her around.”

“Well, you wouldn’t. This isn’t Manhattan,
Kansas, or K-State. She’s a student there. Only comes home once in
a while.” He wasn’t about to explain the reason for her weekend
homecoming—but come Sunday, the bulbs would work as a distraction.
A time when they could plant side-by-side and talk about stuff.
That worked best for them. They weren’t ones to bare their souls to
anyone, much less each other, but talking while working gave them a
way to connect. And his way of keeping up with her without prying
much.

Karl shifted his weight from one foot to the
other. He looked down.

“What?” Lucas asked.

“Dude, is there more to do around here than
Rockets on the weekend?”

“Sure, but most of it looks like farm work.
Come to think of it, feels like farm work, too.”

He hated being referred to as
Dude
.
That offended him more than Combine.

“So what about…” Karl looked down again.

Lucas waited. If Karl had something more on
his mind, he needed to spit it out. Guessing games were a waste of
time, and he didn’t have Helen Carter’s mind-reading abilities.

Karl leaned in close. “What about the
ladies?”

Lucas’s brow wrinkled. “What about them?”

“Like, how do I get one? Seems there’s all
kinds of unwritten rules around here. Things you can say and do
with one person that you can’t say and do with another.”

“Where’d you say you’d moved from?” Lucas
asked.

“Chicago.”

“Well, I don’t know how things go in Chicago,
but around here, you need to treat a female like a lady or you
could have the whole town against you.”

“But what about that Britton one? She’s not
really from around here, is she? Isn’t she from Kansas City? Am I
gonna step on anyone’s toes if I ask her for a date?”