The XOXO New Adult Collection: 16 Full Length New Adult Stories (287 page)

It would be days before the next batch was ready to test. A fact that developed patience in even the most rushed grower. The vitamins had proven to be the key to faster growth. Sort of an all-natural steroid, a recipe I’d picked up in New Mexico as a way to hurry things along between the sporadic rainfalls of the southwest.

Once the vitamins were in and the plants set, all that remained was the wait. Luckily for me, I’d figured out something else to do while I waited. A mental image of Summer in those denim shorts she wore today flashed in my mind. I couldn’t help but smile as I remembered how sexy she’d looked with her feet tucked up underneath her ass in that desk chair, coffee mug pressed between her lips. To be that mug. To have any part of me pressed between those full lips ...

But damn, she was jumpy. If I hadn’t heard the story from Casey, I would’ve thought she’d been burned instead of the one doing the heartbreaking. So why did she look like a deer in headlights every time I got close?

“Judging by the look on your face, I’d say I was interrupting. Kinda’ creepy considering you’re in here alone. You need a minute?”

I hadn’t realized I’d been cheesing like an idiot until my smile faded when the sight of Casey’s face replaced the memory of Summer’s. “I’m good. Your ugly mug snapped me right back to reality,” I said, throwing a rag at him. “What do you want?”

He caught it with a grin and stopped to lean on the raised planter bed a few feet away. “Poker at our house tonight. Joe‘s bringing the beer. You in?”

“I’m in. Is that all?”

“Not quite. What has you smiling like the cat that swallowed the canary?” he asked. “The heat getting into your brain?”

“Some kinda heat,” I muttered.

Casey’s smile widened. “You referring to my sister?”

I wasn’t sure how Casey would feel to know exactly how I’d been thinking of his “sister.” Namely, with her legs wrapped around my waist. Or shoulders. Maybe it was best to keep it to myself. “Maybe,” I answered.

He snorted. “You’re such a bad liar. I saw it coming a mile away, anyway.”

“Saw what? There’s nothing to see.”

“Again, bad liar. If it makes you feel any better, it was way more obvious on her end.”

“It was?”

Casey nodded. “You gonna do anything about it?”

I shot him a look and kept my hands in the dirt. The pressure of my kneading increased. This was where it got tricky. “Define ‘anything.’”

Casey’s eyes narrowed. “Put it this way. I’m an easygoing guy. Feel free to do whatever the mood strikes. But know this. She took a spill when her mom ended things with her dad. Still hasn’t gotten back up if you know what I mean. Now, two consenting adults is one thing. But hurt her, and I’ll have to break your balls.”

“I’m not going to hurt anybody, Case. I’ve barely spoken to the chick. And didn’t you say she just broke up with her boyfriend? Who says she’d even be interested?”

“Uh-huh.” He straightened and walked to the door.

“What kind of answer is that?” I called, frowning.

“The kind where the answer is so obvious, you don’t need my confirmation,” he said as he left.

I didn’t want to admit I’d been fishing for whatever reason Summer had for that spooked look in her eye. If not now, he’d come out with it soon enough. I shook my head and went back to massaging dirt.

When I’d finished, I sat back and let the fans cool me off. There were other projects, other seeds to be planted, but I needed a break. The heat in the greenhouse was necessary, but it was hotter than hell in a heat wave out here.

My watch beeped, announcing the hour. I went to the small water cooler I’d set up and held a cup underneath as I depressed the button. Nothing happened. I twisted the lid and looked inside. Bone dry, like my throat. Damn.

If I hurried, I could make the trek back to the small rental house I shared with Casey and refill it there. I had to pull a shift in the lower field this morning. Part of my work-study agreement with Dean. I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine. I didn’t mind. But I needed hydration.

The main house was closer. Mazie made a killer lemonade and it was best not to chance being late. Or at least that’s what I told myself as I brushed my hands off before donning my shirt. If I also happened to catch a glimpse of Summer’s legs in those shorts she was wearing today, that was merely a bonus. A perk of the job. She might as well be a tall glass of water herself.

Summer

“Don’t cry over the past, it’s gone. Don’t stress over the future, it hasn’t arrived. Live in the present, and make it beautiful.” -Unknown

––––––––

T
he big tractor, affectionately called Goose, was making that god-awful choking sound again. At my dad’s request, I went in search of Casey, the master of all things mechanical. I checked the main greenhouse first since that was the hub of activity around here. Morning roll call, evening progress reports, and gossip at the water cooler over an extended lunch break—all of these happened in the main greenhouse.

As soon as I stepped inside, the air changed. More specifically, it died. It was slightly cooler here than outside, although you wouldn’t know it without a thermometer through the stuffiness. Dean Stafford didn’t believe in changing the seasons underneath his plastic. Year round, the greenhouses stayed a balmy seventy degrees. But it was stale and heavy, like the air gathered close around you and stuck there for the duration of your time inside the filmy walls. It almost matched the asphyxiating humidity that made up Virginia summers. Almost.

I was surprised to find the room empty upon first glance. It so rarely was, but then, this week had proven unseasonably hot and Dad tended to let the guys go early on days like this. I turned to go and stopped when something clanged in the back. I walked toward the sound and spotted Casey on the far side of a large stack of tomato cages. He muttered to himself, alternating between reading from a clipboard and throwing metal cages around. What had been a neat stack when I’d walked through earlier this week was now an overturned mess.

“What happened here?” I asked.

Casey looked up and scowled. “Squirrels.”

I lifted a brow. “Squirrels? In the greenhouse?”

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

I suppressed a smile. The lines in his forehead knotted together in neat little rows when he was mad. I knew from experience, smiling would be very bad right now. “How’d they get in?”

Casey gestured somewhere behind him off-handedly. “Found a hole chewed in the back corner.”

“Wow. That’s some pretty sharp teeth to chew through all those layers.”

“Right? They’re like some damn vampires.”

“Vampire squirrels?”

Casey glanced around dramatically. “Do not mock the evilness of the vampire squirrels,” he whispered.

I giggled.

His lips twitched with the smile he held back. “Don’t laugh, either. They’ll hear you. They’re always listening.”

“And what will they do if they hear?” I asked.

“This. Agghhh!” He dropped the clipboard and lurched forward. I shrieked and ran for the door. Casey took off after me, yelling and clawing at my back.

Outside, I ran for the house, hoping to make it as far as the bucket of water Mazie had left out for the birds this morning. I weaved in and out of rows of hanging baskets. Around mums and violets and gardenias bound for the retail shelves, the brightly colored petals lost on me as I sprinted. Casey hurdled them and caught up to me just as I rounded the farthest greenhouse. His hand closed over my shoulder and spun me.

Together, we went tumbling.

I was laughing entirely too hard to get up. Casey was trying—and failing—to untangle himself from me. I had to hold my breath to keep still so he could extract his leg from around mine. I rubbed my backside. Definitely gonna have a bruise. But then, I usually did when Casey and I started horsing around.

When our limbs were finally free, we both rolled to our backs and rested in the grass, catching our breath. “Those vampire squirrels are dangerous,” I said.

Casey snorted and propped himself on his elbows. Above me, a shadow fell. I blinked, trying to make out the face blotting out the sunlight.

“Hey, Ford,” Casey said easily.

Something in my gut jumped and I had to swallow it back. Casey rolled to his feet while Ford extended a hand to me. I took it, not willing to meet Ford’s eyes, though I had no idea why. I didn’t owe him a single explanation. So why did I feel awkward about him finding me on my ass in the dirt with another guy? Even if said guy was like a brother to me, Ford didn’t necessarily know that.
Shut up, Summer. Stop trying to appear available.

“You two look hard at work,” Ford said, clearly amused.

“We like to give all our effort at once,” Casey said. “I’m spent for the day.”

I forced a laugh and pretended Casey hadn’t just insinuated we’d been flirting—or worse. “Oh, no you aren’t,” I said, dusting my jeans off. “Dad sent me looking for you. Goose broke down somewhere out in the center field. He needs you to go give it whatever beat-down you gave it last week.”

“Goose doesn’t respond to beat-downs anymore. He’s numb to the pain,” Casey said.

“Can you get it back to the garage at least? Work your magic,” I said.

Casey tipped his head back to the sky in a dramatic gesture. “I have to do everything around here.”

“Every single thing,” I agreed. “Especially your job. Now, get going.”

Casey muttered a friendly curse before heading for the four-wheeler parked beside the greenhouse.

“Come find me when you get back,” Ford called after him. “Got a new leaf I want you to take a look at.” Casey waved once to acknowledge the words and hopped onto the seat.

“Leaf?” I repeated, waving away the cloud of dust Casey kicked up in his wake.

“It’s a cross-pollination project for edible and medicinal herbs I’m creating. This one’s a burn salve and a seasoning for salads.”

“You’re ... creating an herb? As in ... from scratch?”

“Sort of. The seeds were taken from three other plants and grown together. Each of them have known medicinal properties that I wanted, so I seeded them together and grew them in a single box. Then, I extracted properties from each in the form of new seeds. The offspring is—And I’ve lost you.”

“No. Okay, well, maybe,” I admitted, a little awed. “So, your work study is that you’re ...
making
medicine?”

He shrugged. “That’s the idea. Or, one of them anyway.”

My jaw fell open. I’d definitely been right with my initial assessment. Ford was not the typical farmhand variety. He was something else. I just wasn’t sure what yet. “And you’ve done this before?”

His expression faltered. I’d hit a chink in the armor. “Yes and no,” he said, frowning. “I’m experimenting right now, trying to work out all the negatives.”

“Negatives,” I repeated before understanding dawned. “You mean side effects?”

“Among other things.”

“And you need Casey for that because ...? Oh geez, please don’t tell me he’s your guinea pig.”

His eyes widened in mock innocence. “Okay. I won’t tell you.”

I shook my head. “I don’t even want to know.”

“Probably not,” he agreed. “But he’s been a big help.”

“Aside from the voluntary health risks you’ve asked of your friends, it sounds really interesting. I’d love to see them sometime.”

“Let’s go.”

“Now?”

“Sure. Why not?”

I thought of the mountain of paperwork awaiting me back inside my office. And the way my mother’s perfume still lingered in that corner with the filing cabinet and all its damned travel magnets.

Then I thought about all the reasons I’d come up with over the past week as to why I should leave Ford O’Neal alone. All good reasons. Rational, sane, sensible reasons. The same reasons that’d spurred me to leave Aaron. To figure myself out and what it was I believed in anymore when it came to guys and relationships. As I looked up and met Ford’s expectant expression, I tried—and failed—to remember a single one of them.

His blue eyes spoke of excitement and passion and there was something unstable and unplanned about all of it. It was the epitome of what I wanted to find in myself.

Screw it. “Lead the way,” I said.

I fell into step beside Ford as he led us onto the dirt path that cut between public greenhouses. These were the ones that customers could tour and shop in when we had an overflow crop. Mom used to love violets. One year for their anniversary, Dad had surprised Mom by ordering and growing anything and everything he could find that flowered in a shade of purple. They’d had to sell a lot of it off to make room for the fall perennials, but that first walk into the greenhouse had been breathtaking. Or at least it had for me. And I thought it had for Mom. I swallowed the lump left behind by the memory and kept walking. I wasn’t going to think about her. This place was for me and Dad now. She didn’t want it. She didn’t want us.

I pretended not to notice Ford’s questioning look when I increased the pace as the last set of greenhouses came into view up ahead. These were for growing, or as Ford put it, creating; something my dad only played at, but from the way he spoke, Ford seemed committed to. I wondered what sort of business strategy Ford had with a trade like his. I tried to think of a way to ask him without sounding nosy or rude but Ford beat me to it with questions of his own.

“So, Casey tells me you two grew up here?”

“Born and raised,” I confirmed.

“You don’t sound thrilled. You don’t like it here?”

“It’s not that. I actually love it here, I just ...” I scrunched my brows, trying to put the words together. “I guess, when I pictured myself grown up, I always pictured the farm as a place I’d visit. Not a place I’d live.”

“Yet, here you are. Back again.”

“Yeah.”

His eyes were intent on me as he formed his next question. I beat him to the punch and gave him the one-liner I’d rehearsed enough times it took the emotion out of it. Made me less wobbly. “My parents split and my dad needed the help so I moved back to handle the business side of things.”

Ford’s brow shot up. Just one. It gave him an off-balance look that made me bristle despite my attempt to leave emotion out of it. “Your dad seems like he’s got a handle on things,” he said.