Page 67 of The Aster Valley Collection, Vol. 1

TRUMAN

Dinner at Mikey and Tiller’s house was a little more awkward than normal because of the large, hulking presence of their moody friend from Houston.

It wasn’t that Sam had a mean face, exactly, but he definitely didn’t seem to think much of me. And I could hardly blame him. I’d gotten him into trouble with the sheriff’s office before he’d even technically arrived in town. He probably hated me anyway.

But… but there had been one moment in the kitchen when the two of us were both bringing dirty dishes to the sink that he’d moved past me in a narrow space and put his big hands on my hips. His touch had been so gentle, so tender, I’d felt goose bumps erupt all over my body.

“Excuse me, sweetheart,” he’d murmured so softly, I’d wondered if I’d imagined it. The words, whether they’d been imagined or real, had lit a fire inside my chest that had burned all night long.

But in the morning, I awoke to find the front door of my house hanging wide open and a hastily scribbled note sitting on my kitchen counter, held down by a dirty rock from the garden.

Tell your friend to drop the charges.

My hand shook as I made my way to the front window. There was no sign of Patrick Stanner or his brother, Craig, but it had obviously been one of the two. Their father wasn’t usually sober enough to accomplish much of anything, and he’d even lost his driver’s license a while ago.

I relocked and triple-checked the bolt on the front door and went around the old farmhouse making sure the window locks were also secure.

For the hundredth time, I wished I had the money to fix the gate at the end of the driveway.

As a single woman, Aunt Berry had taken her home security seriously, but a snowplow had bumped into one of the posts two years ago and knocked it out of alignment.

The solution involved digging out the cement from the original post and replacing it completely, work I wasn’t strong enough to do on my own or wealthy enough to hire out.

I decided to call my friend Chaya to see if she wanted to meet me for breakfast at the diner. My nerves were shot, and I really didn’t want to be alone.

“Only if it’s a quickie,” she said. “I’m taking riding lessons from Nina at Crooked Bar Ranch before my shift at the shop this afternoon.”

I agreed and raced through a quick shower before throwing on jeans and a hoodie. I normally tried to make a better effort, but I didn’t have the time or energy for a dapper ensemble this morning.

When I got to the diner, Pim pointed me to a booth partway down the side wall where Chaya was already sipping coffee.

“Hey,” I said, sliding into the red vinyl seat. “I like your hair like that.”

She was almost a foot taller than I was, and her giant mane of dark curly hair had been tidied into two side braids like a little girl.

It didn’t match her brash personality at all, but it pulled her usually unruly mop away from her face enough to make her look fresh-faced and innocent.

There was no way in hell I was going to tell her that, though. I valued my life too much.

“It’s the only way to get it to fit under the helmet,” she muttered. “I look like a damned milkmaid.”

I snickered under my breath. “You said it, not me.”

“Why do you look pale, hon? Did something happen? I heard from Mia there was a kerfuffle outside the shop yesterday.”

I took a breath. Aster Valley was too small to keep anyone’s secrets. There was no way to expect the scene from yesterday not to have already gotten around town.

“It’s fine. A friend of Tiller and Mikey’s got into some trouble with his motorcycle, that’s all.”

She opened her mouth to question me, but Pim appeared with a pot of coffee and cut her off. “Tell me everything. I heard you were stung by a rabid swarm of bees and had to be taken to the hospital by a miscreant on a motorcycle.”

He winked at me, and I rolled my eyes. This town was crazy.

“It was nothing, I promise. Just a misunderstanding.”

Pim set the coffeepot down and pulled out his order pad. “I heard it involved that hunk from Houston. What was his name? Simba? Sylvester?”

“Sam,” I said. “And I’m pretty sure you knew that since you’ve met him before.”

Pim’s hand fluttered against his chest. “Those muscles. That ass. That brooding scowl…”

His husband Bill’s voice came from the kitchen. “You think I can’t hear you, but I can.”

Chaya laughed. “Okay, I’ve got to see a woman about a horse, so will you please ask Bill to make me a breakfast combo with scrambled eggs, bacon, and hash browns?”

Pim jotted it on his pad. “And you, Mr. Sweet?”

“I’ll take some dry toast. Thanks.”

Both Pim and Chaya stared at me for a minute before Pim wrote something down and muttered under his breath. “Dry toast and a peanut butter, banana, and chocolate protein smoothie.”

I opened my mouth to tell him I wasn’t hungry enough for my favorite smoothie today, but he’d already bolted through the kitchen door.

“What’s wrong?” Chaya asked. “And don’t bullshit me this time.”

“It was Patrick Stanner. He crushed Sam’s motorcycle on purpose because Sam stopped to defend me against his harassment.”

Her eyes narrowed. “That fucker. This has gone too far, Tru. We need to contact the State Police. Sheriff Stanner is never going to prosecute those sons of bitches for their bullshit harassment. Something worse is going to happen, and we both know it.”

“I don’t want to get anyone into trouble.” It was something I’d already told her a million times, but the sentence was starting to sound ridiculous.

Chaya sat back and folded her arms in front of her. “Well, maybe this Sam will finally get Patrick into trouble. Someone from out of state is hardly going to accept them not bringing charges against him.”

When I didn’t say anything, she pressed me. “Surely, this friend of Mikey and Tiller is pressing charges.”

I shrugged. “I mean… it sounded like he was. But when he mentioned it, the sheriff took Sam in instead. I found out later they didn’t charge him with anything, but I think it was their way of trying to intimidate him out of accusing Patrick of the property destruction.”

Just then Pim showed up with my smoothie and gave me a stern look.

“Drink it. And if you want to know what Sam is going to do, simply ask the man.” He looked over my shoulder with a tilt of his chin before returning to the kitchen.

I turned around to see Sam sitting with Mikey and Tiller at the counter.

He was busy scribbling notes with a pencil on a yellow legal pad.

I turned back around to face Chaya and tried not to look as flustered as I felt.

“Your cheeks are like little red apples,” Chaya said with a shit-eating grin. “Funny, you don’t get apple-cheeked about Mr. Balderson.”

“His name is Barney.”

“Babe, I grew up here. He’s been our librarian for a thousand years. We always called him Mr. Balderson. No amount of nookie with my bestie is going to change that.”

I shuddered. “No nookie, and you know that.”

“That’s not what Big Daddy told his model trains club,” she singsonged.

“What?” I cried, unaware of how loud it came out. “What the heck are you talking about?” If Barney had told his model train friends lies about me…

“Gordon Iverson told me Barney had asked the group for a bed-and-breakfast recommendation. He said he wanted someplace special to take his beau for an intimate weekend alone.”

I groaned. “I just want to be friends with the man. He’s been so good to me, especially after everything that happened in December with the Stanners confronting me and then with Mikey and Pim’s accident in front of the shop. How do I convince him I just want to be friends?”

I didn’t have many friends as it was, and I didn’t want to lose one of the few who cared about me.

Before she could answer, Chaya’s eyes widened before a shadow appeared over my shoulder.

“You okay, Truman?” a familiar and delicious deep voice asked from behind me.

I looked up into Sam’s handsome face. His blond hair was scattered about like he’d driven down the mountain in a convertible with its top down, and his eyes bore their usual intensity. I felt my stomach take a dive.

“Your eyes look like rosemary,” I blurted.

No one said anything, so I scrambled to fill the awkward silence. “Ha, but not… not like… I only mean the rosemary plant has the same sort of dusty green color, you know? Rosemary? The herb? Do you know it? Salvia rosmarinus ? Never mind.”

Sam reached out and cupped my cheek gently with one of his hands before squatting down so he was on my level.

His thumb brushed lightly across the remnants of the scrape from my driveway tumble the night before.

He moved his mouth next to my ear, and I almost straight-up fainted onto the floor of the diner.

He smelled like pine and lemons… mint, maybe, from his morning toothpaste. I wanted to inhale every single scrap of his scent I could get my nose on. Chaya stared in shock while my dick strangled itself in my jeans.

“Can I swing by your place later?” he asked softly against the shell of my ear. “This town seems to have eyes and ears everywhere, and I’d like to talk to you in private.”

I turned my cheek against his, feeling the soft scrape of his whiskers. I let my eyes close for a second, just enough to savor the feel of his warm, bristly skin against mine.

“Uh-huh,” I breathed.

As he pulled away from me, I swore I felt his lips brush against my cheek. My heart felt like it was going to thunder into outer space.

Chaya’s eyes were wide and her lips made an o shape.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Sam said calmly to Chaya.

How he could remain so relaxed after that little interlude was beyond me.

I felt like the entire universe had just cracked and shifted like a brand-new Rubik’s cube.

All the colors had been nice and tidy before but now they were mixed-up and jumbled.

It would be impossible to get them put right again.

As he walked away, Chaya’s eyes moved over to land on me like dual interrogation lamps. “That is the hottest man I think I’ve ever seen in my entire life.”

I nodded numbly because it was true.

“And he practically made love to your face,” she added.

I nodded again.

She patted her chest. “Jesus. I might need a little one-on-one time with my vibrator after that.”

Pretty sure I was still nodding. She wasn’t the only one.

“And he’s friends with Mikey and Tiller?”

I swallowed. “Yuh-huh. He does construction for them.” Or something. My brain wasn’t quite all the way back online yet.

She snorted and reached out a hand to snap her fingers in front of my face. “Babe. Focus. I have to leave in like ten minutes, and I can’t do that until you’ve downloaded everything into my drive. Got me?”

“That sounds dirty.”

Now she was the one nodding. “Exactly. So now why don’t you tell me why you’re going to a B&B with Barney Balderson when that blond muscle beast over there wants to make bumblebee babies with you?”

I buried my face in my hands with a groan.

“First of all, I’m not going to a B&B with Barney.

I told you, we’re broken up. Secondly, Sam does not want to make…

whatever with me. He’s just worried about me since he saw me getting bullied.

I’m clearly the kind of guy who can’t handle things himself. He feels sorry for me.”

“Mm,” she said, leaning back again with a thinking look on her face. “So why is he whispering sweet nothings in your ear?”

“He’s not. He just asked if he could talk to me in private. He probably wants to make sure I follow through on filing a witness statement against Patrick.”

“He’d be right. But are you going to do it? You know I have your back, for whatever that’s worth.”

I bit my lip nervously. That note was still fresh in my mind, and I knew if I pushed Sheriff Stanner to arrest his own nephew, things would go from bad to worse.

“Thank you. I think if he asks me to be a witness to the bike crash, I’ll have to do it.

Patrick will definitely retaliate.” I thought again about how to beef up my home security.

Maybe I could temporarily close the shop here in town and stay home until the whole thing blew over.

I had plenty of work to do on the farm, and I could send my internet orders from home.

“If he does construction, maybe he can help fix your driveway gate,” she suggested, as if reading my mind. “Might as well make himself useful if he expects you to put yourself at risk for his sake.”

I glared at her. “Obviously he doesn’t know I’d be putting myself at risk.

And I’m certainly not going to tell him that.

I’ll just give the witness report and suffer the consequences.

I owe it to him for stopping to help me.

Besides, he’s a friend of Mikey and Tiller’s.

I don’t want things to get awkward with them if I refused to make a report. ”

And hopefully that was true. Sam might not believe me, considering I’d told him Patrick had it out for me. Maybe there was a way for me to downplay the whole thing like it was no big deal. I’d talk to him about it when he came to my place.

Sam was coming to my place.

Chaya grunted her disapproval and dug into her breakfast like some kind of feral dog. When she was done, she took a final gulp of coffee and threw some cash on the table for her share. “Sorry to eat and run. Call me later?”

I nodded and waved for Pim so I could pay the check and get moving myself. After dropping by the shop to pick up a few things, I wanted to stop off on the side of the highway and finish putting in the nasturtium seeds really quickly.

Despite everything that had happened yesterday with Patrick Stanner, I still wanted the wildflowers to bloom the way I’d envisioned so every visitor to town this summer arrived feeling happy and welcome.

My plan to add the nasturtiums had a purpose.

The mustard oil they produced attracted garden pests which would help protect the native wildflowers.

They were also easy to grow and stayed low to the ground which made for a nice edging border.

My wildflower initiative was important, even if the county council refused to listen to me.

They were going to let their stubbornness over my involvement in the ski resort closing keep them from realizing the economic benefits of a simple highway wildflower program.

It was so frustrating to see grown adults cut off their noses to spite their faces.

But it didn’t matter. They were getting the highway flowers whether they liked it or not. I had seeds in abundance from my own planting programs, so all it cost me was time and effort.

And a little Stanner harassment if I was caught again.

Not that I was going to let that stop me.