“Man, that’s amazing. I’ve had a full change of heart. Not only should Maria stay here but I will not tell a soul from LA about her, so no one with weaker morals than me tries to poach her.”
“Such a quick convert to the ways of the town. You may have a future here, Duchess.”
“I hope so.” She wipes her mouth delicately with a napkin and leans back. The sun hits her face and lights her up in a way I normally only appreciate in a landscape. Yellows become gold. Browns shed a kaleidoscope of shades. Only now, I see it reflected in the rose of her lips, the pink of her cheeks, the highlights in her hair.
It doesn’t take long before we’ve demolished most of the plate of food, and I glance up at Tessa. She’s sitting ramrod straight, leaning forward with her elbows on the table. There’s a determined glint in her eye that wasn’t there before.
“Look, I read the lawsuit, cover to cover. It has no teeth. It’s barely more than a nuisance suit.”
“I know that.”
“Oh, you do? So why file a suit you can’t win?”
“To get your attention. Because what I really want is to buy your land so I can have access to your aquifer, and your grandparents or whoever’s been controlling it all these years refuses to sell. They refuse to even answer my emails.”
She holds up a hand. “Gonna stop you right there. My grandparents don’t have email.”
“Okay, well, don’t know who I’ve been sending those to, but I’ve been writing letters too. No response.”
“So maybe that’s evidence no one wants to sell you their land.”
I laugh. “Is that how it works in your world? If someone disagrees with you, you leave it at that? Somehow, I doubt that’s how you win huge legal cases.”
“No, obviously that’s not how I win huge cases.” She breaks eye contact and takes some lip balm from her bag and applies it, then rubs her lips together afterward. Seems like she’s trying to distract me from the conversation. It’s working.
I start to wipe a small smudge of dirt from her cheek, but somehow leaving it there softens her. Makes her prettier. Even coated in grime and dust, walking around with a leaf tangled in her hair, she’s the best thing I’ve laid eyes on.
“Have you considered that a bunch of neighbors suing each other isn’t the best way to get water? The laws here are outdated. They reward the biggest water consumers and squeeze smaller ranchers.”
“This isn’t new information, Duchess, but I’m not in a position to sue the Tomahawk company, even if they’re the real reason my fields could go fallow in six months or less.”
“If anyone is, you are, owning half the property around here,” she grumbles. It gets my attention.
“How do you know that?”
She shrugs. “People talk.”
“People shouldn’t.”
But they do. I’m still not sure how she went from not knowing I lived next door an hour ago to knowing how much land I own, but that’s beside the point. “Anyhow, if your big plan now is to stonewall me and then ignore me like your grandparents did, I might as well put you in touch with my lawyer.”
“That’s not my plan.” Her words are so quiet, I barely hear them.
“Okay, so what’s the plan, Duchess?”
She looks at the sky for long enough that I start to become convinced that’s her answer. Then she lowers her gaze and pins me with those pale eyes. “I’m pregnant.”
My first instinct is to look at her stomach, which is flat, from what I can see. Just like it was when I saw her naked a few weeks ago. My brain can’t compute this. She’s obviously messing with me. Talking nonsense. Trying to distract me.
“You’re…” I can’t even say the words because I’m so confused.
“Pregnant.” Her pale blues are so unyielding, and all I can do is blink at her.
Then the pieces begin to fall into place. How she was weird at the urgent care place when the nurse asked if she was pregnant. How we met just over a month ago, and things can happen in that much time. How I could even be the father…but…
I swallow hard and feel my heart start thudding in my chest. My skin feels clammy.
She nods. “Yes, it’s yours. I’m seven weeks along.”
