“Sorryyy,” Maggie calls from the bar, not sounding sorry at all.
“We know what the fire did to your press,” Hal goes on, his face serious. “And your deadline.”
“And we can’t just let you miss it,” the doughnut woman says, stepping forward. “Apple Blossom Orchard is part of this valley. We’ve been drinking your family’s cider since we were old enough to reach the counter. Our parents did, and their parents before them.”
Reed’s mouth opens. He closes it.
The old man in the Carhartt jacket steps up to our booth. “I got my father’s press in my barn. Hand crank. Slow as Christmas, but she runs.”
“I got a scratter,” somebody yells from the back. “Old kind. Grinds the apples.”
“There’s two crushers at the church! Sitting in the basement,” someone else shouts.
“My granddad’s got a tiny press and a masher.”
It keeps coming. Somebody has a thing, somebody else has a thing, and I doubt any of them is enough on its own, but combined...
“And we’ve got the hands to run them,” Hal says, gesturing with a blunt thumb toward the crowd behind him. “Every personin this room is here to help with the labor. Ain’t no way we’re giving up on you.”
Behind him, the room erupts in a low, steady rumble of agreement. Bram stares at them, his eyes wet. He stands abruptly, clearing his throat.
“But we can’t pay you. You know where the books are. We can’t ask—”
“Bram Miller,” Maggie says from the bar. “Sit down and hush. Nobody asked you for a dime.”
Hal laughs.
Bram sinks back onto the bench, his jaw working as he stares down at his hands. He blinks hard, the soot around his eyes smudging as he tries to swallow. Beside him, Ash’s jaw is locked tight, his usual smooth charm evaporated, while Reed just stares blankly at the table, his throat bobbing. They’ve spent their whole lives carrying the weight of this orchard entirely on their own backs, and now, they are left utterly speechless by a room full of people offering to carry it for them.
My throat goes tight. Hot tears prick the backs of my eyes, and I bite the inside of my cheeks to keep from sobbing. But since my alphas are currently incapable of speech, I guess I have to ask...
“Can—can you come by tomorrow with the equipment?” My voice cracks straight down the middle. “All of you?”
Hal looks around the room, at all those tired, lit-up faces nodding, and back at me.
“You bet,” he says, smiling.
51
Luna
- Three days later
The clipboard is slick with apple juice.
I stand on the edge of the cottage deck, pencil tucked behind my ear, watching the yard. Three days ago, our equipment was a smoking wreck. Today, we have a cheerfully loud, chaotic, hand-cranked factory made of the community.
“One hundred and forty!” Reed yells from the grass. He’s at the scratter, a wood-framed apple grinder Cal brought over, his backward cap white with dried pulp. He heaves a basket of apples into the hopper, his shoulders working under a sleeveless tee. “Maggie! We need more baskets at the screw press!”
“On it,” Maggie calls back, carrying a tray of clean glass bottles that she sets down at the filling table where Ash is working.
Over at the main pressing station, Bram is leaning his entire weight into the iron screw of the old man’s hand-crank press, his boots slipping in the mud as he drags the lever around. The wood creaks as the press tightens against the crushed apples, groaning one slow notch at a time. Beneath the slatted woodenbasket, a thick, dark stream of juice pours over the lip, splashing into the collection tub.
Through the bond, the static has smoothed out. It’s a steady, working hum, with the underlying feelings being peace and hope.
“Luna!” Cal shouts from the sorting bins, his hat tipped back. “Delia says these Honeycrisps are too soft for the Gold. Do we dump ‘em in the masher or send ‘em to the pies?”
“Masher!” I call back, looking down at my spreadsheet. “We need the volume for the last batch. Send the drops to the kitchen!”
