“Hey,” he said. “If he gives you compost duty first, don’t breathe through your nose.”
Zane looked at him. “Tyler.”
“What? That’s practical advice.”
“It’s also not her job today.”
Tyler’s relief was immediate and visible. “Good. Great. I mean, good for her.”
Gus grunted, then seemed to remember grunting might count as communication and added, “Compost builds character.”
“Does it?” I asked.
“No,” Gus said. “But people say that before they make you shovel things.”
Birdie laughed. Zane shook his head, but his face stayed relaxed, and something in my chest loosened. They weren’tleering at me. They weren’t whispering about why I was here. At least not yet.
Maybe this would be survivable.
Then Zane pointed to a bed full of green chaos and said, “Weeding.”
Maybe this wouldn’t be survivable.
He walked me to the bed, crouched, and braced one forearm across his knee. The position made his shoulder flex beneath his shirt. His tattoos shifted over muscle, dark ink against sun-browned skin.
I focused on the plants.
Plants were safer.
“This row is carrots,” Zane said. “These feathery tops stay. These broadleaf weeds go. Get the root when you can, or they come back.”
I crouched beside him, my knees immediately protesting the fact that I worked at a desk and considered walking from the parking lot to the office a meaningful cardio event.
“These stay,” I said, touching the carrot tops.
“Right.”
“These go.”
“Right.”
“This one?”
“That’s a carrot.”
I snatched my hand back. “I was testing you.”
“Were you?”
“No.”
Birdie coughed into her glove. Gus looked away. Tyler didn’t bother hiding his grin.
Zane’s mouth curved again, and this time I was close enough to notice the tiny lines at the corner of his eyes. “Ask before you pull. You’ll get it.”
The words were ordinary. The tone wasn’t soft, exactly, but it wasn’t impatient either. He didn’t make me feel stupid. He just showed me again, steady and sure, his big hand closing around a weed near the base.
“You want to loosen the soil first.” He worked his fingers around the stem. “If you yank from the top, it snaps.”
