Page 46 of Save a Wish

“Don’t give me shit about this,” I said. “Every single one of you has turned to absolute mush in the presence of your partners.”

“So he admits that he too has turned to absolute mush.” Isaac stroked his bearded jaw. “Interesting.”

“I’m just relieved he didn’t go ahead and ask Ashley to build him a robot girlfriend,” Logan said. “I was genuinely worried about that.”

I shifted my grip on my beer bottle so my middle finger was on the side facing Logan, but my brother just gave me a toothy smile in response.

“All kidding aside,” Joshua began, “we should all raise our beers in thanks to whatever divine presence is responsible for allowing a bunch of jokers like us to somehow attract all that.” He circled his arm toward the women around the fire.

Sounds of agreement rose up from all of us then Spencer joined our circle, a sleeping Little Ben snuggled against his chest.

“What are we saluting?” he asked as Isaac opened a beer and handed it to him.

“That those chicks over there want to have anything to do with us,” Logan said.

Spencer immediately lifted his bottle. “Cheers to that.”

Talk turned to some Hartley’s Nest matters, which I was grateful for because it meant my brothers and Spencer weren’t busting my balls about Sadie.

Not that they were wrong. I was definitely feeling all the feelings for her. Feelings I’d never felt before and my mind was still on that corn maze kiss.

Actually, my mind was on the kissing that might happen later tonight when we weren’t surrounded by my family. Specifically on the more than kissing that might happen.

My gaze connected with Sadie’s again and the little grin she sent my way told me she was maybe thinking of the same thing.

“Come and get it!” Jimmy hollered from the grill as he plopped cooked meat onto the platter my mother held.

Like a pack of hungry wolves, we circled around the food tables to heap deliciousness onto our plates.

“This looks like a royal banquet.” Sadie sidled up next to me, her plate loaded with a little of everything.

I chuckled. “Been to many royal banquets?”

Sadie’s hand froze over the potato salad, her fingers locked around a serving spoon. “Oh. Umm. No.”

“Me neither. The only princess here in Greenridge is our neighbor’s show horse, Princess Glory.”

Sadie shoveled some potato salad onto her plate then offered me some.

“Thanks,” I said. “Do you ride horses?”

“What?” Sadie blinked up at me as if I’d asked something deeply personal.

“Horses. Do you ride?”

“Yes.”

I waited a beat for her to elaborate, but, once again, she didn’t.

“That’s another date we could go on,” I said. “A horseback riding one. Would you like that?”

“I would.” She moved on to shaking a few tortilla chips onto her plate.

“Great.” I took a handful of chips for myself. “We have some great trails right here on Hartley’s Nest property and gentle horses to ride.”

I led Sadie over to one of the two long tables set up for dinner. She paused before lowering robotically to the seat beside me. I was about to ask her if she was all right, but Flora asked her if she’d had a chance to look at the bookings she’d collected from today’s event and Sadie launched into an excited conversation. Maybe her temporary stiffness was because she was hungry?

We dove into the food and the first bite of chicken pulled a groan out of me.