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“We’re only going to be here for three months,” I said. “No point bringing our whole lives along.”
Zack shrugged. “This is what, like twenty boxes? You hired a moving company for this?”
“I tried to warn you not to come help. We’re not staying permanently, so we only brought the essentials.”
He punched my shoulder. “You think I’d miss seeing my big brother’s charming smile?”
I chuckled. “It is good to see you, too. How’s the rehab center?”
Zack poured himself a coffee while he filled me in on work and what he’d been up to. He had a flying squirrel that kept escaping, even though it still needed to be nursed by hand. There was some asshole bow hunter who was shooting deer and leaving them wounded, and Zack had just rescued his second one this month yesterday. The girl working for him was driving him crazy, and so on.
Glass shattered from somewhere deeper in the house. “Billy!” I shouted.
“You were right, dad!” he called.
I sighed. “How’s grandpa?”
Zack set his coffee down, his expression falling. “Ask him and he’ll tell you he’s doing great, just taking a break. But the doctors took all kinds of scans. He’s got advanced arthritis and a number of joint problems. The doctor said he must be in a lot of pain, and if he keeps trying to be on his feet all day running this place, it’s only going to get worse. There’s no way he can keep this up, and he’s got pneumonia on top of it all.”
I nodded. “Well, he’s got three months to find a permanent replacement, then. I’ll do my best to make sure everything is running smoothly and ready for a hand-off.”
Zack watched me, not saying anything.
“What?” I asked.
“You realize he wants you to take this place over, right? It’d be perfect. I’d be just down the road. You could help me kick this bow hunter’s ass when I find him. I could watch the kids when you need some help.” He gave my shoulder a punch. “The Ashford brothers back at it again. Kings of Fairhope.”
“Two of them, at least.”
Zack gave a little shrug, as if to imply our youngest brother, Patrick, would come around some day. I wish I was as optimistic.
Everything Zack said had some very obvious appeal. But I knew Kate was rooted in D.C. Right now, I got the kids on weekends, and she had them during the week. She’d be perfectly happy to keep them longer and let me only see them every few months when I could fly them out. But fuck that. I wanted more time with them, not less. Moving here would essentially be moving away from the kids. I also enjoyed my work in D.C. I was good at it, too.
“I’m going to do what I can,” I said, hoping my tone made it clear that I was done talking about the subject.
I hefted a box and took it to the downstairs bedroom where I’d be staying. Zack followed behind me, stopping in the doorway with his hands on the frame while he watched me unpack some of my things.
“So I’d say I gave you enough time to fess up and tell me who clocked you. If you’re not going to offer it up, I’m going to ask.”
I unconsciously lifted my fingertips to touch the welt below my eye. “It’s nothing.”
“Nothing looks like it hurts. Does the other guy look worse than you?”
I thought back to the encounter and was surprised to feel myself grinning. “It was a purse.”
My brother’s eyes narrowed. “A purse? Wait. Someone hit you with a purse? Like one of those man purses?”
I took my laptop out of a box and fought the urge to pull it open and check my work email. For the sake of my kids, I never set my phone up to receive work emails. “She said her name was Harper Halloway.”
An unreadable look crossed his face. “Ah,” he said slowly. “Her.”
“Why do you say it like that? Does she have a reputation?”
“For being beautiful and the girl all the young guys in town wish they could date? Yeah, she does. And she just got back from a two-year stint in France studying culinary arts. To say she has been the talk of town would be an understatement. You got yourself smacked in the face by a local celebrity, bro. What’d you do to her?”
I quickly explained. Zack let out a quick laugh. “That’s kind of hilarious. The kid reminds me of you, honestly.”
“Yeah. We’ll see how hilarious you find it when it’s your face getting tenderized.”
“Consider it karma. Think of all the shit you got me and Patrick into at his age with stunts exactly like that.”
I walked back to the front counter and froze. A familiar figure was standing there in a pair of short jean shorts that showed off impressively toned legs. She had on a cropped top that revealed a sliver of equally tanned skin. She wore a flour-smeared apron over all of it and her face was speckled with bits of white dust as well.
