“Hmm.” Acosta moved around me, bent over, and placed his ear to the side of the green wooden box. I studied the box closely, eyeballing the long slot at the bottom where the bees would have been coming and going had it been summer, and saw nary a bee. Hoping he wasn’t playing a prank, I bent over as well, lifted my hat to expose my ear, and put my right ear to the side of the box. Gazes meeting and holding, I couldn’t stop my eyes from flaring when I heard the buzzing of bees inside the hive. He smiled. A really real true smile that sent so much warmth to my body that the snow hugging my knees had a good chance of melting into a puddle.
“That’s amazing,” I whispered, our noses just a few inches apart. I stood up, still grinning, and looked about, my eyes touching on nothing but absolute beauty. “It must be breathtaking here in the summer and fall.”
“Spring is pretty nice too,” he replied, straightening then walking around each hive, taking care not to disturb the busy little honeybees inside. “Everything coming to life after the long cold. Goat kids and lambs being born, flowers blooming, planning the gardens. It’s one of my favorite seasons. So much hope.”
“Well, hope does spring eternal,” I threw out as my eye caught a blue jay landing on a pine forelock, his landing knocking a tuft of snow loose. The bird scolded us soundly and then took to wing, startling a downy woodpecker from a clump of bare maples. Redhead flashing, the woodpecker flew off, banking over our heads and disappearing into the Pennsylvania woodlands.
“Cassie always loved the winter,” he said dreamily, his tender tone pulling me from the path of the woodpecker to him. His face was soft, his eyes sad, his tone bittersweet. “She loved to ski and would spend hours crossing the mountains, coming home giddy and nearly frozen.”
I took a shot in the dark. “You speak as if your wife is no longer with us.”
He threw a fast, dark look my way. Crap. I should have zipped my lips. “Cassie was my sister. She died four years ago from Ewing’s sarcoma. She was twenty years old.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. “I amsosorry for your loss.” I let the topic float away on the cold breeze. Why was this information not in the extensive file my father had given me when this contract had been dropped in my lap? My mind began racing, picking up scraps of information as we trudged back to the tractor, all the joy of the outing now gone. The mere mention of his sister slicing into the man deeply. Even I could see his agony and I barely knew the man. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
I’d ring my father as soon as I was able to get some time alone and find out what the hell was going on here. How did he expect me to finagle a resolution when I didn’t have all the facts? I was sullen now, and mad, and the ride back to the farm held nothing but cold and ire. We ate lunch, a pot of squash soup that was sweet and warming, then went back to work in the barn. Well, I went back to work. Acosta took off on the tractor to plow open the lanes to the main road. Several of his neighbors called during lunch, asking if he could help them open up their driveways. He’d been more than happy to do so, taking off with barely a grunt for me. Looked to be a long, dour day on the farm.
ChapterSeven
Sighing deeply after Acosta left,I cleaned pens for about an hour, Bitsy racing up and down the middle of the barn with a few of the other younger does. She won every race as she was not pregnant and the other racers were, but I gave them all some animal crackers just for keeping me entertained while I broke my back. I’d only gotten one pen cleaned when I took a break. Bitsy, Rufus, Ralph, and I headed through the milking parlor to the room Acosta called home.
After I washed up, I made a beeline to the phone. It was after five now, the sun gone and the long winter night upon us. I called my father at work, suspecting he would be there despite it being the day before Christmas Eve, but shockingly, he had left early. According to the switchboard, he’d gone on an extended holiday to Barcelona with his family.
Huh. That’s an old lie, but it always works. Since his family consisted of his son Frank Jr. who was in Paris, Mom who was sailing the Maldives with Adrastus, and me who was stuck on this damn farm, I had to conclude that my sire was somewhere in Spain with his mistress. Or perhaps a new mistress. That rang true. Cheating on his mistress with another woman. Yep, that sounded like dear old dad. Knowing he would notdareto miss a work call no matter what he was doing and knowing that he would be pissed if I called his cell when he was “networking with clients,” I called him anyway after firing off several texts over thirty minutes that he didn’t deign to reply to. Pacing back and forth in front of the woodstove, I waited for him to pick up.
Finally, when I was ready to chuck the phone across the room, my father answered my call.
He was not happy.
“Decker, this had better be important. I’m—”
“Networking, right, of course you are. I’ll keep it brief. Why was there no mention of a Cassandra Melios in the files that I’d been sent?” A long pause filled with feminine whispers and giggles took place. I rolled my eyes so hard it was a wonder they didn’t pop out and roll under the woodstove. “Dad, can we focus here? This is important. Why was there no mention of a sister for Acosta Melios? That’s rather pertinent information for me to have!”
“Decker, do you honestly think that I have nothing better to do than compile factoids about a stupid little farm in Bumfuck, Pennsylvania? How do you say ‘I’m not ready for the happy ending yet’ in Italian?”
My brain ached. Seemed Dad was enjoying a massage. Super. Good on him. “Uhm, you do realize that you’re asking your son that question?”
“For God’s sake, Decker, would you grow up? You’d think a gay man would be less of a prude when it comes to sex. It’s a well-known fact that queers are—”
I hung up, violently. With a wall phone. Fuck but it felt good. All the memes that claimed slamming a receiver down in someone’s ear was a joyous experience my generation didn’t understand were so on the mark. Because it felt so good, I picked up the handset and slammed it back into the holder once more.
“If I ever find a genie in a bottle, I’m going to make one of my wishes to be for a new family. Santa hasn’t delivered, so maybe a djinn would,” I grumbled to Bitsy. She came rolling over for a pet. I wasn’t sure who enjoyed the scritches more, me or the goat, but scratching her proud nose did help a little. The things families said to each other. Why? Why did people with your DNA think they can flog you with whatever nasty nonsense that pops into their heads?
Throwing myself onto the sofa, I sulked for a long time, rolling over a thousand scenarios as the night grew darker and colder. Surely, Acosta should be home soon. My stomach snarled. I checked my phone, fired off some passive-aggressive comments in the family chat thread, then saw that it was going on eight o’clock. No wonder my stomach was protesting. Heaving a sigh, I went to get up, but Bitsy was ready for a snooze, so I got her freed from her harness and gently hoisted her backside onto the sofa. She snuzzled her nose into the Afghan and fell right to sleep. After covering her up, I padded into the kitchen, washed my hands, and then began rummaging around.
The shelves in the cupboards were stocked full of pasta, canned fruits and veggies, and various spices. Not having a clue as to what to put into whatever I found, I pulled out some garlic and onion powder because garlic and onion went into everything, right? I then had to snoop in the fridge. Tons of veggies and fruit filled the shelves. In the crisper were several zucchinis. Thinking back, I recalled our cook used to make this delicious casserole with zucchini, cheese, and spaghetti sauce. My belly roared at the memory. Working off that childhood remembrance, I rolled up my sleeves and went to work. Slicing the zucchini and then placing them into a square casserole dish I found stacked among other backing dishes, I layered the zucchini with some homemade spaghetti paste—I knew it was for spaghetti as someone had been kind enough to write SPAG PASTE on the lid of the Ball jar—and then laid some slices of thick strong cheese from the fridge on top.
Standing back, clothes spritzed with sauce, I admired my creation. “Perfection!” I decreed and turned on the old gas range to 400 and slid the dish in. Then we had to wait. I perused the books on the shelves. Many were about organic farming, self-sufficiency, animal care, and the like. But there were oodles of fiction books. Many from authors that I had read in college. Vonnegut, Bronte, Chaucer, some Fitzgerald, lots of Toni Morrison, and Maya Angelou. A whole shelf was nothing but romances from the classics likePride and Prejudiceto modern novels by Nora Roberts as well as books from lesser known writers. Two fat tomes—one about foraging the forests and another about keeping your bees happy and healthy—were from the library. At least the small town of Miller’s Lake had a library. That was good. If the people used it was another thing, but, obviously, Acosta made use of it. His eclectic reading tastes only added to my growing admiration of him. I did like a man who read.
Plucking a well-loved copy ofThe Duke and Iby Julia Quinn from the shelf, I made my way to the desk to turn on the gooseneck lamp and sit down to read. The stove was nearby, and since Bitsy had claimed the sofa, the rickety rolling chair seemed the perfect place to read. His desktop was dark and a little dusty. Given how dated his website was I could see that this man was not a big internet browser. When would he have the time? All he did was work and help his neighbors. My sight flickered from his dusty computer to the picture of him and that thin woman along the beach. Staring at it I tried to pick up any familial traits between the two. No matter how much I searched their faces I saw nothing that linked them as brother and sister.
Bitsy made a funny little sound just as the door opened and Acosta came through. He was snow-coated. Even his eyelashes were frosted. I jumped up, my book sliding to the floor with a soft thud.
“You scared me,” I gasped, my heart thundering as he wearily eyeballed me. “Did you get the neighbors plowed out?”
“I did.” He began peeling off layers of wet clothing. I bent down to pick up that handsome duke from the floor, then stood there, like a ninny, clutching a regency romance to my chest as he peeled off everything aside from his long john bottoms and thick blue wool socks. Dear me the man was tasty. “What’s that smell?” He sniffed the air and then bent over to retrieve his sodden clothes from the floor.
“I made dinner!” I preened just a little. His eyebrows flew to his hairline. “Don’t look so shocked. I’m fully capable of preparing a meal.” I never had before, but obviously I was capable. “Also, I borrowed a book.”
