Mrs. Bennet’s eyes shone with furious tears. “What else have you not told me?”

“Mom, I—”

“A baby. With her. Of all the irresponsible, thoughtless things you could do. After all she’s done, after you finally were free, and now this? You knew she was trouble. You knew it, and you went back. And here we are. She will never let you go, Lucas. Never. You handed her all she needed to take advantage of you forever. Forever.” Her face bent, her twisted hand pressing to her lips. And she turned away, found her way into Mr. Bennet’s arms.

He guided her away to the back with an apologetic, disappointed look on his face.

Luke had let me go, his hands covering his face and fingers pressing into his eyes. And I just stood there, stunned still and silent.

I watched through the front window. Marcus had gone out front to try to smooth things over. Kash trailed after his mother, probably to plead a case for Luke. Jett and Laney were head to head, speaking in hushed whispers in that way twins sometimes did.

It felt like a dream, my body and mind too tired to process the madness of what was happening. All I wanted was to wake up. Or fast-forward. Or go to bed. Or be anywhere but standing in this shop next to Luke Bennet.

I opened my mouth to excuse myself so I could retreat, to find a place where I could catch my breath, quiet my mind.

But before I could speak, a pop shot through the room, followed by a groan, a snap.

A crash.

Our faces snapped to the sound, every person in the room frozen still as everything happened in slow motion. One of the installations came unfastened, the pole the pampas was tied to falling into the wheat with a crunch and a thump, crushing it.

Crushing everything.

We ran toward it as everyone outside ran in. Luke reached it first, inspecting the end of the pole that had fallen, looking up with his brows gathered. Tears pricked my eyes, seized my heart with a squeeze of my ribs.

The rope it had been fastened with was in his hand. “It’s wet.”

Down the rope his hand moved, to the pole. When he picked it up, my hand flew to my mouth as I took in the carnage.

The dyed fibers had gotten wet, the colors bleeding onto the wheat it had touched.That wheat was crushed, the stalks smashed and bent, with a myriad of color in senseless streaks across the feathery heads.

It was ruined. There would be no salvaging it.

“I can fix this.” Luke made another promise he couldn’t keep, a frantic, thoughtless promise. He grabbed one of the ladders from behind the counter and popped it open.

“Stop, Luke,” I said. “Just … don’t touch it.”

“I can fix this, Tess,” he said, determined.

“No. It can’t be fixed. You’re just going to break it worse. We need another ladder. We need to move the wheat. We need to—”