Harry grunts, and I know I’m being a dick. I bugged him over and over to come home early for his friend, and now I’m high-tailing it out of here with only the thinnest explanation.

“Did something happen?” he asks quietly, and my chin jerks up, but he’s still frowning at his hands on the ratchet strap.

I swallow hard. “Like what?”

For a long moment, there’s only us and the creaking chorus of insects in the long grass; my dusty, idling truck and the scent of wood sap.

Then Harry shrugs, and I can breathe again.

“Don’t know.” He smirks and jostles me as he rounds the corner of the truck, but not hard. He’s teasing. “But you’re not exactly Mr Welcoming, Ev.”

That has not been mine and Josie’s problem.

A door creaks open across the driveway, and she leans in the barn doorway, her arms crossed. Her hair is wild from tossing and turning all night, and she’s wearing the same blue dress that she peeled off for me yesterday.

Josie watches me load up my gear, her expression unreadable at this distance, and more than anything I want to go to her.

I want to cup the side of her face and tell her it’s going to be okay. Want to unwrap those bandages and check on her poor hands one more time.

“Call me if there are any problems with the Barns.”

Harry yanks the driver’s door open for me. “Sure.”

“And give her hands a salt bath later.”

My nephew snorts. “Get gone, Everett.”

Well, then. The truck dips and settles under my weight, the worn leather seat already warming beneath the rising sun. I toss a peppermint in my mouth before throwing the truck into reverse.

“Be good,” I call at Harry’s retreating back.

Josie’s mouth twists over in the doorway.

This is the right thing. I’m doing the right thing.

But I feel every sickly bump and lurch as I drive away on the winding dirt path.

Nine

Josie

The last shovel of dirt to complete the vegetable patch should be an amazing feeling. I did it all on my own, and it was hard, but I’m a freaking ninja with the shovel now. This is a small triumph, sure, but I’ll take any victories I can get.

So it should feel good, and so should the distant thump of Everett’s truck door four days after he left. I should beam like Harry, jogging to meet his uncle at the truck.

It doesn’t feel good. I don’t jog over.

Guess I need to find a real job now. It’s time to move on, to get out of Everett Bray’s thick, dark hair, because he clearly doesn’t want me here. I’ve already chased him off his own property once.

God. I can’t believe I threw myself at him like that. Can’t believe I got drunk and stripped off my clothes in front of my ex boyfriend’s uncle, then cried when he didn’t want my pathetic ass.