From the expression on Lila’s face, I can tell she’s having a hard time keeping her shit together. She can’t decide if she should be polite since there’s an old lady waving at her or if she should pitch a hissy fit on me like she really wants to do.

I try to keep a straight face and wait patiently while she makes up her mind, knowing it can easily go either way.

“Y’all come on in now,” Aunt Leona beckons from the porch.

I take Lila’s hand in mine. “We’re coming,” I yell back.

Lila obviously needs a little push. Otherwise we’ll be standing here all night while she tries to figure out how I screwed her over.

“You’re going to love my Aunt Leona,” I say. “She’ll tell you everything you ever wanted to know about making hooch. And I mean everything. She loves to talk, especially if she has a captive audience.”

Lila plasters a fake smile on her face.

“Great,” she says cheerfully. “I’m looking forward to it.”

My aunt opens the screen door for us to walk through and winks at me behind Lila’s back. She might be old, but she’s as mischievous as I am, if not worse. When I called her earlier and filled her in about what was going on, she jumped at the chance to fool a city girl. The last thing she said before hanging up was that “nobody messes with my boys and gets away with it.”

I’m actually feeling kind of bad for Lila at the moment.

Not too bad though.

Whatever Aunt Leona is getting ready to do to her, she deserves it.

And more.

Chapter Six

Lila

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I would like to strangle Sam with my bare hands.

We’ve been walking for fifteen minutes through a hot, hilly cow pasture to reach an apple orchard that I can’t even see yet. I’m already out of breath and his aunt isn’t winded, though she hasn’t stopped talking since we set out. She insisted that I call her Aunt Leona too, which feels awkward and weird.

“It’s a good thing you’ve got your walking shoes on, Lila,” she says, pointing to my new, uncomfortable sandals that are killing my feet. I’ll be covered in blisters tomorrow and will have to go barefoot for a week.

“If Sam had told me we would be hiking, I would have worn tennis shoes,” I reply, giving him a dirty look.

“But that would have spoiled the surprise,” he says with a straight face.

Is he screwing with me?