Adorbs pushed his way forward and took the apple from her, eating it in a sloppy way that made Ella chuckle. When he was done, he stuck his head through the fence rails, looking for more.
Ella patted the Highland calf, scratching his fluffy head between his ears.
Gray watched morosely. Great, I’ve been rejected and now I’m jealous of my own cow. This day can’t get worse.
She tilted her head. “Can I ask you something?”
“About Adorbs? Sure.”
“No. About you.” Her eyes, darker than usual, regarded him with curiosity. “You’re happy here. Why?”
He looked past her to the field around them. It was getting dark already, but final rays of sun lingered, brightening the red of the barn until it glowed, and making the grass even greener than usual. “There’s something calm and right about this place. I felt it the second I came here.”
“Is that why you bought it? Because it made you feel calm?”
“Partially. I was ready for something bigger, too. Something just mine. And this was it.”
She nodded, still scratching Adorbs through the fence. “I’ve never felt that way about a place.”
“Neither did I. And I never thought I’d end up farming either, but here I am.”
She looked beyond him to the pasture that stretched out toward the mountain. “It’s peaceful here. I get good vibes, and I’ve been to a lot of different places.”
He leaned against the fence. “Do you miss Paris?”
“No. I mean, I loved it there, but it was time to go. Do you ever feel that way? As if you were just done with a place and it was time to leave?”
“My old job.”
“You’ve only felt that way once?”
He nodded.
“I feel it all the time. Maybe I shouldn’t. I—” Adorbs sniffed Ella’s dress pocket. She chuckled. “Easy, buddy. I don’t have any snacks in there.”
Adorbs sniffed again, nudging her as he did so.
“Seriously, there’s nothing in there. Here. I’ll show you.” She rammed her hand into her pocket. She froze the second her fingers disappeared. “Oh no.”
“What’s wrong?”
Ella slowly pulled her hand out. It was covered in pink frosting.
Gray tried not to laugh but couldn’t stop. “Looks like you’ve been pranked.”
“It wasn’t a prank, it—” She closed her lips over the rest of her sentence. “I need to wash my hands.”
“Sure. There’s a spigot on the side of the barn.” He walked with her, their shoes crunching on the gravel. When they got to the spigot, he said, “Hang on. I’ll get you a rag.”
He went to the tack room, where he kept his supplies, and pulled out two rags from the bag he kept there. He returned and handed her a rag and watched as she scooped out the frosting from her pocket. Once she’d gotten out as much as possible, she wet the rag and cleaned her pocket as well as she could. That done, she rinsed the cloth and handed it back to him. He tossed it onto a bale of hay while she washed her hands.
“Looks like one or both of your sisters are out to get you,” Gray said. “Maybe we should have stayed and played Scrabble after all.”
“Or not.” She turned off the spigot and shook her hands to dry them.
Gray pulled out the other rag and draped it over his arm. “Your towel, madam.”
She took it, drying her hands silently.
He could see she was thinking. “Trying to figure out who did this to you?”
“No.” She shot him a searching look. “I think… I think I need to go home.”
That was disappointing, but he wasn’t surprised. He’d played his hand, and she’d been clear in her answer. He forced himself to smile. “Sure.”
He followed her to his truck and opened the door for her, and soon they were on their way, driving past the herd where it still gathered under the apple tree.
Ella was quiet for most of the ride, her eyebrows lowered as if she were mulling over a problem.
As they turned onto her street, she broke the silence. “Thank you.”
“What for?”
“For being so patient. Not just with this, but with life, and me, too.”
“I’m patient when I know the outcome will be worth it. And you, Ella, are worth it.” He turned his truck into her driveway and switched it off. “You deserve to be happy.”
“So do you. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do, but… Gray, I—” She bit her lip. After an agonizing moment, she splayed her hands over her knees. “I hate this. I wish things were different, but they’re not. I’m not.”
She opened her door.
He reached for his own so he could walk her to the porch, but she didn’t give him a chance. With a quick wave and a mumbled goodbye, she hurried up the sidewalk, moving so fast she was almost at a run.
He watched as she disappeared into her house. The last time he’d watched her walk away like this, he’d felt miserable, wondering what he could have done differently, what things he could have said to persuade her to stay. But this time, all he felt was an infinitely deep sorrow, as if his soul had been irrevocably and permanently cut in half.
His heart heavy, he turned his truck back on and went home.
CHAPTER 16 ANGELA
“It looks like someone kicked over an anthill.”
Angela straightened from where she’d been collecting her purse from the floorboard of Gray’s pickup. Throngs of people filled the park.
Before Angela moved to New York, the Apple Festival had been an important annual event, but it had faded as the years passed. Every leaf season, it seemed to be smaller and thinner. But no more.
Jules had said that Grace had successfully revived the festival, but Angela hadn’t expected this. Rows and rows of tents featuring local businesses and craftspeople filled both the town park and Main Street, which had been blocked off from one end to the other. In the middle of this madness, near the town fountain, sat a huge tent surrounded by a long line of people, which snaked twice around it and then down the sidewalk.
Angela was glad she’d put her foot down with Jules about attending. It hadn’t been a fight, exactly, but Angela had had to threaten to walk to town on her own to get here before Jules finally caved. Of course, Jules had then tried to ruin that moment of triumph by coming up with an endless list of “things you should do” and “things you shouldn’t do.” Angela had just nodded and smiled, knowing full well she was going to do pretty much whatever she wanted. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this many people in Dove Pond.”
“Hurrah,” Gray said dully.
She shot him a sharp look. “That’s about the tenth negative comment you’ve made today. What’s going on?”
He shrugged. “I’ll just be glad when this day is over.”
“I think we all feel that way.” Angela turned so that she faced him on the truck seat. “The word on the street is that Ella will be flying out with her assistant and the crew when they leave.”
His mouth tightened. “I didn’t know that, but I’m not surprised.” He stared out at the crowd with an unseeing gaze, his expression as dark as a summer storm over the ocean.