“I’ve been happier. I feel like I’m at this fork in the road with my life. And I always thought I’d go left, but now, I want to take a sharp right.”
“Where will that turn take you?” she asks, as I pull onto a dirt road.
“Right now, it will take us to the oak tree.”
“Why?” she asks.
“Because that tree is mine, Lucia. And I thought we might go there and have ourselves a picnic.”
Chapter Twelve
Lucia
It’s his tree. I turn to him, stunned. “What, you own this tree?”
He parks his car near my favorite tree in the whole wide world and kills the engine. “Yeah. I bought this property when it was up for auction ten years ago. Never did anything with it.”
“That’s…” I search for the word. Random doesn’t capture it. “Kismet?”
He gets out of the car and opens my door. Taking my hand, he nods. “I couldn’t agree more.”
Popping the trunk, he grabs a thick wool blanket and a gorgeous picnic basket. “Look at all these goodies.”
“Didn’t know if you preferred sweet or savory. So I got a bunch of everything.”
“I’m not a picky eater. And this all looks delicious.” He spreads out the blanket under the oak tree and then we begin pulling out the goodies. Olives, salami, cheeses. A baguette.
“We should have brought your bread and butter pickles,” he says.
“Next time. Oh, and look, this is Nettle Bank Farm butter,” I say, showing him the package. “You have good taste.”
He chuckles. Both of us thinking about the way I melted not too long ago. “I love bread,” he says. “But not without butter.”
“Agreed,” I say, slicing the bread and slathering creamy butter on it. “For you.”
Logan pours us glasses of wine and he makes a toast. “To butter days ahead.”
I laugh. “Butter hand it to you, that’s pretty clever.”
We talk about our favorite books, movies, music. He tells me about his business, how they offer bridge loans to other businesses.
“And do you like it?” I ask.
He shrugs, biting a slice of apple. “I don’t hate it.”
I laugh. “That’s terrible, Logan. What would you do if you could do anything?”
He pulls me to him and he leans back, against the tree. “Stay here forever. Just like this.”
I smile. “I like that for you. Maybe you could trade in that fancy-pants car for an old truck like mine. Get yourself some overalls.”
He laughs. “I said I’d stay under this tree with you, not become a farmer.”
My cheeks hurt from smiling so much. I turn on my belly, my hands on his jeans, playing with the edge of his pink shirt.
“And what about you, Lucia? What would you do with your life if you could do anything?”
I blow air from the side of my mouth, a strand of my hair lifting. “It might sound a little… weird. What I want.”
He chuckles, tucking the hair behind my ear. “Try me.”
I swallow. “I don’t know… I mean, maybe what I want could change. Depending on who I was sharing that life with.”
“You’d change for a man?”
I lick my lips. Confident. “Who I am, at my core? No. I wouldn’t change that for anyone. But plans, ideas about the future? Yeah. For the right person I would pick up and go, run off to Tahiti or Tallahassee if my partner wanted that.” I shrug, dropping my gaze. “I feel like who I live my life with matters more than how we spend it.”
“And this oak tree? Could you see yourself here?”
I meet Logan’s gaze. “We just met.”
“And that talk of kismet… was that nothing?”
“It was something,” I admit. “I just…”
“What?” He sits up, leading me closer. I sit facing him on my knees, the sun setting around us.
“What I’ve always imagined for myself is in direct contrast to the life you lead, Logan.”
“What do you know of my life, really?” he asks.
“I know you have a daughter my age. And a son who is grown. Both married.”
“Is this about my age?” he asks. “I turned forty this year, there’s no hiding that fact.”
“No,” I say, adamant. “I don’t care how old you are. And God, you look way better than any man I’ve ever met.” Heat rises in my belly as I say that.
“Then what?” he asks, his hand on the base of my neck.
“You want my honest answer?” I ask. “You wanna know what I’ve always wanted since I was a little girl?”
He nods. “Tell me. Let me in. I know we just met but God, Lucia, I want to know your heart. Your soul. I want it all.”
Nodding, I decide to tell him what I’ve always dreamed about. Always wanted.
“I want to have a family,” I say. “I want to be barefoot and pregnant, knocked up five times in a row. I want a big farmhouse, like Levi and Josie have, but I want it to be mine. I want goats and chickens and I want my own garden. My own vegetables. I want to make my husband a farm-cooked meal every night. I want to make my own butter and have my man compliment me on my biscuits. That’s what I want, Logan Barton. The long and short of it.”
He’s grinning as I finish my spiel.
“What are you smiling about?” I ask. “That little speech should have a man like you running for the hills.”
He laughs. “And why is that, Lucia?” he asks, pulling me into his lap.
“Because you already did all that,” I say with a sad laugh. “The wedding, the house, the babies.”
He pulls my mouth to his. “I may have done all that, Lucia, but I never once did that with you.”
Chapter Thirteen
Logan
When I drive her home, I don’t want to say goodbye. I want to stay with her, all night.
“I have to milk the cows at three-thirty,” she says as I stand at her apartment door. “And you have work in the morning. Aren’t you the boss?”
“I believe in love at first sight,” I tell her.
She blinks, the moon hanging in the sky. “So do I.”
“I meant it when I said it before. I love you.”
“Logan… I don’t want a broken heart.” She sighs. Scared. Not quite able to believe the words I’ve said. That I would do it all over again, for her. A family, a farmhouse, the whole nine yards. There are crazier things than falling in love and making a life with her.
“I know,” I tell her. “So it’s a good thing I don’t plan on breaking it.”
She laughs, pressing her hands to my chest. “You asked me to wait until the end of the date to rate it. But I must say I don’t take back anything. This was undoubtedly the highlight of my life.”
I pull her to me, kiss her softly under the stars, the dark, heavy sky. “Good. Because I’m planning on coming back for you tomorrow.”
“I’ll be waiting.”