Autumn turns toward me. "You are?"
Greta clears her throat. "It looks like you have some business to take care of." Before she walks out of the room with Olivia, she gives Autumn a wide-eyed look that I definitely don't mistake. She's giving us space because she thinks there's something going on between us.
Autumn apparently doesn't notice that look. "You're a smoke jumper?"
"Yup."
"So, you already have a job," she says. "You don't need this one."
I shrug. "I do and I don't."
"What's that supposed to mean? God, you're infuriating."
"I'm infuriating because I have a job?"
"No, you're infuriating because you don't give a straight answer to any question."
"Maybe you should stop being nosy and I'll stop being evasive."
Autumn exhales heavily and gives me a look out of the corner of her eye – pure irritation –that just makes me laugh. "You're already the worst employee ever."
"I can be a better one," I assure her softly, not bothering to disguise the innuendo evident in my tone.
What the hell is wrong with me? She's older, has a kid, and is completely not the kind of woman I need to be fucking around with.
Autumn's eyes widen, and when she stands up, I do something stupid. Reckless. I reach out and take hold of her wrist to stop her.
"What are you doing?" she asks, looking down at me. I'd think she’s pissed, except the way she looks at me with those big eyes and the sharp inhale of breath makes me absolutely sure she's not angry at all.
I turn her hand over, slowly tracing the inside of her wrist with my finger and running it across her palm. By the time I reach the middle of her hand, her eyes close softly for a second like she's blinking, except it's just a moment too long to be just a blink. She's enjoying my touch. Savoring it.
Her lips part slightly, and I think I hear her moan. The fact that she's so turned-on by my touching her hand makes me want to fucking explode, my cock rigid against the zipper of my jeans.
It's been a long time since she's been touched by anyone, I can tell that immediately. That fact makes her vulnerable. She's been burned.
That fact makes her the kind of girl I shouldn't be putting my hands on, not at all. That fact makes her the kind of girl I shouldn't be thinking about the way I'm thinking right now.
I'm not the kind of guy a girl like her needs.
I pull my hands away from hers and clear my throat. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing."
"Are you sure you want this job?" Autumn walks ahead of me through the orchard between the rows of apple trees.
"Temporarily," I note. "Until you find someone more permanent."
"Why?" She pauses to look at me, shielding her eyes from the sun.
"Because there's no sense in you winding up burning down this damn property on account of a no-good foreman."
"You sure you've got nowhere else to be?" she asks.
She asks like she's interested, like she wants to know the answer to why I'm hanging around West Bend. She has no idea what a complicated fucking answer that is. Shit, it's more than complicated. It's just plain ol' fucked up.
My abusive asshole father was the reason I got the hell out of West Bend as soon as I turned eighteen. He died a few months ago, and the world is a better place for it. I don't give a shit that he's dead, except that my mother supposedly committed suicide after that.
My father's death makes sense to me. The medical examiner ruled it accidental, a contusion to the back of the head. Shit, there was nothing unusual about that. The man was a drunk – a mean one – and stumbling around and falling into things was par for the course for him.
But my mother killing herself? After the man who made her life – and ours – a living hell was finally dead? Shit, that just hasn't sat well with me. After all that time she stayed with him, why would she kill herself when he finally died?
I should be long gone from West Bend. Instead, I'm here for now, for reasons I can't explain to this girl, Autumn Mayburn, who comes from old money. Bourbon money. Yeah, I went home and looked her up on the internet last night. Even if I didn't read what I read about her family's bourbon company, I'd be able to tell by the way she carries herself: sure and certain of every step she takes. She's classy.
And I'm as far away from class as you can get.
"Luke?"
Autumn’s voice jolts me out of my thoughts. "Yep?"
"You don't have someplace else to be?"
"Nah. I'm here in West Bend for a little while," I say. "Taking some time off."
Autumn looks at me for a long moment, and I think she sees right through my flimsy statement, but she doesn't probe any further. She just nods. "Okay. My gain, then." She pauses. "I think."
I clear my throat. "What are you doing with this place, anyway?"
Autumn laughs. "You mean how did I wind up running an orchard? That's kind of personal, don't you think?"
"No. I meant, what are you doing with this place, as in what are your goals?"