Page 283 of How to Kiss a Hawthorne Brother
“You ready to get out of here?” I say softly. I heft the small pack at my feet onto my shoulders and hold out my hand.
“Sure. Where are we going?”
I lace her fingers through mine and lead us outside into the warm spring sunshine. “Just on a walk. I want to show you my favorite place on the farm.”
A smile blooms across her face, almost pushing away my earlier worry. She would tell me if something was amiss, wouldn’t she? “That sounds amazing,” she says.
We start off toward the east orchard and the trail that will take us up to the ledge, Toby bounding between us.
“He never got to be outside like this in L.A.,” Tatum says. “I think he’s ruined for any other kind of life.”
“It’s a common problem when people come to the mountains. Once you live here, it’s hard to want to live anywhere else.”
Her eyes dart to mine, but she looks away too quickly for me to read her expression. “Yeah, I can imagine,” she says softly.
Crap.That sounded like a loaded statement, and I didnotmean for it to be a loaded statement.
“Did you do a lot of hiking growing up?” I ask, hoping to steer the conversation to safer territory.
She nods. “Some. In Santa Monica, mostly. And when Dad took me to Palm Springs for Christmas. Just day hikes, though. Probably nothing like what you’ve done. Kate made it sound like you guys are all pretty big hikers.”
“Perry does more of the long-distance stuff. He hikes a section of the Appalachian Trail every summer and stays out for a week or two. But we’ve all hiked in most of the national parks and know the trails around here as well as we know the farm.Whenever Brody travels for his kayaking, we try to go with him and hit a few trails wherever he is, too.”
“Kate told me about his kayaking.” She looks over and smiles. “You Hawthornes are a bunch of overachievers. Must be a family trait.”
I grin. “All but Flint, maybe. He’s the lazy one.”
“Right. Yes. His career definitely indicates he’s the lazy one,” she jokes.
This is good.Better.
“You know, I didn’t even know he was your brother until I applied for this job,” she says. “It was kind of a crazy thing to discover.”
“So you did knowIwould be here?” I ask. “That Stonebrook was my family’s farm?”
“When I applied, yes,” I say. “But not when I saw the job posting. I did a little digging as soon as I saw it, and that’s when I figured it out.”
We pass the farmhouse and continue toward the barn, winding down a footpath that skirts the main drive. A row of massive sugar maples, their leaves a vibrant spring green, cast dappled sunlight over us as we walk. “I’m surprised it didn’t scare you away—knowing I was here,” I say, my tone light.
She huffs out a laugh. “Honestly, it kinda did the opposite.”
“Iknewyou’d been harboring a crush all this time.”
She rolls her eyes. “Very funny. It definitely wasn’t that. Do you remember the peer review you gave me during our last year of school? It was in our sauté class.”
“Oh no. I wasn’t very nice to you, was I?”
“You were honest, Lennox. My entrée was as bad as your salad dressing.”
“Nothing is as bad as that salad dressing,” I say, and she grins.
“Fine. It wasalmostas bad as your salad dressing. And yet, no one said anything negative.” She meets my eye. “No one but you.”
“Okay, and I’m sensing that was a good thing?”
“Of course it’s a good thing. You never cared about my father being famous. No one wanted to insult the daughter of the great Christopher Elliott. But if people had been honest with me sooner, maybe I wouldn’t have wound up ten years into a career that I’m not even all that great at.”
I would argue that she’sdefinitelygreat at being a chef, but I still understand her point.
