Page 62 of Off the Beaten Path

His brow wrinkles. “What?”

“Nothing,” I say and take the bottle from him. It’s sweet and better than the six-dollar bottle I usually buy. Of course he’s ruined me for strawberry wine too. I’ll never be able to drink my budget bottle again, and when I buy this kind, I’ll always remember how he looked pulling the cork out with his teeth and taking a drink like a dying man.

My heart stops when his tongue darts out to lick a drop of pink liquid from his bottom lip.

“What?” he asks again, no doubt catching me staring.

I swear he doesn’t know how attractive he is, and it makes me want to throttle his ex-wife for ever making him feel anything less than desirable.

I lean in, pressing my lips to the spot where that drop of wine lingered, tasting it. Time slows, like the universe is stopping just for us, the earth halting on its axis.

Holden sighs into my mouth, his hands tightening on my hips before he pulls back, placing a kiss to my nose. “Let’s watch the stars, Red.”

Maybe with someone else I’d feel rushed, frantic, but with Holden, sitting with his arms around me, our eyes fixed on the wide expanse of sky above us, I feel like we have all the time in the world.

“I like it here,” I say, watching a star streak across the inky blackness.

“Me too, Red.”

“The view at my place is better.”

He laughs into my hair. “You can’t see the view.”

“I can feel it.”

His sigh ruffles my curls, but I know he’s not exasperated with me, even though he wishes he was. “The view at your placeisbetter.”

“Maybe we could pick this cabin up and transport it to my property.”

“Maybe I’ll just build you one like it.”

A smile into the sky. “I’d like that. I might need a little more money.”

“Someday,” he says, his breath warm on the back of my neck.

“Yeah, someday.”

“Until then, I’ll take sitting here with you on a camp chair in the dark.”

I turn my face into his, feeling his beard scrape against my cheek. “It’s a pretty good first date, huh?”

“It doesn’t really feel like a first date.” His words are a soft rumble, seeping into my skin and penetrating my heart.

“No, it doesn’t,” I agree. It feels like the first of many. Like a last first date.

Wildflowerseasonstartsthefirst weekend of March at Misty Grove, and I’ve never in my life missed an opening weekend. As a kid, I’d come with my parents, and as a teen, I’d meet Stevie and her cousin Hazel here and we would pick wildflowers until our baskets were full. Then we’d pluck the petals off to find out if our crushes loved us back. For the last few years, I’ve been working at the farm on the first weekend, coordinating vendors and food trucks, taking photos for social media, greeting the guests with Stevie’s parents.

I’ve never been quite as excited for wildflower season as I am today, watching June’s face light up as bright as the sunshine overhead when she sees the fields of wildflowers.

“They’re beautiful,” she says in as reverent a tone as a six-year-old can muster. Her hair is braided away from her face today—my doing—and every one of her freckles stands out on her little tanned face. She makes my chest hurt.

“I think so too, June Bug.” I tell her, squeezing her shoulder.

“Eh, it’s okay,” Holden says, but I can see his lips twitch, catch the sparkles of sunlight in his eye.

June spins around, her face gone hard. Her hands land on her hips, and I have to fight the urge to laugh. “Itispretty, Daddy,” she says sternly.

Holden scoops her up, and she squeals. “Hard to notice the flowers when I’ve got the two prettiest girls in town with me.”

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