by Vivi Holt
“Hey, Issie, you’re here,” Baker greeted her, flicking off his oven mitts. He marched over and wrapped her up in his strong arms, kissing her softly on the crown of her head, his breath stirring her hair.
She laid her head against his muscular chest. “Thanks for inviting me.” She glanced up and met his gaze full of love.
“I wouldn’t want you to be anywhere else,” he whispered huskily. “How are you? I know this is a hard day for you.”
She swallowed. “I’m fine. It’s hard, but not the way I expected it to be. I just miss them, but I’m also really happy at the same time. I guess that doesn’t make sense. Does it?” She laughed shakily and raised an eyebrow.
He smiled and released her, taking her hand in his and pressing it to his lips. “It makes perfect sense.” He led her out to the back deck where the rest of the group had set themselves up on lounge chairs and sofas.
A long table was full to bursting with roast turkey, prawns, grilled scallops and fish, fresh salads and tropical fruits, breads and more. Meg and Evie were there, along with Abi and Rose. An older couple stood beside the barbecue and when they turned to greet her she recognized them as Baker’s parents – she hadn’t seen them in years and they’d barely changed, save for more gray in their hair. “Everyone, you know Issie?” Baker said.
There were nods and words of welcome all around. Meg hurried to kiss her cheek, her eyes burning with the need for a quiet conversation – probably about Baker, given the way he was holding Isabella’s hand. She could tell her friend was bursting with curiosity, but merely smiled in response, clinging tight to Baker’s arm.
Baker whispered in her ear that he had to pull the pudding out of the oven. She nodded and reluctantly released his hand before he hurried off. She couldn’t believe how much her feelings toward him had changed in such a short time. Her misgivings had dissolved when she’d met the God he loved and served. With those out of the way, she felt overwhelmed by his love for her, and missed him when he wasn’t there.
“Issie, it’s so good to see you,” Mrs. Pritchard said.
“Mrs. Pritchard, it’s been a long time.” Isabella embraced her.
Mrs. Pritchard kissed her softly on the cheek. “Yes it has, my dear. I was so sorry to hear about your parents.” The woman’s eyes misted over and she met and held Isabella’s gaze with a look of concern.
Isabella swallowed the sob that threatened to rise up her throat. “Thank you. It’s been a difficult few weeks.”
“Well, my dear, you just let us know if we can do anything at all to help you.”
“I appreciate that.”
Baker returned and addressed the group. “Thank you for coming everyone! It’s truly a special day as we celebrate the birth of our Lord. Let’s say a blessing together and we can eat.”
As he prayed, Isabella glanced around the group. Every head was bowed, every eye closed. She felt a swell of love for those standing around her.
When the prayer was over, Rose rushed to her side. “Do you like prawns, Issie?” she asked, eyes wide.
Isabella knelt down beside her. “Yes, I do. Do you?”
“I don’t. But I helped Daddy peel them. He says I’m his helper. Would you like some prawns? I can get them for you.”
Isabella chuckled and took Rose’s outstretched hand in hers. “That sounds fantastic, thank you.”
Rose dragged her to the table, handed her a paper plate, then piled prawns onto it. “There you go.”
“Well, thank you – that looks delicious.” It also looked like more prawns than she really wanted, but never mind. “Can I get you something?” She reached for a second plate and held it up.
Rose studied her. “Yes, please. I’ll sit over there.” She pointed to the small square table that had been set up on the deck for the kids.
“Perfect. I’ll bring it right over to you, okay?” Isabella set her plate on the end of the table and worked to fill Rose’s plate with things she thought the little girl might like, while surreptitiously returning a few prawns to their bowl.
Baker appeared beside her, bumping her elbow with his and grinning mischievously.
She smiled back as she spooned potato salad onto Rose’s plate. “This looks amazing, Baker,”
“Well, Mum and Dad did most of it, actually. And Meg brought some of the salads.”
“Do you know if Rose likes fish?” she asked, her brow furrowed.
He tipped his head to one side. “No, she doesn’t. Is that plate for her?”
Her cheeks flushed. “Yeah it is. I’m sorry, I should have asked you first.”
He put an arm around her shoulders and kissed the top of her head again. “No, it’s fine. I was just about to get a plate for her and now I don’t have to. So thank you.”
She grinned, her face flaming even more. “No problem.”
Once everyone had a plate, they all sat at the table together to eat. It was a rowdy affair with plenty of conversation, teasing and laughter. Isabella felt right at home. Before the meal was over she had Rose in her lap, laying out playing cards in front of her. Abi squeezed up beside her, trying to push Rose out of the way. “Rose, move! I want to play too and there’s no room!”
“How about I come sit at your table and we each take a chair?” suggested Isabella with a chortle. “That way we can all play the game together.”
While the rest of the adults cleared the table, Isabella sat with the girls, her legs bunched up in front of her on the small chair. She reached forward to slap down her hand with a shout of “Fish!” and sent the girls into squeals of laughter. She felt Baker’s eyes on her and turned to see him smiling.
Soon Abi and Rose tired of playing cards and ran off to jump on the trampoline, so Isabella headed inside, where the rest of the group had settled in the lounge room with drinks. She slumped onto the couch beside Baker with a sigh. He looped an arm around her shoulders and she nestled into his side. Meg gave her a wink.
Isabella rolled her eyes in response. There was no getting around it – everyone would know about her and Baker before the week was over. But she didn’t mind. She wanted to shout it from the rooftops herself and tell the world that she loved Baker Pritchard.
The thought startled her. She loved him. She’d never said the words to any man other than her dad, not even Simon. She hadn’t said them to Baker yet either, but there it was – she loved him. She grinned and closed her eyes for a moment, enjoying the feel of his warmth against her side and his arm around her shoulders.
When Meg left to take Evie home for her nap, Baker’s parents decided to go for a walk and Abi and Rose left with them. Suddenly she and Baker were alone in his house. She loaded the dishwasher for a second run and Baker wiped down the counters, silence filling the room for the first time that day. He sighed and turned to lean back against the counter, crossing his feet at the ankles. “Can I ask you something?”
She nodded and started the dishwasher, then made her way to him and leaned casually against his chest, her head over his heart. He wrapped his arms around her and caressed her back with one hand. “What is it?”
He lifted a hand to trace the outline of her cheek. “I know you’ve had misgivings about us – our relationship. But it feels as though something’s changed. What are you thinking now … you know, about what’s happening between us?”
She sighed against his shirt, then stood to face him, lacing her fingers through his. “Now? Now I don’t remember what I was worried about.” She chuckled and drew a circle around his palm with her fingertip.
He raised an eyebrow. “Really?”
“Yeah.” She smiled, and the look in his eyes made her heart skip.
He cupped her face in his hands. “So you’re willing to give us a shot?” he asked, his voice thick with emotion.
She nodded and rubbed her cheek against his hand.
“Because you know I love you. Always have.”
Her eyes crinkled at the edges. “I’ve known you my whole life, and for some reas
on I never really saw you before. But I see you now … and I love you too.”
He pulled her to him and kissed her, hard. She surrendered, her entire body trembling beneath his touch as an ocean of love gushed from her soul. She knew with certainty that she would be with him forever.
10 January 2018
The phone rang and Isabella reached across the desk to pick it up. Her eyes stayed on the ledger in front of her and she wrote down another number before speaking. “Hello, this is Isabella.”
“Isabella, Sam Hilton. How are you?”
“Sam, I’ve been meaning to call you.” She set the pen on the desk and leaned back in her chair.
“Oh? Have you thought any more about what we discussed?”
“Yes, I have. But there’s something else I wanted to raise with you. I noticed you spraying crops on your property and I took a sample a couple of weeks ago. Turns out, you’re using a mixture of pesticides, herbicides and insecticides on your land. You’re breaking the Organic agreement your parents had with mine, and the other area farmers.” She paused, waiting for him to respond.
He gasped and mumbled a curse. “Well, I don’t know what you expect me to do. I’ve got to make a living, and Dad ran this place into the ground. The property’s not big enough to live off, especially not as an organic farm. I have to use chemicals if I’m going to bring in a profitable crop. And I’ve got to expand. My father made that agreement with your folks, but that doesn’t mean I have to stick to it.”
With a sigh, she ran her fingers through her hair. “I’m sorry to hear you say that, Sam. I know how hard it can be to make a living on the land, but I think you should know that it almost killed off my father’s bee hive. And I checked with my solicitor – you have to abide by the agreement for its full term, which is another five years at least.”
He didn’t respond at first. Then, with a lot less wind in his sails: “Sorry about the bees. I didn’t realize. So if you’ve got a lawyer involved, I guess this means you’re not selling, huh?”
“No. Not selling.”
The drone of buzzing bees filled Isabella’s ears, and she grinned with delight behind the mesh of her visor. It had only been a few weeks since they moved the hives, but already she could see an improvement. The bees were active and focused, rushing out to find pollen and returning with the sweet nectar to fill the frames in the hives with honey. She’d been right about Sam’s spraying, and Kim was working on an injunction against him to stop him spraying chemicals on his land. She had a feeling it would all work out.
She’d even received a call from the CEO of Smithson Communications a week earlier – they wanted her to come back. They’d fired Simon after another female employee had reported him for sexual harassment, and wanted her to return as an Associate Director, what she’d always desired. Only now she didn’t. She had everything she wanted and needed right here in Heartstone. When she turned them down, she’d felt a thrill of joy. A smile flitted across her face at the memory.
She opened the nearest hive and tugged a frame up to expose the honey. Already it was filling with runny, golden syrup and looked much healthier than it had before. She returned the frame to its place, confident she’d be able to meet the supplier’s end-of-month deadline. She walked back to the shed and stashed the bee suit, smoker and equipment, then climbed into the truck where she’d shut Hector in with the windows down. She patted him on the head, and his tail thumped against the passenger seat. “Let’s go home, buddy.”
Hector panted happily, saliva dripping from his tongue onto the seat cover.
She grimaced. “Man, you’ve got to stop doing that – it’s disgusting. I guess I’m gonna have to get you a towel to sit on or something. This old ute is one thing, but my car is off limits for dog slobber, got it?”
He leaned forward and licked her forearm, then resumed panting.
She laughed and turned the key. The diesel engine roared to life and she stepped on the accelerator. The ute bumped its way back to the house and she parked it beside the barn. Beavis and Butthead glanced up at her and ambled toward the fence, knowing she always gave them a piece of apple or carrot at this time of the afternoon. They’d taken to waiting patiently for her to return from wherever she might be.
She leaped from the truck with Hector on her heels and foraged in the bucket by the barn door for the food scraps she kept there. Retrieving two pieces of carrot, she carried them over to the fence and reached through the railings to give each horse a treat. They munched happily, their long tails swishing at the flies that landed in gangs on their brown rumps.
There was a crackle of tires on gravel behind her, and she turned to see Baker’s truck pull into the drive. She waved and, with one final pat for each horse, ran to greet him. When she reached him, she leaped into his embrace, throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him full on the mouth.
He laughed and kissed her back, then set her feet on the ground. “You’re in a good mood,” he teased, letting his fingertips trail down the side of her face before cupping her cheek in his hand.
“I am. I just checked on the colony and the bees are looking good – they’re producing honey again. I really think they’re going to recover.” She grinned and leaned against his thick chest, relishing the sound of his heart beating through the thin fabric.
“That’s amazing – well done! I knew you could do it.”
“Thanks. I’m so glad they’re doing better – I really didn’t want to let Dad down by having his colony die off like that. I think he’d be proud of me.
“I know he would.” Baker lifted her chin with his finger until her eyes met his. “So does this mean you’re staying in Heartstone? And you’re gonna be a bee keeper?”
She nodded with a grin. “I guess it does. Who’d have thought that one day I’d follow in Dad’s footsteps? I know I certainly didn’t.”
He laughed, his mouth hovering just above hers. “I believe you can do anything at all, but this fits you.”
As his lips met hers, she felt a rush of love for him, and her body tingled from head to toe. She looped her arms around his neck, threading her fingers through his thick hair, dislodging his hat and sending it floating to the ground below. Finally she pulled away and rested her forehead against his with a sigh. “Do you mean beekeeping on a farm fits me, or being with you?”
“Both. You fit with me and I with you. I never want to be without you again … it’s like you’re a piece of me that was always missing. And now I have you, everything makes sense.”
She closed her eyes and breathed in his scent with a smile as his lips closed over hers again.
MAKE-BELIEVE FIANCE
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Excerpt from Make-Believe Fiance
Make-Believe Series
Chapter One
Some things, Heath Montgomery understood. He knew about horses, and about ranching, and how to run a business. And he understood poker. Women? Nope. But poker he got.
He leaned forward in his chair and peered over the cards in his hand to survey the three faces staring back at him. The air stank of stale peanuts and sweat. His mouth turned up at one corner. He chuckled silently and drew in a long slow breath as his friends frowned and squinted at their own hands. Finally, he fanned his cards out on the table. “This is it, then.”
Adam Gilston, his co-worker and best friend, lay down his hand and rolled his eyes. “You’re cruel.”
He pushed the pile of chips in the middle of the table toward Heath. “Remind me why I ever thought it’d be a good idea to play poker with you?”
Heath laughed and ran his fingers through his hair. “Sorry, dude, I can’t help it. I was born to win.”
Adam punched him in the shoulder.
“Hey!” complained Heath with a chuckle. “Sore loser.”
“Someone’s got to bring you back to earth.”
“Anyone need another drink?” asked Tim, holding up a pitcher of Coke with ice, his dark eyes gleaming in the dim light.
Heath shook his head. “No thanks, I’ve had enough. It’s just about time to head home. How many hours have we been at this?”
Heath’s kid brother Dan groaned and covered a yawn with his fist. “Too many.”
“We’re getting too old for this,” added Adam, blinking reddened eyes as he scooped the cards into a pile.
“But it’s tradition,” Tim insisted, stacking his chips neatly, his biceps bulging beneath the sleeves of his plain white T-shirt. Every time Tim was around, Heath made a mental note to go to the gym more often. He had a home gymnasium, but preferred the outdoors – riding a horse or roping cattle always seemed preferable to pumping iron.
“Maybe we could come up with a new tradition,” Dan offered. He’d always played the peacemaker, even when they were young.
“One that doesn’t involve staying awake for an entire weekend to play poker,” added Heath, rubbing his tired eyes. He pushed his chips into a drawstring bag and handed it to one of the casino staff standing against the wall. The man, dressed in a black uniform with red trim and a badge that said “RAMON – I’m here to help,” took the bag, nodded and headed for the cashier’s cage.
“You’re all soft,” Tim huffed.
Heath laughed. “Old and soft. That sounds about right.”
