A Family for the Farmer (5 page)

“I wanted to get the egg,” Phoebe wailed, fresh tears starting.

“And here it is. There'll be more of them come morning. Next time, though, you'd better wait and let me go in there with you. Okay?” Abel handed over the smooth brown egg, and the tears stopped instantly.

“I'm going to go put it in the 'frigerator!” she exclaimed happily, and she and Paul dashed out of the barn toward the house.

“If that egg makes it all the way into a carton, I'll be amazed,” Emily muttered under her breath. Then she glanced up at Abel. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“I guess Grandma's rooster's made your point for you. That scared me to death. Doing the chores around here and keeping an eye on the twins at the same time...well, it's going to be a lot to manage. I couldn't live with myself if Paul or Phoebe got hurt because I wasn't paying attention.”

She was probably overestimating the damage one pint-size rooster could have caused, but he figured it wouldn't be to his advantage to mention that. “Neither could I.”

“I guess if your offer still stands...” She trailed off.

“It does.”

“I don't know how we can work this out, though. I can't pay you. At least not until the farm sells.”

Until the farm sells.
The words stabbed at him, but he shoved the pain aside for the moment. “I'm not asking for any pay.”

“Well, you're not working here for free. That's out of the question.” Emily's chin went up mulishly. She didn't want to be beholden to him. That was plain enough.

This was going nowhere fast, and he had hungry animals to tend to. “You'd better get on back in the house with the little ones. You've probably got some egg to clean up by now.”

The distraction worked. A tiny smile tickled around the corners of her lips. “You're probably right.”

“Here. Take this milk on in with you and get it strained and chilling. You remember how to do that, don't you?”

“Sure.” Emily reached over and took the full pail he held out to her. He winced a little when he saw her adjust her slim frame to balance its heft. He should offer to carry it for her. He'd always brought the milk pails in for Miss Sadie.

But he had a feeling Emily needed to feel like she was carrying her weight, so he let it go. “While you're tending to that, I'll finish up with the animals. I'll come up to the kitchen for a minute or two when I'm done, and we'll hash out some kind of arrangement. All right?”

Emily hesitated. She'd never been much on being told what to do, but she finally gave in. “All right.” She turned, carefully managing the milk bucket so it wouldn't slop over on her pants, and headed back toward the farmhouse.

Abel began to measure out feed to take to the goats in the west pasture. Judging by the level of pellets in the big can, he'd need to make another trip to the feed store soon. Beulah was running low on her alfalfa hay, too, and that stuff was wickedly expensive and not something they could grow on-site.

As he began to think about everything he needed to explain to Emily, he felt his stomach tense up a little. There was a lot to managing even a small farm like Goosefeather. Stepping in cold turkey would have been a challenge for anybody, but for a city girl like Emily, it was going to be next door to impossible. Unless she was willing to accept his help, she was never going to meet the county extension agent's standards for animal and crop care.

And then there was the whole business about her plans to sell the farm. He'd expected that, but hearing her say it out loud had set him back a pace or two.

He sighed, hoping Emily had the sense to put on a pot of coffee after she finished straining the milk. When it came to talking and explanations, he was every bit as far out of his comfort zone as Emily was out here dealing with Beulah.

He had a feeling this might take a while.

Chapter Three

E
mily set the brimming pail carefully on the side of the old-fashioned apron sink and removed its loose lid. Phoebe's egg had actually made it intact into the carton in the refrigerator, so Emily was able to get straight to straining the milk.

“Go wash your hands,” she instructed the twins, “and use plenty of soap.” Taking her own advice, Emily turned on the hot water faucet and squirted a generous dose of dishwashing liquid onto her hands. When she finished, she twisted the old-fashioned faucet off firmly. It had always dripped if you didn't wrench it down tightly.

She was struck again by how little had changed on Goosefeather Farm. The fading afternoon sun still filtered through the same red-checkered curtains, and there were still terra-cotta pots of blooming geraniums lining the bookshelf under the wide kitchen window. The walls were the same creamy yellow, and the old wooden floor was showing its familiar signs of wear around the doorways and in front of the sink and the enormous freestanding stove.

This kitchen had been Emily's happy place on the farm. There was something about this airy room that had always made her itch to pull out her grandmother's ceramic mixing bowls, get the heavy crocks of flour down out of the huge pantry and bake something crumbly and sweet.

As she dealt with the milk, she reconsidered the space with a more experienced eye. The fixtures and the appliances needed updating badly, but the kitchen had a great flow and boasted some amazingly generous work surfaces. This room had been designed for serious cooking and canning, unlike the cramped kitchen she and Clary made do with in their Atlanta apartment. With just a smidgen of updating, this could be the kitchen of her dreams. If it were located somewhere else.

Anywhere else.

Emily finished straining the milk through the dairy filter into clean half-gallon glass jars and set it to cool in an ice-water bath, a task she'd done twice a day during the summers she'd spent here. Inside work had always played to Emily's strengths, and since Sadie Elliott had never liked to spend any more time indoors than she had to, they had worked it out between them.

That was the one thing that had changed on Goosefeather Farm, Emily reflected sadly. Her grandfather Elliott had died before she was old enough to remember him, but her grandmother had been such a part of this place that it was almost impossible to believe she was gone. Emily half expected to see the old lady thumping down the kitchen stairs with her gardening hat on, heading out to wage war against the summer weeds. Emily blinked back her tears resolutely and lifted her chin.

She wouldn't go there.

It'd be selfish to wish her grandmother back. For the past few years, Grandma had made no secret of the fact that she was ready, as she put it, “to get on to the next thing.” Once she'd reached her eighties, she said that the good Lord had tarried long enough.

Emily was thankful that her grandmother's earthly journey had ended peacefully, but Sadie Elliott had sure left a big hole behind her. Emily sighed. Then she firmed up her lips, squared her shoulders and got busy. She had enough sorrow under her belt to know that the best way to fill up this kind of empty spot was with hard work.

There were some benefits to growing up with a mother whose idea of a meal was nuking a frozen waffle in the microwave and who couldn't have cared less what kind of mess her daughter made in the kitchen. Emily had started cooking as soon as she was big enough to reach the oven controls, and she'd spent the last few years baking and waitressing in the hectic environment of a busy coffee shop. She might be clueless about managing a farm, but she knew her way around a kitchen. By the time Abel came through the back door, she had the coffee dripping fragrantly into its carafe and her children eating snacks in front of Grandma's ancient television.

“Animals are all settled for the evening,” he said, crossing to the sink and beginning to lather up his hands. Emily noticed that he left the dishwashing liquid alone in favor of the little orange-colored bar of homemade soap in its dish.

“I sure wish we were,” Emily muttered under her breath. She had the three-hour trip back to Atlanta in front of her, and the twins were already exhausted. It wasn't going to be a fun drive.

And there was still this conversation with Abel to get through. She might as well get that over with. “Have a seat,” she invited. “I'll pour the coffee.”

“I was hoping you'd think to make some.” Abel pulled out a chair at the immense table that filled the center of the kitchen and slid his long legs under its checkered cloth.

“I don't know about you, but I think it's necessary.” She poured two mugs, black. She remembered that Abel had never doctored his coffee with cream or sugar, and she'd had to learn to drink hers plain because black coffee was cheaper. “It's been a long day, and if I'm going to stay awake for the drive back, I'm going to need all the help I can get.”

Abel nodded. “I'm sure you're ready to get on the road. I won't stay long, but I thought your mind might rest easier if we went ahead and got a few things settled between us.” He accepted the cherry-red mug of coffee, flashing his crooked smile at her in thanks.

“You're probably right.” She wasn't looking forward to it. She hated negotiations when she was the one needing favors. The incident with the rooster had really scared her, though. It would be too easy for the twins to get hurt on the farm. She was going to have to keep one eye on them all the time, and that meant she had to have some help. Stalling, Emily turned to the counter and opened a green-striped bakery box. “I hope you like muffins.”

“I like pretty much anything I don't have to cook, but you don't have to feed me. The coffee's plenty.”

“I brought these from the coffee shop where I work. It's not any trouble to share them.” Emily took down two of her grandmother's thick white plates and set an oversize muffin on each one. Casting a quick look back at the tall man sitting at the table, she considered, and then added a second muffin to one of the plates. Abel Whitlock had always been lean, but if her memory served, he had a hearty appetite.

“Thanks.” Abel picked up one of the muffins and toyed briefly with the thin silver paper on its bottom before setting it back down on the plate. “These look real good, but I can't eat your food, Emily, until I'm sure you understand where I stand on this. I know you're finding it hard to believe, but I'm on your side here. I want to help you.”

“Even though you'll get the farm if I don't stick this out?” She offered him a wry smile, but this time his expression remained serious.

“This farm is yours by rights. Miss Sadie was your family, not mine, and I'm sorry she left things like she did. I truly am.”

He sounded sincere, and Emily felt a niggle of guilt. Abel had no family worth speaking of. His mother had run off when Abel was just a boy, leaving him to deal with his younger brother and their moody, alcoholic father as best he could.

Her grandmother had told her about the morning Abel had knocked on the farmhouse door. A fourteen-year-old boy with hungry eyes, he'd asked if he could split firewood for her in exchange for some food for himself and his little brother.

“I almost ran him off the property,” Grandma had told Emily, shaking her head ruefully. “I'd been living next to the Whitlocks for too long not to be suspicious of them. Most of them would steal anything that wasn't nailed down. But he was nothing but a boy, skinny as a beanpole and so famished he was shaking. No telling when he'd eaten last. Elton Whitlock never cared much about anything that didn't come straight out of a liquor bottle, and he sure wasn't troubling his sorry head about feeding those boys of his after Gina left him. But that young'un had more gumption in his little finger than the rest of his kin put together. He wouldn't even eat the sandwich I brought out to him unless I let him earn it. So in the end I just handed him the ax and let him get on with it.”

At the end of that day, Sadie Elliott had a neatly stacked woodpile that would last her for a month of cold weather, and young Abel had gone home with a new shirt on his back, a basket stuffed with eggs and vegetables from her garden and a job on Goosefeather Farm for as long as he wanted it. Abel had been family to Sadie ever since that day, and Emily knew it.

She got very busy peeling the paper off a muffin before she spoke. “You don't have to apologize for meaning a lot to my grandmother, Abel. And I don't blame you for the way she left her will. You and I both know nobody could talk Grandma into doing anything she didn't want to do.”

Abel heaved a deep sigh, and she looked up from her muffin to find him smiling that lopsided smile of his. He looked relieved. “That's good to hear.” He stripped the paper off one of his own muffins and broke off a generous chunk.

“That doesn't mean I'm happy about being put through this trial by farm, or whatever you want to call it,” Emily cautioned. “It's the craziest thing I ever heard of. I don't know what Grandma was thinking.”

“The letter didn't tell you?”

Emily shrugged. “Grandma never thought I appreciated Goosefeather Farm the way she wanted me to. It looks like she just wanted one last opportunity to change my mind. She was always convinced I belonged here.”

“Maybe you do,” Abel said simply, breaking off another chunk of muffin.

“Believe me, I don't.” He looked as unconvinced as her grandmother had every time they'd had this particular conversation. Time to change the subject. “How are those muffins? I baked them yesterday morning.” She was tinkering with her apple spice muffin recipe, and she thought adding the extra ground cloves had been a good idea.

“Really good. But then you always were a good cook, even when you were a little slip of a thing. Better than Miss Sadie, rest her soul. Her muffins were like hockey pucks.”

Emily smiled, remembering. “She mixed them too much. You've got to be careful with muffin batter. I always told her so, but you know Grandma. Whatever she did, she did with a vengeance.”

Abel chuckled. “You're right about that. Miss Sadie never did do things by halves. I recall when she finally got fed up with my excuses about not going to church with her. She went out in the middle of a Saturday night and flattened her own truck tires, all four of them, so I'd have to come over and drive her into town. Then she made a big show of stumbling on the curb in front of the church so I'd be sure to walk her in. She had me sitting in that pew before I knew what had happened, and she was right beside me, grinning like a mule eating briars.” He sighed. “I'm sure going to miss her.”

Emily nodded and took a deliberate sip of her scalding coffee to dissolve the lump in her throat. “I know. Me, too.”

She'd been right to give him two muffins. He polished them both off in short order. She watched as he carefully wiped up the few crumbs he'd dropped on the table and deposited them on the plate next to his neatly folded muffin papers. Then he drained his coffee mug, set it on the plate and rose to carry his dirty dishes to the sink.

Abel had always done that, she remembered. He'd cleaned up after himself, been careful to remove his muddy boots at the back door and never left one crumb or drop behind. It had seemed so strange for such a big, outdoorsy boy to be so meticulous about things like that that Emily had found it amusing. She'd joked about it one time to her grandmother, and Sadie Elliott's sharp reply had caught her off guard. “Them that's had their share of trouble know better than to make trouble for other folks, missy! Mark that, and remember it.”

“Emily?”

She glanced up, startled to find Abel standing at the sink looking uneasy.

“Yes?” She tilted her head to look up at him, thinking that inside the house he seemed bigger somehow. He'd always been tall, but she never remembered him taking up so much
space
before.

“I reckon we've circled around all this long enough. I don't want to upset you, but I'm going to speak plain. You're going to lose this farm if you don't have good help. There's just no two ways about it, and I'd sure hate to see that happen.”

He'd filled out, Emily realized suddenly. Abel couldn't be called lanky anymore. He was still lean, but his shoulders had broadened, and there was a muscular set to them now. When she'd left Goosefeather Farm six years ago, Abel Whitlock was only a few years out of his teens. Now he was a man. That was the difference she was picking up on.

She felt a sudden prickle of nerves. Maybe this deal with Abel wasn't such a good idea after all. Then again, she knew he made a good point. If she didn't have help, she'd never be able to keep this place afloat.

It looked like she was trapped between this rock of a man and a very hard place.

“Listen to me, Emily. I know you're not easy in your mind about any of this. You don't like leaning on somebody else, and I can't say as I blame you. I'd likely feel the same if I were in your shoes. But I'm no stranger to you. You've known me nearly half your life, and you surely know me well enough by now to know that I mean what I say. If you let me help you, I'll make sure you end up with this farm at the end of the summer. You have my word on it.”

For a second, all Emily could do was blink at this man standing in her grandmother's kitchen in faded jeans and a threadbare shirt. Apparently he was so determined to forfeit a tidy little inheritance that he was promising his help to the very person who was going to do her best to make sure he didn't get it. Was it even possible that such a person still existed in this dog-eat-dog world?

“Come on, Emily,” he coaxed, one side of his mouth quirking up. “You must have one last Goosefeather Farm summer left in you.” Suddenly there was something irresistible about that crooked smile. She found herself smiling right back at him, and that was when it happened.