RANSOM (12 page)

   “Oh, my baby! I missed you so much. That job you have keeps you too busy, you should really find something that lets you have a life, honey,” she says as she pulls back to get a good look at me. She takes a breath to say something else when a door closes, and she looks around me to see Sage. “Maybe I spoke to soon. Who is this doll?”

   Oh lord, here we go. “Momma, this is Sage. Sage, this is my mother, Chrissy.”

   Sage rushes up to my mom and instead of the formal and proper greeting that I’m sure was imbedded into her since birth that I expected, she embraces her with both arms.

   “It is so nice you meet you, Miss Conner,” she then releases her quickly, “I’m sorry, was that inappropriate? I didn’t mean to make you feel uncomfortable.”

   “My dear, I can assure you that if I was uncomfortable, I wouldn’t have let you hug me,” Mom tells her with a pat on the back and continues, “Now, let’s go inside and you can fill me in on all you have heard about me, and I can inform you which things are just over exaggerated rumors and which ones are not.”

   My mother keeps one of her arms draped around Sage’s waist as they walk to the porch and into the house. I follow behind them as they giggle and talk so low I can only catch pieces here and there until we reach the kitchen. In there, I see she is completely prepared for canning and freezing of anything beyond what she will use before it goes bad.

   “So what are we tackling first?” I question her.

   “I figured we would hit the ones closer to the ground first and work our way up.”

   “Why don’t you just sit on the porch? Sage and I can handle this,” I plead.

   “I’m not an invalid, Lynkin Boyd Conner, so don’t treat me like one. I can help,” she argues right back.

   “Fine. You’re such a stubborn ass woman,” I just mumble the last part to myself, but I should have known better than to think I could get away without her hearing me.

   “Watch that mouth. Don’t think you are too old for me to bend over my knee,” she scolds.

   I grab one of the buckets on the counter and duck my head in shame as if I was still a kid, “Yes, ma’am.”

   I don’t care how old you are, your mother can put you in your place faster than you can snap your fingers. I don’t look back as I make my way out the back door and to the garden. I start with the cucumbers first, breaking them from their vine and tossing them into the five gallon pale. By the time I am finished, it’s almost full. I walk to the side of the house towards the porch when I hear the screen door smack closed and Sage saying, “…you should be proud of him.”

   I stop and step closer to the house so they don’t know I’m here, knowing good and well I shouldn’t listen, but needing to hear out this conversation.

   “I am very proud of him.”

   “I hear a ‘but’ coming on.”

   “Growing up with me working all the time and still struggling to make ends meet has made him want more for himself, and that is good, but I just worry. He has worked so hard his whole life to make something of himself, but I think he has forgotten to live in the process. I just don’t want him to let all the good things pass him by.”

   “He is just twenty-five. I’m sure once he gets to where he wants to be in his career, he will make time for other things.”

   “I’m not so sure. Lynkin has always been distant, only allowing a few people to get close to them. He really likes that boss of his though. I remember when he came over nearly in tears when Mr. Donavan offered him a full-time job after his internship. He just kept telling me how much he looked up to him for taking a risk on someone like himself.”

   All that went out the window with a snap of his fingers. I don’t want to hear anymore. I walk up next to the porch and set down the bucket of cucumbers down.

   “You’re going to have pickles for life with all these,” I tell Mom. They both look at me for a second. Mom’s face is full of worry, and Sage is a mixture of pity and sorrow. It pisses me off, and I snap, “Come on. The damn things aren’t going to pick themselves.”

   I dump the bucket onto the porch and head back to the garden. It’s obvious that Mom has connected with Sage on some level, it’s also obvious to my mom that she doesn’t have a clue what she is doing as Sage stares at the plants like they were aliens from another planet. For the next hour or so, she educates Sage on every little thing she can as we go through four more rows of various veggies in the garden. We call a break when it’s downright miserable with heat. As we reach the porch, Mom tells us to take a seat and she’d bring us some lemonade.

   “Can’t we come into the air conditioning?” Sage asks.

   “Lord no, dear. If you go in there right now and cool down too fast your body could shut down. Just stay out here in the shade and I’ll bring you a nice cold lemonade.”

   I sit down on the steps, with my back against the wall and Sage drops to ground and lays on her back in the grass with her hands stretched above her head. I watch as her chest expands and deflates with her breathing, drawing my attention to the neckline of her tank top. What cleavage that is showing is glistening in the sun light from the sweat that has accumulated on her skin.

   I think all woman are beautiful in their own way. I have never dated or had a relationship with anyone other than casual sex, and they have all been pretty, but this damn woman tops all charts. I’m not even sure she realizes how damn tantalizing she is. My eyes travel from her chest to where her shirt is up just enough to show a sneak peak of her hip bones, and keep going down to her longs tan legs that are bent into the air, feet planted on the ground.

   I imagine myself in between them, the reason for her sweating and panting, just like last night. As my eyes wander back up her body, I am startled to realize that she is staring at me too. From the desire on her face, I assume she is thinking about the same thing that I am.

   Our eyes lock. I don’t know how long our eyes stay locked onto one another. One, two, five minutes? Hell, it felt like forever before the screen door opens.

   “Here you two are, a nice tall glass of ice cold lemonade.” She hands me a glass, then walks out to Sage and hands her one. She looks back and forth between us both a few times before she takes a swig from her own lemonade. We sit in silence as we finish our drinks, and when we are done Mom takes the glasses from us and says, “I’m going to go in here and start us up a good supper. You two go ahead and get some more of that garden done. I’ll be back out to help finish in just a bit.”

   Sage jumps to her feet but sways a little when she takes a step. I rush up to steady her. “Easy there, Beauty.”

   “I’m fine. I just got up too fast.” She grabs my hand and pulls. “Let’s get moving. We are wasting daylight!”

   I keep behind her as she drags me along. Not because it’s hot and I don’t want to get back to work, but because it is hot watching every second I can catch of her ass in these shorts.

   “So what are we working on now?” she asks, coming to where the yard ends and the plowed soil begins. She drops my hand and grabs at her shirt and pulls it away from her skin to start fanning herself. Granted it takes me a minute, but I pull my eyes from her and scan the garden from one end to the other until they land on the water hose at the end.

   “I don’t know about you, but I am still thirsty.” I walk to the pipe sticking out of the ground and raise the handle up halfway. Grabbing the end of the hose, I hold it out to her. She just stands there with her nose snarled, so I drop my head and drink from the cold water that comes straight from the underground spring here.

I peek out the corner of my eye and spy Sage watching me curiously. She looks so exhausted and overheated standing there. With my hand on the handle I stand up straight and push down on it just enough to leave a small trickle of water coming out, then hand it to her.

   She looks at it for a second then back at me. “Could you turn it up a little bit more?”

   She asked for it right?

Sage

I asked for it, but I didn’t see it coming. No more do I get the words out of my mouth before he yanks the handle up as hard and fast as he can. A burst of water comes out and sprays me straight in the face before I can process it’s going to happen.

   “Holy shit, that’s cold!” I scream as I drop the damn thing to the ground. It has so much pressure running though it though, that all I do is make matters worse. It whips back and sprays me again. Lynkin lets out this full on laugh, but karma gets him when the hose twirls a few times, hits the ground, and sends mud flying all over him. It’s my turn to laugh now.

  He puts his foot on the hose, and runs both his hands down his face, and shakes the mud from them. “You think this is funny?”

   I shake my head and cover my mouth in a horrible attempt to hold back my laughter. When a clump of mud falls from his chin and slaps ground with a palpable splat, I can’t keep it in anymore. I laugh
til’ my ribs hurt. The whole time, Lynk just stands there waiting for me to gather my wits. Or so I thought.

   “My turn,” he says just before he bends forward, and I see what he was really waiting on. He was just buying time as the water continued to make the ground we were on into one giant ass mud puddle. He scoops up a big glob of gooey soil, grass and all.

   “Oh no you don’t,” I tell him with my hands out. I take a backwards step, but my foot gets stuck and I fall flat on my ass. Lynkin takes that opportunity to swoop in and smack his handful on top of my head.

   “I think I just did.”

   I jump to my feet and bend over, trying to get it out of my hair, and learn fast it’s an impossible task. While I’m bent over I might as well make the most of it. I dig both of my hands as deep as they will go in the ground and come up with a colossal ball of mud. It’s so heavy that the only way I can throw it at him is to granny toss it. I pull my feet apart and look up to where Lynkin is watching me with an amused look.

   “Don’t think I will do it?”

   “I have no doubt you will do it.”

   “Then what’s with the smirk on your face?”

   “It’s because I bet you couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn from this distance with that, let alone little ol’ me,” he says in the worst impression of a southern belle I have ever had to witness.

   “I’ll take that bet.” I swing my arms back and forth a few times until I am sure I have enough momentum. I pull it back one more good time as far as my arms and legs will allow, and sling the mud forward. I’ve always heard people say keep your eyes on your target and you’ll hit it every time, so I did. Only problem is my target was Lynkin’s chest, and I ended up catching sight of his gorgeous smile. As luck would have it, the advice was pretty spot on.

   He turns trying to avoid it, but it’s too late. I don’t even wait to catch his reaction after the mud splatters across the side of his face. I pull my feet out of the mud and run, only to be tackled face first to the ground. I take a brief moment to thank god that the ground was softened just enough for me to handle the jolt of being smushed between two hundred pounds of solid man and the unmovable earth, before I push him off me and start bombing him with mud like a super-fast catapult.

   Lynkin grabs my hands and twists them behind my back, securing them with just one of his. He grabs my chin and tilts my face towards him with the other. “Beauty, I have to say that you make mud look pretty fucking gorgeous.”

   Here we are, knee deep in mud and I am thinking about being naked with him. I mean, really? You have to have it bad for someone when you’re thinking about doing them in the mud. Can you imagine the places it would end up?

   Lynkin leans into me and my heart picks up its pace. Just as I feel his breath against my lips, one side of his face turns up into a grin. Cold, wet, and grimy mud slides down the side of my face and into the collar of my shirt. I purse my lips together and close my eyes. Even in the midst of a mud battle, my lust for Lynkin wins over natural instincts.

   “I’m sorry. Did I get you even dirtier?” I open my eyes just so I can narrow them at him. “Here, let me help clean you up.”

   I try to move away, to get up and run, but he still has me by the hands. The cold water pours down my head and over my body.

   “Lynkin! What in holy hell have you done to my yard?” his mother screams as she makes her way off the porch. “And poor Sage.” She assesses my appearance, clad in mud, as she shakes her head. “Boy, I know I taught you to treat a woman better than this.”