‘I’m not twenty anymore, Alex, and I’m happy with that.’ He put his hands in his pockets. ‘I’m happy with my life, my choices.’
‘Whatever, man.’ Alex smirked. ‘You do you.’
‘See you at Jess and Owen’s barbeque, Alex,’ Nate said, shrugging on his jacket. ‘Look after yourself.’
Nate drew out his phone and scrolled to the taxi number but changed his mind. It was a nice night. The long walk would be good for him. He glanced up at the flat above the Post Office as he passed. A glimmer of light showed through the crack in the curtains and he wondered what Laurel was doing. Was it too late to knock on her door and tell her he’d sorted everything out with Alex? Yes, it was too late. It wasn’t like he was hitting her up for a one night stand.
But also, had he sorted everything out with Alex? Alex was mercurial and could never be trusted not to cut off his nose to spite his face. But Nate wouldn’t hesitate to cop to an assault charge for the chance to explain to the BAS why he did it in the first place.
Chapter Eleven
Laurel
After the drama of Alex’s visit, the rest of the week had been nice and quiet. Laurel told Sylvie that the farm would sponsor her to do the course she wanted and she would find the money somewhere, somehow. She reworked the budget with Barbara and if everything went well this year, meaning no wedding cancellations and a half decent Pick Your Own season, then the farm would be more or less on an even keel.
Nate had promised her he’d fixed it with Alex. That funding, when it came through, would ensure that the farm was as far away from the edge of the abyss as they could be. Which wasn’t particularly far.
But, what if she didn’t get the funding for Hibbert’s fields? If developers bought the land, she could lobby against them, she would petition, she would bring injunctions. Whatever it took, because she was not going to let her mother’s little slice of heaven become a tourist resort.
Nate had come and gone through her office, telling her he would let her know as soon as he had news about Alex and the BAS. Well, he had until Monday before she took things into her own hands. It had already gone on far too long.
Laurel spent Saturday morning with Rebecca and the twins, brunching raucously at a cafe two towns over, then braving the parental hell of soft play.
‘So, have you managed to speak to Jack, properly?’ she asked her sister-in-law.
Rebecca’s eyes were on the ball pool.
‘Yeah, he went for a drink with Nate, thought about things, and said that he should be a bit more accepting of how hard it was for me.’
‘What?’ Laurel spluttered on her disgusting soft play coffee. ‘Nate convinced Jack to see another point of view?’
Rebecca grinned. ‘Looks like Nate is the Fletcher Whisperer.’
Laurel smothered a smile.
‘He still wants another one, but he’s willing to have a proper conversation about it, and a proper look at the division of labour in our family.’ Rebecca glanced at Laurel in disbelief. ‘That’s what he said, “division of labour in our family”.’
‘Fuck me, did he?’ she said, louder than she should.
‘Laurel,’ Rebecca admonished.
‘Sorry, sorry.’ Laurel looked around and cringed at the other parents. ‘Jack’s got a new boyfriend. You should be careful about that,’ she teased.
Rebecca smiled benevolently.
‘It’s good for him to have a non-farming friend, someone with a different, more enlightened opinion.’
Laurel took another sip of her coffee. She spent more time than she wanted to thinking about Nate and his different, more enlightened opinions. Well, less about that and more about his forearms pulling against his crumpled shirt, and his throat working in a swallow. Good job she didn’t get the words out in the pub, because quite frankly she could never sleep with him and then have the torture of working with him every day.
Yes, best leave all that in the box.
Her phone buzzed and she pulled it out of her handbag.
Huh, this was new. Perhaps he had heard something and this was his way of breaking the news to her gently, around a lot of people, and so she could drown her sorrows.
Surely, surely, it couldn’t be bad news if he was making her wait like this?
‘Who are you texting?’ Rebecca asked, craning her neck to spy her phone.
