I ran to the kitchen door and opened it. Austin was looking up at my bedroom window, with his hand over his heart.
I couldn’t help but smile. His pitch was awful and this was the worst rendition of Billy Ray Cyrus’s“Achy Breaky Heart” I’d ever heard.
“You can tell my arms go back to the farm. You can tell my feet to hit the floor.”
Wiping the smirk from my face, I stepped onto the patio. “What are you doing?”
He looked over at me and grinned. “Serenading you.”
“Why?”
He walked toward me, but was careful not to step across that boundary of personal space. “Because you once told me you wanted to be serenaded someday. So I thought, why not today?”
“Shouldn’t you be at work?”
“My father owns the business. I can get away with being late.”
His father was going to give it to him good for that. He was alead-by-example type and ran a tight ship. I don’t think I ever saw a tool out of place or a tractor that didn’t shine at his store.
“You promised that if we talked, you’d leave me alone.”
He held up a finger. “The deal was thirty minutes, and you only gave me ten.”
I folded my arms. “And now you just tacked on another five.”
He gestured toward the patio table. “And you still owe me fifteen.”
Austin gave me his sorry puppy dog eyes, and I caved. “Fine. You have fifteen minutes.” I turned to shut the door. Lucas was still sitting at the kitchen table, focused on his laptop with a bigger scowl than usual. “Sorry for the screeching sounds. I’ll just put the thing out of its misery.” With that, Mr. Intensity cracked a half-smile.
I closed the door and sat down at the table across from Austin.
He nodded toward the house. “Why didn’t you tell me the out-of-towner was a Freeman?”
Austin didn’t know the full story about Marlena and Mortimer—no one in this town did. As far as they were concerned, we were the caretakers and the Freemans owned the property. But rumors did fly, especially those passed down from elders who swore that Marlena and Mortimer were once a thing.
“How did you hear about that?” I asked.
He dipped his chin and gave me anare-you-seriouslook.
“What are they saying?”
“The news going around is that the Freemans are selling the estate. Is that true?”
“Yup. We have thirty days. Well, twenty-nine and a half, to be exact.”
“Where are you gonna go?”
I sighed, not wanting to think about that just yet, and especially not wanting to talk about it with Austin. “Is this what you want to talk about with the remaining ten minutes you have left?”
Austin leaned forward. “Let me take you out on a date, just once.”
“No.”
He drummed his fingers on the table, thinking a moment. “Alright, how about a non-date?”
“A non-date?”
“Just two people getting to know each other, without the usual touchy-feely stuff.”
