Chapter 70
Ezra
His head pokes around from the tips of the growing tomato vines.
I see the bleached highlights of his otherwise dark hair and the glint of glasses as he rounds the corner of the trellis.
Excitement courses through my veins like it does every morning he and I do this.
I rush over with a basket in hand, body expectant and tingling with elation.
Atlas’s face scrunches up in concern while he studies a particular vine that wraps messily on a spool.
When at last I approach, he sighs, deep and guttural.
He folds his arms but smiles when he notices my arrival.
“Hey, you,” Atlas says warmly.
“Hi.” I grin. “What’s wrong?”
He studies the tomatoes, feeling the frayed leaves.
“It’s this vine,” he mutters, tracing fingers along its twirling figure. “I’m not sure what happened, but it wasn’t like this a few days ago.”
“There’s too much extra foliage. No one pruned the poor thing,” I say, angrily ripping away a few excess leaves.
“We’ve been so busy with the corn, I think we overlooked it.”
“Who was in charge of the tomatoes last?” I ask.
“Kyler,” replies Atlas.
I grunt with exasperation. “We’ll have to tell Ofa. I think he’s still mad.”
“No shit.”
Atlas instructs me to reach for the roller hook at the top of the trellis.
I retrieve it from its clasp, then we tug the vine from its square-foot-spaced roots in the soil.
Atlas saunters off with the spool and tomato vine to dispose of them.
I start to pick the ripened tomatoes in the wake of his absence, but five minutes pass and he hasn’t returned.
Two distinct fingers poke into my sides—they tickle, and I release a sudden burst of laughter.
Arms wrap around me, pulling my waist to his.
Atlas digs, then nestles, his nose into the crook of my neck.
He tugs, I lose balance, and then we’re toppling on top of each other to the grass bed below.
He lands on my stomach, but his arms catch the brunt of the fall.
His deep brown irises gaze into my blue and green, and his lips press hungrily into mine.
I don’t know how long we lie there kissing as Angelics busy themselves with the early crop. No one can see what we do. Tomato vines and wooden trellises encompass the area he and I lie in. We bask in the privacy as long as we can.
“Get back to work, you two,” says an inconspicuous Ofa from somewhere nearby.
Caught red-handed.
We return to picking the tomatoes as if we weren’t kissing in an R-rated fashion.
Once the basket is brimmed to the top, Atlas and I head in the direction of the Shop.
He nudges me in the divots of my hips, because of course I’m the one tasked to carry the basket.
A few tomatoes topple to the grass, but I flee, so he’ll be the one to pick them up.
Instead, Atlas careens my way, hands positioned for attack.
At least he didn’t cheat by teleporting.
Gunshots echo across the valley. I hear the way they ricochet off the buildings of Proctus, the way they travel to where we stand. That’s when we hear the screaming and the explosion of the front gates. They come crumbling to the ground in a heap of smoldering flame.