Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
JACKSON
He smelled clean, fresh from the shower, with an intoxicating undertone of a recently poured glass of bourbon as he sat in the chair beside me.
I wanted to lean over and inhale him, certain I would get drunk from the scent of his skin alone.
But he looked more… exhausted. Weighed down by something that hadn’t been there when he’d left me on the porch steps of the bunkhouse.
Tucker was still gorgeous, but somehow, the extent of everything he carried on his shoulders was more apparent than ever.
What did he do to take the load off? He hardly seemed like the kind of person to take breaks unless he was forced to, but despite barely knowing the man, I worried he’d been working himself into an early grave.
It was that thought that struck me back into awareness of the stillness surrounding us.
The clinks and scraps of silverware on dishes and plates were notably missing.
I glanced around, unease building, as I realized all eyes were trained on Tucker.
It was like the entire room had collectively held their breath, waiting for his next move.
And he felt it. He knew.
“It’s fine,” he grunted curtly, reaching before him to grab a dish of greens. “Can we all stop acting like I’m a bomb about to explode?”
My eyes jumped to Granger, seated where I’d been at lunch. Initially, I had just sat down without realizing everyone had their preferred places. He had assured me I could stay where I was for lunch, but when I’d arrived for dinner, he’d already claimed his seat.
Truthfully, the idea of sitting beside Tucker had sent little bubbles of nervous excitement off in my gut, and I’d almost been eager for him to join us.
To be praised for the good job I’d done at removing any trace of Raleigh’s smell from me.
But when Granger turned his attention back to Tucker, I wondered if my time at Juniper Grove was going to be forever marred by the mistakes I hadn’t known I’d been making.
“Can you blame us?” He stretched to take the mac-and-cheese everyone had been raving over and passed it down the table.
“He has to sit somewhere,” Tucker responded, offering me the container of greens only to scowl when I shook my head. His brow smoothed out when I reluctantly spooned out a small amount onto my plate, and he returned the dish to its trivet on the table.
“But he isn’t just sitting somewhere,” Mack interjected, glancing toward me as well. “He’s sitting beside you.”
Tucker made a grunt of acknowledgment before reaching for the biscuits.
Something heavy hung suspended in the air while Tucker continued to plate his food like he and I weren’t the center of everyone’s attention.
Pressure built in my chest as I waited for the anvil to drop, crashing through the floor of this makeshift stage we’d found ourselves on.
I’d unwillingly become a costar in this performance Tucker was putting on, and I wasn’t sure if it would be better for it to be stopped or carried on to completion.
“I can move,” I offered tentatively, unsure if I was about to burst the bubble of this facade.
He shook his head without looking at me and stabbed at some of his food with his fork. The scrapes against the ceramic plate echoed in the near silent room. “You don’t need to move, Jackson. I’m serious. There is nothing wrong with you sitting here.”
A scoff came from Granger’s direction, and I wondered if our show was now interactive. The glare Tucker sent his way spread the stage wider, and now our audience became the supporting actors.
“I could move to the foot of the table, and the new guy can sit here,” a redhead on the opposite side of the table suggested, picking up his plate and starting to stand.
Dudd smacked the man’s stomach with the back of his hand. “You can’t sit there, you idjit,” he hissed.
“I’m not trying to be rude.” The redhead, Weston I presumed, defended himself. “He can’t sit in that seat, so unless we’re putting the new guy at the foot, someone else has got to move.”
“He’s fine where he’s at,” Tucker snapped, and Weston dropped his ass back into his seat. “No one needs to move. Can we all just get back to eating?”
The sharp sounds of Tucker’s heavy breathing resonated around the space, and I wondered if he was having to calm himself from anger or another emotion that plagued him.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, understanding had already dawned on me what this situation was, but I was desperate to live in a reality where I hadn’t once again done something to hurt my new boss.
“Well, don’t have to tell me twice,” Marcy, the live-in vet, quipped.
Like her words had been the crack of a director’s film slate, our scene ended and the one of the happy farm started again.
The sounds of dinner resuming began to filter in, little murmurs from various pockets of conversation overlapping the snicks and clicks of silverware being used, but I couldn’t pull my eyes from the tense set of Tucker’s jaw.
He sat there, frozen in contrast to the table around him yet again. Frozen somewhere in his head.
“I really don’t mind moving,” I tried again in a low voice, leaning toward him so only he could hear my words.
As if my speaking brought him back to his current reality, Tucker blinked then looked toward me. He let out a weary sigh and shook his head before running a hand through his dark locks. “It’s really not necessary.”
“But if it bothers you that much to have me here, I can just—” I protested, but my words were cut off when his hand came down on my knee under the table.
“Stay, Jackson,” he murmured, giving my leg a small squeeze.
Color in sharp relief broke through the monochromatic haze dinner had been cast in, and I sucked in a breath at the shift in my senses from his touch alone.
But just as quickly as it flooded in, it receded as Tucker pulled his hand back from where it’d been momentarily resting on my thigh with a short clearing of his throat.
Heat pricked along my skin from where we’d been connected, and the split second of possessive desire in his grip had visuals of the older man in my head that were better suited for an hour alone in the shower than being in a room full of people.
I straightened up, the ricocheting of my heart against my ribs surely audible to everyone around me. What the fuck was wrong with me? Tucker Legare was a still grieving widower. He wasn’t trying to put the moves on me.
Somewhat embarrassed by my reaction, I focused on loading up my plate with pot roast and mac-and-cheese to join everyone else in eating.
Everything was delicious, as expected with the high praise everyone gave Tallie, though I could have done without the collard greens.
Still, I ate them because I’d been taught to clean my plate and never waste any food.
After I put away the final forkful of them, I let out a breath I’d been holding and leaned back in my seat, when a gentle laugh caught my attention.
My eyes landed on Mrs. Legare, a sliver of a teasing smile on her lips and a twinkle in her golden-brown eyes that she’d surely passed on to her son.
She gave me a polite nod, and a flush traveled up my neck as I felt like a child being praised for eating his vegetables. And maybe in a way, I was.
A little bit later, I noticed Weston at the other end of the table opening one of the biscuits to slap on a small chunk of pot roast, mac-and-cheese, and some gravy to make some sort of slider.
When he caught me making a version of my own, he flashed me a wide grin that had his two canine teeth popping out over his lip like little fangs.
His cheeks were flushed as he lifted his creation in cheers to me, and I couldn’t help sending him my own smile in response.
The rest of dinner passed without much fuss, other than Elliot and Lane ribbing a few jokes that riled up Mack and Weston into mouthing off.
Dudd added his two cents, which had Tallie chiding him for his use of language at the table despite his age.
That had Granger laughing so hard he nearly choked, and Dillon had to smack his back a few times.
Most everyone other than Dudd, who was scowling, and Tucker dissolved into their own fits of laughter.
It was mayhem, but the best kind, and it made rightness settle over me once again.
Despite the uncomfortable start to the meal, I knew Juniper Grove was exactly where I wanted to be.
When everyone was finished eating, Dillon began clearing the dishes while some of the other hands followed Tallie into the kitchen.
Granger had explained after lunch that all the farmhands helped with cleanup duty at the end of the night so Tallie wasn’t stuck doing it all herself and the work went faster.
I moved to help collect dishes with Dillon when Tucker stopped me, taking some of the stacked plates from my hands.
“What are you doing?” I asked, knowing his position as foreman didn’t include him in the cleanup crew.
“I’ll take the dishes in. It’s your first day. Go turn in for the night,” he responded without looking at me.
I crinkled my brow together and moved to take back the dishes. “Absolutely not.”
He seemed taken aback by that. “I need to go talk with Tallie, anyhow, so I can take them.”
“Then go talk with her, but I won’t have the other men on this farm thinking I can’t pull my weight.”
Tucker opened his mouth to protest but must have thought it over and relented. “Don’t be up too late. Morning comes early around here.”