Chapter 26
CARTER
My mind awoke before my body did. I lay motionless in bed, eyes closed, feeling Shelby curled up against me. Like the last time I had woken up beside her in bed, I was happy to just experience how good it felt, while trying to etch this moment into my memory forever.
I couldn’t remember the last time I had felt so at peace, like everything was right with the world and I was exactly where I was meant to be.
It was a confusing feeling since I was meant to be back in Los Angeles.
I was already pushing my luck as it was, still being out here without any new results or work to report back to home base.
The social media team was on hold, cooling their heels at the motel. I really needed to send them home if we were finished getting footage. I hadn’t decided though, which was why they were getting paid to sit on their hands.
I hadn’t met with any other farmers recently, either.
It seemed silly to invest in anyone’s farm but Shelby’s. I had made a tentative deal with Ronnie Miller, but if I was going to work with anyone else, obviously I wanted it to be Shelby.
She had never mentioned needing any help. I doubted she was looking for investors, especially Allory Enterprises. But almost every business could benefit from a cash infusion. There were always improvements to be made, not to mention expansion.
It occurred to me then, lying naked next to her in bed, that I had no idea what she wanted for her little egg farm. We had never really talked business while I was working as her farmhand. She kept that part of her life shielded from me.
Sharing her hopes and dreams with me might feel more intimate to her than what we had done the night before.
I wanted to be upset at the thought, but I had shown up in Ferris as her enemy. It made sense she would keep things from me. For all she knew, I was in town to buy her farm up from under her the way my father had bought her parents’ farm.
Which was all the more reason I shouldn’t ask if I could invest in Granny’s Acre Farm.
Shelby would take it the wrong way, I suspected, and there was no reason to rock the boat like that. I didn’t know what label to put on a relationship like ours, but whatever it was, I wanted it to last as long as possible.
If this is a dream, let me sleep forever.
Forever was probably out of the question, but another week or so might be doable. I just needed a reason to still be here. And since I wasn’t really looking to invest in anyone else’s farms, that only left the social media team. I needed to put them to work.
We wouldn’t be involving Shelby in any of the PR stuff, but Ronnie Miller might be just what I needed.
He could let the media team get some footage of the dairy, show off some of that cheese.
It was legitimately one of the best cheeses I had ever tasted, and I was pretty sure I could make Ronnie a very rich man.
I just needed to run the social media stuff by him first. Then I could send the crew out, and I could justify my presence in Ferris a little longer.
I opened my eyes and looked at Shelby, sleeping soundly. Her chest rose and fell, still shirtless but beneath the blanket with me. I put my hand lightly on her hip, wanting to feel her again but not wanting to wake her up.
We had gone another round the night before, keeping her up way past her bedtime.
Neither one of us could lie next to each other naked without nature taking its course.
I was just glad I had thought to bring more than one condom.
Otherwise, we would have needed to get creative.
Because there was no way I could have held back.
Shelby had me wrapped around her little finger. If there was any doubt, the fact I was still in town was proof. I lived to work, choosing to spend most of my free time in the office. While I had never been as driven as my father, I worked just as hard or harder.
Money didn’t motivate me the way it did him, though. For me, I just wanted success. To prove to myself and to the world that I was good enough. That I could take the reins of the company and make it thrive.
Success was starting to look different to me. I glanced down at Shelby again, wondering if I had been chasing the wrong thing for the last few years. What the hell was the point of having all the money in the world when no one loved you?
I nestled against Shelby’s back, sliding my arm over her. The moment I felt her round ass against me, I got hard again. With a grin, I gave her ass a little nudge, testing the waters. I heard her cute little laugh in response.
“Oh, my God,” she said. “You’re obsessed with me.”
I laughed and pulled her in tighter. “I absolutely am, Shelby.”
She spun around to face me, smiling at me. I kissed her, ready to use my last condom. But my phone rang from the bathroom where I’d left it in my pants.
Shelby broke the kiss, and I leaned my forehead against hers with a sigh. “I’ll ignore it.”
“Don’t,” she said, her smile dimming a little but not disappearing completely. “If it’s work, you should get it.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I suppose so.”
“I’ll go make coffee.” She hopped out of bed and I ignored the ringing while I watched her throw on a T-shirt. Fuck, she was gorgeous.
I got out of bed with a growl. The name on the screen stopped me cold. It wasn’t just work calling. It was my father.
The old man was technically retired but still sat on the board. He wasn’t in charge of anything anymore, but he didn’t act like it. With a sigh, I answered.
“Morning, Dad. You’re up insanely early. What time is it back there?”
“Time to get your ass back to Los Angeles. That’s what time it is.”
“Miss me already?”
Dad didn’t find me as funny as I did. “What’s this I hear you’re on vacation?”
“I don’t know where you heard that, but I haven’t taken a vacation since I started at Allory a decade ago. You said vacations were for weak men and Europeans.”
Dad knew all of that already. He just had selective memory. “And taking time off for Easter of all things. Who takes off on Easter?”
“Lots of people,” I said. “But again, this isn’t a vacation. I don’t know who you’ve been talking to, but tell your spies they got it wrong.”
Dad scoffed. “Spies? Get over yourself. People tell me things. That doesn’t make them spies.”
It made them traitors. But I didn’t tell him that. “Well, whatever. I’m out here in Kentucky cleaning up your PR mess, so maybe go easy.”
“I don’t know what all the fuss is about,” he said. “Who cares if I closed a farm three years back?”
“It turns out, a lot of people care, Dad, which is why I’m down here.”
Dad sighed. “And you’re taking your sweet time, it seems.”
“It’s not easy to unfuck this thing,” I said, my voice rising. “You ruined this town, and you don’t even realize it.”
“It’s not my job to take care of them. And it’s not your job either.”
I clenched my fist at my side so I didn’t scream in frustration. My father had always been a hard-ass and time hadn’t softened him any. Then again, most of the time I’d spent with him had been working. I barely knew the guy on any personal level.
I knew I had trouble opening up to people and letting them in, but I had learned it from the ice king himself.
The man had worked throughout my entire childhood, missing birthdays, holidays, and school functions.
Not to mention wedding anniversaries. It was no surprise to anyone my parents ended up divorcing when I was a teenager.
Mom was doing great now, living along the coast in a house on the water. As busy as I was, I still talked to her at least once a week. She had always been present and supportive.
When she left for her own sanity, I was left mostly alone while being trained to be Dad’s replacement one day. It was why he had insisted I stop working with my uncle. The funny thing was that my father still didn’t trust me, even after drilling me for years on how to run the business.
Looking back, I was pretty sure I had only agreed to work with him because it would allow me to get to know him. Even then, he didn’t make it easy.
“Look, Dad, I’m just doing what the PR folks told me to,” I said to cut off more arguments. “I’m lining up a shoot with a dairy farmer soon. We’ll be using that in whatever PR stuff we put together.”
“How much longer will that take?” he asked, sounding like I was a huge pain in his ass.
“I’m going to be here another week,” I said.
“A week? Why don’t you just move there at this point? My God, son, just get it done and get back to the office where you belong.”
I couldn’t deal with a whole lecture this morning. I had been having a lovely time with Shelby, warm and cozy and horny as a billy goat. “Dad, have you been drinking?”
“Of course not.”
“Then maybe have a bourbon and let me run Allory my way.” I hung up on him and put the phone on silent, knowing he was going to be sending me pure venom through the cell towers after that rude dismissal.
I had never hung up on my father before, and despite the fact that I was thirty-three, I felt like a rebellious teenager, finally standing up for himself.
Dad would be pissed, but so what? I was pissed at him for all the bullshit he had pulled when he was in charge.
If he didn’t like how I was handling things, he could come down to Ferris himself and get it done.
He wouldn’t, though, because they would probably burn him in the town square while people ate funnel cakes.
He was no longer in charge of the company, but he could still make my life more difficult by getting the board to put pressure on me. I doubted he would do that yet. He would piss and moan but he would give me another week here. After that, all bets were off.
I had a sour taste in my mouth. For a man who seemed to hate me, he sure was eager to get me back to LA. I was feeling the exact opposite way. Looking out the window of Shelby’s bedroom, the green grass stretched out in front of me like a slice of heaven. I didn’t want to leave.
A week would go by in the blink of an eye, and then what?
After last night, I was seriously considering telling Shelby how I was feeling.
Not just because the sex had been mind-blowing.
But because the idea of leaving Shelby behind caused me physical pain.
My chest ached like it had a big hollow space in it, and I couldn’t imagine feeling that emptiness for the rest of my life.
Putting the phone call behind me, I headed downstairs, knowing just what I needed to clear the dark cloud hanging over me.
Shelby stood in her kitchen, watching the coffee brew. She was a ray of pure sunshine, and when she turned and smiled at me, I forgot all about Los Angeles and the responsibilities waiting for me there.
I slid up to her and wrapped my arms around her. “I want to show you something,” she said, leaning back into me.
I nodded without question, excited to see anything she wanted to show me.