Chapter 10 Planting Seeds
Planting Seeds
Renée
He had ten garden beds installed. Big ones. I stood there stunned, watching the landscaping crew tear out everything that used to be there. Then, one by one, they built ten large raised beds in a neat five-by-two grid. Despite being set into a hill, every single bed was perfectly level.
Oh, but it didn’t stop there. The next morning, the crew arrived again and put up a beautiful fence around the entire garden—tall enough to keep the deer out.
Then came the dump truck, rumbling up the drive, and it unloaded a mountain of pea gravel.
They spread it carefully between the beds, raked it smooth until it looked like something out of a magazine.
The whole thing looks like Martha Stewart herself designed it.
I’ll pretend I’m mad about the over-the-topness of it all when he’s around, but secretly I’m glowing on the inside.
A garden like this has always been a dream of mine.
I had one about half this size when I was first married, living in Nashville.
But with studying for my master’s and doctoral degrees, I didn’t have the time to really take care of it.
When we moved out here, a little slice of me fell away.
The girls and I went to the garden center to pick out all the seeds we wanted.
It’s too late in the season to plant everything we wanted, but a late summer/early fall harvest should turn out plentiful with pumpkins, butternut squash, kale, beets, cabbage, and Brussels sprouts.
But that’s just six of the beds. The other four are going to be a mix of daylilies, foxglove, cosmos, zinnias, dahlias, and of course, sunflowers (because my daughters love them, not because Jonah does).
The three of us are preparing the garden, Delta asking me a million questions, and Loretta silently by my side, waiting for the next direction, when Jonah’s SUV rolls down the street behind us, well under the speed limit.
A couple of minutes later, his pair of Great Pyrenees are bound for us and bark to be let inside the fence line. God, they’re adorable. I want to rub my face in their fur.
Jonah catches up with them. He’s wearing rugby shorts, sandals, and a cut-off T-shirt that exposes his tattooed, muscular arms and the sides of his defined torso.
I quickly tamp down the horny little gremlin inside of me who is begging me to remember what his arms looked like hooked around my legs and his face between my thighs.
“Looks like you’ve put in a lot of work already,” he says, but makes no move to open the fence gate, his hands firmly placed on his hips.
“We planted sunflowers,” Delta replies, before running to open the gate.
When it’s opened, he hesitates and looks to me for approval—which is both comforting that he’s respecting my space, but also infuriating because it turns me on when a man waits for what he wants.
Even his dogs wait there until I give him the okay. Each of the girls hugs a dog as Jonah strides in, inspecting our progress with a smile. “Can I help with anything?” he asks.
“That’s okay; you don’t have to. You probably wanna shower and rest up.”
“I’d like to help if you don’t mind. If you can handle how much I smell,” he chuckles.
“We’ve been elbow-deep in compost today, so I think we can handle your body odor.”
That makes him grin. “What do you need?”
“We’re just finishing up with beets right here. Hand me that little plastic container.” I outstretch my hand, and he passes the tiny, jagged beet seeds to me. “Now take that spade and dig half-inch holes, each hole two inches apart.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he says, but it’s not in a flirtatious way. It’s studious, and it burns me with unexpected pleasure.
The girls are far from interested in helping me now that the dogs are here, and they’re rolling around on the gravel with them without a care in the world.
There’s not much left to do other than wait for each hole to be scooped and plant a single seed in each, which gives me time to sit on the wide edge of the garden bed and watch as Jonah carefully digs each half-inch hole. To be quite frank, I’ve never seen him apply so much focus to anything.
I could take another spade and dig along with him, but after a long day of gardening, sitting here and watching a pretty boy do my work feels luxurious.
He digs a hole a little too deep, but fills in back in at the right depth. “Sorry,” he says.
Fuck, he’s cute. I want to punish him for it.
He’s so concentrated on his task that it gives me space to study his body.
His golden hair is tied back in a bun, flyaways framing his head.
His jawline is strong and defined, giving way to a pronounced Adam’s apple.
He has the most random assortment of tattoos covering his arms and peeking along his ribs—all different styles.
Some colored, some not. Animal from The Muppets sits behind a drum set along his left-side flank.
Jonah is kneeling on a pad in front of the raised garden bed, and my gaze skates over his thighs, which are very exposed in his small black rugby shorts.
Dark blond hair dusts down to his ankles.
There’s a crest inked on this right thigh with the words Philadelphia Men’s Rugby Team in a banner at the bottom.
“You still play rugby,” I say.
“I do,” he replies, still focused on his task. But something triggers him, and he looks up at me. “You knew I played in college?”
I drop a seed into a hole and cover it up. “You pretty much only wore Keystone State rugby apparel. And your brother had mentioned a time or two that you played together.”
“You ever see one of our games?”
“No.” Though suddenly I’d love to see him running around in those hot little shorts. “Is post-college rugby much different?”
“Kinda.” He lifts his shoulder once and resumes his careful digging. “Less singing, more seriousness. But it’s still fun. Always is.”
“Singing?”
“Yeah, ruggers have a bunch of drinking songs. And team songs. It’s a thing. That’s how Yogi got his name. It’s based on a rugby song about Yogi Bear.”
I plant another seed and hum. “And the other dog?”
“That’s Rugger.”
“They’re cute. Good with kids, too.”
“They’ve been around my family since they were pups. They love babies.” He smiles. “And ducks, and goats, and horses, apparently.”
I glance over at Loretta, who is inspecting one of the dog’s ears like she’s playing doctor, and my heart warms.
Jonah adjusts his kneepad further down the garden bed to reach fresh territory. “But the team is definitely more serious. I play Division 1, but we’re trying to level up to the Premiership League. That’s like, the level between where we are currently and profesh.”
“What do you have to do to qualify for the next level?”
“Score a lot of points. Act like we want it.”
“And do you want it?” I ask, and cover another seed.
“Honestly, I don’t really care what level I play at. But my brothers and teammates really want it, so I’m gonna do everything I can to get us there.”
That’s... a little surprising. Jonah always seemed like the kind of person who thought little outside of his own bubble, if at all.
“We just made an offer on a building we’re turning into a training facility. I’m really excited about it. And we’re gonna work with community organizers to see what we can offer to the neighborhood folks.”
“Like what?”
“Like, I don’t know. Cleaning up their yards or streets for free, or letting people use the facility for events. Something like that. We haven’t figured it out yet.”
“That’s very generous of your team.”
He shrugs, and even under that bit of a sunburn, a blush creeps to the surface. “So, um,” he starts, “what all have you planted?”
“Mostly vegetables and flowers that will bloom in late summer.”
“What are we planting now?”
“Beets.”
“I’ve never had a beet.”
A smile grows fat and lazy across my face. “You’ll have to try one when they’re harvested.”
My pulse picks up when his big blue eyes find mine, and I’m suddenly frozen. He looks so good, so fuckable on his knees, waiting for me.
“Promise?” he asks quietly, and there’s nothing sinister or bratty about what he says. In fact, it feels filled with meaning—about our history and the future.
There can’t be a future between us, though. We’re in different parts of our lives. He’s young and carefree and has his whole life to screw up. I’m a thirty-eight-year-old mother of two with baggage so heavy and dark no one would ever touch it. I certainly don’t.
And I don’t want to lead him on. “I make no promises,” I say.
He side-eyes me, and the corner of his mouth turns up. “Alright, keep your secrets.”
A comfortable silence settles between us before I ask, “You never told me what the dress code is for this wedding. I need to buy a dress.” I don’t reveal that no matter what the dress code is, I’d have to buy a new one because none of my dresses fit anymore.
My weight has fluctuated in the last year, and I’m rediscovering my body in this unfamiliar size.
“I don’t know,” he offers. “Just wear what you’d normally wear to a wedding.”
My eyes find the back of my skull. “Jonah, I’ve been to weddings in a forest wearing hiking boots. I need to prepare properly. Do you have a wedding invitation you can show me?”
“Oh, yeah.” He sets down the spade and pulls his phone from beneath his compression shorts. “We cordially invite you... blah blah blah... black tie.”
I gasp. “Black tie?”
“That’s the fancy one, right?”
I huff a humorless laugh. “Yes.”
And just like that, I’m painfully aware of my bank account and its sad little balance. A black-tie dress would wipe me out. There’s still time to back out, right? If I rescind my offer to be his date, he might be disappointed, but—
A gentle hand lands on my knee. “Renée?”
I blink back to reality. He’s watching me, concern written across his face. “You okay? You kinda zoned out there.”
I lift his hand off my knee. “I’m fine. You know what, Jonah, I don’t think—”
He cuts me off. “Would it be okay if I bought your dress?”
“No.”
“Why not? I’d love to. I’ve always wanted to do that.”
“You have?”
He nods, earnest as ever. “I always wanted to ask a girl out, buy her an entire outfit for the occasion, and set up a hair appointment for her too.”
I don’t miss his choice of words—girl, not woman. It’s a painful reminder: he probably hasn’t dated many grown women. College girls, sure. Yes, they’re technically women, but they’re still budding into womanhood at that point.
But there’s something undeniably sweet—and yes, a little intoxicating—in the dreamy, boyish way he offers.
Oh God. How does he keep persuading me?
“Why would you do that?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know. I guess it would make me feel good. If I knew you were pampered and looked and felt incredible, I would feel like the luckiest man in the world.”
And just like that, it clicks.
He’s a service sub.
I hate that Amber’s right. He is exactly my type, and he’d perfectly match my freak. Why did he have to move in next door? This is bullshit.
“Please?” he adds, softly now. And God, I have to bite my tongue.
I won’t date him, and we’re not hooking up, so there’s no future here. But that doesn’t mean I can’t have a little fun toying with him... right?
I drop a few more beet seeds into the soil but don’t cover them. “Finish planting these, and if you do a good job, I’ll let you buy me a dress.”
He smirks. “Oh, you’ll let me?”
I arch an eyebrow, and he tracks my gaze to the holes I just dropped the seeds into, and he catches my meaning. Jonah efficiently covers them in the same manner I did, before continuing the row.
“You’re doing great,” I murmur, and a dark little thrill rushes through me.
He works with quiet focus, every hole exactly two inches apart, a half inch deep by my eye. I drop in the seeds, and he seals them with care, grinning like digging in the dirt for me is the best thing he’s done all week.
When he finishes, he stands without a single knee crack and brushes off his hands. “How’d I do?” he asks, before spotting a watering can. “I should water them, right?”
I nod, but don’t move. “Just a little drink over each.”
With more focus than anyone has ever needed to water a garden, he showers each seedling for a second or two until the can runs dry, and refills.
When he’s finished, he surveys his work like a Midwestern dad admiring a perfectly mowed lawn—hands on hips, scanning for last-minute flaws. But there are none.
“You did very well, Jonah. Thank you.”
Pride puffs out his chest. “So, I can take you shopping?”
“A deal’s a deal.”