6. Hayes
Chapter six
Hayes
After texting back and forth for a few days, mostly logistics, Kai is coming over today. When his messages turn flirtatious, I don’t have a clue how to respond, so now he probably thinks I’m pretending our thing didn’t happen.
At the bar I felt like we still had chemistry.
It was like time stood still when Kai appeared in front of me.
I forgot everything and everyone around us when I saw him.
If Kristen had been there instead of Leon, who was distracted by playing pool and the game on TV, she would have called me out on my behavior.
Actually, if my sister was there, she would have been sending eligible women my way and I wouldn’t have gotten that time to reconnect with Kai. I love her, but I do not want to be set up by my little sister.
Shadow whines to be let out so I open the door for him. He can sense my nerves, and I feel like a neurotic mess. People come over all the time. It’s a working farm. I don’t need to be twisted in knots over a single man.
But is he still single? It’s a long time between early spring and the end of summer. Two full seasons of harvests for me. He might have met someone on his travels. Maybe some rich guy who can buy him the fancy things he likes. Kai is pretty enough to have a sugar daddy.
Is pretty even the right word? He’s undeniably masculine. Kai’s toned, muscular arms and legs were on display at the bar, and his sharp jawline had a five-o-clock shadow. I consider looking him up online again to see if there’s pictures of him wearing even less. I bet he’s pretty all over.
Shaking my head at the wayward thought, I don’t want to get hard right before the man himself arrives. Shadow starts barking and I step outside to see a white car entering the gate I left open for Kai.
He’s in a more sensible hybrid vehicle from the looks of it, and it eases over the bumpy dirt and gravel driveway much better than the flashy electric car he had as a rental in April would have.
Pointing to the spot of dirt beside my truck, Kai parks and hops out to pet Shadow on the head. He’s got his ever-present phone in his hand as he rounds the car to stand in front of me with a grin. “Hi, Farmboy.”
“Hey, Hawai’i,” I respond as my face heats, remembering how we called each other by the nicknames at the bar. “Is this a thing, now?”
“It’s so a thing,” Kai insists with a laugh. “I can see it now, hashtag Farmboy Hayes.”
Rolling my eyes, I gesture for him to follow me. “You wanted to see places to film, so let me show you around.”
“It’s cool to meet the famous Shadow,” Kai follows along with his shorter legs, my dog walking beside him with adoring eyes. Yeah, buddy, I get it. “Guess I only saw your kitchen last time.”
Choking on air, I almost trip over my own feet at the memory of him in my old kitchen. I got hard every time I walked into the room for a week after he left town. “I’m showing you around the property today.”
“”Fire,” Kai responds with a nod and I look around in a panic. A fire would be just my luck. His laugh has me turning back. “Oh, shit. Sorry! I meant, like, cool.”
My heart rate slows as I realize he was using some Gen Z slang my millennial ass doesn’t get. Though I think it has more to do with living in the middle of nowhere. I don’t get half of what they say on TV shows now.
“I feel like there’s a law about saying fire when there isn’t one,” I grumble and continue towards the opposite side of the driveway. “The chicken coop is across from the house so I can keep an eye on the hens.”
“Doesn’t the rooster do that?” Kai asks with genuine curiosity as he takes a picture of the dozen or so hens pecking at the ground in the open area beside the faded yellow coop. “And why is the fence so high around it?”
“I try not to have roosters, and the fence is to keep predators out.”
“Don’t like cocks?” Kai asks and I’m spluttering again. He’s grinning like he knew exactly what he was doing as Shadow sits beside him to receive more head pats.
Shaking my head, I hide my own smile at his antics by smoothing my mustache. “Roosters crow at the ass crack of dawn and fertilize the eggs. I don’t want either of those when I already wake up at sunrise.”
“Damn, I only got up that early for surfing.”
Leading Kai past the raised planting beds and towards the greenhouse, and find myself asking, “Do you miss it? Surfing and Hawai’i?”
“Yes and no,” Kai bobbles his head and takes a picture of the greenhouse, which is half-shaded by an apple tree I need to prune back. “My older brothers are more into surfing than me, but I miss my siblings sometimes. And even though Hawai’i is a tourist destination, I don’t miss feeling trapped.”
Gesturing to the side of my property that isn’t lined by trees, I point to the open fields leading to the foothills. “We’ve still got lots of wide open spaces in California.”
An expression passes over his face I can’t quite read. Maybe awe at the view and something else akin to sadness, and I realize he didn’t mean trapped by being on an island. I know the kind of trapped you can feel from family expectations.
“Let me show you the barn,” I offer to break the mood. “I’ve got some cute animals.”
Kai grins again and I like that he lets things roll off his back so easily. “Lead the way, Farmboy.”
Right as I walk into the big open doors, I hear Opie braying from outside. What I don’t hear is the sound of pigs and goats in my barn. I planned for Kai to come right before feeding time so they’d be eager, so they should be making a ruckus to be fed.
The creak of a hinge has me stopping short, Kai running into my back. “Hey, what’s with the traffic jam?”
“The goats’ pin is open,” I explain, rushing to check the next pin where two pigs should be shuffling through the hay and snorting at me. “Dammit. Pigs too.”
“And that’s bad?” Kai asks warily, his hand gripping my sleeve like my farm animals will attack. Shadow seems to sense his unease and presses against Kai’s leg.
“The main gate is open,” I explain, hurrying to grab a scoop of pig feed in the empty coffee container I use to measure it. “The goats will wander and the pigs are escape artists.”
Not waiting for Kai to ask more questions, I run out the back of the barn, shaking the can with the sound I use to tempt them. With my luck, they’ve gotten into the rest of the berries and I’ll have none left to sell. At least they can't climb trees.
“Pinky, Brain,” I call the pigs, named for their dynamic more than how they look. Though Pinky is sort of pink with black spots, Brain is the, well, brains of the operation. This isn’t the first time they got loose. “Slim, Jim?”
Of course, I had to give Leon the day off because Kai was coming over. Now I have no one to help me round my wandering animals up.
The sound of another coffee can with food shaking comes up behind me and I find Kai there, mimicking my movements. “You really named your pets Slim, Jim, Pinky and the Brain?”
“Not pets,” I insist, rounding the row of cherry trees towards the berry bushes. “Plus, you run out of names when they get butchered every year.”
“If they aren’t pets, why do you name them?”
“My niece says they need names. Though my brother in law named these ones,” I shrug.
We pass the area that is a pond in winter through spring and I spy my missing livestock. Shadow drops his head like he’s spotting our prey, and I wish I’d trained him on herding more.
“Now what?” Kai asks like it didn’t occur to him there would be actual pigs and goats at the end of our search for pigs and goats.
Good question.