Chapter 52
Tucker
I don’t get to drag Autumn back to Rush Creek like a caveman. She has stuff to finish up and loose ends to tie down. She has an apartment to sublet and furniture to move, friends to say goodbye to and suitcases to pack.
But a week and a half later, she makes a trip to Rush Creek and we go looking together for an apartment for her.
She wants something downtown, right in the thick of things, and she finds it—the rare empty apartment over Vows, the bridal-gown shop.
She can smell the coffee when it starts brewing at Morning Rush and the bread when it starts baking at Rush Creek Bakery.
She can walk half a block to poke into Rush to Read books and another half a block to sit at the bar at Oscar’s or grab a sandwich at Spa Day Sandwiches.
Her apartment is way nicer than mine. When I say so, she says, “You can live somewhere nicer, you know,” and for the first time, it feels possible. We go looking for a new place for me and find a two-bedroom outside of town with a pool and a hot tub.
It’s too early to talk about living together, but it seems possible that we will someday soon, and that, by itself, is top tier.
A week after we move her into her new place (and a week before I’ll move into mine), we have a giant barn raising to rebuild the fire-damaged structure at Hott Springs Eternal.
My whole extended family is there. We’ve brought in a general contractor to make sure we don’t do anything stupid, but we’re doing the labor ourselves—partly to save money, yeah, but also because when Quinn suggested it, it felt right.
Of course we’d rebuild the family business together. After all, all those years ago, we promised to run it together. We thought it would look a little different than it does, but that’s okay, right? Life often looks different than you thought it would.
Demolition is done, and we’ve started reframing when there’s a shout of recognition from behind me.
I turn to see a passel of people. It takes a moment for recognition to sink it, and then I realize: It’s Easton’s brothers and their wives and girlfriends and even some of their kids—Easton’s sister’s two oldest, who are old enough to be safely around the building site.
“What the heck?” Easton demands.
“You’re my brother,” Gabe Wilder says. “Which means Hanna is my sister. Which means all of you”—he gestures—“are family and you’re fucking stuck with all of us.
” He finishes with a gesture to his own chest and the people gathered around him.
“Tell us what to do. And don’t give us the easy jobs. It makes us grumpy.”
“It doesn’t take much to make Clark grumpy,” Brody says.
“Look who’s talking, asshole,” Clark says—grumpily.
Their sister, Amanda, is a caterer. She runs Around the Table Catering, widely hailed as the best food you can get for a party in Rush Creek, and she’s brought several long tables which she drapes with tablecloths and covers with lasagnas, casseroles, salads, sandwiches.
We take turns taking breaks to dig in, and man, it’s amazing—exactly the fuel this operation needs.
Even though we’re far from town and there’s no reason news of our barn raising should spread, it does, of course, because this is Rush Creek.
So before too long, people show up to watch the spectacle.
Given the ratio of women to men present in the crowd, I personally suspect it has something to do with the number of my brothers and Gabe’s brothers who have taken their shirts off and are working bare from the waist up, but regardless, we have an audience.
Autumn and I have taken a break to chug large amounts of water and dig into another plate of food when a car pulls up and two people get out.
One of them extracts a long folding table from the back of the car, and the other unfolds a tablecloth onto it.
Then they both begin unloading enormous stacks of bakery boxes onto the table.
“You’re a goddess!” Sonya calls to Nan. “I was just fantasizing about a chocolate croissant.”
“You’re in luck, hon,” Nan says. “They’re still warm.”
Sonya moans and drops the hammer she’s holding to cross to the bakery table.
The other person with Nan sets boxes on the table and appears from behind her.
Weggers.
Oh, wow.
“Did we get everything?” he asks Nan.
“Did you get the cookies? They were in a box on the floor in the back seat.”
“Oh, no, I didn’t see them,” he says and trots off to retrieve them.
Autumn and I stare at each other, wide eyed.
“Nan,” I say, “anything you want to tell us?”
She smiles, a slightly goofy secret smile. “In good time, Tucker. In good time.”
Of course Nan chooses now to be tight lipped.
I wonder if this will change Hanna’s feelings about having Weggers disbarred.
The Wilders and Hotts rebuild the Hott Springs Eternal barn together. Rome wasn’t built in a day, but it turns out barns still can be. Which is pretty fucking cool.
Afterward, Autumn and I go back to her place, shower, and crawl into bed together. We’re both exhausted and aching all over, so sex will have to wait—
Oh, who the hell am I fooling? I roll to my side and reach for her, and she’s there, open-mouthed and eager, and I realize: This is the beginning of the rest of my life, and fuck yeah, I’m grabbing it with everything I’ve got.