Chapter 6
SIX
TRICIA
The next morning, I spend extra time on my eyeliner.
And immediately regret it when the wind slaps my face in the parking lot. By the time I reach the office, my “effortless” look requires actual effort—fingers, lip balm, and a date with the mirror
Lanie glances up from her laptop and smirks.
“Well hey there, Cover Girl. You look awfully nice for a Sunday at the pumpkin patch.”
Heat climbs my neck. “It’s laundry day.”
“Uh-huh.” She props a hip against the counter. “Laundry day comes with perfume now?”
I bury my nose in the clipboard.
“It’s cinnamon roll body spray. It’s seasonal.”
She presses her lips together like she’s trying not to smile.
“You do you, babe. Huck’s teacher says he can help with face painting next weekend if you want an assistant.”
“I’d love that.” I click through the morning ticket list like it’s the most compelling thing I’ve ever seen. “We have two birthday parties and a scout troop at ten.”
Lanie leans closer, voice lowering. “If—hypothetically—you had plans tonight, I can cover the last hour.”
“I don’t have plans,” I say too fast.
“Then I didn’t offer.” She returns to her ledger.
I’m still smiling at the computer screen when the door opens and Quinn steps in. My stomach does the embarrassingly buoyant thing it’s been doing since the truck.
“Morning,” he says, easy and casual, Which is frankly rude, because I am not easy or casual on the inside. “How’s the large group booking list look?”
“Green across the board. I scheduled an extra hay-rack run for the scout troop.”
“Good call.” His gaze lingers a fraction too long. He clears his throat. “Uh, the new chalkboard by the cannons looks great.”
“I’ll be sure to pass your compliments to… myself.”
“Right.” He tries not to smile and fails. He tips two fingers off his cap to Lanie and disappears like he didn’t just light my entire vascular system on fire.
“Really smooth, guys,” Lanie murmurs, not looking up. “Not suspicious at all.”
“Work,” I tell the screen. “We’re at work.”
“Sure are.”
The rest of the day drags as my body thrums in anticipation of what’s to come.
I give out wristbands. I make change. I help a toddler choose a pumpkin that is definitely too big for him.
By closing, I’m vibrating with nerves. A dash of fear. A whole bucket of anticipation.
In the employee lot, I sit in my car and pretend to scroll my phone until the last car pulls out of the employee lot.
There’s a soft thump on my door. Pumpkin’s nose appears against the window, breath fogging the glass. I giggle, but taper off as I look beyond him.
Quinn stands there, hands in his pockets, trying to look casual and looking entirely too attractive.
“Ready?” he asks, taking my hand as I step out.
“Very.”
He falls into step beside me as Pumpkin leads the way. Tail wagging and body prancing as if he’s leading a parade.
The trailer glows warm from within. Quinn opens the door, I stop.
It’s the same small space I saw earlier this week. Tiny galley kitchen, small couch, and two doors at the back.
But it’s been transformed. A dish towel has become a makeshift table runner. Two mismatched candles flicker in short jars, filling the room with vanilla and spice.
Plates are placed carefully on either sides of the table with cutlery and mason jars beside them. A bowl of apples acts as the centerpiece.
It’s still every bit a bachelor pad, but it’s been dressed up with extra care.
“You did all this?” My voice tips up at the end, surprised and a little undone.
“I had help.” He moves toward the slow cooker. “From an appliance.”
He lifts the lid, and a savory-sweet smell envelops us. Apples, cinnamon, a touch of thyme. It’s the kind of scent you want to take a path in.
“Pork chops with apples and mashed potatoes. Which I did not burn, even though Chase bet me five bucks I would.”
“You’re a regular chef.”
“Don’t get used to it.” He reaches for a drawer. “Want to make yourself comfortable?”
I sit at the table. He plates with concentration. When he sets the food in front of me, I have to hold my hands under the table to keep from reaching for him instead.
The first bite melts on my tongue. I moan.
He laughs—low in his throat, clearly relieved. “Good?”
“Criminally good.”
We eat like people who worked hard and earned it.
Conversation finds an easy track.
We discuss our favorite lunches as kids, the worst coffee we’ve ever had, and what music we listen to when no one else is around.
He clears our plates before I can insist on helping. When he turns back, he’s holding a foil-wrapped secret behind his back like a magician.
“Room for dessert?” asks.
“You didn’t.”
“I did.” He reveals two perfect slices of apple pie, crust shiny with egg wash, sugar glinting at the edges. “Borrowed from the Snack Shack. Don’t tell Chase.”
I take a bite and close my eyes because I’m only human. “If I marry into this family, it will be for the pie.”
I realize what I said a heartbeat after I say it. My eyes fly open. He has paused, fork in midair, expression unguarded and startlingly soft.
“Noted,” he says, voice gruffer than before. He sets the fork down with care. “For the record, if you ever want seconds, I’m not above bribery.”
“Duly noted,” I whisper.
The candles burn lower. The heater hums. Pumpkin snores like a truck downshifting. The world outside narrows to a circle of light from the moon, sheltering us from the dark.
We migrate to the couch. He sits first; I tuck in beside him, not quite touching. Our knees bump. Neither of us moves away.
“Tell me something you haven’t told anyone here yet,” he says after a quiet stretch.
“I was going to leave San Francisco a year before I did,” I say after thinking for a minute. “I even packed boxes. Then I unpacked them because leaving without a plan felt like failing.”
I pick at a loose thread on my jeans. “I wish I hadn’t waited so long.”
He turns that over, serious.
“I wish I’d asked for help here sooner,” he says. “I thought I had to carry everything by myself, or I wasn’t the right man for the job.”
He huffs a small, self-conscious laugh. “Turns out I was just a tired one.”
“You’re allowed to be tired.” The words come out softer than I intend. “You’re allowed to want things.”
He looks at me then, really looks, and I can feel honesty settling between us like a warm blanket. “What do you want, Tricia?”
You.
“I want… roots,” I say instead. “To make things that last. To wake up and not feel like I’m late to my own life.”
He nods once, a muscle jumping in his jaw. “Me too.”
He reaches up, slow enough to back out, and tucks a piece of hair behind my ear. His knuckles graze my cheek. My breath stutters; his does too.
“Can I—” he starts.
“Yes,” I say, already gone.
The kiss is nothing like the earlier ones. Those were all spark.
This is a slow flame, deliberate and deep.
He tastes like cinnamon and apples and something that makes my head swim.
His hand slides to the nape of my neck, anchoring me to him.
My fingers curl into his flannel shirt, holding him tightly, as if I’m afraid he’ll escape.
When we break for air, we’re both smiling like we’ve gotten away with something.
“Hi,” I whisper.
“Hi.” His voice is a scrape of velvet.
We kiss again, and again, conversation dissolving into the kind of language that doesn’t need words. The candles gutter lower. The space heater clicks off.
The world pulls in tight around the couch and the quiet certainty that whatever we’re starting is real.
Rain starts while we’re still wrapped in the soft thrum of our stolen kisses. Light at first, then steadier, drumming a rhythm on the metal roof. Pumpkin lifts his head once, decides we’re safe, and resettles with a sigh.
Trailing his lips down my neck, my top somehow disappears. His lips work against my chest, teasing my nipples into peaks.
At some point, my pants are gone. I’m lying on the little bed in the back of the trailer, naked as the day I was born.
Quinn is leaning back on his heals. “Can you do something for me?”
My body is tightly wound from his caresses, but I nod. “Of course.”
“Show me how you like to be touched.”
My eyes widen. “What did you say?”
He reaches for my hand and slides it slowly down my belly, creating fresh goosebumps along the way.
He keeps moving it, our gazes locked, until my fingers reach the apex of my thighs.
“There.” He swallows hard. “Show me.”
Still staring at him, I start to move my index finger in slow circles.
“That a girl.” His voice is low and deep. “Show me what you like.”
Unable to resist following his orders, I stroke my clit. Circling it. Applying more pressure, just as he’s asked.
He watches me with heat in his gaze.
“Fuck me.” He moistens his lips. “I have to taste you.”
Laying down between my thighs, he takes over with his long, hard fingers. And then his tongue.
Oh, God, his tongue.
He laps at me, tasting me as if I’m the most delicious treat in the world.
He slides a long finger inside me. Mimicking the act we’re no doubt about to follow.
“Right there.” I gasp for breath. “I’m so close.”
“Come for me,” his voice rumbles against my pussy. “Come for me.”
My eyes flutter shut, and I fall apart.
My hands fall limply to the side. I’m only vaguely aware of him kicking off his jeans and pulling off his shirt. I hear the rip of foil.
I open my eyes to find him next to me, stroking his thick cock, cloaked in a condom.
My pussy pulses in desire.
“Ready?”
I nod, moaning as he slides into me. Stretching me as his hips roll against mine. Whispering my name, he closes his eyes as if to savor me all the better.
The need stirs in me once again. And it isn't just in my body. I feel it in my soul.
Either he has a dick gold, or he’s working his way into my heart.
As he thrusts into me, I clench my eyes shut. He’s so hard. So long. I feel every bit of him as he moves, and I love it.
Setting a steady pace, he slides his hand between us. His thumb finds my clit.
“Oh, God,” I cry out, wishing I had words to tell him how good he feels.
Instead, I reach around to grab his ass, pulling him more tightly. His muscles flex under my cheeks as I take him even deeper.
When those familiar pangs of pleasure build again, I cry out once more. His name, shrieked until my ears are ringing. I pulse around him. He pumps into me once more, burying himself to the hilt, finding his own release.
“That was…”
With a laugh, he brushes a lock of hair back from my faces and rests his forehead against mine. “It really was.”
When we finally ease apart, breathless and quiet and smiling in the dark, the rain has softened to a hush.
He presses his forehead to mine, voice low. “I like you too much already.”
“Good,” I whisper. “Then we’re even.”
He laughs softly, and I tuck that sound somewhere safe.
Satiated for now, we talk in low voices between kisses—small things that feel like big ones.
He tells me he learned to drive a tractor long before a car. I tell him my grandmother kept a box of fabric scraps because she believed you could save anything beautiful and make it useful later.
He says he wants a porch swing and a roof that doesn’t leak.
I say I want a studio with windows big enough to make winter feel less like a cave.
He laughs when I admit I name my plants. “What’s the aloe called?” he asks.
“Spike.”
“That’s it? I’d expect something more creative from you.”
“What? I’m trying to save it to help pumpkin patches.”
“We pumpkin patches are grateful. In fact.” He lowers his mouth to my neck. “I think I’d like to show you just how grateful.”
As he starts to make love to me, outside, the farm falls asleep.
Inside, I let myself believe I found exactly what I came here for: a life with purpose and joy.