Chapter 11 Clarke
Clarke
For the first time, maybe ever, Leith Wilkes was stunned silent. It wasn’t until we went through the front door of the small log shed, which turned out to be his home, that he said, “Wait, really?”
The inside of the old saddle shed was cozier than I expected.
There were dark hardwood floors, a small kitchenette complete with a rusty camp stove, and an open living space that had enough room for a love seat and a worn-out recliner.
There was a door in the back that I assumed used to hold extra tack and grooming supplies for horses, but based on the rest of the setup, I guessed it was now Leith’s bedroom—unless he slept on the couch. Wait. Why did I care where he slept?
“I’m here to lay out some ground rules.” There were two things in my life that were in pretty desperate need of repair—Toades and my relationship with my mom.
To me, though, they felt like one and the same.
To fix one, I had to fix the other. And no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t find another solution for fixing Toades that was better than Leith’s offer.
“Ground rules?”
I nodded. “We need rules, and we need an actual plan if we want this to work. You were right that we already have a leg up because of the whole robbery situation—”
“Hold on, did you just say I was right?”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t get used to it,” I said. “I think we should talk through what you had in mind, and I’ll share my thoughts.”
“Okay, yeah,” Leith agreed. “Do you want to sit? A drink?”
I made my way toward the love seat. “What do you have?” I asked.
“Water, kombucha, beer, and a bottle of vodka that I’m ninety-nine percent sure Lainey snuck when she went to a sleepover last weekend and replaced at least half of it with water.”
“Water is fine,” I said. “Regular water. Not the vodka water mix.”
“Got it.” Leith switched on an old radiator space heater on his way into the kitchenette.
The hum that came from it matched the one in my head in volume.
I tried to turn the latter down. It seemed to take more and more focus lately.
“So, to be honest, I didn’t have, like, a big grand plan.
I figured we could just fake it until we make it, you know? ” Leith said.
Figures. “Okay, well, my plan is a little bit more detailed than that.” I’d barely slept the last two nights thinking about it—not that I get that much sleep anyway.
“That doesn’t surprise me,” Leith said as he set a glass of water on the coffee table for me. “Hit me.”
I grabbed the water and took a swallow.
“Well, first, we have to start planting the seeds of a backstory, and we do that by taking advantage of the Sweetwater Peak rumor mill.”
“How do we do that?”
“We start dropping information to some key people—like Chayton at the taffy shop and Cleo at the bar. They’ll ask about it because they’re shameless gossips and can’t help themselves, and then we have a chance to push our own narrative.
” I just had to think of this as a public relations campaign.
It helped me feel like I wasn’t getting too close to anything dangerous—like my childhood crush on Leith.
“What’s our narrative?” Leith asked.
“That we started seeing each other a few months ago, but we decided to keep it a secret while we were figuring things out. Now we’re ready to share it with the world, or whatever.”
Leith rubbed at the back of his neck, and his Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. I didn’t realize I was tracking the movement until he spoke. “That makes sense,” he said. “But what does that look like, exactly? I mean, we’re kind of on a time crunch here.”
“I know,” I said. “We’ll start planting the seeds this week, and then we’ll move forward with some aggressive, all-up-in-your-face dating.”
“Are you using farming metaphors on purpose?” Leith asked with a small smile.
Oh, seeds. Duh. “No.” I shook my head quickly. “Stay on task.”
“This is just like math class.” Leith laughed.
“Fuck off,” I said.
“I like you like this,” Leith said. His eyes seemed too focused on me. I didn’t like the way it made my breath catch.
“L-like what?”
“Determined,” Leith replied. “Stubborn.”
I narrowed my eyes at him.
“Anyway,” I said. “After we’ve convinced everyone in the town that we’re two crazy kids in love, we figure out how you approach Ron and get everything for the farm put in your name.
Once it is, we wait for a few weeks, and then stage a big, public breakup that everyone will say they saw coming because we moved too fast.” But before that, everyone would say they knew we were going to end up together. That was how this town worked.
Leith nodded. “And where does Toades come in?”
“We can wait until everything with the farm is secure.” I could hold on a few more months. I probably would need to buy new coverings for the holes in the roof, though. Maybe I could get Leith to help me lay them. He probably knew what he was doing with shit like that.
“No.” Leith shook his head. “I’ll start on it right away. It’s the least I can do, and it will probably work in our favor if people see me helping your family business.”
“Yeah, okay,” I said. The thought of having someone help with Toades made it hard to swallow. I never thought that person would be Leith Wilkes, though. “That’s…that’s nice. Thank you.”
“Sure thing,” Leith said. “So what are the ground rules?”
“We can’t tell anyone it’s fake—even after it’s over.
” Obviously, there were a lot of social ramifications of tricking an entire population into thinking that we were dating, no matter how small, but for Leith, there might even be legal ones.
And then this whole thing would’ve been for nothing.
This was a secret that Leith and I were going to have to take to the grave, which was okay with me. I was good at holding things in.
“That’s only one rule.”
I restrained myself from making a sarcastic comment about how observant he was. “And it’s the most important one, so I don’t think we need any more.”
“I disagree,” Leith said, and I tilted my head, confused. “If we’re going to convince people we’re together, we’re going to have to act like a couple.”
I nodded. “Yeah, that’s what I said.”
“That means we’re going to have to do things that couples do in public.”
The tiny room seemed to close in even more. I was afraid my heartbeat was going to become visible, Loony Tunes style. “Like what?”
“Hold hands, be affectionate, kiss a little,” Leith said. His cheeks had gone pink; at least I wasn’t the only one affected.
“U-u-um, okay,” I stammered. “That’s fine.”
“You’re fine if I just kiss you whenever I want?” Leith didn’t sound convinced, and he was right—I didn’t think I was okay with that. It was…nice of him to check. I was also hung up on his word choice “whenever I want.” As if there would be a time he wanted to kiss me.
“We can hold hands and be generally affectionate all the time,” I said. “And forehead or cheek kisses are fine. But if we’re going to kiss, like…on the mouth, I think we…agree beforehand?”
“Sounds fair.” Leith’s smile was mischievous and unnerving. “I’ll ask permission before I plant one on ya, which is more than you did, by the way.”
My cheeks were on fire. “I— I’m sorry. It was…I didn’t mean to—”
“Clarke,” Leith interrupted me. “I’m just kidding. I was into it.”
I took another gulp of my water. When did it get so stuffy in here? “W-what?” I asked.
“It was quick thinking. It got us out of there unscathed, and it was a decent kiss. Could’ve done without the papers shoved down my pants, though.”
“Decent?” I asked, mildly offended.
Leith smiled impishly. “I’m happy to help you practice—with your permission, of course.”
“I don’t need practice,” I said. Then I tried to remember the last time I’d kissed someone before Leith. Nothing came immediately to mind. Well, shit.
“Whatever,” I grumbled. “I was thinking we do our first public outing at the indoor market on Friday. That will get the most eyes on us in the shortest amount of time.”
“Good idea,” Leith said. “So we have a deal?”
“We have a deal.” I reached my hand out.
“Sure you don’t want to seal it with a kiss, honey?”
I used my hand to give Leith’s shoulder a healthy shove before I stood up. “I’ll see you on Friday. Pick me up at six-thirty.”