9. Dahlia #3
Dahlia didn't reply, her chest tightening with a warm emotion that had nothing to do with budgets or deadlines.
By the time the afternoon sun dipped behind the western hills, her muscles were stiff, and her hands were thoroughly stained with damp soil.
But as she watched the last families depart, she didn't feel the usual drain of a long day in the city.
She had spent her whole life trying to organize things, but she'd finally found a rhythm that didn't need to be written down to make sense.
The red taillights of the last sedan faded down the gravel lane, leaving the yard in a clean stillness.
The air had turned cold, carrying the crisp scent of bruised apple rinds and damp hay.
Dahlia leaned back against the wooden porch railing of the farmhouse, her fingers wrapping around a cold bottle of apple cider.
The condensation on the glass dripped down her wrist, a cool trickle that made her shiver.
Inside the house, the kitchen light had just gone dark, signaling her sisters had finally gone upstairs to sleep.
They'd spent the last hour sitting on the porch decking together, their shoulders touching as they shared a single basket of day-old donuts, their laughter soft in the dark.
For the first time since she'd returned, the silence between them wasn't filled with the old defensive walls.
They'd survived opening day, and they'd done it together.
A figure moved near the corner of the equipment barn. Beckett emerged into the yellow glow of the porch light, his faded canvas jacket zipped against the autumn breeze. He didn't climb the stairs. Instead, he stopped at the bottom, his hand resting on the wooden post.
"You're still awake," Beckett murmured, his voice low in the quiet yard.
"Just trying to convince myself today actually happened," Dahlia replied, her fingers tracing the waxy label of her bottle. She gestured toward the empty yard where the display tables stood in neat rows under the stars. "I had a whole schedule. I had diagrams. And then a goat escaped."
A dry laugh shook Beckett's chest, his eyes crinkling at the corners. "The schedules are nice, but the farm doesn't care about plans. You've got to bend with the wind out here, or you'll snap."
"I've learned that," Dahlia admitted, looking down at her hands.
Her nails were chipped, and a streak of dried mud still marked the sleeve of her shirt.
She didn't care. "The counter was completely under control.
Every family's name was known, and the counts of the donuts were planned out before anyone even asked. I've never felt so out of my depth."
"You weren't out of your depth," Beckett countered, his tone softening as he leaned his shoulder against the post. "I watched you with the school group. You were holding the gate and helping with the tags. The work you did would have made the family proud."
Dahlia's throat constricted, a sudden wave of emotion catching her off guard. She took a sip of the cold cider to hide the tremor in her chin. "I spent so long believing I had to escape this place to build something real. I thought the limits of the farm were holding me back."
"And now?" Beckett asked, his eyes locking onto hers in the quiet light.
"Now I'm beginning to think the limits are the only things that kept us safe," Dahlia whispered, her thoughts drifting to the locked cabinet in the cider barn that they still could not open.
"We've got a responsibility to keep this place going.
Not just for the business. There are things here we have to protect. "
Beckett nodded, his hand resting on the wooden post. "We'll protect them. You're not carrying that weight alone anymore."
The distance between them felt incredibly small in the cool air, the silence stretching between them like a thread.
Dahlia's breath hitched as Beckett reached up, his hand resting briefly over hers on the wooden railing.
His palm was calloused and dry, his touch sending a sudden heat through her wrist. For a second, neither of them moved, their eyes locked in an unspoken promise that had been waiting for decades.
Then, Beckett slowly let his hand drop, offering her a smile. "Get some sleep. We've got another crowd coming tomorrow."
"I will," Dahlia promised, her voice barely a whisper in the dark.
She watched him retreat across the gravel, his figure disappearing into the dark of the pasture.
When the sound of his movement had faded completely, Dahlia turned to look toward the north.
In the distance, the hemlock ridge rose in silhouette against the starry sky, dark and silent.
The locked cabinet, the mysterious six acres, and whatever secrets her mother had kept hidden in those high woods needed to be solved.
Dahlia took the last sip of her cider, casting one more glance toward the ridge.
Her thoughts settled as determination grew.
“Tomorrow is another day, and I’ve got plenty of time to figure out the mystery of the six acres and save the farm.
” She spoke her promise to the wind. “But come what may. I will do both.”