Bittersweet

by Sarina Bowen

  “Ow!”

  “You started it,” he teased, his fingers caressing the skin he’d tweaked only a second earlier.

  Griff Shipley was surprisingly cuddly after sex. I wracked my brain to try to remember what had happened five years ago in Boston after we’d done the deed. I supposed we’d slept together then, too. But at the time I’d probably assumed it was because he didn’t want to get up to walk me home…

  “You’re right,” he said.

  “What?” My mind had wandered.

  “I do like what I do. It’s just that I’m not sure I ever had a choice.”

  “Oh.” He’d told me that first day—when my car had been in his ditch—that his father had died. “Didn’t you intend to run the farm?”

  He was quiet a moment. “I hadn’t decided. Football was still important to me. Still thought I could make it onto a roster.”

  “You could have,” I said a little too quickly. I loved football, and I went to every home game at BU. Every time Griff Shipley had taken the field in his tight pants, my eyes had been glued to his very fine ass. Not that I was about to admit that I paid way too much attention to him well before we ever hooked up.

  In fact, I’d done something quite obnoxious. When he’d introduced himself to me at the frat party, I’d made him repeat his name.

  “Something funny?” he asked as I smiled into his shoulder.

  “Not a thing.” I cleared my throat. “Maybe you won’t farm forever. You’re young. Some day you’ll have choices.”

  “I’m here at least until Daphne and Dylan get sorted out. And most days I’m happy,” he said quietly. “I like the work. What I don’t like is the pressure. We’re always one bad crop away from bankruptcy, you know?”

  “Football players are always one bad game away from a debilitating injury,” I pointed out.

  “True.”

  His fingers stroked my hair, and I began to drift on the sweetness of it all. My thoughts became misty as his hands wandered across my neck and down my back. He cupped my backside, pulling me tightly against his body. I woke up fully when I realized there was a very hard dick poking me in the belly. “Again?” I mumbled.

  “You should be so lucky,” he murmured.

  “Poor thing, you’ve got no self esteem.”

  He laughed and moved his hands onto my breasts. His smiling mouth moved to cover mine, and then we were kissing again, his beard chafing my face.

  I loved it.

  After a while he slipped me onto the sheet, face down. I heard the crackle of a condom wrapper. Then big hands spread my legs and reached between them.

  I pushed my face into the pillow to muffle my gasp. There was something dirty and wonderful about the way he handled me. Every touch was a command, as if I’d been placed on this earth to pleasure him. Judging from the way my body responded to his touch, perhaps I had.

  Maybe I should just get it over with and change my legal name to Tawdry. I’d need a new set of business cards, though…

  “Oh-fuck-gaaaahhhh,” I moaned as he pushed inside.

  He chuckled into my ear at close range. “That’s my girl. She wants my cock however I give it to her.”

  Guilty. I slammed my eyes shut and tried to memorize the way this felt. His burly body surrounded me. Thick arms boxed me in. Muscled legs held mine tightly together. I’d been immobilized in the most perfect way. And now he was dropping wet, open-mouthed kisses onto my neck, gently sucking on my skin.

  I let out another moan and tried to buck my hips. But I could barely move his great bulk.

  “Going somewhere?” he whispered.

  “Get on with it.”

  He chuckled. Then he gave his hips the slowest pump in the history of sex.

  I growled into the pillow.

  “Okay, baby,” he whispered, kissing my neck. “All right.” He picked up the pace, and I nearly wept with gratitude.

  As Griff whispered sweet, dirty things into my ear, I let go. My thoughts melted like a stick of fine butter. I stopped thinking so hard and let him carry me away again.

  Several hours later, I opened my eyes to a sunny morning.

  I knew right away that Griff was gone. It was too cool in the bed, for starters. That man’s body was like a furnace. And it was too quiet. Disappointment sliced through me, even if I knew he and I didn’t have a snuggling-and-out-to-breakfast relationship.

  We didn’t have a relationship at all.

  That’s when loneliness set in. Hard.

  This always happened to me, too. It was why I didn’t have many one-night stands. It wasn’t that sex embarrassed me. I wasn’t ashamed. It’s just that if something was good, I wanted more of it. Like a good brown butter sauce or salted caramels.

  It was probably a good thing that Griff had bailed already this morning. I’d have probably freaked him out by suggesting we get together again tonight. And I wasn’t in Vermont for Griffin Shipley. I was here for me.

  In the little bathroom, the shower squeaked to life. When I stepped under the spray, the water was warm and steady. So at least I had that going for me. Today I needed to find someone to sell me both fingerling potatoes and honey. (But not together, because ew.) My job could be worse. I could be digging ditches. I could be the dishwasher at a diner.

  Though if I effed up one more job for BPG, that dishwashing gig was a possibility.

  But first, coffee.

  Once showered and tidy, I gathered my farming notes and phone. Keys in hand, I opened the door to my little one-room cabin, almost stepping on a note that had been left just inside my door.

  Princess—wish we could have breakfast, but I’m off to milk 50 cows. You called the house phone last night, which means I don’t have your number. Here’s mine. 802.228.4330. —A.G.S.

  Aw.

  Okay, Audrey, I coached myself. You are not going to get all giddy about this note. Nope. Bad idea.

  Leaving a girl a note after two rounds of toe-curling sex was not all that romantic. It meant nothing. It meant that Griff Shipley wanted to keep things cheerful with his new fuck buddy. He’d probably left Zara fifty notes when they’d been together, right?

  Right.

  And what difference did it make, anyway? Griff was tied to his farm and his cows. I was going to build a foodie empire in Boston any minute now. It was a relationship with no future. Correction—it was a…sex fest with no future.

  Damn shame, though.

  I got in my rental car and drove two miles to The Mountain Goat. If I were a smarter girl, I would have already figured out if it was open for breakfast.

  There was one car in the parking lot, which told me nothing. So I pulled in.

  Now that I thought about it, hadn’t Griff left his truck here last night? He’d said it was intentional, so Mrs. Beasley wouldn’t gossip.

  Ouch. He didn’t want all his neighbors to know about our boinkfest. Which was probably because he didn’t want his family to know.

  While I might be deep in lust with Griff, I’d already fallen head over heels for his family. Given the chance, I’d move right into his kitchen. I wanted to be one of the lucky Shipleys who called Ruth “Mom” and set that big oak table for twelve every night. I would play Frisbee with Dylan and braid Daphne’s hair.

  This was the secret fantasy that every only child had occasionally. Over the years I’d appropriated dozens of my friends’ families, mentally inserting myself into their happy mayhem.

  Then again, if I were a Shipley, that would make Griff my brother. Ew. Bad plan.

  A tapping on my car window pulled me out of my reverie. I turned quickly to see Zara’s questioning look.

  Whoops.

  I opened the car door and stepped out. “Hi. Sorry. I was just wondering if you were open in the mornings for, you know, coffee.”

  Zara slowly shook her head. “I’ve thought about it. We have to take deliveries in the morning, so there’s usually someone here. But, no. Never figured that into the business plan.”

  My gaze tr
aveled to the wooden building. “You own this place?”

  “Nope. I manage it.” Her mouth turned hard. “But a woman can run a bar, you know. You don’t need a penis for everything.”

  “Sorry,” I said quickly. “I’m, um, familiar with the problem.”

  She raised her pierced eyebrow. “The problem of penises?”

  “Yes. No.” Hell. Which penis were we talking about here? Heat crawled up my neck. “I know, um, a bar can be run with a vagina. Well, not with the vagina but…” I coughed.

  Zara startled me by laughing. “You really do need coffee, don’t you?”

  “Yup.”

  She jerked her chin toward the shuttered restaurant. “Come on. I just made a pot to help me wait for the bread delivery.”

  I galloped after her like a happy pony. Free coffee? That would get me out of my lonely funk.

  Zara stopped at the side of the building to tug two bins full of beer bottles out into the open. It must be recycling day. Then she kicked open the door and headed through the dining room to a coffee pot behind the bar. She poured two mugs and grabbed a quart of milk out of the reach-in below the bar. “Here,” she said. “Have a seat.”

  I hoisted myself onto the same bar stool I’d sat on last night and poured a dollop of milk into my mug. Then I took a deep gulp of it. “Ahh,” I sighed. “Thank you.”

  She eyed me over the rim of her cup. “Speaking of penises.”

  Uh-oh.

  “Griff’s truck spent the night in the parking lot here.”

  I should have known that an interrogation would come with the coffee. It was probably worth it, though. I decided to play dumb. “Did it?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Just don’t fall for him, okay?”

  I’m sure I failed to hide my wince. “We, uh, used to hook up in college. Nothing serious.”

  “Oh,” she said slowly. “So you know how it is.”

  “Yeah.” I really did. He was like any bad habit—tasty and hard to resist.

  “He loves his apple trees and his family. And that’s a lot of trees and a giant family. So it’s almost as if they use up all his emotional availability. Half the county has it bad for Griff Shipley.”

  “I’ll bet.”

  Zara cupped her coffee mug in her hands and sighed. “There aren’t many single men around here, either. All the good ones move away, where there are better jobs.”

  “But not you?”

  She shook her head. “I like it here. But it’s lonely.”

  “You can be lonely anywhere,” I told her. “Trust me.” That was probably too much truth-telling, but hey—I hadn’t had a full cup of coffee yet.

  Zara measured me with her eyes. “You’re a fancy chef of some kind, right?”

  I snorted. “Only in my own mind. But someday it will be true.” I said this often, but I also believed it. Because good guys ultimately won out, and karma was real.

  “What brings you to Vermont?”

  Zara was interrogating me now, but I didn’t mind, because the coffee was dark and aromatic. “Business. I work for a big restaurant group that needs to up their farm-to-table game. It’s my job to fill up their shopping cart with produce.”

  “Huh. My uncles have an orchard and the pears look really good this year.”

  “Pears?” I perked up. “That’s not on my list, but I’ll bet my overlords would want some.”

  Zara smiled. “Let me write down the address, and I’ll call them and tell them to talk to you.”

  “Yay!” I drained my coffee. “This is great. Thank you.”

  “Don’t mention it,” she said with a frown. Zara seemed uncomfortable with affection. Or enthusiasm. I hadn’t quite figured her out yet. She jotted something on a cocktail napkin and then handed it to me.

  I tucked the address into my purse. “If you’re here in the mornings, you should sell coffee.”

  “I’ve thought about it.” She glanced around the room, as if picturing the place full of caffeine hounds. “But that would require adding on some even earlier hours. You can’t just walk in and start selling coffee, right? I’d need pastries, too…”

  “Good point.” And now I was craving pastries, damn it. I put my mug on the counter. “I’d better go. Thanks for all your help.”

  She gave me a wave and plucked my mug off the bar. “Later.”

  I went outside and got in the rental car. It was time to scope out some pears and find something for breakfast.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Griffin

  The morning I woke up beside Audrey was a good one. Even though I had to jog two miles to my truck at dawn and then put up with all the smirks in the cow barn, I was a happy man.

  And it wasn’t just the sex. Everything seemed to be going right for a change. When I told her about the big order from BPG, my mother’s mind was put at ease. Nobody panicked when I bought a set of three fermentation tanks that were larger than anything we already had. I got ’em used, too, from a guy in Massachusetts who was sizing up after just two years.

  That’s how things would go for me, too, right?

  The next few days had me feeling so optimistic that my helpers began to tease me. “Can you, like, snarl at us? Just once? It’s weird seeing you smile all the time,” Kyle complained.

  “Creeps us out,” Jude added.

  They needn’t have worried. My mood took a hit when a late afternoon windstorm did some damage to the apple trees at the front of the property. I probably lost twenty bushels of fruit when the storm knocked branches off several of my trees.

  “What do you want to do with these, boss?” Zachariah asked, showing me the immature fruit he’d begun to fetch off the ground. “Odds are they won’t ripen up even if we try sweating ’em.”

  “Never tell me the odds!” I quipped, earning a grin from Zach. I took the apple out of his hand and took a bite. It was hard, of course. But worse—the starches hadn’t converted to sugars yet. Hell. They’d make terrible cider. “Compost.”

  “Sure thing,” he said, helpful as ever.

  My mood continued to sink as the week ground onward. This was the most stressful part of the year—when I had a great crop hanging on my trees, but it couldn’t be harvested yet. All that potential was vulnerable to Mother Nature’s whims.

  But the buzz kill was that Audrey hadn’t called. I don’t know what I was expecting, really. All I knew is that I wanted to see her again. And if she only had a few days to be in Vermont, why the hell wouldn’t she want to spend ’em with me?

  Eventually I did what I should have done already. I got in my truck and I drove by the motor lodge. But Audrey’s rental car wasn’t out front, and her cabin was dark.

  Maybe she’d gone back to Boston already without bothering to tell me. I spent the night alone re-reading a couple chapters of The Lord of The Rings, because Zach had just finished reading it for the very first time, and I’d been chatting about it with him. It was hard to feel lonely while touring Middle-Earth.

  I went to sleep at nine. If I couldn’t have Audrey, at least I could have eight hours of sleep before my five o’clock wakeup. The next day I spent hours reading and rereading our latest round of organic certification paperwork. I hated the parts of my job that had to be done at a desk. What good was it being a farmer if you were trapped indoors?

  When I finally went outdoors to check on the day’s work, Zach nudged me. A Rav4 was coming up the drive.

  “Ooh, it’s Griff’s girrrrrlfriend,” Kyle sang.

  “What are we, twelve?” I growled to hide my excitement.

  After parking the car, she unfolded her long legs from the driver’s side and shut the door. I watched hungrily. Audrey was unnecessarily beautiful. She was like the butterflies I saw every day hovering over the meadow—they were more stunning than all the other pollinators. It didn’t really seem fair to the bees who did the same work.

  “Hello,” I said walking toward her car.

  She turned her chin up to look at me, an appraising look o
n her face. “Hi there.”

  “Thought I might hear from you before now,” I said slowly.

  Audrey squinted at me. “The contracts department hasn’t given me any paperwork for you yet.”

  I stared her down. “Ah, well. Guess there’s no reason you’d stop by, then. What was I thinking?”

  She blinked first, dropping her chin and turning to wave at Zach who was trotting toward the dairy barn in search of my little brother. Then she looked back up at me and frowned. “What’s the matter? What’d I do?”

  “Nothing,” I said quickly. What did I expect, anyway? “What can I help you with?”

  Her expression turned sheepish. “I’ve come to beg you to sell me some apples.”

  There were other things I wished she’d beg me for, but apparently that topic was off limits. “Let me guess. The price isn’t great.”

  “Well, it’s double what they offered before. Two bucks a pound. But they want something interesting. Some kind of heirloom variety that the pastry chefs can make a fuss over.”

  “In other words, they want the best thing I’ve got for a cheap price.”

  “Yeah.” She sighed. “But maybe you could just sell me a small amount? I’ve been having to piece things together all over the place. So a few bushels would really help me out.”

  “Of course I can.” And I couldn’t resist reaching out to push an errant piece of hair out of her face.

  Her eyes lit up. “Really? And you have something good and weird to sell me?”

  “Yeah.” I thought about it for a second. “I have a few Blue Pearmain trees.”

  “Are they blue?” Audrey looked positively giddy.

  “They’re blueish. Blue for an apple. Henry David Thoreau wrote about ’em. They were his favorite variety. That ought to give your snobby pastry guy a big boner.”

  “Totally!” She put both hands on my chest. “This is awesome! Thank you so much!”

  Swear to god, nobody ever looked so cute and sexy talking about apples before. “You’re welcome.” I grabbed her hands. “Now come with me for a few minutes. I want your help with something.