A Farm Fresh Romance Series 1-3 (A Farm Fresh Romance Box Set)

by Valerie Comer

Jo had yearned for that herself, many times. Sierra was the only one she knew with some sort of normal family. Too bad it hadn’t made her friend more understanding. Enough. She’d do her best to set aside the jealousy over Sierra’s ease with Zach.

  “Speaking of which, I had an email from my dad,” Sierra continued.

  Jo swung her legs over the edge of the bed. “Oh?”

  “He and Jacob will be here the fifteenth for two whole weeks. We’ll get the straw bales up.” She retreated to the hallway as Jo advanced toward her.

  Two strong guys would go a long way to raising the walls on the new house, even if they knew as little about straw bale building as the girls did. Sierra’s dad had renovated their Portland house, though, and her little brother had helped. They were in good hands.

  “Where are they staying?” called Claire from the kitchen.

  “Oh, Dad’s bringing the motor home.”

  Jo followed Sierra down the hallway. Sierra’s dad and brother had helped the girls move, and it would be great to see them again. They had such an easy relationship.

  Unlike her and her mom. Never mind Brad.

  Chapter 16

  “The GPS unit doesn’t know where Thompson Road is, Josephine. How are we supposed to find you?”

  Jo bit hard on her tongue. Mom made it sound like Jo had blanked the navigation system’s memory on purpose. “I could give you directions.”

  “Well, please do. Brad needs to get back to Spokane tonight. We don’t have all day.”

  “What are you going to drive while you’re here? I told you there isn’t a rental place in Galena Landing.”

  “Nonsense. Don’t you still have that little hatchback? I’ll drive it.”

  Deep breath. “I don’t own a car, Mom. I sold it before we moved out here. The girls and I share a car, and it’s not available.”

  “What?” There was static then her voice became muffled. “Brad! She doesn’t have a car anymore.”

  Jo heard her stepfather curse. How she had missed the two of them.

  Mom spoke to Jo again. “Well, we’ll deal with that when we get there. We’re on Highway 95 at some park by the lake. Lakeside Park. How original.”

  “Do you want to stop off at the hotel and freshen up first?” Maybe she’d hate the place so much she’d leave again with Brad.

  “No, I told you. Brad has to get back to Spokane. Which road do we take from here? I’ll stay on the line while we drive.”

  Jo sighed and rattled off the first stage of directions. She had no more than five minutes before the grand arrival, but in that amount of time she heard all about how Brad’s son’s ex was suing the family. Served Earl right. He was a jerk.

  Jo counted the seconds since she’d told them to turn at the last intersection.

  Her mother’s monologue ended with a sharp intake of breath.

  Right on time.

  “Oh my word. Josephine. You can’t mean you live in that…that…”

  Her mother, at a loss for words? Couldn’t remember when that had happened last. “The old dumpy trailer? Yep, that’s us.” Jo couldn’t resist. “We got a really good deal on it.”

  “And it’s a mud driveway.” Mom disconnected the call.

  Nothing else to say? Not likely. She was saving it up.

  Jo peered out the window as a gray Lexus sedan turned into the pot-holey driveway and inched forward. Her stepfather obviously meant to keep the rental’s muffler intact. Good call, Brad.

  Claire appeared by Jo’s shoulder. “They’re here, I see.”

  Brilliant observation. “Yeah.”

  “God must have brought them here for a reason. We’re praying for you.”

  Guilt knifed through Jo’s heart and tears flooded her eyes. “Do you really think so?”

  “Jo, you know so. You asked us all to pray for your mom and Brad years ago. And we have been. I know you have some bitterness still—”

  Now that was an understatement.

  “—but I think God brought them here so you could make things right with them.”

  In the absence of a true parking spot, Brad pulled the Lexus in alongside the old Golf. Brad waved his hands and then slammed one down on the steering wheel. Jo’s mother looked like she was yelling back at him.

  Delightful. Everyone was in a great mood to start. That would make things go even smoother. And they had yet to slog through the mud to the trailer steps.

  Mom got out of the car and rounded the back of it, her gaze on the ground. When she came into Jo’s line of vision wearing a narrow lavender skirt with matching jacket—and teetering on impossibly tall heels—Jo understood why. Those pumps were no match for the muck created by a week’s worth of rain.

  Claire’s hand squeezed Jo’s shoulder. “Wow, I thought your mom had lived in the country before. She’s sure not dressed for it.”

  A giggle tried to bubble up, but in reality, Jo’s mom would be only that much more commanding because of the added difficulty when she finally got into the trailer. “Oh, yeah. She grew up on a farm across the border in Canada.”

  “In other words, she should have known better.”

  Brad exited the car in a dark gray suit, complete with a tie. Those polished black oxfords would need to stop at a shoeshine stand before his fancy schmancy hotel would let him in.

  Jo sighed. “They both should have guessed. And I suppose I should have remembered to tell them. I’m so used to it now it didn’t cross my mind.” She walked over to the door and opened it. “Hi there.”

  Her feisty little mother stopped squishing through the mud to glare at her. “You could have warned us.”

  That fired Jo’s back up, no matter what she’d just told Claire. “I did. I told you it’s been a wet spring. I told you we lived on a farm.”

  “But this?” Mom waved her manicured hand to encompass the ground around her.

  Brad grasped her elbow and all but lifted her across to the squishy grass. “There you go, Denise.”

  Mom toddled up the steps, Brad right behind her.

  Jo edged backward into the kitchen. “Welcome to Green Acres.” If only she weren’t lying about the welcome part.

  Brad looked around with disdain oozing from every pore. Not that Jo expected anything different from him.

  Mom leaned forward and kissed the air beside each of Jo’s cheeks in turn. “Oh, Josephine. You don’t have to live like this. Just come home. Brad will find you something to do in his company, won’t you, darling?”

  Brad jerked like he’d been bitten. “Yes, of course. There’s always room for one of our own.”

  Claire, who’d disappeared like a wisp of fog, now floated into the kitchen from the corridor. “Why hello, Mr. and Mrs. Jimmiesin. Good to see you.”

  Brad looked her up and down as though she were an animal at the zoo.

  Mom glanced at Jo.

  “This is my friend Claire Halford. She’s a chef.”

  Brad’s eyebrows rose so quickly they merged with his bushy hair. “A chef.” Statement not question.

  Jo took a deep breath. “Yes, she trained in Paris and worked at a great spot in Seattle the past few years.”

  Jo’s mom examined Claire. “I’m sure that’s nice, dear. It can’t be easy making decent food in a kitchen like this.”

  Claire smiled. “It’s a bit of a challenge, to be sure. But we’re starting on our community house in a couple of weeks, and we’ll have more space in there.”

  “It’s not coming a moment too soon,” Brad said.

  “How…lovely.” Mom’s lip trembled. “You girls plan to keep living together? How big will the new place be?”

  Jo opened her mouth to answer, but Mom pushed on. “Why not each build your own? If it’s money that’s holding you back—”

  “About two thousand square feet,” Claire cut in. “We’d go smaller if we didn’t need room for guests. And a commercial kitchen, of course.”

  Jo’s mother’s eyes bugged out. “Smaller? But…two thousand? My word, ther
e’s no elbow room in that tight a space.”

  “More than double what we have now.” Jo gritted her teeth. Just because Mom had upgraded from an apartment to a huge mansion when she hooked up with Brad didn’t mean Jo had appreciated the vast caverns of his California estate.

  “We are each planning to build our own cottage later,” Claire went on. “Then we’ll use the community house as a bed and breakfast for people who want to come and experience life on our farm.”

  Brad wiped his shoes against the mat.

  Jo could just about hear his thoughts. Like anyone would want this experience. Little did he know lots of their college friends were jealous. They had a great gig happening here.

  Mom turned to Jo. “I was going to offer you money for your own place, but—” She shook her head as she looked around.

  Jo only hoped any mice, alive or dead, would stay out of her mother’s line of vision.

  “—but I really can’t condone this kind of lifestyle. I do think you should come back to California.”

  Had she forgotten Jo hadn’t asked for her approval—or her cash? “Why don’t you come sit down in the living room?”

  Brad glanced at Jo’s mom as she took a step toward the adjoining space.

  “Won’t you stay for dinner, Mr. Jimmiesin?” Claire asked. “We’re having chicken stir-fry with kale and wild rice tonight.”

  Perfect for the caviar man. No surprise when he shook his head. “Thanks anyway.” He attempted some sort of smile then leaned down to peck his wife’s cheek. “I need to return to Spokane. My first appointment is at eight in the morning. I’ll check your bag in at the hotel on my way through, Denise. See you Saturday.” Brad reached for the doorknob behind his back.

  Jo’s mom cast a desperate plea in his direction. “How will I get to town?”

  Brad paused. “I’m sure one of the girls won’t mind giving you a lift.” He looked over Jo’s cast arm with disapproval. “Not, perhaps, Josephine.”

  No duh. Should Jo say something about their mandate and the number of trips to town they made in a week? Nah, no point. Someone would drive Mom in, or she would drive all of them crazy. No discussion required.

  Claire felt the same way. “Sure, I can give you a ride after dinner, Mrs. Jimmiesin. It’s not a problem.”

  Brad nodded. “That’s settled, then.” His disdainful look swept the trailer once more before he disappeared out the door. A moment later the Lexus lurched out of the driveway.

  “Come on in the living room, Mom.” Jo turned toward the rickety recliner. “Claire will let us know when supper is ready.”

  “Dinner,” Mom corrected on autopilot.

  Like it mattered.

  “Where is the other one? Sierra, I think her name is?” Mom perched on the edge of one of the loveseats. Maybe she was afraid it would swallow her.

  Jo settled into the recliner. “Picking up groceries.”

  Mom’s eyes narrowed. “I thought you said there was only one car between you.”

  “Oh.” Jo waved a hand. “She has the bike trailer.”

  Mom’s face contorted as she leaned forward and lowered her voice. “I raised you better than this. This may be all your friends can afford or aspire to, but you don’t need to sink this low. I commend your loyalty to them, but all you need to do is say the word and I’ll set things up for you at home.”

  Jo stared blankly. Her mother thought all this was someone else’s dream, not hers? Okay, not the mud so much. Or the mice. Or even the trailer. But the rest? “Uh, thanks. But it’s my choice. I want to be here.”

  “Well, I never.” Mom flapped her hand in front of her face. “You had everything money could buy, Jo. Why throw it all away?”

  Mom made it sound like she was really trying to understand, but experience told Jo otherwise. She took a deep breath. “Money isn’t the most important thing to me.”

  “Apparently.”

  And apparently her mother would never understand. No surprise there.

  **

  “Zach, my boy, can I get you to go out on a call when you’re done here?” Wally Taubin leaned against the doorframe of Exam Room 2.

  “Sure. A couple more sutures and this pup will be as good as new.” Zach smiled at the pre-adolescent girl who rubbed her puppy’s ears. He completed the stitching and tied it off. “No more letting him run into barbed wire fences, you hear?”

  The girl looked up at him with wide eyes. “I’ll try, Dr. Nemesek.”

  Zach resisted the impulse to muss her hair. “Nadine here will tell you what you need to do to help Bandit heal quickly, okay?”

  She nodded.

  Nadine waved her hands to shoo Zach away, and he followed Doc Taubin into the refrigerated pharmacy at the end of the corridor. “What’s up?”

  “Problems out at the Waterman farm.” Wally stacked boxes of medication into an insulated case. “Several cows coughing. He hopes it’s nothing serious, but you know it could be.”

  Zach’s heart sank. Number one reason he wanted to be a city vet? He hated working with large farm animals, especially cows. No other animals were quite so stupid—with the possible exception of sheep, but at least sheep were small enough to manhandle. Cows… He shook his head. His preferences didn’t matter today. He’d signed on to cover for Wally and so he would. He picked up one of the packages and read the dosage-to-weight ratio. Looked like he was going to be at the Watermans’ for most of the day by the amount of meds Wally was sending along.

  His boss turned a pensive frown to Zach. “I wish I could be of help to you, but the hip gives out too easily and I can’t risk injuring it now with only a few days until surgery.”

  “Oh, I’ll be fine.” Zach hoped he sounded more confident than he felt. “Gary will give me a hand, no doubt.”

  Wally nodded and proceeded to brief Zach on the procedure. They’d done shots like these in college, but never since.

  “You’ll need to inoculate the rest of the herd so it doesn’t spread.”

  “How many head?”

  “Only thirty-five, plus calves.”

  Only? Yeah, he knew it wasn’t a big farm, but still. There went the day.

  Wally put his hand on Zach’s arm. “Waterman is worried. Those cows represent his farm profit for the year. Not only that, but Leasks’ feedlot is next door to him. What would happen if the disease got into there?”

  No doubt the situation was the other way around. That’s where Dad had been working, after all. And he was sick. Zach had dug into enough case files to suspect it wasn’t a coincidence. He sighed. Nothing like a little pressure. He grabbed his coveralls and boots then snapped the case lid shut. “I’m on my way.”

  Chapter 17

  Claire brought Jo’s mom out to the farm the next morning before she and Sierra left for appointments in town. Jo watched the VW pull out of the drive for the second time in half an hour. Too bad she hadn’t been scheduled to work, but her mother had somehow timed her visit well, and Jo wasn’t due back at the care home until Monday.

  To give Mom credit, today she wore slacks and a turtleneck rather than a dress suit. But as soon as she opened her mouth, Jo remembered the same person lived inside the clothes.

  “When will you be done in this God-forsaken place and come home where you belong? You know we didn’t pay your way through university so you could throw it all away in some hick town on the border.”

  Jo filled the kettle and turned it on to heat. She pulled out the coffee beans and grinder, one at a time, and set them on the counter. “This place isn’t forsaken by God. He made it and poured almost more beauty into it than it can hold.”

  “Beauty?” Disbelief etched Mom’s voice.

  “Sure, it’s brown and muddy right now. But the fruit trees have already blossomed and the grass will grow.”

  “But there’s no culture.”

  Jo glanced at her. “Depends on what you mean by that.” She buzzed the coffee grinder. Getting the lid off with one arm in a cast was a pain. She dumped
the grounds into the French press, barely getting any on the counter.

  “But.”

  “Mom, we’ve been over this.” Like last night. “I appreciate the education, I really do. Do you want me to pay Brad back? Because I can start with payments if you like.”

  Her mother’s eyes narrowed. “Brad has nothing to do with it.”

  Right. Because her mother had been rolling in dough when she met the guy.

  “You could have anything you wanted if you came home to work for Jimmiesin Farms. You could build a mansion right next door to ours.” Mom’s nose twitched in distaste as she evaluated the little trailer. “Get a cleaning lady.”

  The kettle whistled and Jo turned to pour the boiling water over the grounds. Lord, what do I say to her? “I appreciate the offer. I really do.”

  Hope infused her mother’s voice. “Then you’ll come?”

  Jo shook her head. “No. I have to do what I believe in.”

  The perplexed look on her mother’s face pained Jo. How had she managed to cling to the values her grandparents had taught her, when they’d so obviously escaped her mother? Must be a gene that skipped generations. Good thing Jo wasn’t likely to have kids. She wouldn’t want them to take after their grandmother. She pushed the plunger down, separating the liquid from the grounds, then poured the brew into two pottery mugs. “What do you take in your coffee?”

  “Just sugar.”

  Jo closed her eyes for a second. This was going to go over well. “There’s honey.”

  “That’s not what I asked for.”

  “It’s what we use for sweetener. Unless you want molasses.” Ouch. She should’ve bit her tongue instead of adding that.

  “Very funny, Josephine Lynn. That would be even more disgusting.”

  Which wasn’t quite an answer on a sugar substitute. Jo set the honey jar on the table, hoping there were no mired toast crumbs.

  “You’re serious.”

  “Yep. Do you know how much energy it takes to refine sugar? Plus most of it is genetically modified. Honey is much more natural.”

  “I don’t need a sermon, Josephine.” Mom’s nose curled as she dipped a spoon in the honey jar and transferred it to her mug. “Do you want some, too?”