“Well, all right. But you be sure to run and tell me if he ever pesters you again.”
“I will.”
He gave a stiff nod, then returned his attention to his work. “Would you mind running in and asking your mother about lunch?”
“Of course, Papa.” I kissed him on the head and headed toward the house.
“Mama!” I called, opening the door, but she didn’t answer. I moved into the kitchen and didn’t see any lunch preparations, so I went ahead and started something myself. No doubt Mama would be back soon enough. I set some eggs and potatoes to boiling, then pulled out a loaf of bread. I went outside and down to the cellar to get a little butter, and as I came back up, my mother was approaching the house, her steps hurried and her head shaking.
“Hello, Mama.”
She raised her head to look at me and smiled. “Have you started lunch?”
“Yes.”
Her step slowed, and her shoulders relaxed. “Good girl,” she said as she entered the house.
I followed after. “Is everything well?”
She checked the pot of water that hung over the fire and then sat down with a sigh, shaking her head again. “I was just visiting with Mildred.”
“Is she well?”
Another resigned shake of her head.
“Has Mr. Tanner had another bout of confusion?”
“It’s not only confusion. He’s becoming more and more irrational as his fear seems to be getting worse.”
“What can she do for him?”
She threw up her hands. “Nothing. There is nothing to be done for him. It’s as though his mind no longer works properly, but only sometimes. Other times he seems perfectly fit.”
I finally set the butter on the table and picked up the loaf of bread to tear off several chunks. “Did something happen today?”
She passed a worried hand over her eyes. “He climbed onto their roof with a burning torch in hand.”
My chest convulsed in alarm. “Why?”
“He kept saying something about an intruder. Luckily we were able to coax him down before the thatch caught fire or he lost his footing. Poor Mildred is frazzled, as you can well imagine. It’s taking its toll on her. We’ll need to check in on them more often.”
“Of course.”
She nodded and then pulled herself up, as if physically and mentally moving on to the next thing. “Well, let’s get this lunch finished before your father perishes from starvation, shall we?”
She gave a little wink and I was happy to see the sparkle return to her eyes. “And then I can finally start spinning that wool,” she said while dusting off her hands and turning to the fire.
I smiled, grateful that my duties during harvest relieved me of that chore. The idea of spending hours on end inside, bent over a wheel would have soured my mood completely.
Chapter Nine
THREE DAYS LATER, my patience had been worn to a breaking point by Fynn’s competitive spirit, and though I was grateful for his help, I was ready to have the orchard to myself again. I was also anxious to have Rylan help me, and I pretended to be patient while waiting for him to come along.
I had use of the wagon, so I was able to keep picking to my heart’s content without dragging Herman to and from the barn.
I was up on the ladder, facing the road, when I spotted Rylan’s horse trotting toward me, and a wicked idea entered my head. I quickly descended the ladder, but left it where it was, along with Herman and the wagon. I ran to a nearby tree and pulled myself up into the branches. I climbed up a ways before sitting on a limb and gathering several small apples in my lap to use for ammunition. Then I tried to slow my breathing so I could wait in silence for his arrival.
It wasn’t long before he walked into view, leading Apollo. I could tell the moment he spotted my wagon and pony because he made straight for it. He wrapped Apollo’s reins around a tree before approaching Herman and giving him a pat. “Kinley?” he called after noting the empty ladder.
I let my first apple fly, hitting him on the shoulder.
“Ow!” He jumped. “What? Kinley!” He looked around but couldn’t find me, so I clamped down on my laughter and threw a few more.
He spotted me this time and ran toward my tree. It was then I realized I had nowhere to go. He jumped up and caught the first branch, easily pulling himself into the tree. “What are you going to do now, you imp? You have nowhere to go.”
I couldn’t help the shriek that escaped as I climbed frantically higher. “I did not plan this well!”
“What?” He swung closer. “You didn’t plan on cornering yourself in a tree?”
I hid behind the trunk. “I’m sorry! I shouldn’t have pelted you with fruit. I won’t do it anymore.”
“You expect me to just let you off the hook, when you laid in wait for me? Ambushed me? And probably even bruised me?”
“I’m sorry.” I peeked around the trunk at him, trying to look contrite, even though I wasn’t.
He had stopped several branches below me and was pulling the collar of his shirt down to look for bruises. “You throw surprisingly well.”
“I didn’t mean to.” I tried to sound meek, but I was grinning at the same time.
He quickly climbed the last couple of branches so that he was on the opposite side of the trunk from where I sat. He tried to look stern, but ended up laughing as he said, “You most certainly did mean to!”
I hid again, feeling cornered, but also excited and nervous and fluttery. “What are you going to do?”
“Honestly, I don’t know what to do with you when you are cowering.”
I leaned to the side so that I could see him again and gave him my most innocent smile. “You could let me climb down,” I suggested while easing to the branch below me.
He narrowed his eyes at me and eased down so that he remained on the same level.
“And we could forget all of this ever happened.” I infused my voice with sweetness while making my way lower.
“Why do I feel like an animal being lured into a trap?”
I tried a distraction in the hopes that he wouldn’t realize how not sorry I was. “There’s more harvesting that I need to get done.”
“I already had one bruise from where you punched me. Now I’m likely to have more.” He moved suddenly closer. “Don’t you think that deserves some restitution?”
My heart jumped, but I tried to keep my wits about me. “I have a salve I could get for you. Mama swears by it for bruising.”
He lunged for me, but we had reached the bottom branches and I evaded capture by dropping to the ground. I backed away, holding in my nervous laughter as he watched me like a falcon and slowly lowered himself to the ground. I backed up a few more steps.
“If you run, I can easily catch you,” he warned.
“And what would you do then?” I backed up another step.
He raised one eyebrow. “Do you truly wish to find out?”
Yes. No. Maybe. “Are you suggesting I should surrender?”
“I’m saying you should pay the price for your crimes.”
He certainly could catch me, so I decided to stand my ground and try to win the war with words. “I already offered you a salve. What more do you want, you greedy beast?”
“A beast, am I?” His hands were behind his back as he advanced with feigned nonchalance.
“Yes.” I lifted my chin. “Only a beast would wish to punish me simply for teasing.”
“I was humiliated by your brazen attack.” He wagged a finger at me.
I tucked my hair back under my kerchief, nervous at the unknown of what he would do next.
He eyed me, scrutinizing my nervous habit. “I think you need to suffer similar discomfort.”
“You mean to intimidate me?” I put my hands to my side and pulled my shoulders back, trying to look confident while having to tip my head back to look into his eyes. He was quite close.
“I simply mean to do a little teasing of my own.” He reached toward my face, and m
y breath caught as, for a split second, I thought perhaps he was going to caress my cheek or some other such romantic gesture. Instead, he reached behind my head, and before I could think to stop him, he had pulled the kerchief from my hair.
“What are you doing?” I tried to grab for it, but he stepped back and held it behind him.
He grinned. “So that’s what you’re trying to hide.”
I ran my fingers through my wild, tight curls, trying not to let my self-consciousness turn my cheeks red. “I’m not hiding anything. I’m merely trying to keep it under control.” I gathered my hair in my hands, attempting to keep it from looking like a windblown haystack.
He chuckled and tugged on my hands. “Just let me see it for a moment.”
I sighed in resignation and released my hair, crossing my arms as I looked up at him through the curl that bounced in front of my eyes.
He studied me for several moments, trying not to smile too widely, but his eyes were lit with mirth.
“Have you had enough amusement at my expense?” I asked in what my mother would have called my sassy voice.
“I’m not amused.” He pulled on a curl, then released it so that it sprang back into place. “I’m enchanted.”
I rolled my eyes. “It’s not enchanting. It’s a disaster.”
“That’s a matter of opinion.” He waggled his eyebrows at me and backed away, swinging my kerchief from his hand. “Now come along, and I’ll let you put me to work.”
I shook my head and followed after him, smiling in spite of myself.
He reached my ladder and gestured grandly toward it. Instead of climbing as he intended, I stopped directly in front of him and held out my hand, wiggling my fingers. I needed my kerchief back.
He decided to be obtuse, and instead of handing over my property, he took my hand and kissed my palm. I snatched it away and took the opportunity to grab for my kerchief. He quickly held it out of reach, laughing. “Why are you so attached to this thing anyway?”
I shoved my hair away from my face. “I can’t work if I can’t see. And I can’t see unless my hair is tied back.”
“Fine. Turn around.”
“Why?”
“I’m going to tie your hair back.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, suspicious, but he only smiled and twirled his finger. I turned, hoping this wasn’t one more way to tease me. He took hold of my hair, but instead of gathering it all together, he seemed to be dividing it into different sections—not an easy feat when my curls wrapped together and clung to one another. I let him continue without saying anything, curious what he was going to do. When he took one section and wrapped in over another, I asked, “Are you braiding my hair?”
“Do you object to a braid?”
“Hardly.” Was he really braiding my wild mane? “I’m just surprised that you know how.”
“My horse likes to have her tail braided.”
“Are you comparing me to your horse again?”
He cleared his throat. “No, not in the least.” He sounded guilty.
If I’d been able to turn and look at him, I would have glared.
He continued winding my hair together, then wrapped my kerchief around it and tied it in a knot. Several curls had refused to be confined and framed my face, which would bother me, but I didn’t say anything. Despite my suspicions that he was only trying to get a rise out of me, the gesture had actually been very sweet. His hands in my hair had felt nice—intimate without being inappropriate.
I turned and gave him a smile of thanks, curiously at a loss for words.
He gestured toward the ladder again. “Shall we work?”
I nodded and climbed the ladder, but his question made me curious. “Don’t you have work at home that you should be doing?”
“I’m the lazy, privileged, younger son of a lord.”
“I don’t believe for a second that you laze about all day. You used to study your books far past the time when your tutors were finished with you. Surely your father realized that he could put all of that knowledge to some sort of use.”
“He did.”
I nearly fell off the ladder when his voice came from right behind me. He had climbed up until he was only two rungs below. As I looked back at him, he pulled himself off the ladder and into the branches before climbing higher. I watched him, wondering how he was going to harvest if he had no basket. My question was answered when he steadied himself on a branch and pulled his cape around, grabbing the corners and using it in the same way I used my apron.
Industrious, that’s what he was, and I couldn’t help but admire him for it. “So what is it that you do for your father?”
“I’m his unofficial man of business.”
“And what does a man of business do?”
He kept his focus on loading his cape with apples. “I keep track of his land holdings, his tenants, their crops, their yields, their successes and failures. I advise on how to improve crop yield and how to combat bad weather, insects, and small animals. Sometimes I get involved in disputes and try to resolve them, but he usually handles that on his own.”
I was dumbstruck by the way he rattled off his list of duties as if they were insignificant or unimpressive. I looked around at my own little orchard. “Do you have any suggestions for me?”
He looked down at me and grinned, almost as if he were proud. “For a one-woman operation, you do amazingly well.”
I chose that moment to climb down the ladder so that I could hide my grin and my red face. His praise made me want to giggle and twirl my hair and all sorts of ridiculous things. I unburdened myself and turned back to move the ladder to the other side of the tree. I startled when Rylan dropped down in front of me. His unrestrained grin made me want to fidget. Instead I cleared my throat and asked, “And why is your position unofficial? It sounds like you have it well in hand.”
“I do,” he said as he dumped the contents of his cape into the baskets. “But being a man of business is not an appropriate vocation for the son of a lord, so my father insists that I not claim the title.”
“But he doesn’t mind that you do the work?” I set a hand on the ladder, needing to move it, but more interested in his answer.
“Not at all. He seems quite satisfied with my abilities.”
“Then what does the title matter?”
He shook a few twigs from his cape, then threw it behind him. “That is an excellent question. One I’ve pondered over myself and for which I don’t have an answer.” He shrugged as he took the ladder and moved it for me. “I’ve given up on trying to understand why it’s so important to him.”
“Do you get along with your father?”
“He . . . tolerates me.” He lifted the corners of his mouth briefly in the imitation of a smile.
“I’m sorry.”
“Nothing to fret over.” He wiggled the ladder where he had positioned it on the other side of the tree to be sure it was stable. “I tolerate him as well.”
“Are your brother’s and sister’s relationships with him similarly strained?” I asked as I climbed the ladder.
“No. It’s only me.”
“It’s not that way with your mother, though, is it?” I’d only encountered her a few times, but I was almost certain she was liberally indulgent.
“My parents are complete opposites in many ways.” He climbed up behind me but jumped into the tree as he had before. “The only reason I haven’t been turned into a spoiled laze-about by my mother is because my father makes up for it with his own severity.”
“You got your love of books from her?” I was picking slower than usual, distracted by the conversation, but I figured his help would make up for it.
“Yes. And she not only loves to read them, but to care for them and collect them. She was ecstatic when I brought her your book.”
“Do you think you’ll be able to fix it?”
“My mother thinks we will be able to repair most of the damage.” He paused until I looked at him. “She
was quite curious about how I came to be in possession of a book from the royal library.” He said it with such weight that I knew it must be significant.
I turned one palm up, while holding my apron with the other hand. “All I know is that it came from Ella.”
“Did you know all books from the royal library are marked as such?”
“I didn’t. What kind of mark do they use?”
“It’s stamped into the leather on the back cover.”
“Oh.” Of course I had noticed the design on the back of many of the books Ella lent me, but I hadn’t thought anything of it. I was much more interested in what the pages said. “So what did you tell your mother?”
“Honestly, I was quite flummoxed at first. Then I realized that it made perfect sense if they were loaned to you by Princess Ariella. So I told her of our friendship and explained who your brother was. She’s very excited to be able to do what she can to restore the volume. She admires Princess Ariella a great deal.”
“You can just call her Ella.”
“No, you can call her that. I’ve been given no such permission.” He raised his free hand as if refusing to take any part of that responsibility. Then he climbed out of the tree with one hand while he held his cape full of apples with the other.
I smiled, amused that he would think of Ella as being formidable in some way.
After unburdening his cape, he climbed back up and sat on a branch just above me, draping his arms over another branch that was at his chest level. “Dare I ask how the pursuit of young Zander is going?”
I looked at him sideways. “I’m fairly certain that young Zander is older than you are.”
“Not the point.”
I just raised my brows at him and returned to work, hoping to be mysterious.
“It’s unfair to keep secrets now that you’ve forced me to be your confidant,” he griped.
I cut my eyes over to him and then descended the ladder. The truth was that I didn’t know what to do about Zander. I didn’t know what I wanted to do anymore.
“Kinley,” he said in a somewhat threatening tone.
“Yes?” I asked as I unloaded my apron.
“Please.”
That simple word caught me off guard. It wasn’t teasing or sarcastic. It was . . . I didn’t know what, and I was a little nervous to find out. So I gave in. I returned to the ladder but paused with my hands gripping a higher rung and my foot resting on the bottom one. I looked up at him. “I’m not going to try to force it anymore.”
Keeping Kinley Page 10