Fern’s voice carried easily as she explained what the plan was for the day.
Every guy there was watching her. Listening. Enjoying the new project.
Fern put down her clipboard and stood at the head of one table where everyone could see her. “We’re going to plant seeds in these small starter pots. We have green beans, cucumbers and pumpkin seeds. It’s a bit late for corn, but we’ll try it next year. It’s still fun to get our hands dirty.”
She glanced around the group—and her stare landed on Crew.
Without shifting his stare from her, he drifted to the closest table and positioned himself in front of some starter pots she’d scattered among the group.
“Now choose your packet of seeds. On the back it will tell you how deep to plant it in the dirt, and how many seeds to place in each. Some of them arereallysmall. Here’s what I do.” She dumped a few seeds into her palm and took a pinch. Everyone watched as she poked her finger in the dirt, creating a small hole, dropped the seeds in and covered them with dirt.
“See? As easy as that.” She smiled at them all, but when she locked gazes with Crew once more, that pretty flush that got himevery timecoated her cheeks.
She moved among them, answering questions, encouraging, never making anyone feel foolish for asking.
One of the guys frowned down at his tray. “How deep is this supposed to go? Three-eighths of an inch, right?”
“How do we know how deep three-eighths of an inch is?” another guy called out. “Does anyone have a tape measure?”
Fern laughed softly. “Okay, listen. Let me tell you a story.”
She told them about camping with her family when she was young. About roughing it. About there being no outhouse.
She blushed as she said they had a designated spot forthat, and the entire group leaned in, enthralled.
“We ate a lot of hamburgers with tomato slices on top. The next year,” she went on, “tomatoes were growing out there. Just…growing. And no way were we eating them knowing where they came from. But it proves something.”
She spread her hands. “Seeds will sprout anywhere.”
Laughter rolled through the tent, easy and genuine. The tension melted away from some of them, and the vets went back to work.
Crew’s chest tightened.
God, he was proud of her and of what she’d built here on her own. She’d fled in the night from a bad relationship, yet she managed not only to find ways to heal but to help others do the same.
When things wrapped up, he caught her eye. She drifted over with a tiny sway in her sexy hips.
“Dinner.”
She blinked. “You can eat after that story I told about the tomatoes?”
He grinned. “Everything is better with you.”
The vets drifted off, and Crew helped Fern clean up. Afterward, they climbed into his truck, dust still clinging to their clothes and on their skin.
“Should I go home and change clothes before we eat?”
He looked her over, gaze snagging on her hips, her waist, her breasts. “Can if you want. But you look good to me.”
Her freckles stood out more under her blush.
“If you don’t mind, I need to stop by the post office.” The thick bundle of letters he and Gray had written that week were stowed in the console, addressed and stamped.
“No problem.” She settled back in the seat, a soft smile teasing the corners of her lips.
He flicked through radio stations with deliberate care until he found one he knew she’d love.
Sure enough, Fern’s face lit up. Their gazes locked for a beat, and she launched into the chorus.
