“Provisions?”
“Yep.” She kicked her feet up on the firepit rim. “Oh, and that I need to study the bylaws.”
“For The Haven?”
“Yes.”
“Seems wise. She’s not my favorite person, but no one could ever say she wasn’t a sly fox.”
Bronwyn stared across the firepit toward the property she owned on the other side of the river, and memories flooded through her. They’d played here as children. Splashed in the river. Played hide-and-seek in the trees. Their land wasn’t heavily forested, but there were more trees than bare patches. Cal and Landry’s house was so deliciously nestled into the trees that it felt like someone had planted a house seed and it had grown up right along with the woods.
“Did I tell you Landry tried to sell me the land back?”
If Mo found her abrupt change of subject surprising, he didn’t let on.
“I told her I’d buy it back from her if she needed the money, but otherwise that she should keep it and sell it back to me when Eliza’s ready to go to college. It will be worth a lot more then. It’s not like I need it.”
Mo eased his wounded leg up to the firepit rim beside hers. “Cal told me. He thought it was brilliant. Landry was offended that you would think she would take advantage of you that way.”
“Landry is an incredible artist, but her business sense is nonexistent. She’d give everything away if she could.”
Mo nodded in agreement. “I’ll be right back.” He disappeared into his house for a few minutes. When he emerged, he carried a laptop and two bottles of water. “Here.” He handed her a water.“Aunt Carol texted me and told me I needed to hydrate. Something about blood loss. I don’t know. I don’t care. But if I have to, you have to.”
He resumed his seat and opened his laptop. “Please keep talking. I’m listening. I’m running down a hunch.”
She didn’t say anything. Not out of any spite or grouchiness. Not even because she doubted that Aunt Carol would approve. It was simply that she didn’t want to disturb him. If he had a hunch, she wanted him to chase that thing down and beat it into submission.
And my, my, hadn’t her thoughts turned vicious today.
She sipped her water, studied her land, and listened to Mo do whatever he was doing on the computer. After a few minutes, he tapped her arm. “You’re being awfully quiet. Everything okay?”
She gave him a look.
He held up his hands. “Okay, okay. I get it. No. Everything is not okay. Your family is imploding, your grandmother is scheming from her deathbed, and don’t think I’ve forgotten about Bob the super-friendly bodyguard who wants to date you. Or Peter Brown who is a lying scumbag if ever I saw one.”
She had to laugh at his concise recitation of the facts. “Precisely.”
“But, given the amount of consternation that level of chaos should be contributing to your mental clutter, one would conclude you would have plenty to converse about.” Mo grinned at her. “And yes, I did include all that alliteration on purpose. I couldn’t help it.”
She tilted her water bottle toward him. “Well played, sir.”
He gave her an expectant look.
“You’re working. I’m processing. I’m...” She dropped her head and confessed, “I’m enjoying that we’re sitting here together, and we don’t need anyone to help us communicate.”
Mo’s grin was straight out of her childhood. Rare, mischievous,and devastating. “But we aren’t communicating. I’m working, and you’re not saying anything.”
She took another sip of water. “I think we’re communicating just fine.” She wanted to slap her hand over her mouth. What was wrong with her? Was she flirting with him?
Based on the way his grin went from devastating to surprised, she thought maybe he’d taken it as flirty, regardless of how she meant it.
“I’ll concede that nonverbal communication is something we excel at.” He spoke the words without looking away from his computer, but then he turned those big blue eyes on her and winked. “But if we’re going to share what we enjoy, then I should tell you that I’m enjoying hearing your voice. I’ve always loved the way your mind works. But I can’t read it. You have to tell me what’s going on in there.”
Couldn’t he?
As if in answer to her unspoken question, he continued. “Okay. Sometimes I can come close to reading your mind. And it’s cool that we can still communicate without words.”
She agreed.
