The Blossom Festival happened every year and was a big selling day for us. Production would need to be monitored so we could be prepared. I’d also need to see if Lerana would have any time to come help Ma bake for the event. With the festival, we’d need all the extra hands we could have.
I put the box in my truck and drove to town, windows down, turning up the radio coming through my speakers, probably a bit too loud. But I was alone, with the breeze through my hair. It always made me feel alive.
Until I noticed a car pulled off to the side of the road. It had to be someone coming up to the farm who had gotten stuck in the mud, but I didn’t recognize the car. Either way, I put my hat on and pulled my truck over to help.
Chapter two
Sydney
I revved the engineagain, but the tires just kept spinning.
Fuck.
I rested my head against the steering wheel, trying to figure out how I got here. Well–I knew exactly how, but I wasn’t happy about it.
I’d gone to college for a business degree, without knowing that, in the current job market, unless you were a nepo baby, your chances of a job at a major company were almost nonexistent, which had me scrambling for one. The first job offer I got was for the Organic Certifiers of Stonebridge, and I jumped at the opportunity. Most of the time I pushed papers around, so I was determined to get out of there soon.
Today, however, I’d been asked to sub for one of the auditors. We were all certified to do it, but only certain people were considered field people.
Apparently, on this occasion, that was me.
I looked at my partner in the passenger seat, sleeping soundly. Matilda had been at the job longer than I’d been alive. She had been moved to desk duty a long time ago, but because this was the beginning of spring, there was no one else available.
She looked like a librarian, with short, gray curls and large, framed glasses perched on her nose, and she was sleeping like the dead, which I worried she was until I heard her snore every once in a while.
“Matilda,” I said, trying to wake her to figure out what the fuck we were going to do. She didn’t budge.
“Matilda,” I called again, shaking her slightly. Still nothing.
“Matilda!” I all but yelled.
That time she jumped, looking around. “Are we there?” she asked. Her voice was warm, like a grandmother's. I wondered briefly if she was one.
“Kind of.” There was no GPS out here in the middle of nowhere. We’d been warned cell service was choppy, and they weren’t kidding. Not a single bar. According to the map, we should be pretty close, but I had no actual way to tell. I’d never read a map in my life, much less to drive, and the sun should be setting soon.
“The car’s stuck,” I said.
“Stuck?” she repeated.
I revved the engine again, and the tires spun through the mud.
“Hm,” she offered.
That’s it? Hm?Hm wasn’t going to get us out of here. I glanced around but saw nothing but fields for miles.
I heard the clanking of an exhaust when I saw a truck come toward us from the other side of the road.
“Oh, perfect,” I mumbled, unbuckling quickly and stepping out of the car. I had immediate regret when my heel plunked through the mud and my entire foot went with it.
“Stupid middle-of-nowhere town,” I grumbled. I’d always lived in Stonebridge. Growing up poor, I promised myself I would go to college, get a good job, and get myself a nice penthouse and maybe one of those fluffy dogs rich people had.
I kept telling myself this job was a stepping stone. I didn’t know how, but this opportunity made me confident I would get there.
The banged-up blue truck rolled to a stop next to us. When the window came down, I gasped unintentionally. The man had hazel eyes and skin that looked tanned from long days in the sun. He also had blond hair that was a bit long peeking out under a worn leather cowboy hat and darker, curved horns curling above it. His ears were also different, with them being a bit harrier and almost pointed. The bit of scruff on his face added to the rugged vibes.
I knew this farm was owned by a family of satyrs, and though there weren’t many monsters in the city, it wasn’t anything new to me. I was more surprised by how… attractive he was.
“Need help, ma’am?” he asked. His voice was deep and thick with an accent I wasn’t used to hearing.
