“Well, I’m a farm girl.” Tara’s sharp brown gaze tracked over her. “A little sweat never hurt me. Come on over here.”
Tara’s hug was lovely, and gave Katrina the same sense of homecoming Daisy’s had given her. Katrina took a step back and smiled, her anxiety melting away. “It’s lovely to finally meet you.”
“And you. I always liked Hardeep. He was a good friend. I know he passed a while ago, but my condolences.”
She relaxed. She’d tried not to take Andrés’s annoyance with Hardeep to heart, but it was nice to have this, too. “Thank you. He was a great man.”
“The nicest. So generous too. Whenever he visited, it was like Christmas in whatever month of the year it was.”
Jas cleared his throat. “Mom, what are you doing here?”
“I came by to see if you were home. The door was open, and I wanted to ensure your kitchen and toiletries were stocked.”
“I mean, what are you doing here, on the farm, in Yuba City?”
“Oh, I thought, my whole family’s here, I should take a couple days off and stop in, too.” Tara turned to Katrina. “I’m a teacher, so is Jas’s stepfather. Unfortunately, he couldn’t arrange the time off, or he’d be here to meet you as well.”
Jas grunted. “What a coincidence that you decided to drive up after last night’s—”
“What’s all that hay doing outside?”
Jas rocked back on his heels. “It’s... being stored here.”
“That’s weird.” Tara moved closer to Jas and reached way up. They all stared at the tiny piece of hay she retrieved from behind his ear. “What kind of work were you doing out there?”
Katrina scratched her nose.FML indeed. “Jas, um, I mean, we had a mishap.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. We were... making hay.” Was that the right word? Or phrase? Damn it, why had she never read any articles about farming.
“Interesting.”
“Katrina, why don’t you go shower?”
She grasped on to Jas’s suggestion like a lifeline. “Yes, let me do that. I’ll be quick.” She gave them both a wave and escaped, Doodle panting at her side as she accompanied her upstairs.
JAS WAITED UNTILhe heard Katrina close her bedroom door before he yanked the piece of hay out of his mother’s fingers and tossed it aside. “Damn it, Mom.”
Another woman might have scolded her son for cursing, but his free spirit mother had never been a conventional mom. Tara dimpled. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist. You’re so cute when you blush.”
“You embarrassed her.”
“By implying you two were rolling around in the hay together? I don’t see why. Surely she knows I am aware my children might engage in sexual activity.”
“Mom.”
“Stop being so uptight, Jas, sex is a natural act.”
He huffed out a breath. “Let’s talk in the kitchen.” He didn’t particularly want to talk at all, but better to talk there than out here in the foyer, if his mom was going to go on and on about sex. Less of a chance of Katrina hearing them.
Tara rolled her eyes and spun around in a cloud of tiny bells on her anklets and a wave of her cotton skirt. His mother had always embraced the hippie aesthetic. When he was a child, he’d follow along behind her to bonfires and prayer circles, clutching her colorful loose clothes. She’d been so young when she’d had him, and until she’d met Gurjit, it had been her and him and his grandparents against the world. Sometimes Jas felt like they’d raised each other.
She was his number one weakness, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t get annoyed as hell with her. “You can’t just barge in here. I thought you were an intruder,” he said, when they were in the kitchen and out of earshot of Katrina. The pipes squealed as the water turned on upstairs, and he relaxed.
Tara leaned against the counter. “Don’t be silly, who would break into the little house? It’s safe.”
Normally, that was true. Beyond the fact that it was a safe community, no one, not even a rebellious teen, would dare cross the Peach Prince of Yuba City. “I protect a rich woman, Mom. This is my job.”
