“What were you doing, cutting through the fields?” Jonas asks with a smile, mystified.
“I wasn’t really aware that I was trespassing. Sorry.”
He waves away my apology. “It’s just that the people who go walking around the fields in these parts either own them or are escaping from penitentiaries.”
Weallcrack up at this.
“I won’t do it again,” I promise.
“You can walk wherever you like,” Peggy says firmly. “Can’t she?” She’s asking Jonas, not Anders.
“Fine by me,” Jonas replies.
Anders gets to his feet and picks up the radio from beside me, turning down the volume and cocking his ear to the door.
“How are things looking up there?” Peggy wonders.
“I think the siren’s stopped.” He replaces the radio and heads up the stairs. “Wind’s died down too.” He unbolts the door and cracks it open while I sit up straighter. “I think we’re good.” He opens the door fully and climbs out.
Jonas hunches over and clasps his hands between his knees, his earlier smile nowhere to be seen. Peggy quietly says something to him, her expression fretful as the others around the table get to their feet. Peggy and Jonas make no move to stand, so I’m the next to head upstairs after Anders.
“House is still there,” I note with relief.
Anders nods seriously, turning to survey the barn’s roof. It looks intact from this angle. There’s tree debris scattered around the place, but that’s the only sign of high winds. If a tornado touched down, it doesn’t appear to have come through here.
Patrik emerges from the shelter next, his expression dark.
“I’m going to check for damage,” Anders tells him.
Patrik responds with an abrupt nod.
“You want a ride home first?” Anders asks, looking at me directly.
My heart skips a beat as I realize that the strange flash of color I caught a glimpse of earlier is a defect in his right eye: a tiny splodge of orangey-brown, just to the bottom left of his iris.
“Or you could walk,” he adds, scratching his eyebrow.
I jolt to my senses, realizing I’ve taken too long to accept.
“Yeah, you won’t be getting me on that thing again anytime soon.”
His lip curls upward into a smirk. “All right, then, Wren. Guess I’ll be seeing you.”
I’m distracted by Dad and Sheryl emerging from the shelter, loudly expressing their relief at being back out in the open. When I return my gaze to Anders, he’s already walking away. The sight has an uncanny knack of stilling my butterflies.
6
The next day, Dad, Sheryl, and I put on our raincoats and venture out into the orchards to see how much of the fallen fruit can be salvaged. Sheryl wants to puree the peaches for Bellinis, a drink she first tasted at Harry’s Bar in Venice ten years ago. The owner of the bar invented the tipple and Sheryl is keen to see if she can re-create it.
I’m over my hangover now, so I’m completely down with this idea.
“I wonder if Anders is on his way back to Indy already,” Dad says, turning a peach around in his hand and surveying it for bruises.
I’ve been wondering this too. I’ve been finding it hard to put the intriguing Fredrickson family out of my mind, especially Anders, with his freaky green eyes. It bothers me that our last encounter ended so abruptly.
“You’ll get a chance to chat with him next time he’s in town,” Sheryl replies impatiently as she swoops down to pick up two peaches from the grass.
This is not the first time Dad has expressed his disappointment that the storm scuppered his plans to invite the family over for drinks. He asked Peggy as we were leaving, but sheregretfully declined, saying they’d be too busy on a clear-up mission. We offered to help, but she turned us down. I think she was quite keen for us to leave them to their own devices.
