“I owe you?”
“Yes, for about four years of free coffee, for fixing your ever messed-up love life—well, before Violet came back—having to go to your dumb games, and I could probably name a million other things. So, you owe me, and your saint of a fiancée agrees.” Her smile says she thinks she just played her winning hand.
“What’s my total that you feel you’re owed? I’ll write you a check.”
Hazel grins. “Not a chance. Now, we’re being rude arguing in front of a customer.”
I lift my hands and chuckle. “Oh no, this is great. Reminds me of me and my brother.”
Hazel slaps Everett’s chest. “He’s an idiot, and it’s my job to fix him and all the other dumbasses who live in this town.”
“There’s a lot of them?” I ask.
“All of them, and coincidentally the four biggest ones who reside in Ember Falls happen to be on the same Ultimate Frisbee team.”
I pull my head back. “What is an…Ultimate Frisbee team?”
Everett huffs. “Seriously, the women in this town need to learn more about sports. For fuck’s sake, it’s a very serious league. It takes an extreme amount of athleticism as well as mental concentration. We are elite athletes.”
At that Hazel bursts out laughing. “Oh my God! You said that with a straight face? Oh, I can’t wait to tell Ainsley, Penny, and Violet what you said.”
“I hate you,” Everett retorts.
“You don’t, but you’re ridiculous.” She turns to me. “It’s Frisbee with goal lines. You should come by and see their intense athleticism and absolute dialed-in concentration.”
“I’m a little afraid now,” I confess.
I’m not really afraid, but they seem pretty intense about this. I need to occupy myself a little, and if this is a league and there are games or something, that could be fun.
Maybe.
I love sports, don’t get me wrong. I used to sit on my grandpa’s lap and watch football every Saturday and Sunday before he passed away. He didn’t discriminate between college and professional. Saturday we listened to him scream about his alma mater continuing to suck each year and Sundays it was the same thing.
But no matter what, I would go in my room, get my jersey and sit with him, yelling and repeating whatever he grumbled about. It carried on through college by going to home games, even though we lost all the time, I just love sports.
This doesn’t really sound much like a sport.
“Oh, they’re harmless, don’t even worry, but it’s fun and the girls bring wine and charcuterie, make fun of everyone. I know you’re only here for work, but a week is a long time to be holed up somewhere in this town. Isn’t there a practice tonight?”
Everett crosses his arms over his chest. “Yes, at six.”
She grins. “What do you say, Tessa? Want to come watch middle-aged men pretend they’re still in their twenties?”
I laugh. “I wouldn’t miss it.”
eleven
Killian
“Absolutely not,” I huff. It’s just past lunch and Tessa and I are in the middle of a heated debate on how to save the farm.
Tessa rubs her temples with her two fingers. “You need this.”
“Not that much. I’d rather eat nails.”
She glares at me. “That’s going to be all you can afford if you don’t do something to start bringing income in. I have four options. Pick one.”
I’m not doing children’s horse-riding parties. Absolutely not. We’re a freaking award-winning horse breeding operation. We don’t do parties.
