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Kate narrowed her eyes at him. “I can’t tell whether you’re making fun of me.”

“Only a little.”

Before Kate could answer, Penny appeared with her little basket clutched in both hands. “Put one in mine.”

Wes crouched beside her. “How many are you planning to carry?”

“Lots,” Penny said.

Kate laughed. “That isn’t really an answer.”

“Yes, it is.”

Wes chose a good apple from the basket and placed it carefully in hers. Penny held the basket out for another, and Wes obliged.

“Penny,” Kate said, laughing, “you do realize you have to carry that all the way back.”

Penny looked into the basket, considered this and held it out again. “One more.”

“One more,” he agreed. He placed a third apple beside the others, and Penny bent to lift the basket. It wobbled as it left the ground, and Kate covered her mouth, but Wes could see the laughter in her eyes.

“I can do it,” Penny insisted.

“I know you can.” Alan came up behind her and steadied the basket. “But you haven’t picked one yourself yet. Do you want me to show you how to tell when an apple is ready?”

Penny set the basket down at once.

Alan led her to one of the low branches and crouched beside her. “You don’t pull. You lift it and give it a little turn, like this. If it’s ready, it lets go.”

Penny lifted, turned, and the apple came away in her hand. She stared at it, then at him.

“That one was ready,” Alan said gravely.

Wes hid a smile. He had shown Alan that himself, beneath a different tree.

“That child has him wrapped around her little finger,” Janice said from the other side of the tree.

“And he loves every minute of it,” Kate replied, making Janice laugh.

There was no edge to any of it, just the easy sound of people working together. Eileen and Janice moved along the lower branches while Alan and Penny tested one apple after another.

Wes climbed the ladder again. He had spent plenty of mornings helping the Harlands since they bought Bramblewood. There had been tractors to look at, questions about trees, equipment to borrow and a hundred small things that came with learning a new orchard. Today felt different. Was it only because Kate was standing at the foot of the ladder? He reached for the next apple and twisted it free. He didn’t think it was only that.

Alan passed beneath the ladder and gave Wes a quick pat on the leg before taking a full basket from Kate. “Keep going. We’ll have this tree done before coffee.”

It was such an ordinary gesture that Wes almost missed it.

Janice was already setting an empty basket in its place when she looked up at him. “You’re staying for coffee, aren’t you? There are muffins.”

“I’ll stay.”

“Good.” She turned back toward Eileen as if that settled the matter.

They like us, his bear said.

Wes glanced toward Kate. She was helping Penny decide how many apples she could reasonably carry without requiring another rescue. I like them too.

On the other side of the tree, Eileen had gone still. She had known Wes since he was young enough to ride through these orchards on his father’s shoulders, and when their eyes met, her gaze moved from him to Kate, then toward Alan and Janice before returning to him. She smiled and went back to picking. Wes looked away first, although his own smile stayed with him as he reached for another apple.