Page 3 of A Field of Beauty

So she continued her sales pitch. “Think about it! It’s a dream come true. Imagine taking this tired old acre and transforming it into a lush garden of flowers. It’s a golden opportunity.” She was banking on a hope that Dawson Greene understood what it was to devote yourself to a cause.

“Tina—”

“Tessa.”

“It’s an interesting idea ... but I don’t think you can afford me.”

She couldn’tnotafford him, that much she knew. She was willing to do anything to bring him on board, even if it meant selling her new car to pay his salary. “I’m prepared to offer you a base salary plus thirty percent of the profits.”

He scoffed. “Turning a profit could take years. If ever.”

Nope. She was determined to make a profit in this calendar year. Absolutely determined. She cleared her throat. “Forty percent.”

“Think you’ll even last a year?” His gaze slid down her outfit to her feet.

She was wearing a white tee tucked into a short blue-jean skirt, and sandals. Red nail polish on her manicured fingers and toes. Maybe she should’ve thought through what to wear when hiring a farm manager. “I guarantee it.”

“And you’re offering me this goldenopportunity”—he added air quotes—“for one year?”

“That’s right. Just one year.” That was how she had explained the purchase of the land, after escrow closed and it was a done deal, to her parents. Just a one-year venture. “Flowers,” she said with a smile, “can work miracles.”

He remained quiet for a long, long moment, and she wondered what was running through his mind. Finally, he turned to her and looked her straight in the eye. “Base plus fifty-fifty.”

She could’ve hugged him! But she was pretty sure that Dawson Greene would run for the hills if she did. He was the kind of guy who radiated an invisible sign around his neck:Do not touch. So instead she stuck out her hand. “You, sir, have got yourself a deal.”

two

Happiness held is the seed; happiness shared is the flower.

—John Harrigan

And so they set to work. Despite the heat and humidity of a North Carolina summer, Dawson tilled the field with a rented hand rototiller. It was a laborious task, but he was convinced it was the only way to keep the land from getting compacted like it would’ve with a tractor. Tessa followed him to break up large clods of dirt with a pitchfork. More than a few times, he would stop, stretch, turn around, and say, “Do you see how bad this soil is, Tessa? Not a single worm.”

Worms, to Dawson, were evidence of healthy, well-nourished soil. He was right about Mountain Blooms Farm. Tessa had yet to see a single worm in the tilled gray soil. No worms, but at least he finally got her name right.

Tessa had found some rusty tools and a wheelbarrow with a flat tire behind the house. Dawson repaired the wheelbarrow and oiled the tools. He knew the owner of a horse farm and brought truckloads of manure to Mountain Blooms Farm. Then he and Tessa took turns pushing load after load out to the field. Whenthey were working side by side, that was when some tension would begin between them. Tension ... because of constant interruptions.

Tessa’s boyfriend, Tyler Thompson the Third, was blessed with the gift of communicating. He called and texted Tessa frequently, interrupting whatever she was doing. The frequency of Tyler’s communiqués exasperated Dawson, who texted only if absolutely necessary and probably did not have a girlfriend. Tessa finally started ignoring Tyler’s calls and texts, and tried to remember to keep her phone on silent when she was working closely with Dawson. He felt she should just leave the phone in the house, but she liked having it with her to listen to music.

Tyler had come into Tessa’s life through her father’s introduction. A few months ago, her dad had been nearby for business and made a quick stop in Asheville to check on Tessa. While there, he met a friend for coffee—Tyler’s father, whom he’d known from college days. The two dads schemed together to introduce Tessa and Tyler. It was a successful matchmaking endeavor, at least from Tyler’s point of view. As cute as he was—and he really was!—she wasn’t quite so enamored, especially with the way he homed in on her like a bee to honey. That kind of behavior from a male always made her uncomfortable. She had learnedthatlesson in Sunrise.

And she was even less interested in Tyler after he told her he was running for a seat on Asheville’s city council in a special election, replacing a councilman who had passed on to glory. Tyler was a big fan of using social media, big into publicity of any kind. Not Tessa. She liked her phone, but she had avoided social media addiction. Since Sunrise, she had avoided getting involved with anyone too.

Partly, she hadn’t met anyone who interested her. Mostly, she had a deep-down fear that where men were concerned, her judgment might be off-kilter, like she was a bad picker. Flowers were easier. So much less complicated.

But her dad had kept encouraging her to go out with Tyler, andso, after he had lost the election, she finally accepted a date with him. Just coffee. She happened to mention that she was looking for nearby acreage to turn into a flower farm. “I don’t want to be too far out of the city.”

The strangest expression came over his face, and then he smiled. He had just the place for her, he said, and drove her out to meet the owner of Mountain Farm. She was impressed, more so as Tyler helped her with all the tedious paperwork—both making an offer and then closing the deal. Tessa felt appreciative of Tyler, truly grateful because she had no understanding of contracts. But she still wasn’t enamored with him. Nothing like the feelings Tyler expressed for her. “Struck by a lightning bolt,” he told her more than once. “That’s how I felt when I first laid eyes on you. Destiny. You’re the girl who’s meant for me.” Sweet.

But then she turned him down for another date. Her reluctance only fueled his determination. He wouldn’t take no for an answer. Not for his campaign—he had immediately started work on the next one—and not from Tessa. He was relentless. She went out with him for dinner, and another time to a country music concert. In due course, she found herself growing fond of him. His optimism and confidence were refreshing to be around after spending so much time with Dawson, who was on a mission to find what mineral was missing in the dirt (metaphorically and practically!). The two men couldn’t be any more opposite. And they did not like each other. No ma’am, not at all.

Tessa paid no attention to Tyler’s digs about Dawson as an ignorant field hand, or Dawson’s disdain for Tyler’s enthusiasm for “intrusive” government. Her mind was on her farm.

The drab gray field of Mountain Blooms Farm was starting to take on hues of brown. By August, Tessa was anxious to start planting before the growing season officially ended. She was eager to see something green in her acre of earth—sunflowers or fava beans or clover. But Dawson wasn’t satisfied with the amounts of amendments that had been dumped on the field. “Still not goodenough,” he would say. He’d heard about free compost offered from the county and hauled in more truckloads. He wasn’t the kind of guy who showed much emotion, but he couldn’t stop grinning over the county’s free compost. On many levels, it suited his dire skepticism about government.

In mid-August, Dawson rented the rototiller again to till the compost deeply into the soil. Not only was it much easier than the first and second time of rototilling, but it actually looked like soil that could support life.

“Now?” Tessa asked after he finished. “Good enough?”

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