Page 43 of The Fate Factor

I look again at the vibrant green, thinking of the way I might capture it. There’s no way he could have known the effect this place would have had on me. But he thought I might like it.

“I love it,” I whisper.

“The harvest is tomorrow. All of this will be gone.”

“What?” I cry, and he chuckles.

“Everything has its season, flower girl. And next season, we get to drink it.”

“Huh.” I’m still not sure how these quirky little flowers become beer. “It smells like a pine forest,” I say, “… but also fruit salad?”

“Good nose.” Reaching behind him, he plucks one of the flowers, pinching it between his finger and thumb before holding it up for me to smell. “It’s grapefruit. These hops are what we use for our IPA and our summer blonde. The beer you had the other night, my fall ale, uses a different plant. There’s less fruit scent in that one. More spice. Still has the pine.”

He takes the flower back and squishes it again. I watch, entranced by the way the delicate nubs roll between the pads of his fingers. “Let me see your hand.”

I oblige, holding my arm out, and he presses the two fingers he just held the flower with to the thin skin on my inner wrist.

“Some people use the oils for a natural anxiety reliever,” he says. “Or they’ll put dried plants under their pillow to help them sleep. I’ve tried it, actually. It works.” He lifts my wrist to my nose. “Smell.”

My eyes fall closed, and I take a long pull of the fragrant oil. I feel it too, a natural calm hitting my veins. “Do you have trouble sleeping?”

He shrugs. “Sometimes. I have a lot of energy. That’s why I don’t mind working until two a.m. every night.”

“God. I’m tired just thinking about that.”

He chuckles, and I think of the mismatch I originally saw in the two of us. Sitting together admiring his flowers, though, it feels more like complimentary colors. A yin and a yang.

“Back in the early nineteenth century,” he says, “hops farmers used to have trouble staying awake for a full day of work. That’s how they discovered the plant could be used that way.”

I laugh delightedly, picturing a field full of grown men, napping in the sun like cats.

Jamie seems to notice he’s still holding my wrist, a fact I’ve been acutely aware of, but instead of letting go, he pulls it to his face, pressing it under his own nose. His lip rests against my wrist bone, stubble scratching. Heat flushes through my body, a whip of it right through my center. I imagine that scratch on other sensitive skin, the heat of his breath, and it’s a bit of a jolt that my mind goes there so easily.

Though, I suppose when you’ve already seen yourself naked with someone.

This is So. Freaking. Weird.

Jamie lets his eyes roll back and pretends to pass out on my shoulder, his fake snore blessedly breaking the tension.

I shrug him off, embarrassing myself with another one of these girlish giggles I can’t seem to control.

“How did you learn about all of this stuff?”

“Ronnie and I used to bounce downtown together,” he says, tossing the pinecone flower from hand to hand. “That’s how we met.”

“Bounce?”

“Like, man the door at the bar. Check IDs.”

“You were the muscle?” I cover my laugh with the back of my hand. “With those dimples?”

He scrunches his nose and proves my point. “I’m six-four. I’m very intimidating.”

It’s not his build—his height is unmissable, and he has thick hockey player thighs, and the sculpted arms of a man used to hauling kegs. Physically, I would trust him to intervene in a bar scuffle. It’s more that I can’t imagine him having the temperament. It would be like choosing a Golden Retriever puppy for a guard dog.

“You’re more adorable than intimidating.” I say. “I can’t see it.”

“Adorable, huh?” He flashes me a grin I’ve labeled the Jamie Smile. It’s three parts sex and one part that boyish mischief from before. I dedicated my childhood to avoiding mischief. I was the mischief police from age nine to nineteen. Why do I like this hint of it on him?

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