Page 54 of Love and Lattes at Pumpkin Hollow
‘I’m glad you’re explaining it to me,’ I said quietly, knowing this was a big thing for him to get off his chest. I understood the feeling that you weren’t good enough. Of wanting your family to be proud of you. I couldn’t tell him off for feeling that way. I’d been so determined to save the farm for my family, after all.
‘I thought if I agreed to stay on the farm, I could persuade you to give up your crazy pumpkin-patch idea, or I could persuade your dad not to let you try it. I thought you’d soon agree to sell to me. Arrogant, right?’
I turned to face him then. ‘Very,’ I replied.
‘But you intrigued me from that first night. You were so feisty and determined. You had all these big ideas. You didn’t let me bulldoze over you. You fought right back. And, God, I admired the hell out of you. And it was more attractive than I was expecting. You drove me crazy. Which is why it got harder to keep trying to persuade you against your ideas. I felt this urge to help you make them all happen instead.’ Dylan smiled a little bit. I tried not to smile back but it was hard. His eyes were soft on mine like he really was fond of me. ‘When we kissed at that inn, it was better than I’d been imagining it would be. We had such a great night together. I couldn’t face hurting you. And I knew by then how much it would hurt if you had to let go of the farm. But it was hard. My brother was breathing down my neck, confused why I was still here but hadn’t got your dad to accept our offer yet. And then you said our night together had to just be a one-night thing… That hurt, I have to say.’
‘Well, I just felt like I was setting myself up to get my heart broken. I knew you were only here for six weeks, and we wanted different things. We were enemies, basically.’
‘No!’ Dylan cried. ‘We were only enemies for about five minutes. I was hooked as soon as you challenged me to make that pact with you.’
‘So, you were happy when we slept together again?’ I asked him, really hoping he had been.
‘Over the moon. I’m sorry I fucked it all up afterwards.’
‘Why did you?’
A yellow leaf floated down then, landing on the bench between us. I picked it up and twirled it between my fingers as I waited for Dylan to answer.
He watched me holding the leaf and sighed. ‘Nate phoned me so I left you sleeping. He said Dad was irate that I was still on the farm and wanted me home. Nate said I was letting them down not getting your dad to sign our deal, and I should just give up. He said similar things to what he said today, like I was useless and he regretted offering me a job. Instead of telling him where to stick his job, I found myself telling him that it was all in hand and I’d get you to sign. I wanted for once to shut him up, to prove him wrong. And I suppose for a second, I did wonder why I had let go of my original plan. Why I had let you get under my skin and into my heart. I told him we’d slept together so now I could get you to do what I wanted.’
41
I sucked in a breath at what Dylan had just said. It brought back that cold shock I’d felt when I’d heard him talking to his brother outside of the cottage. I’d been so hurt that he had said those things about me after the great time we’d had together. It had seemed so unlike the man I’d got to know but I had thought that he’d lied about who he was, that I’d got him all wrong. Now, I just wasn’t sure.
‘And you had no idea I was listening outside, and had heard every word.’
Dylan winced at the memory and looked away from me. ‘As soon as the words left my mouth, I bitterly regretted them. I hate lying, but also, I hated saying anything negative about you – about us. It was such a low moment for me. I’m so sorry, Willow. I’ll never forget the look on your face.’ He shuddered. ‘I just wanted Nate to leave me alone so I could be here with you. I should have told him how I really felt, though. I have now.’
‘You have?’
‘I told him I need a break. Until the end of the month. Until the end of our six-week pact. I made a promise to stay and that’s what I want to do. I need to figure out what I want in life. Would you let me stay, though? Despite the fact I was a complete dick and I hurt you?’
I hesitated. Surely this would just make it harder for him to leave?
‘I don’t know. The pact is done and dusted. I already told Nate, and my dad agreed with me, that there’s no way I’d let him get his hands on my farm.’
Dylan nodded. ‘I know. And I completely agree with you. You should be here, Willow. This is where you belong. I worked that out pretty quickly, even though I didn’t want to admit it to myself or you, and certainly not to Nate. Would you ever be able to forgive me for the things I said to my brother?’
‘I’m not sure,’ I said.
I thought for a minute. This weekend had been hard. But I’d made it through. Dylan had finally stood up to his brother and he wanted to stay. I knew I could still do it with his help. We still had the rest of October to try to make this work and secure the farm for at least the next year. I didn’t want to do it without him.
Finally, I nodded. ‘Okay, Dylan. You can stay as we agreed until the end of October. I’m still not sure if I can make this all work out. And I could do with your help still. If it’s really what you want.’
Dylan reached for me and I let him take hold of one of my hands. His touch still felt good. He gazed into my eyes. ‘I really want to stay with you, Willow.’
My heart skipped. ‘You can stay,’ I whispered.
The look on his face was so happy, I returned his smile and I knew that whatever had happened, he was sincere about wanting to be here. And I was happy to have him here. I didn’t know what was going to come next for us or the farm, but I couldn’t wait to find out.
The rest of the week was a blur.
We threw ourselves into the pumpkin patch. Now that Dylan had told his brother he was staying and working on the farm, he abandoned any pretence of doing work for Henderson Homes and seemed happy to pitch in with me and my dad, and Steve, on what needed to be done. He still hunched himself over his laptop a lot though but that was because I asked him to. He was so much better at dealing with the publicity and social media side of the business while I was happiest working on the patch and my dad liked dealing with greeting visitors and putting through payments. We became a solid team of three somehow, with Steve helping too. It was working better than I could have ever predicted.
Birchbrook got behind Pumpkin Hollow more each day. Word did start to spread, especially after the local newspaper posted a positive review online and then in the physical edition later on. Steve’s sister and her friends shared the patch on their social media, and Sabrina encouraged families from her school to come. The two Pats did a great job of publicising it in their café too. And Paul came by in the café van each afternoon to sell food and drink, and every day, the line for them grew longer. By Thursday, I even saw him smile once, although he denied it.
But the best boost to the business came when Dylan’s old school friend Amy posted her content on her TikTok and Instagram. She had hundreds of thousands of followers and they all loved the pumpkin patch videos and photos. She tagged us and almost immediately, the ticket sales started to roll in.
