Page 7 of Hand Picked
What was that expression about saying the devil’s name and he’d appear? I gave Knox a hard look becausehe’dcaused this.
I folded my arms over my chest. “What’shewant?”
Gage groaned, no doubt at my lack of manners.
“Er, well… Mr. Williams is trying to untangle a bit of a Gordian knot regarding the title to his land, as I’m sure you know—”
Nope. I made it my business to know as little about Luke as possible.
“—so I figured I’d come introduce myself since I was already here for the meeting. No reason we can’t keep things friendly, is there?”
Yeah, there sure was. Luke and I were not friends. Just the idea made me all… twitchy.
“What’s up with his title?” I asked. “Does he not own the land after all?”
I tried not to sound too excited, but Gage gave me another exasperated look, so apparently, I failed.
Mr. Fox shook his head. “Oh, no, he definitely owns the land right enough. The issue is that I’m not sure exactly how much he owns. He won it all in a contest, you know. Poor man.”
Yeah, right. Tragic. My heart bled for him.
“Anyway,” the lawyer said, fumbling for the battered messenger bag slung over one shoulder, “no need to waste your time chatting when you have things to do and I could be billing for my hours.” He chuckled heartily. “But I wanted to give you some preliminary information on our claim… where is it… ah, here.”
He pulled out a sheaf of papers and shoved them into my hand. I stared at him while nerves began slithering in my stomach.
“What is this?”
“A copy of my preliminary research into the portion of land in dispute. For our claim,” he repeated.
“What land? What dispute?” I blinked at him. “Whatclaim?”
“The Pond land that’s currently in use as a Sunday orchard, of course.” He sounded exasperated, as if he’d explained whatever the hell this was in exacting detail and I was still obtuse.
“There is noPondland used by the orchard. There’s the land that my mother inherited—”
“Oh, no, that acreage is not in dispute.”
“And there’s the Sunday land that runs along the border with Lu—your client’s—land, which was transferred to my family a very long time ago as a wedding portion,” I said, biting back my frustration at this unexpected—and entirely freaking unacceptable—interruption of my perfectly mediocre night. “That land’s not in dispute either.”
“Yes, well, you’ll see from my notes that it remains to be seen whether that transfer was legal.” Before I could argue with him, he rustled in his bag again and produced a business card, slapping it on top of the stack of papers in my hand. “The meeting’s about to start, so I’d best be on my way. Give me a call, and we can talk about it. Enjoy your evening!” He gave an absentminded smile and tottered away.
My siblings and I stared after him in shock.
“Who was that guy?” Hawk asked. “He’s not from the Hollow.”
“What the fuck just happened?” Knox growled.
Emma frowned. “Is he talking about the Pond orchard where your heirloom varietals are?”
My stomach plummeted to the floor. “He’d better not be,” I said in a low, angry voice.
I’d been single-handedly cultivating that orchard since I was Emma’s age. Over the years, I’d researched and acquired scion wood from a wide variety of apple trees that had nearly gone extinct, patiently grafted them onto rootstock, and nurtured them to health. And while I loved every square inch of Sunday Orchard, from the U-pick fields to the commercial operation to the pumpkin patch, the Pond orchard was my pride and joy. My labor of love. My life’s work.
I was going to kill Luke Williams, plain and simple.
Gage took the papers out of my hand. “Everyone stay calm. Jeez, it’s like Sunday brothers live to get all alpha-angry over nonsense. Let me take a look… oh.”
Hawk shoved his head over Gage’s shoulder. “Oh, what?”
