Page 73 of Hand Picked
“Do you want me to lie?”
I whimpered.
“Just a little to the right, please, Mr. Williams!” Genevieve said crisply. “Oh, this is so perfect. And just lift the hands a little so we can see the rope.”
“The…” I straightened and stared down at my wrist, where Aiden’s loosely tied constrictor knots bound my hand to Knox’s.
Oh, mother trucker.
“Good Lord, people! Wait for me!” Ernie York slammed his car door and ran over, tightening his tie, with the Scroll of Doom tucked under his arm. “We ready, Gen? Got the house in the background? My hair okay? Okay.Ahem. Whereas Thomas Webb Sunday and Luke Guilford Williams were reported to have been repairing this very domicile for future co-habitation, I, Ernest York, as the mayor of Little Pippin Hollow, hereby declare Part the Third—” He unrolled the scroll.
“Uncle Ernie,” Genevieve whisper-hissed. “Theirhands. They’re bound by rope.”
The mayor gasped. “AndPart the Eleventh!”
“That isnothow it happened,” I argued. “It was a project for Nature Scouts. Aiden? Tell them.”
But when I turned to find Aiden, he’d scampered away.
“They drank sweet water, too!” Ralph announced excitedly.
All heads—which was to say literally every head on the property—swung in his direction.
“Right, Luke? You and Webb both drank Drew’s cider out of the same bottle. Cider brewed with water from the Pippin Well. Says so right on the label,” he said triumphantly. “We’ll count it, won’t we, Ernie?”
“But that’s—” I began, unsure how to finish.
It wassweet. That was what it was.
Ralph clearly thought he was helping us get our tasks completed. Every one of these meddlers—except maybe Genevieve—did. They were enthusiastic the way guests at a wedding were enthusiastic, trying to make the experience as wonderful as possible for the happy couple.
I couldn’t bring myself to disappoint them.
Webb squeezed my hand tightly, like maybe he was feeling some of the same things. “I would rather them show a shot of us smiling than a video of me singing.”
“True.”
“And we’re in control, remember? There’s no way they’re going to get us to blow that bugle the second time.”
I wanted to argue precisely because I wanted so badlynotto argue.
“Trust me?” he asked in that low, deep growl.
My eyes slid shut, and a tremor shook me. “Yeah, okay.”
We turned back toward the camera and let Ernie York officially check off three more items from the scroll before rolling it back up and heading over to the food table to sample Drew’s cider.
“Thank you, baby,” Webb said simply, once the crowd around us had begun to disperse. “You make so many things easier.” He cupped my jaw in his big hand and pressed a kiss to my lips, and suddenly I didn’t care about how confusing things were getting, I just wanted to throw caution to the wind and—
“Hey! Hi. Excuse me. Sorry to interrupt. Has anyone seen— Oh,” Amanda Sunday said, blinking in shock as she pressed through the crowd of people and caught sight of the two of us. “Uh… Webb?”
Webb’s whole frame locked down as he stared at his ex-wife. She was picture-pretty, with light brown hair and pixieish features that reminded me of Aiden. She wore a frilly, pretty blouse that was going to get utterly ruined at the campout and a pair of hiking boots that looked so stiff and new, she probably already had blisters.
As far as I was concerned, her picture belonged in the dictionary beside the wordTrying. But Webb looked at her with wary anger, like she was Godzilla, come to stomp all over the Hollow.
“I’m sorry,” she babbled, still staring at us. “I wasn’t sure where you’d be, and I was at home waiting. I mean, your home. I mean, at Sunday Orchard. And I wondered why you were so late, but I figured everyone’s late sometimes, but then I realizedyouaren’t, and then I remembered you said you wouldn’t be there, but I couldn’t remember where you said youwouldbe and you weren’t answering your phone, and…” She broke off and swallowed.
It was painfully clear where Aiden inherited his word-spewing.
