sealed it. He was wearing the sweater, and maybe he’d thank Ella the next time he saw her. “You ready?”
“Whenever you are.”
Landon got the coat he’d chosen for her at the store, a black parka that was really more like a blanket than a coat, according to his sister Charley, and held it for Amanda. With his coat on, he offered her his arm to hold as he walked her slowly toward the truck that had red lights on top and fire department license plates. “You want me to grab your crutches?”
“I really don’t need them if I can balance on my toes.”
When they reached the truck, Landon opened the door and gave her a lift into the high-profile truck.
“Thanks. Not sure I could’ve pulled that off.”
“I gotcha covered.”
He drove them into town, watching for Fred, who was often found standing in the middle of the road, oblivious to cars, and everything else, for that matter. Fred followed his own set of rules. The last thing Landon needed was to smash his relatively new truck into the side of an unyielding moose. In cases of vehicle versus moose, the moose almost always won.
Recalling the state of Cameron’s poor little car after her altercation with Fred had Landon chuckling softly to himself.
“What’s so funny?” Amanda asked.
“I was thinking about how my brother Will met his wife, Cameron, when she crashed her car into the town moose—and how the car came out on the poorer end of the altercation. The moose was fine. The car? Not so much. And when I met Cameron, she had two black eyes from the air bag.”
“Damn, that moose is tough.”
“I know. That’s why we have to really be careful when we drive around here in the dark. You never know where he’s going to plant himself.”
“That’s kind of scary.”
“Nah, he’s a pussycat. You just don’t want to crash your car into him.”
“How can a massive moose be a pussycat?”
“You’ll have to meet him to fully appreciate him.”
“That’s fine. I’m good.”
Landon laughed at her emphatic statement. “Oh, come on. If you want to truly go wild in Butler, Vermont, you have to meet Fred. If you stick around here long enough, you’ll have a Fred encounter. We think he has a crush on Cameron.”
“How can a moose have a crush on someone?”
“He seems to show up wherever she is. Such as when he came strolling into the tent during their wedding.”
“Stop it. He did not!”
“He did. We’ve got photos to prove it. My sister Hannah is the family moose whisperer, though. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen tiny Hannah turn that thousand-pound bull moose to putty in her hands.”
“How does she do that?”
“We have no idea. But she marches right up to him and gives him hell, and he does whatever she tells him to while Nolan has a meltdown over her staring down that massive moose.”
“I love your family,” she said, laughing.
“They’re certifiable.”
“I bet it was never boring growing up in your house.”
“God, no. Never. It was a madhouse.”
“I can only imagine.”
Landon glanced at her. “Do you have siblings?”
“Two who are much older than me. They were both in college by the time I hit high school.”
“Where are they now?”
“My brother lives in Alaska, and my sister is in Oregon. I haven’t seen them in years.”
“I can’t imagine not seeing my siblings for years.”
“You’re lucky to have them all close by.”
“I know, even if sometimes I don’t feel lucky when they’re all up in my grill about something. It’s not easy being one of the younger brothers. Every one of them has an opinion about everything I do.”
“You had a lot of parents.”
“Yep, and I still do. They drive me crazy.”
“I’ve seen you with them. You also love them like crazy.”
“Sometimes.”
“All the time.”
“If you say so.”
“I say so. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. You’re so lucky to have nine siblings you’re actually close to. Do you know how rare that is?”
“Yeah, and I appreciate them, as well as my eight cousins, who are also like siblings to us. We grew up in a gaggle.”
“Lucky. We didn’t have any other family close by when I was growing up, so it was mostly me and my parents. They split when I was in high school, and my dad took a job out of state, so I hardly saw him either.”
“That must’ve been tough.”
“It was. I was closer to him than my mom, but he traveled so much for work that I couldn’t stay with him. My