Tom, if you sold your orchard and looked for another line of work, what would you do?”
Tom had chicken kabobs—looked wonderful. He stabbed his fork into a wonderful cube of chicken and said, “Just out of curiosity, what do you have lined up for me?”
She laughed merrily. “You’re so funny.” She lifted one lovely light brown brow. “Well, there’s that manufacturing job, still open…”
He didn’t find that particularly funny. “There is nothing else I want to do.”
“But it’s exhausting,” she counseled.
“And if it ever becomes too much work at the harvest or the planting, there are lots of people around here looking for work. But if Maxie can last seventy-four years, I can last longer.”
“You could actually invest the money you earn from the sale of the orchard, watch it grow, take care of Maxie in high style and begin another career.”
He chewed and noticed that she grinned excitedly. What had her parents invested in that smile? It was simply beautiful. He was also curious about her breasts, so large and high and delicious-looking—he wondered if he would touch them and find them not real. That wouldn’t be an issue if he was in love, but he was beginning to realize he was not even close to in love. Still, he was curious.
Finally he came back to the present. He looked at her levelly and said, “I’m going to work the orchard till I drop dead.”
“Why?” she asked almost desperately.
“Because I just love apples.”
She made a gak sound in the back of her throat. And Tom laughed.
* * *
The drive back to Virgin River was a revisit of the drive away—a lot of talk about vacations, bonuses, expense accounts, perks. There was a little about drug trials and prescriptions thrown in there. Tom thought about introducing the topic of national health care but frankly he was tired. So he drove.
She asked him if he was happy living in an older home; she had purchased her home new with lots of upgrades like granite countertops, slate floors, cherrywood cabinetry. She could open her garage and turn on her hot tub from blocks away.
He told her he loved that old house. “I’ve never seen a really proper porch on a new house.”
Then they came to the orchard. Tom jumped out of the car, opened the gate, pulled in, jumped out and closed the gate, and as they were driving between the groves Darla said, “Tom, I want you to know how grateful I am for your friendship. If I didn’t have these little escapes to the orchard on the weekends, I don’t know what I’d do.”
“Huh?” he said.
“I’m lonely, so far away from my family. And with Bob gone…”
“Oh, man,” he said. He’d been so busy falling out of like with her, he’d forgotten she was lonely and widowed and all that. “Well, I’m glad it’s relaxing for you.”
“It’s a godsend, seriously. Like a rescue. And there’s all the other stuff—going out, which I haven’t done in so long. Home cooking. Fresh fall air. It’s all just wonderful. I look forward to it all week. I’ve been out on a few dates, but I hadn’t really expected to end up seeing a handsome, successful man with his own rather impressive business.”
“I grow apples,” he reminded her.
“Very popular apples,” she reminded him. “If you chose to sell that orchard to a commercial grower like Del Monte, you could really make a killing. But I hope not too soon—I love coming up here every weekend. It’s so lovely and quiet.”
He wondered if she knew his net worth. He didn’t, but he wondered if she did.
“Um, Darla. Next weekend might not be as relaxing. For a couple of weekends every October we open up the orchard for people to tour, visit, buy apples and other products. It might not seem like such a big deal, but the place is swarming. People come from everywhere. Typical of Virgin River—most of the town comes out. They shop, pick apples, bring their own ladders even. They bring their dogs, their kids, sometimes their grills. It’s big business.”
“Is it lucrative?” she asked.
He paused before he said, “It works for us. But it’s madness. And there is no home-cooked meal, no going out to dinner, no walk in the moonlight between the groves.”