Page 18 of The Payback Adventure
She adjusted her gold wire-rimmed glasses. “Wearingbriefs can have an adverse effect on a man’s sperm count, as does riding a bike. The temperature increases and—”
“Thanks for the warning. I’ll keep that in mind next time I’m shopping.” Even though his top button was undone, his collar felt two sizes too tight. No man wanted to discuss his sperm count, especially not with an eight-year-old. He grabbed the rest of the clothes from the duffel bag and dumped them into the drawer. “All done.”
“At least he’s not a neat freak,” Sam muttered.
Another throw and the ball bounced across the floor to Henry’s feet.
He grabbed it. “Anyone want to go downstairs?”
No one said anything, so he tossed the ball back to Sam and headed to the staircase. Halfway down, Henry realized he was being followed. He continued into the living room. The sofa was clean, so he sat. Abby settled on one side of him, and Caitlin plopped down on the other. Sam stood, glaring.
Elisabeth entered from the kitchen. “It’s time to feed the animals.”
Sam groaned. “Do we have to?”
“No chores, no dessert.”
As she stepped aside, the kids stampeded into the kitchen. The slamming of a door told Henry they were gone.Thank goodness. A moment of peace and no one watching him except Elisabeth.
“I hope they didn’t bother you too much,” she said.
A police interrogation would have been easier. Henry wondered if he should mention Abby’s comment about briefsand sperm count but thought better of it. He didn’t want to worry Elisabeth. “I’ll get used to it.”
“I’m sure you will.” She wiped her hands on her pants. She’d changed out of her uniform and into a pair of worn-in-all-the-right-places jeans and a white T-shirt. Simple, yet stylish.
“Would you like to see the crops?” she asked.
Over the years, women had asked him to see a variety of things, but crops had never been one of them. Until today, he’d never thought about what a crop would look like. Now he would be working in them. Or was that with them? “Seeing the crops would be great.”
She led him through the kitchen. Mismatched pots and pans covered the stove, but the counter was now clean. He noticed a black-and-white cow cookie jar in the corner.
“We don’t have much time before dinner,” she said. “But you can see a little before it gets too dark.”
He stepped out the back door. A grassy area surrounded the house, and a rusted swing set took up one side. It looked more like a death trap than play equipment, making him wonder if the kids had had tetanus shots. A garden lay to the right, and beyond that, row after row of crops. The knee-high bushes were tied together.
Berries, he assumed. They might be beans. It definitely wasn’t corn. He knew what corn plants looked like.
“These are marionberries,” Elisabeth explained. “We harvest half our berry acres each year. The others are cut down to the ground to strengthen the roots as they grow back. You’ll be helping me train them.”
“Train them?” Henry asked. “Do they do tricks?”
She stared at him without a hint of a smile on her face.
He didn’t get it. He was being his adorable, charming self, but he wasn’t impressing her one bit.
Elisabeth pulled back the leaves to show him the inside of the bush. “Cane berries are trained to grow on trellises.”
“Like grapes,” he said.
“Exactly.”
See, he wasn’t without farming knowledge. Wine and champagne he knew something about. “There’s a…” He was about to tell her about the château and vineyard where he stayed in France last year. Instead, he pointed at the stack of white boxes amid the berry plants. “What’s that?”
“Beehives. We usually don’t have them this late in the year, but the beekeeper hasn’t picked up the remaining ones. We rent hives each spring for the fields to help with pollination, so the blooms turn into berries. It’s extra insurance for harvest time.”
“You don’t take any chances.”
“We can’t afford to.”
