Tansy somehow made it through the berry fields and back to the house.

Sage was still in town so Tansy decided to prepare lunch for the household. Cooking wasn’t exactly her forte, but she could whip up grilled cheese and tomato soup.

She snagged Grandma Helen’s apron from the hook on the wall and put it on.

She tried to keep her mind on the task at hand, but it was impossible not to envision that look on Burton’s face as she rummaged around for ingredients and pans.

She hadn’t wanted to cause him pain, but he would never be happy sharing a life with her if he wanted to sleep late in fancy hotels with women wearing puffy dresses. Tansy might be able to survive that lifestyle for a year or two. She could picture getting the farm up and running again with a great crew and then paying her dues to the governments of Earth and Aerie for the shortest respectable time possible. But long-term… there was just no way.

“I like wearing your overalls,” she muttered to Grandma Helen under her breath. “You looked beautiful in them, and so do I.”

And although Tansy didn’t believe in ghosts, she could’ve sworn she caught the twinkle of Grandma Helen’s eye in the wink of the copper soup pan in the sunlight from the window over the sink.

Tansy grabbed the slab of cheddar from the fridge and put it on the butcher block to slice.

She had cut her thumb the last time she was on lunch duty. Burton had been with her that time and he had taken over slicing the strawberries they were preparing.

It was hard not to smile thinking about how many strawberries he had eaten while doing the slicing. Burton worked very hard on the farm, often seeming to do the work of two farmhands all by himself, but at mealtimes he could be a bottomless pit, eating as much as any three people Tansy knew. And he really liked the strawberries. He had said they tasted like starlight, the highest compliment she could imagine, given his past life.

She wondered what he would think of the peaches.

The thought gave her a double pang of sadness.

Without pollination there would be no peaches this year.

And Burton was the best person she knew to help her find the bees.

He had been so determined to help, even when it meant risking blowing his cover to trespass on the Petersons’ farm. And he’d saved her in the corn field, carrying her safely home without even getting winded when she was in over her head.

How could a man like that want to live in fancy hotels?

She wiped her hands on her apron and looked out the window as the sandwiches sizzled on the griddle and the soup simmered in the pan.

The north meadow stretched upward into the distance. She could just make out the tiny shapes of the horses up there and the silhouette of a man.

She’d been so upset earlier that she hadn’t been able to fully take in the beauty of his half naked form, tanned and glistening with the sweat of an honest morning’s labor.

A wave of lust swept over her just as she locked down on the thought.

Don’t think about it, she instructed herself.

But she wasn’t sure she could stop. Last night was the most fulfilling sensual experience she had ever had. And it wasn’t just about the mind-blowing climax. It was about the feeling of oneness, the utter lack of embarrassment at baring herself, heart and soul to Burton.

She wasn’t sure if she would ever feel that way again.

The smell of burning bread alerted her to the fact that she was predictably ruining lunch.

She dashed back to the stove, snatched the griddle off, burning her hand slightly, and turned off the burner under the soup.

As she held her smarting hand under cold water from the sink, she begged herself not to waste any more time mooning over Burton. She needed to let him go, just as she had asked him to do for her.

He had agreed readily enough.

This is how it is meant to be, she told her aching heart. This is best.

If only her heart would believe her.