CHAPTER TWELVE
Scarlett leaned back against the side panel of Cross Creek’s box truck, 99 percent certain her leg muscles had been replaced by old rubber bands and even older glue. But since the crack of dawn boasted practically nonexistent natural light, she hadn’t been able to snap any useable shots since she and Eli had pulled into Camden Valley’s pavilion nearly an hour ago. Pitching in to help the Crosses set up for the farmers’ market until she could get to work on her own stuff had been a no-brainer. Of course, right now her calves were tag-teaming with her lower back to give her no-brainer a whole lot of grief, to the point that Scarlett had no choice but to admit the truth.
Working on a farm definitely wasn’t the tranquil cakewalk she’d expected it to be.
Now that she finally had a bit of daylight on her side, Scarlett took advantage of her brief respite on the sidelines to check out her surroundings. The pavilion was part of a larger park area, with ball fields and playgrounds and picnic tables on either side. Although the vendors had been able to drive all the way up to the pavilion via a narrow access road—thank God, because the mere thought of hauling all those crates from the parking lot made Scarlett consider crying outright—the main entrance was gated on the other side of a gently rolling hill. Railroad tracks formed the area’s back boundary, separated from the rest of the park by a small commuter lot and a passenger platform.
The vendors for today’s market—maybe thirty or so in all—had parked on the perimeter of the pavilion, which was protected from the elements by a fixed roof spanning four oversized columns in each corner. Scarlett grinned as she realized the sun would still have plenty of opportunity to slant in and brighten things up, and yeah, time to throw back a couple of ibuprofen and get going. The sooner, the better.
But before she could move so much as an aching muscle, a frosty water bottle appeared in her direct field of vision, sending a hard shot of relief all the way to her toes even as she tabled the go-go-go message pumping through her brain.
“Best hydrate,” came Tobias Cross’s warm-yet-gruff voice as he settled in next to her with a smile. “Or Owen will give you a wheelbarrowful of grief.”
Scarlett grinned, unable to do anything but. “That sounds like firsthand knowledge.”
“Might be,” Tobias answered, but his wry smile said she’d hit the truth jackpot. “But I can’t blame him for lookin’ out, I s’pose.”
She paused to crack the top off the bottle of water he’d passed over, taking a deep draw of its contents before she leaned back against the box truck and replied, “For whatever it’s worth, Eli’s the same way with me when we’re running all over the farm.”
“Is he now?”
The way Tobias’s salt-and-pepper brows drifted up toward the brim of his Stetson suggested Eli’s actions surprised him. Which made the two of them even, since Tobias’s surprise shocked Scarlett right back.
“Mmm-hmm. Not that I’m complaining—all that bugging has probably saved my bacon a time or two. I get a little wrapped up in the moment when I’m shooting, and I don’t like to slow down. I guess doing what you love can make hours feel like minutes.”
“That does seem about right.”
Although his smile stayed in place, it grew more wistful as he sent his gaze over the tables beneath the pair of oversized red canopy tents Owen and Eli were still stocking with last-minute crates of produce, and the sentiment in Scarlett’s chest took the springboard route directly out of her mouth.
“I’m really grateful for your allowing me to visit Cross Creek for such an extended shoot,” she said, her stare following his to the nearby hustle of last-minute preparations before the market opened. “I know having a stranger in your midst can’t be easy. Especially one with a camera and a direct line to the Internet.”
The lightning-fast wink Tobias sent in her direction was proof positive that Eli came by his charm honestly. “Well, I guess it’s lucky for us you’re not a stranger anymore, now isn’t it?”
Scarlett’s stomach squeezed. God, the Crosses’ uber-inclusive dynamic was so outside of her wheelhouse. But since she refused to offend Tobias by saying so, she went with, “You just have such a tight-knit family. I appreciate that you’re willing to let an outsider in.”
For a heartbeat, he remained quiet, and her heartbeat accelerated with the worry that she’d somehow managed to offend him anyway.
But then he pushed off the side panel of the box truck, tipping his caramel-colored hat at her as if the pause had never happened. “Well, we’re right happy to have you. ’Specially since Emerson tells me these stories of yours are startin’ to take off.”
Scarlett thought of the stats Mallory had texted her earlier, along with the correlating response Eli had told her Cross Creek’s social media pages had been getting, and her pulse tapped faster for a completely different reason. “The photos and articles on FoodE’s site definitely seem to be gaining the traction we’d all hoped for.”
Her eyes darted to the spot by the checkout station where Eli had carefully stored her gear next to the food scales and the cash box. Her fingers twitched with anticipation, all the colors and textures and shadows and contrasts around her insistently whispering with the need to be framed up and caught on camera, and she slid her hands into the pockets of her cutoffs in an effort to conceal the urge to not eat or breathe or stop until she’d taken pictures of pretty much every last thing under the tent in front of her.
Tobias’s laughter welled up in a rusty burst. “Guess we should go on and get started. Sun’s up, and I expect you’re itchin’ to snap a photograph or two.”
Busted. A flush crept from her cheeks to her temples, but she didn’t try to hide it. “What gave me away?”
“Darlin’, I mean this as a kindness, but you are an open book. Plus, I’ve been around long enough to know passion for somethin’ when I see it. Now go. Grab that camera of yours and take pictures of whatever suits you.”
Smiling, Scarlett thanked him one last time for the water before covering the dozen or so steps between the box truck and Cross Creek’s tent. She geared up easily, her excitement at the prospect of a day-long shoot as much a part of her muscle memory as the movements themselves, and equally vital. Knowing she had the luxury of time on her side since she’d be working in a relatively fixed space, Scarlett made the judgment call of sticking with just her primary camera for now. She could always swap out her glass and make other adjustments as the sunlight shifted around the tent, and anyway, she was going to get dangerously close to spontaneous human combustion if she didn’t start taking some pictures, stat.
Her sneakers shushed over the smooth concrete on the pavilion floor as she moved farther beneath the tent. Lifting her camera to her eye, Scarlett measured the elements around her, taking a few test shots before a rumble of familiar, masculine laughter worked its way from her ears all the way down her spine.
“Smart to snap pictures of the produce while you can, bumblebee. They’re gonna open the gates in five minutes, and I heard the parking lot is already jam-packed.”
She lowered Baby, her brows pulling downward in confusion. “Who told you that?” Eli had been right here in the pavilion, with the parking lot well out of sight, since before the sun had come all the way up.
Not that his cocky smile would be deterred by such details. “He did,” Eli said, pointing to his brother, Owen, who lifted his hands in explanation.
“My buddy Lane is Millhaven’s sheriff. He comes down here to the farmers’ market on Saturdays to help out with traffic and things like that whenever he can. He texted me a few minutes ago to say he hasn’t seen the parking lot this full, this early, all year.”
“Wow.” Scarlett’s lips parted over her surprise. “That’s a good sign, right?”
Eli waggled his brows, gesturing to the tables in front of them with a flourish. “That’s a great sign. Unless you’re a Jonagold. Or a watermelon. Or one of Owen here’s fancy-schmancy heirloom tomatoes. Or—”
“Okay, okay. We get it,” Owen said, a small smile breaking past his normally serious demeanor. “And for the record, those tomatoes are Cherokee Purple, Marvel Stripe, and Brandywine. In that order.”
“’Course they are.” Eli paused for just a beat before he jokingly added, “Show off.”
“Mmm.” Owen’s smile had an extremely short shelf life, disappearing even more quickly than it had arrived, and wow, that brotherly tension thing sure hadn’t taken a hike since Scarlett had last been around both Eli and Owen together.
She took a half step toward Eli, whose shoulders had gone rigid beneath his navy-blue T-shirt. Time to lighten the mood, and fast. “Well,” she said, letting her own smile pick up the luster Owen’s had lost. “Seems Camden Valley has way better cell service than Millhaven if Lane was able to text you with such good news, Owen.”
Both men blinked at her, but Eli found his feet first. “Eh, that’s not saying much. Most parts of Siberia have better cell service than Millhaven.”
Owen’s expression remained unreadable for only a second longer before sliding into a wordless good point. “Hopefully we’ll be too busy to even think about cell service today. Although I did promise Emerson I’d try my best to get on Cross Creek’s social media sites to do a little promo of our specialty selections.”
“She’s not coming?” Scarlett asked, and Eli shook his head to the negative.
“Not today. Emerson has MS, and the heat and the car ride don’t always make the trip out here to the farmers’ market easy on her.”
“Oh!” Scarlett’s chin snapped up, a bolt of surprise filling her chest. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
“Don’t feel bad,” Owen said. “It’s not something she advertises.”
Admittedly, Scarlett’s knowledge of the disease was limited, but still . . . “Living with an illness like that must be tough.”
“Yeah, but Emerson’s tough, too,” Eli pointed out. “She comes out to the market when she can, and that turns out to be more often than not. But she has a physical therapy practice in town in addition to the help she gives us at Cross Creek, and sometimes all that work can knock her out.”
Scarlett’s respect factor for the woman quintupled, just like that. “God. I can’t imagine having to juggle two jobs and a health condition like multiple sclerosis all alone.”
“Emerson isn’t alone,” Owen said, his voice gruff but his gray eyes kind. “We all pitch in to give her a breather when she needs one, just like she helps out at Cross Creek when she’s feelin’ up to it. Hunt is holding down the fort at the farm today, too, so he’s nearby in case she needs anything.”
Wow. Scarlett knew Hunter and Emerson weren’t married, but the Crosses’ support for her put a triple knot in their already tightly knit family dynamic, for sure.
Scarlett looked down at the camera around her neck, the idea in her mind going from zero to out-loud in less than three seconds. “Since you two will probably be really busy helping customers today, I can post updates and pictures to your social media accounts. I mean, I won’t be able to edit the photos as carefully as I would for a magazine spread or anything,” she amended, but Eli just laughed.
“Uh, news flash. You’re a professional photographer. Your unedited photos will still kick the ass of anything Owen or I would shoot with our cell phones and throw on Cross Creek’s Twitter feed.”
Owen nodded in agreement, and Scarlett split her smile between the two of them.
“Fair enough. But as long as you guys are okay with hooking me up as a temporary admin on Cross Creek’s social media pages, I’m happy to help,” she said. Another idea popped into her mind right on the heels of the first, and yes, even better. “I can text Mallory and have her share everything on FoodE’s accounts, too.”
“That’s a great idea,” Eli said. “A couple of cross-promoted posts will entice more people to come out and keep them tuning in to the magazine for the next video segment.”
God, he must be the one who handled the marketing when Emerson needed a break, because he was seriously a ringer on the media side.
“Actually, I couldn’t have said it better myself.” Scarlet turned toward the tables full of produce, trying to break the fifty-way tie in her head over what to put online first, but then Eli threw her for a loop.
“Are you sure you’re okay adding social media detail to your list of things to do today?” he asked, leaning in as Owen moved to the other side of the tent where Tobias was pouring some water into a plastic bowl he’d brought along for his dog, Lucy.
Scooping up her camera, Scarlett managed a laugh. “I know we haven’t been working together for too terribly long, but the fact that I like to multitask cannot possibly be a shock to you.”
“No,” he agreed, pausing long enough for her to frame up a shot of the cardboard containers of green beans on the table in front of her—click-click. “But doing direct marketing for Cross Creek is above and beyond the deal we have with you and Mallory, and you already helped us set up for the market when you didn’t have to.”
“I’m here for the authentic experience, remember?” Shifting, she took another shot, then another, the movements loosening the ache from her overtired muscles. “Doing as much as I can while I also do my job is what gives the photos and the articles that personal connection. Anyway, taking pictures is part of our deal. Posting them online only takes me an extra second or two. Here, look.”
Scarlett’s fingers were in the back pocket of her cutoffs before she’d even finished the sentence, her cell phone in hand before she’d taken her next inhale. “Instagram has some crazy-good filters for a social media site, and we can cross-post to Twitter from there, too. All I need to do is take a shot”—she sent her stare over the produce beneath the bright-red canopy, pausing over the pretty pile of tricolor peppers sitting next to the green beans. Click-click—“do a little creative cropping to make sure the composition works”—a few slides of her thumb had the job in the past tense and the image centered with just the right ratio of subject-to-background—“choose a filter to make all the colors pop”—she scrolled through her choices before ah! Yeah, Clarendon was perfect for all these warm reds and yellows, with a little sharpening to pull in the gleam from the growing daylight—“and voilà! All I need to do now is to make things official.”
“I see,” Eli said, and wait . . . how had his cocky smile resurfaced at double its usual strength? “And what are you going to write for the text portion of the post?”
“Oh.” Good freaking question. Mallory had always been the writer. But come on. Scarlett had a brain in her head—one that had earned her a degree from one of the most competitive Ivy League institutions out there. She could come up with 140 characters to back up her photo. Or wait, was it 120?
Shit.
“I guess I could just keep it simple and give up the facts, like our location and the market’s hours,” she offered slowly, but Eli made a face like he’d smelled something decidedly past its prime.
“Sure. That’d be spectacular. If you want the posts to be as scintillating as the instruction manual for an office printer.”
Scarlett’s belly squeezed behind the dark-green cotton of her tank top. Although she hated to admit it, the point was sadly valid, so she tried again.
“Okay. How about if I just look at what Emerson posted last week and recycle that?” There had to be at least a nugget or two of goodness in there. The woman did a huge portion of Cross Creek’s PR, for God’s sake.
Not that the suggestion seemed to impress Eli. “Emerson’s good, but you need to do better than repurposing her copy. The words are as important as the photo, and they both have to be fresh, otherwise the post just turns into white noise. Here.” Eli reached for her phone, his fingers turning out to be just as nimble as hers. “All we have to do is enter Cross Creek’s password”—tap, tap, tap—“load the picture. Nice”—he paused to slide her an appreciative grin—“and come up with something quick and catchy that’ll make Cross Creek stand out in the crowd.”
Eli tapped an index finger against his bottom lip, but the unnervingly sexy gesture lasted only seconds before his eyes lit up and he returned his attention to her phone. Fifteen seconds’ worth of keystrokes later, he passed the thing back over, and Scarlett found herself torn squarely between laughing out loud and being ridiculously impressed.
The laughter won out by a hair. “‘Cross Creek Farm—today’s peppers are so fresh, you’ll want to slap them’?”
“You won’t forget it, will you?” Eli asked. “Between the tagline, the great photo, and the link to the market, that should work for at least a little exposure.”
Scarlett glanced down at the tweet on her phone, which had already gotten two likes and as many retweets, and her curiosity stirred faster. “What about Facebook? We have a little more room there for text, if you want me to just add on to this a bit.”
“Ah, we have like two minutes before anyone will make it over the hill from the parking lot. I can totally come up with something for you real quick. No sweat.”
He moved his fingers in true “gimme” fashion as he reached out to reclaim her phone. Her interest went from a slow burn to a simmer when he did exactly as promised, easily expanding on the original copy. But then her simmer turned into a full boil when she realized why the tone of the messages seemed so oddly familiar.
It was a spot-on match with the copy she’d read on Cross Creek’s website, to the point that she’d bet the bank the same person had written them.
A person who, from the look of things . . . was Eli.
“Wow,” Scarlett said, her heart pumping faster to keep up with her racing curiosity. “And you seriously don’t have any sort of writing experience?”
Eli’s cocky smile hitched, so slightly that if she hadn’t seen the genuine thing about three dozen times this week, she probably wouldn’t have even noticed.
“You got me. I’m actually a Rhodes Scholar.”
His answer arrived with all his usual charm, those baby blues flashing and that distracting-as-sin mouth shaped by his trademark playful smirk. But he hadn’t answered the question—in fact, now that she thought about it, he’d gone out of his way to dodge the question. Which left Scarlett with a question of her own.
Why would Eli hide the fact that he was a damned good writer?
She opened her mouth to ask exactly that, but something deep in his expression made her trap the words between her teeth.
Getting Eli to open up enough for a simple video segment on a farm he knew inside and out had been like trying to squeeze rainwater from rocks. Getting him to talk about something he so clearly wanted hidden?
Not going to happen. No matter how badly Scarlett found herself wanting to know.
“Ah. Well, I guess that explains it.” She worked up a smile, lifting her cell phone in salute. “Thanks for the help with the posts. I’ll catch you at lunchtime to do our next video?”
His brows arced up, clearly delineating his surprise, but still, he said, “You bet, bumblebee.”
And then he walked away.