The Promise Of Rayne - The Promise of Rayne Part 17
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The Promise of Rayne Part 17

Light punched through the dimly lit space, and she scrutinized the assembly line of tables. The organized packing stations of fresh produce and vendor commodities she'd smelled upon entry were placed next to the pallets of labeled, ready-to-use boxes. All was evidence of Levi's determination and grit. All contracts and partnerships he'd pursued.

He strode to the center of the concrete floor, an iPad in hand and pride in his eyes. The same pride that shone in every square inch of this building. Of this land.

A fresh realization sent tingles down her spine.

Levi loved his farm the way she loved her lodge.

"What's wrong?" he asked, scrutinizing her the way he did when he sensed her discomfort.

"Nothing." She tried to shake away her melancholy, to hide the burning guilt she'd felt for weeks, yet the feeling lingered.

"If you're worried someone is going to walk in and find you with me, then-"

"I'm not." Truth was, getting caught was only one slice of her worry pie.

He waited, but she couldn't quite reconcile her thoughts enough to speak them aloud. According to Cal's most recent lecture, her presence on this farm would be considered treason. She couldn't afford to add blasphemy to her running list of familial sins. And affirming the farm's efforts and its obvious success, while also encouraging Levi's aspirations for a broader reach and profit margin, was just that: blasphemy.

She brushed her fingers over the wooden produce sign next to a dozen dewy heads of lettuce and cabbage and repeated her internal motto. Just don't think about it.

"These signs are beautiful," she said. "Do you use them at the open markets?"

"Yes." His voice flatlined. She knew he hated her attempts at diversion, yet she hoped to prevent a trip on the Ferris wheel of family drama.

"Are they made here locally?"

"Can't get much more local."

He offered a half shrug at her questioning look. "Is that code for you made them? Have you been hiding a secret woodworking talent from me, Levi?"

His eyes softened and his lips twitched into a begrudging smile. "Ford may have taught me a few things over the slower winter seasons."

No matter how many times she practiced her face of indifference whenever Levi spoke the man's name, Shelby history prevented complete nonchalance. She couldn't pretend Ford wasn't the swindler who'd cheated her grandfather in the midst of his grief, or that the farm, her family's rightful inheritance, hadn't been jeopardized in the name of his greed. The mental line she'd drawn to separate Levi from his boss, to evade the darts of her guilty conscience, to justify her growing feelings for a man who saw her as more than a name, thinned.

The cool morning air nipped at her bare arms while she made her way to the end of the table, passing Levi, to reach the pile of empty boxes.

Levi had other plans.

He planted his hands on her upper back and pressed his thumbs deep into the hollow under her shoulder blades. Her body sagged against the comforting touch, but still, she pinched her lips together in preparation for his impending questions. Questions that would force her to be truthful. Questions that would put them at odds. Questions that would risk the balance they'd found in keeping their truce and their relationship intact.

"Whatever happened with Teddy the sci-fi writer? You said something about visiting him the other morning before I left."

Levi's purposeful change of subject was met with relief. "You mean Teddy the mystery writer. And I visited him yesterday actually."

At Levi's prompting, she lolled her neck forward, her voice coming out in muffled bursts. "I would have told you all about it this morning, but-"

"I bailed on you. Yeah, yeah. You don't have to keep rubbing it in," he teased. "It won't happen again. Scout's honor."

The tight coil in her throat prevented her laugh as his artful fingers carved into the space between her neck and shoulders. Because she knew it would happen again-maybe not by choice, but by circumstance. As soon as Cal decided to stick around for longer than a weekend, things between the two of them would slow. They couldn't keep this up forever.

She twisted to face him, taking in his light hair and his sea-glass eyes and his stern jaw. "Were you really a Boy Scout?"

"Sweetheart, I was much closer to earning my place in juvie than earning a Good Samaritan badge in the Boy Scouts. Trust me." He pressed his thumb to the dimple of her chin. "But since you've already dodged the honesty bullet once this morning . . ." He hiked an eyebrow.

"I'll tell you anything you want to know about Teddy. He's quite the character." And a perfect scapegoat. Better to fill their time with nonconfrontational topics than to voice her internal warfare. "But we can definitely talk while we pack. You only have"-she glanced at the clock on her phone-"an hour and fourteen minutes before cutoff. So tell me what to do, Boss."

"I could get used to that." He winked before giving her a rundown on the assembly-line-style system. His interactive spreadsheet kept the process easy and efficient.

She secured a well-fitted cardboard lid to a box stuffed full of vegetables and fresh herbs set to be delivered to a little Greek restaurant two valleys over. She'd eaten there with Gia several times over the last year.

Rayne packed seven boxes in the time it took her to tell Levi all about her visit with Teddy. How she'd checked in on him, brought him a few of Delia's special dishes, and left him with a standing job offer at her aunt Nina's restaurant.

When her monologue finished, the echoey room fell silent.

She swiveled her neck to the right and found him at the table marked "Personal Care." Handmade soaps, lotions, scrubs, and balms all around him.

"You got the man a job because Celeste fired him?"

"It was the right thing to do." She shrugged, but still she could feel his probing gaze. "He's older, and a little different, a writer type, ya know? He's worked at the lodge for so many years and was used to the quiet, the odd hours, the ability to let his mind free flow with story ideas as he managed his nightly tasks."

"You sound like you could write his resume." Levi's tone was neither approving nor disapproving, so why did she feel the need to defend herself?

"I took his shift, Levi. I know how it feels to be booted out of something you've put years of your life into. Teddy was my grandfather's friend. He didn't deserve to be fired."

Levi hoisted the box to his chest. Tight lipped, he watched her for a few seconds more and then left to add the package to his truck. Hadn't she thought this topic a safe bet? So much for nonconfrontational.

When he entered the warehouse again, he stalked toward her. "I don't understand you."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't get this . . ." He waved a hand down the length of her. "This bleeding heart you have for everyone around you when you won't fight for what you want. You won't fight for yourself."

"I did too fight." She just hadn't won.

"No, you allowed Cal to hand your dream to a woman who sounds like his spitting image."

Rayne shoved a completed box at him, the second-to-last one on her assembly table. "Don't assume you know what happened in that meeting. You weren't there."

"No, I wasn't there," he said. "But I did read your proposal. And I know how many hours, days, months, you spent working on it. And for what?"

Levi had spotted the infamous blue folder tucked inside her laptop bag a few mornings ago. Refusing to take no for an answer, he'd read it straight through while waving away her attempts to minimize and distract. And when he'd finished, when he'd closed that folder, he'd strode to where she stood fidgeting at the desk and bracketed her face in his hands, kissing her so soundly she felt as if her heart might burst through her chest.

"You don't understand how things work in my family."

"No, I don't care how things work in your family, Rayne. Big difference. Because they're wrong." He shook his head. "You deserved that promotion. And your dream deserved to be given a chance."

"You sound like Gia." Only Gia knew the limits. Cousin Milton's fate had scared them both.

"If that's true, then I like her a whole lot more than I thought I did."

"You wouldn't say that if you knew how she feels about you."

"Yes, I would." He pointed to her breastbone. "Because out of your entire family, Gia's the only person who seems to care more about you than the Shelby image."

Heat rose to her cheeks as he continued that hard, unwavering stare.

When he spoke again, the edge in his voice had softened, but his eyes had not. "You really don't understand what an asset you are, do you? Rayne, your proposal is brilliant and creative and incredibly selfless. What you could do for this town, for this community . . ." Levi clamped his teeth together. "I wish I could afford to hire someone at Second Harvest with even half the heart and vision you have."

Rayne forced her gaze away. "Celeste won't stay in Shelby Falls forever. She's promoting her career, not the lodge. It's not over." Yet. "And given the circumstances, I chose the best option I could."

"Really? You think staying in that penitentiary is your best option?"

Their gazes collided again, and this time, she wouldn't be the first to look away. "Aren't you being just a tad hypocritical? Look around you, Levi! Would you ever walk away from the farm-for any reason?" Just watching the strain of his jaw made her own ache involuntarily. "Well?"

"I don't know." He stormed out of the warehouse carrying an armload of boxes. She followed him out to the back of his open delivery truck, the corded muscle in his forearms flexing.

"You don't know?" How could he not know? She knew. Everything about Levi, everything he said and did, declared the farm and all it contained his territory. His sweat. His heart. His purpose. They were the same in that regard, cut from the same devout cloth of loyalty. Just divided by a fence line.

She'd seen it for weeks now, yet she'd only just allowed herself to realize the depth of his dedication today.

"I don't know, Rayne." But there, in his words, she heard it again. The slightest inflection. A waver of doubt. A tell. The same one he'd pointed out in her so many times before.

"Why aren't you being honest with me?" It was an uncomfortable observation coming from the perpetually gullible, yet she knew she wasn't wrong. He'd trained her too well in detecting deception. His reading of people had been a major topic of discussion over the past weeks. He'd pointed out her tells time and time again, no matter what the lie. And now she'd done the same to him.

Levi set the next load down and braced his hips. He exhaled for several seconds, and when he lifted his head, the ferocity of his expression crippled her ability to speak.

"For the last nine years I've cared about nothing more than this farm and the man it's attached to. Until you."

She stared at the hollow of his throat, unable to meet his eyes, unable to accept his words.

But despite her shock, he continued. "Whatever I thought I wanted last year or even last month is not the future I've been thinking about lately."

The ring of her phone snapped them from their frozen stare down.

Missed call: Cal Shelby And then an immediate text to follow: Where are you? Celeste and I have already started the meeting. You're late.

Two things hit her at once. One, Cal was back and it was only Wednesday. And two, Celeste had scheduled a meeting without bothering to inform Rayne.

Levi clambered down the metal ramp. "What's wrong?"

"I have to go." She tucked her phone into her pocket once more.

"Why?"

"He's back, Levi." There was no breaking it to him gently. Cal was home and their time together would suffer for it. "And I'm late to a meeting."

He wrapped a hand around her bicep before she could turn away. "It's not like he's roaming your lobby at four a.m. Cal being back doesn't have to change anything for us."

Only she believed differently. Cal being back would change things. It would change a lot of things.

"We'll see each other when we can, Levi." The best reply she could offer for now, yet one she knew he'd ultimately refute.

She freed herself from his hold and started for the exit.

Levi followed her out, matching her hurried stride up the driveway and into the trees beyond. "And when will that be?"

Hadn't she known he wouldn't accept her vague response? "I'm not sure yet. I need to figure some things out first."

"Fine. Then let's figure them out together. You're not in this alone."

Wasn't she, though? The question seemed to materialize out of nowhere, as if her doubt had been crouched in hiding, waiting for just the right moment to pounce. Yet the truth was . . . if the two of them were exposed, it would be her dreams at stake, her future at risk.

"Rayne."

At the sound of his voice, the spiraling disquiet in her mind morphed into the crunching of footsteps at her side. Levi was still trailing after her. Onto Shelby land. And by the look on his face, he was prepared to march straight into the lodge if she didn't stop him first.

With no time to spare, she spun toward him and pressed a quick kiss to the edge of his jaw. "I'll call you the second I can. I promise."

For now, it was the only promise she knew she could keep.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

Levi replayed Rayne's hurried departure a hundred times over in the next few days, their interactions limited to phone calls and predawn text messaging. Cal's return and endless demands on Rayne had been met with ample frustration on his part-all of which could be summed up by a lack of face time with the only Shelby he cared about.

He kicked a pile of loose gravel and trudged up his front porch steps after a long day networking with his new vendors. His mind was everywhere but on the invoices and paperwork awaiting him inside.

A half step into his house, he stopped short.

Hauser's ears perked up, his eyes playing a game of tennis between Levi and his master.

The smack of the screen door against the frame elicited no reaction from either of the visitors in his home.

"Sit, Hauser. Stay." Ford laid a weathered hand on the shaggy dog's head, his bony shoulders bowed as if an invisible fifty-pound weight had been strapped to his back.

Levi tossed his wallet and phone on the coffee table. "Didn't you have a meeting in town with the Farmers Society this afternoon?"

"It ended early."

Those meetings never ended early. "How come?"

Ford shifted a shiny object in his hands, continuing on as if Levi hadn't asked the question at all. "Out of respect, I've tried not to notice the odd hours you've kept over the last week, your high spirits, your frequent phone calls. I've wanted to honor your privacy, refrain from asking too many questions."

"I've been seeing someone."