All of You (A Well Paired Novel Book 7) Page 3

  That would be an easy gig. She typed out a quick reply and responded to a few more emails before closing her computer. Opting for comfort rather than style—which was her norm—she changed into a pair of yoga pants and a loose shirt before drying her hair.

  Dinner with her parents was a great way to end her weekend. Since moving back, she’d been eating Sunday dinners with them almost weekly. It was nice to have unconditional love and support in her life.

  Jack made it when he could, but being one of the few master electricians in the area, he was pretty much on-call twenty-four-seven, three-hundred-sixty-five days a year. Dad and Rosie set a plate for him at every Sunday dinner and holiday meal, even knowing he might not be able to make it. Her brother might have lived closer than she had for the past decade, but he didn’t make many more meals than her.

  They weren’t exceptionally close, but they didn’t not like each other either. They didn’t have a lot in common, but they got along fine enough. They didn’t know much about each other’s personal lives. That was the kind of family they were—caring but not overly involved. Even Dad and Rosie’s involvement was limited. It meant there were rarely any family squabbles, which was nice.

  Her dad and Rosie weren’t even offended by Jack’s last text saying he’d be there long enough to scarf down salad and two bites of lasagna, and would then have to take off for a job. It was just as well. It would mean she wouldn’t have to stick around and be tempted by dessert.

  Rosie’s infamous Death by Chocolate cake and homemade apple fritters were temptations too strong for Hailey’s newly acquired self-control. Her stepmother was as cute and roly-poly as they came, which was adorable on her stepmother; not so cute on a single thirty-two-year-old.

  Her phone rang, and she contemplated not answering the unfamiliar number, but she didn’t want to pass on a possible job, so she answered.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, Hailey. I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time. It’s Ben Martelli.”

  “Oh, hi, Ben. No, now is fine. I actually just responded to your email.” She opened her laptop and pulled it up again.

  “I saw it. I don’t know what your schedule is like, but do you have time this week to come by the vineyard? We can walk the land, and I can give you an idea of my thoughts?”

  “I’m free tomorrow, if that works for you.” She had a couple weddings lined up on the upcoming weekends, and an engagement photo shoot on Friday; other than that, her work calendar was as open as her social life calendar. Scratch that. Her social calendar was completely empty.

  “Perfect. Alexis and I will be here all day, so come on by whenever it’s convenient. The tasting room doesn’t get much traffic on a Monday.”

  “Great. Is there a time I should—"

  “Sophie, honey, be careful not to spill the paint,” Ben said to whoever Sophie was. “I’m sorry, Hailey. I have to go. My daughter thinks she’s Picasso, and I don’t think Alexis wants the walls painted tonight.”

  “No worries.” Hailey chuckled. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Good luck with your daughter.” Feeling better about her week, she finished getting ready and headed to her parents for dinner.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Carter loved the freedom working for himself provided. Growing up, putting in long hours on his family’s farm hadn’t been a bad job. It beat working at a grocery store or flipping burgers. But it wasn’t his life calling like it was for Brady and their parents.

  He’d been lucky never having to go into combat when in the military. He had spent most of his time on base in Virginia, and when he was deployed, his platoon was stationed in a relatively safe area in Afghanistan. They’d been focused more on rebuilding and educating the Afghanis than combat. That was where he had picked up his interest in technology and graphic design. He’d continued on that track when he came back home.

  The computer kept him busy most days, but it was nice to get out in the fresh air and work side-by-side with his brother from time to time. It was planting season on Marshall Farm, and Carter didn’t mind getting his hands dirty. Lacing up his work boots, he ran a mental checklist of everything he’d packed in his cooler for the day. Water, a twelve-inch sub, a family-size bag of Doritos, a container of chocolate chip cookies that tempted him in the checkout aisle at the grocery store, and a couple of beers for the end of the day. He’d have to sneak in the cookies when his mom wasn’t looking, or she’d give him a hard time for buying store-bought instead of coming to her for some baked goods.

  Planting and harvesting seasons were short and required a lot of hands on deck. Carter helped out Brady on the farm, and the rest of the days he spent on his computer building websites, creating advertisements, and even designing business logos for companies.

  Grace, the hottest sister-in-law a guy could ask for, did wonders for his career referring him to her designer friends. He never imagined he’d have clients in Germany, Austria, and Russia. It was pretty cool.

  When Grace was at her shop in Boston, she flaunted his services around the city whenever she could. If it wasn’t for her, he wasn’t sure how successful he’d be. Even with some fancy clients under his belt, it was the little jobs, especially the local opportunities, he was most proud of.

  Driving by a logo displayed on a shop window or coming across one on social media he’d designed gave him a sense of pride. It wasn’t like he was voted most likely to not succeed in high school, but his party habits hadn’t exactly fallen by the wayside as he’d gotten older.

  Carter was known for being the life of the party. It was his senior superlative in the yearbook, and he worked hard at maintaining his reputation. If life wasn’t fun, what was the purpose of it? His brother inherited the serious genes. Thank God for Grace to spark a bit of life in Brady, or Carter feared his brother would have lived a life of boring solitude.

  He folded the bill of his favorite stained and worn-out John Deere baseball cap and shoved it in his back pocket. Making sure his phone was fully charged, he slid it into the side pocket of his cargo jeans. The weather was perfect for planting. The sun was creeping its way up over the horizon, and there hadn’t been any frost in over a week.

  The next few weeks he’d be busy with planting during the day and working on his computer at night. By early June he’d get back to work on his house. While he didn’t have Ty’s carpentry skills, he was able to put a decent amount of sweat equity into it two years ago when he helped Ty and his father with the framing and roofing. It was a nice perk having a friend who owned his own carpentry business.

  When it passed code enough to live in, he moved out of the farmhouse, giving Brady and Grace some much-needed newlywed privacy. Adding on an in-law apartment to the family home didn’t take long either, especially with his mom’s bare-minimum requests. A roof and running water were all she needed.

  Besides, Grace and Brady liked having her live in the house. Mostly it was for her cooking, although Grace was a quick study. They had a good thing figured out between the three of them. Carter loved his mom and brother, but he needed his space and privacy. Not that he’d been entertaining the ladies much lately.

  His brief dating stint with Jenna last year had put his entire dating game into a new perspective. He wasn’t looking for the happily ever after gig his friends had, but he didn’t want to keep on being the town man-whore either.

  Revving the engine of his side-by-side, he let it warm up while he strapped on his helmet. His cooler was safely tied down in the back.

  The land at the back edge of the farm was perfect for his needs. A bit too rocky for blueberries, but he had a scattering of apple and peach trees. He’d made a trail with his side-by-side that wound through the woods and came out behind the barn to the farm.

  For the next eight hours, he worked with his brother, tilling the dirt, planting the seedlings his mother had started in the greenhouse this past winter, and inspecting the blueberry bushes for insects.

  “Thanks for the extra set of hands today.” Brady prop
ped a pitchfork and shovel against the side of the barn.

  “No need to thank me. Just because I don’t make farming my full-time job doesn’t mean I’m going to abandon the family during planting and harvesting season.”

  “I know. Still. Thanks.”

  That was just like his brother. Quiet and humble. And the first to expect Carter to bail on his duties. Not that helping out the family was a duty. He liked the physical labor. If he had to get up at the ass crack of dawn every day for the rest of his life, well, yeah, then he’d hate it.

  For now, it was a welcome break from sitting behind his computer screen. He was an outside kind of guy like his brother and mother, and as their father had been. But doing something you loved as a job would make him, well, not love it anymore. Better to dip into farming from time to time and keep that appreciation of the land and all that Mother Nature provided for them.

  “You staying for dinner? Grace is going to pick up some steaks on her way home from work.”

  The sound of tires on their dirt drive had him craning his neck toward the visitor’s vehicle. “Ben coming to dinner as well?”

  “He wanted to stop by for a minute to talk marketing or something.” Brady took out his cell. “What should I tell Grace?”

  “Steaks on the grill? Yeah, what kind of guy would pass that up? You got any beer to go along with dinner?” Carter turned on the hose and held his mouth to it, lapping up the cold water like a dog.

  “Yes, and if you’re coming to dinner, you’re drinking out of a glass.” Brady turned, put his phone to his ear, and headed toward Ben.

  With a chuckle, Carter lifted the hose to his lips again. A second car parked next to Ben’s SUV and a familiar woman stepped out. Hailey. Blindly, he reached for the spigot to turn it off. Water sprayed from the nozzle soaking his shirt, which had already been wet with sweat and dirt.

  “Damn.” He quickly turned the water off and draped the hose over the spigot. Trying to play cool, he ran his hands down the front of the shirt like an idiot. It wasn’t like he could wipe off the water. “Hey, Ben. How’s it going? Nice to see you again, Hailey.”

  Her dark jeans accentuated her luscious curves in all the right places, making it hard for Carter not to stare. Not wanting to be caught gawking, he lifted his gaze up to her face. Perfect full lips, long dark lashes framing those witchy eyes. Yeah, her face wasn’t helping his don’t gawk mission.

  “Carter. Hi. I didn’t know...” She glanced at Brady who stood off to the side, his phone glued to his ear and a dumbass smile on his face.

  Grace did that to his brother. He was a total dork, but the love and marriage thing looked good on him. And on Grace too.

  Hailey lifted a brow. “Do you work here too?”

  “I lend a hand when I can.”

  “Actually, I’m glad you’re here.” Ben scratched his chin and glanced from Hailey back to Carter. “Hailey and I could actually use your help. This could be bigger and better than I had originally planned. You may be the key to the missing puzzle piece.”

  He didn’t have a freaking clue what Ben was talking about, and by Hailey’s wide eyes and open mouth he’d bet the rest of the beer in his cooler she didn’t have a clue either.

  Good thing Carter liked surprises, especially when they included a cute photographer with crystal eyes.

  HAILEY GASPED IN SURPRISE at Ben’s announcement. She didn’t think there was anything missing from the business plan she and Ben had just discussed at Coastal Vines. In fact, their meeting had gone quite well.

  He gave her a tour of the vineyard and laid out his wish list. A series of pictures capturing the very essence of the vineyard and the grapes during each season. Their website currently showcased pictures of their wine, but they had many updates over the past year that had yet to be included on their site.

  Hailey pitched the idea of a photo library journaling the day-to-day process of what it took to run a vineyard. She’d even be shooting some videos of them pressing and making wine. While her videography skills weren’t award winning like her photography, they were still on point.

  Ben had thought Marshall Farm would want to do something similar, which was the reason for their impromptu visit.

  What any of this had to do with Carter, she hadn’t a clue. It was Brady they’d come to talk to. If he was a farm hand at Marshall Farm, she could understand the lure of getting him in the background of some of the shots. With his tall frame and his boyish good looks, he’d be a nice addition to any frame. But the missing piece? That didn’t make sense at all.

  When Brady ended his call and joined them by the barn, Ben filled him and Carter in on the work Hailey was going to do for Coastal Vines.

  “The Marshall Farm website could use a facelift as well; no offense, Carter.”

  “Okay.” Carter shoved his hands in the front pockets of his wet and dirty jeans. Worn jeans that clung to his hips and strong thighs.

  The movement made his thin white T-shirt stretch across his shoulders, and she could see the outline of his pecks through his shirt. Normally, she wasn’t a fan of men wearing their baseball hats backwards. But on Carter, well, he could pull it off. He could pull just about anything off. Including those wet clothes.

  She’d seen her share of six-pack abs and veiny muscles. The guys on the covers of the fitness magazines she photographed were not her style. Not in any way, shape, or form. Carter’s muscles weren’t anything like theirs. His were more... man made. From hard, physical labor like farming, and not from weights, protein shakes, and steroids.

  While Ben explained what Hailey would be photographing throughout the year, she studied Carter. At first confusion set in his brows, and then one brow lifted with interest.

  “I see where you’re going with this. I’d have to restructure the layout of our website, but it wouldn’t take too much.”

  “And the Coastal Vine’s website would need to be redone as well,” Ben added.

  “It sounds nice, but is the cost worth it in the end? Having a fancy website isn’t going to sell more blueberries,” Brady added; skepticism laced his words.

  “It’ll drive more traffic to our website, and then Marshall Farms will pop up higher in the search field when people are on the prowl for blueberry farms. I like the idea of videos as well. Brady can talk about dirt and manure all day. Sure to draw in a crowd.” Carter clapped Brady on the back.

  “Wait a minute. Give me time to catch up. Hailey is going to film me doing stuff around the farm, and then you’re going to post it to our website?”

  Brady had been on the phone for half the conversation and had missed that part, as had Hailey. Although she didn’t have a phone call as a distraction. Instead, it was a half-wet gorgeous man directing his dimpled grin at her.

  “You should post to your social media pages as well. People like reading about the families behind the business,” Ben said.

  “Is Alexis on board with this?” Brady crossed his arms.

  Ben had warned Hailey about Brady’s old school methods of running a farm and that he may need coaxing into the idea. She still didn’t see how Carter was the missing piece.

  “She is. You know she loves giving tours and explaining the wine process. She showed Hailey the ropes earlier today.”

  “If Brady is too shy to give the tour, I always can,” Carter said with a grin that would have had her knees buckling if she wasn’t so used to men using their good looks to get their way.

  “I’m sure people would rather hear from the farm owner. They like hearing stories about the family, the traditions. No offense,” she added to take the edge off her words. Working closely with Carter would be dangerous. Not physically, but emotionally.

  Again, that sexy grin filled his face. If he wasn’t wearing aviator shades, she’d swear he wore a sparkle of mischief in his eyes as well.

  “None taken. But if it’s stories you want, I’m your man. Brady isn’t much of a talker. I seemed to have inherited all those genes.”

 
; “Inherited?” She furrowed her brows.

  “I’m sorry. I thought you knew each other. Brady and Carter are brothers.”

  Had Carter introduced himself with his full name at the wedding? He may have. She was focused on not making a fool of herself by drooling all over him and had tried to feign she had no interest in him. If he was the other Marshall brother, now it all made sense. Sort of.

  “Carter’s right. He knows as much about the land and the farm as anyone. He left us a few years back to work in the land of computers, but he still helps out during the busy season, like now.”

  Obviously, by the layer of dirt covering him.

  “We could use your graphic design skills,” Ben said, and then it all clicked. Carter was the man behind the technology while his brother was the face of the farm.

  “Sure. I’ll play around with some new layouts. Just tell me what you have in mind.” Carter took out his phone and tapped on the screen. “I blocked this week for farm work, so this weekend I’m going to be pretty booked with business, but I can squeeze you in on...” He tapped his screen again. “Next Wednesday?”

  “Sorry about making you get backed up. I can hire more high school kids this week,” Brady said.

  “Not a problem. I can manage.”

  It was nice to see the brothers support each other. That would have to be part of the story as well. Alexis had mentioned that her sister Grace, Brady’s wife, wasn’t big into farming. Funny since she grew up on a vineyard and married a farmer. There’d be interesting stories there for sure. The beautiful blonde farmer’s wife trotting around in designer heels would make a fabulous photo shoot.

  If Grace and Alexis approved, Hailey would find a way to interview them both and draw people into both the grape and blueberry harvest.

  “Will you be joining us as well, Hailey?” Her name rolled off Carter’s tongue like a crisp, smooth sip of the blueberry wine she’d sampled at Coastal Vines. Only one sip. To be polite.

  “You don’t need me there. Ben can give me your email, and I can send you whatever photos I take.”