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“Can’t call you a farmer? Wait. What happened?” Charlie asked.
I headed behind the bar, grabbing glasses for all four of the guys as they posted up next to Sawyer. I listened as he told the story to the Fixer Brothers guys. I pulled beers for Sawyer, Nathan and Shawn, and our best non-alcoholic cider for Charlie, who didn’t drink. I slid a bonus shot glass of whiskey next to Sawyer’s glass.
“Obviously the farm was having a rough couple of years, but I didn’t expect this yet,” Sawyer was telling them. “Maybe I was dumb not to expect it. I just thought we’d bounce back.”
“Are there other local farms you can work for?” Shawn asked. “You’ve got to be one of the most experienced people for a hundred miles around here. Anyone would be happy to have you.”
Sawyer clicked his tongue. “Small farms have been drying up for years now. Decades. Everything’s gone corporate, large-scale, high-tech… I’m not going to move to some factory farm hundreds of miles away, that’s for sure.”
“Okay. Simple fix,” Charlie said, slapping his hand down on the bar top. “You should come work for us.”
Sawyer puffed out a laugh. “Would be nice, wouldn’t it?”
“You know who our next big construction client is, right?”
“Who?” Sawyer asked.
Charlie tapped his finger on the bartop. “Right here. We start the Jade Brewery renovations next week. Back deck, outdoor seating, redoing the entire outside lawn. Whole overhaul. The back of this place is going to be a forest resort oasis by the time summer hits.”
Shawn gave Charlie a glance, then looked at Sawyer. I could tell he was chewing on something in his mind before he spoke.
“Wait,” Shawn finally said. “Maybe Sawyer coming to work for us is actually a good idea.”
Shawn and Nathan were the brother duo that owned Fixer Brothers. Charlie was always joking around, but if Shawn was considering it, I knew it might be a real offer.
“It’s a great idea,” I said before I could stop myself. “He’d be perfect for it.”
“Don’t listen to Harlan,” Sawyer said, waving a hand through the air. “He believes in me too much. He’d tell me I could walk into an operating room and perform surgery just based on intuition.”
“Hey, I’ve seen how good you are at taking splinters out of my hands,” I said. “Who says you wouldn’t be great at surgery?”
“It’s so cute how much he loves you,” Charlie teased again.
“I think Shawn is right, though,” Nathan continued. “I think I speak for both of us when I say we’d be lucky to have you join the Fixer Brothers team.”
Sawyer was looking down at the bar, drawing circles with his thumb into the condensation on his beer glass. “You guys are sweet, but I can find my own way into new work. I know people are barking down your door ever since your TV show took off, and I’m a farmer, not a construction guy.”
“We do get a fair amount of applicants lately,” Shawn continued, “but our best landscaping guy is moving out to Texas soon. We really need help with it. I know landscaping ain’t agriculture, but something tells me you’d be good at it, and a quick learner.”
Sawyer gave Shawn a sad half-smile. “I don’t have any idea about the process for getting licensed as a landscaping contractor. It’s okay, guys. Really. I’m going to drink my cares away tonight, but first thing in the morning, I’m starting a job search.”
“Actually,” Nathan added, “you actually don’t need a license to operate as a landscaper in Colorado. Fun fact.”
“Very fun fact,” Charlie said, his eyes widening. “Shit, Sawyer, you’d be great at it. I’ll get on my knees and beg, actually, if you want. Jax tells me I look hot when I beg.”
“No one needs to hear about what you and Jax do, Charlie,” I joked. “And Goose, it kills me to agree with Charlie, but he’s right. You would be great at it.”
Sawyer didn’t seem convinced.
“I wouldn’t want to do it if a more experienced landscaper could have the job—”
“You know you’d be damn good at that job,” I interjected, a little too hastily. All of the guys’ eyes looked up at me at once, and I cleared my throat. “You’d have a lot to learn, but these guys are good teachers, and they already know you’re the most loyal worker in Colorado. That’s all I’m saying.”
The hot feeling on my cheeks was back again, and I started dreaming again about hitting a punching bag for a few minutes. Few hours. I busied myself behind the bar, grabbing a rack of glasses and putting it down soon after, not even fully aware of what I was doing.
And then Sawyer reached over the bar and gently squeezed my forearm, stopping me in my tracks.
Instantly, I came back down to Earth.
