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“I’ll help you. You aren’t alone.”
A sob rips from Sadie, and my chest squeezes. My heart aches to take her pain away.
“What are you going to do, Jude? The land is crap after that flood. I should’ve known. We never recovered after that.”
“This isn’t the time to discuss this.” I put my hand on her forearm.
“When is the time?” The chair legs screech against the floor as she bolts up to standing. “Forget it. I just want this day to be over.”
She leaves me at the kitchen table, and the back screen door bangs against the wooden frame. I blow out a breath and lean back in my chair.
“Gill!” Ben shouts through the front screen door.
I turn and look through the archway into our family room.
“Shh…” a woman who I’m pretty sure is Gillian says.
“Why are you hiding in the family room?” Ben asks.
You’ve got to be kidding me? Gillian was listening to all that?
I get up from the chair and round the corner to find Gillian biting the corner of her lip, guilt all over her face. “You eavesdropping, Gill?”
“I didn’t want to interrupt.”
Ben walks through the screen door.
I crack my neck, and it pops. I don’t remember the last time I was this stressed.
“How is she?” Ben asks.
“How do you think?” What a stupid-ass question. He was young, but he has to remember the feeling he had when we lost Mom. Add in the fact that the future of her family’s land is on her shoulders now.
Ben doesn’t argue with me.
“Two months to find that kind of money…” I shake my head.
There are very few options. Fundraisers would never raise enough. Harvest isn’t going to turn a big enough profit. I’m not sure what Sadie’s thinking, but everything in farming takes time, and that’s the one thing we don’t have on our side.
“I was thinking,” Ben says.
He better not say what I think he’s about to say. Before he can even suggest being the fucking hero, I shoot him down. “No.”
“It could be a loan. She can pay us back whenever.” I think it’s great that my little brother has millions in the bank. Good for him and good for Gillian when she marries him because I know Ben, and he’d never make her sign a prenup. But there’s zero chance I’m going to let him do this.
“No.” I repeat myself.
“It’s the only solution. Let us help,” he says.
Gillian withdraws from our little circle. She’s obviously not comfortable with this conversation. I’m sure no matter what Ben says, Gillian still believes that it’s Ben’s money, not hers. Allowing Ben to cut a check would be the easy fix, but his money isn’t welcome here. He’s not the white knight in this story.
“Sadie is mine,” I say without running those words through my head first.
Ben raises his eyebrows with a smirk that makes me want to drop-kick him to the floor and wrestle it off his face.
“You know what I fucking meant. She’s my best friend.”
“But that’s not what you said.” Ben chuckles.
