“Wow.” Laurie raised her eyebrows at that.
“We live off the land here.” Emma sat down beside Laurie. “Sometimes we’ll trade with the neighbors for this or that.”
“I’ll need your help in the barn today,” Albert said to Dante. “I have a leak I need to patch or we won’t be able to bring in the hay.”
Dante grimaced. He didn’t like his father volunteering him for manual labor. But he owed his parents now. He owed them big.
“I’ll be doing some weeding in the garden today if you want to help.” Emma smiled at Laurie.
“Oh, okay. Sure.” Laurie sipped her coffee, her mouth drawn into a frown.
“We should get started.” Albert nodded to Dante.
Dante said nothing. He begrudgingly moved toward the door with his father. He cast a parting glance at Laurie. She gave him a small wave. That cheered him. Knowing she was warm and safe made him feel content. He wondered at that. Dante knew he could put up with his father, so long as it was for Laurie. He wondered at that, too. His urge to protect a witness had never been so strong. Of course, Laurie was much more than a witness to him. Even with previous girlfriends, the need to keep them safe had never been so strong.
Dante got his first glimpse of the farm during daylight as he followed his father. The farmhouse was a light blue-grey, with dark grey shudders. Well-kept, modest flowerbeds stretched around the base of the house. Out back was an expansive garden, which had every manner of vegetable growing. Dante spotted ripe tomatoes, green beans, and peppers, just for starters. The barn towered over everything else, rising up behind the garden, casting long shadows in the morning sun.
Albert and Dante crossed the cut green field that bordered the garden. The rest of his parents’ land, as far as he could see, was corn. Dante took a deep breath. The cold, fresh air woke him up. The sky was brilliant, almost as bright as Laurie’s eyes. The thought made Dante smile.
When they reached the barn, Dante saw bins and bins of corn lined up on the left. Toward the right was a giant table. A bandsaw sat at one end, but the rest of the table was clear. On the far right side was another long table, this one full of tools, saws, and rope. His father turned to him.
“Dante, it would be best if you never brought up intelligence gathering in front of your mother ever again.” Albert rested his hands on his hips.
Taken aback, Dante looked at his father confused.
“What do you mean?” Dante crossed his arms over his chest.
“I mean, when you were talking about finding out information on Kaimi and the mole in the department. Now, I can help you with that, but your mother can’t know.”
“Is there a reason she can’t?”
“Well, let’s just say it’s been a little difficult giving up my old job.” Albert looked away, studying an old hay bale in the corner. “She just wants me to be retired and stay that way. It’s crazy, but I at least let her think I’ve lost touch with my old contacts.”
“Are you saying you’re lying to Mom?”
“Not lying, just not telling her everything. You’ll understand when you’re married.” Albert waved away his concerns.
Dante scowled.
“Do you want me to help you or not?”
“Fine, but I don’t like not telling Mom.”
“It just has to be between you and me, no one else.”
“Are you going to Hilton or the agency?”
“The agency. Hilton will know you’re here the moment I call him.” Albert went to the table and picked up a tool belt. “If I ask him about specifics he’ll just get dodgy anyway. He was never one to give away anything. I suppose he’ll be calling me any day, once he gets wind of you being gone.”
“No one at the agency would tip off the Marshals?”
Albert smirked. He shoved his thumbs into the wide belt loops of his jeans. Then he rocked back on his heels as he gazed at his son with an amused gleam in his eye.
“Would you if it was the other way around?”
Dante smiled.
“No, I guess I wouldn’t.”
“Good. Now that that’s settled, I’ll let you know what I find out.”
“Fair enough.” Dante surveyed the barn.
“Let’s get this leak patched. Climb the ladder up to the rafters. Let me get the work gloves.”
Dante walked to the ladder his father gestured to and climbed hand over hand to the loft. He surveyed the roof. He couldn’t see any obvious damage, but he knew almost nothing about handiwork. The loft area had a couple of stray bales of old hay, but there wasn’t much up there now.
Albert joined him in the loft with the work gloves and tool belts. They strapped on the belts, put on the gloves, and went in search of the leak. Albert surveyed the far side of the wall, but they realized the leak came from the roof, at a point right above the wall. They spent the better part of the day up on the roof, replacing the metal sheet that was the problem.
From the roof top, Dante could see Laurie out back with his mother. Both of them were crouching over a vegetable. Her gold hair was down, blowing around in the crisp wind that kept him cool in the midday sun. Her beauty overwhelmed him. She was all warm sunshine. Whenever he touched her skin, it was like fire in his hands. He never wanted to be with someone as much as he wanted to spend every second with Laurie.
“Son?” Albert said sharply. “What is it? What do you see?”
“Huh?” Dante jumped. “Oh, nothing. Thought I saw an animal, a deer. That’s all.”
Their job finished, Dante followed his father back to the ladder. When they reached the ground, they walked back to the house where they met the women bringing in some baskets of vegetables. Laurie was breathless as she jogged up to him with a heavy basket. Her eyes were wide and they sparkled with excitement as she gave him the biggest grin he’d ever seen.
“Dante! Look!” Laurie walked backward in front of him toward the house, holding an oddly shaped tomato up like a trophy. “Have you ever seen a tomato that looks like that before? It’s a German striped tomato. Isn’t it amazing?”
Dante smiled, looking at the tomato she handed him. It curled in upon itself, with bubbly lobes on each side and an irregular scalloping to its juicy flesh. It wasn’t just red, but also green, yellow, and a hint of orange. There was a seam running around part of its edges, which had split and mended itself. To Dante, it didn’t look amazing or appetizing. It looked like a Frankenstein tomato, but his smile deepened. He handed it back to her.
Laurie waited for his response, looking for a monumental reaction to seeing the Frankenstein tomato.
“It’s really something.” He reached for her basket. “Want me to take that?”
She shifted her basket to her other hip.
“Oh, no, it’s not heavy. Look at these. These things with this papery stuff on them. They’re tomatillos. Have you ever seen them before? Or this? This is okra.” Laurie showed him everything she had collected like an excited child. Dante fought to control his laughter.
“No. I’ve never seen either of them before. Let’s go in for lunch, okay?” He put his hand on her shoulder to lead her inside.
“These, well these are just green beans, but they’re fresh. They have this fuzz on them like peaches.” Laurie talked a mile a minute. They entered the kitchen to find his mother slicing fresh bread. His father had disappeared into another room.
“These are Japanese eggplants. I’ve never seen these before either. I’ve only seen the big eggplants you get in the grocery store, you know? Emma showed me how to pull up potatoes right out of the ground. Have you ever done that before?”
“No, I haven’t.” He let out a little chuckle before he could gain control of himself.
Laurie barely noticed as she turned her face down to gaze at the vegetables, trying to decide if she had anything else remarkable to show him.