Page 79 of While the Sun Shines

But Cooper comes closer to him, grabs Drew’s chin in his hand, and tips his face side to side. “Andrew.”

“Get off.”

“Andrew Madison.”

“Or put some clothes on at least.”

“What happened between you and Penny?”

“Nothing,” Drew says, but he can feel the blood rush to his face.

Cooper lets out a loud laugh. “Nice, my man. You two got down and dirty? Fucking finally, right?”

“No—okay, yes, but—listen, Coop. I need help.”

“With—?” Cooper grimaces and drops his grip on Drew’s face. “Look, I can do a lot to give you a hand, but bedroom issues with the ladies is not my forte.”

“No, not with—fuck you, I know what I’m doing.”

“Good, ’cause I like to believe I could figure it out, but honestly—”

“Cooper. Focus. Tonight. Penny, her friend at the bar. Us, Whit, Abelardo. Battle of the Bartenders. Can you put something together?”

“Tonight?”

“Yeah, tonight. After work. I want—she deserves something. That whole bartending thing got cancelled, and I want to—whatever we can manage, okay?”

“A huge event, absolutely no notice? You’ve come to the right place.” Cooper claps him on the shoulder. Then he stills and leans closer. “I just need one thing.”

“I figure we call Deb, Penny’s boss, get her permission. It’s got to be slow there tonight ’cause it’s Sunday, so it’s not going to be a big deal if we do something fun, could even be good for business.” Drew’s words trip over each other, his thoughts moving as he talks.

“One small, little, tiny thing I need from you in exchange for saving your ass with the girl of your dreams.”

“And it looks like milking’s a bust anyway, and we’re not going to have the baler fixed in time, so not much to worry about for the farm today either, so it’ll be fine if we—”

“Drew. I’m serious.” Cooper squeezes his shoulder.

“And as long as we get the animals all set this afternoon, we can take this evening off from work and—”

“Details.”

Drew pulls away. “Fuck off.”

“Who kissed who? Wait, obviously Penny did.”

“I’m not telling you anything.”

“And whose idea was it? Oh, yeah, must’ve been Pen.”

“You still smell like milk.” Drew ducks into the hall.

“And you’re the color of a fire truck,” Cooper shouts after him.

Drew takes out his phone as he hurries down the stairs. You around? he texts Travis, and at his reply that he is, Drew jogs up the road to Caroline’s. He needs to figure this out, needs to think through what he’s going to say, come up with a good enough argument to—

Though he’s climbing the steps to the porch before he’s halfway through unscrambling his thoughts, and when Travis opens the door to his knock, Drew just blurts, “You can’t sell this place.”

“I can’t?”