Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
Kemp
“That was the best Rusty Anchor event yet,” I said as I drove us home, riding one hell of a natural high. I couldn’t even blame it on a buzz. I’d only had time to grab a single beer, and I’d abandoned it somewhere along the way, too caught up in talking to as many guests as I possibly could.
Anna held up a hand for me to high five. I did, then wove our fingers together and rested our hands on her bare thigh below the hem of her dress.
“It was packed,” she said, “and Chloe said merch and tour sales set another record. Plus Adrian crushed it with the tunes.”
“According to Chance, we had two beer influencers there with hundreds of thousands of followers on their platforms. They were raving about both the stout and the pale ale.”
She pulled our hands up to her lips and kissed my knuckles. “Congratulations, Kemp. You deserve all of that and more.”
I pulled into the driveway and parked in the garage, then leaned across the console and kissed my beautiful girl.
She kissed me back and said, “Let’s go see how Oliver did and let Kinsley get home.”
“Let’s do that,” I said, not forgetting for a second her earlier comment about what she was wearing under her sexy little dress.
I followed Anna inside, holding her hand.
The dogs met us at the door, tails going a hundred miles an hour, noses everywhere.
We greeted them and found Kinsley in the living room, reading a book that had English class written all over it.
She closed it and stood. Baxter went to her side as if they were best friends.
“Hello,” Kinsley said, brushing a strand of hair out of her face. “How did it go?”
“It was lit,” I said.
“Kemp’s the beer hero once again,” Anna told her. “How’d it go here?”
Kinsley filled us in on Oliver’s evening. He was clean, read to, and had woken up for a bottle an hour ago. He’d gone back to sleep twenty minutes ago.
I paid her, offered her a ride home, and saw her off on her scooter when she refused, securing her promise to ride on the sidewalks. When I came back in, Anna was in the kitchen, drinking a glass of water.
“You danced your sexy ass off tonight,” I said, pulling her into my arms.
“How do you know?” she teased. “You were busy being important for most of it.”
“Oh, I had an eye on you the whole time. One of the best parts of my night.” She and her girlfriends had torn up the dance floor. If I needed any mood setting for our alone time—and I didn’t—watching her shake and sway her killer body on the dance floor would’ve done it.
She set her glass aside and ran her hands up my chest. “I think it’s safe to say the whole world knows about us now.”
“Was it the dancing or the kissing?” I asked.
Laughing, she said, “From what I heard, the kiss when we got there was quite emphatic. But the dancing was nice.”
“I’ve wanted to slow dance with you like that for years, with your body so close it’s like we’re one person.”
She stretched up to kiss me. “I’m so glad you had a good night. I’ve been worried about you.”
I put some space between us and got my own water, realizing how parched I was from all the socializing.
“Nothing to worry about, Anna Bobana.”
“Are you kidding me?” she asked, leaning against the cabinets, her tone going overly serious. I braced myself. “You’re running yourself into the ground, Kemp.”
“I’m fine. I’m good. I’m fucking happy.”
“Now you are. Before we left for the brewery, you were a hollow shell.”
“That leadership class is hard,” I said. “Once I get through that, things’ll get better.”
She tilted her head. “Do you really believe that? Once you get through your class, you’ll likely be working two full-time jobs plus parenting a baby. Who does that, Kemp? Nobody who doesn’t absolutely have to.”
“It won’t be two full-time jobs. I’ll cut my brewery hours in half.”
“So you’re spending forty-plus hours a week at a job you don’t love and cutting back on the one that brings you joy?
You’re a different person when it comes to the brewery.
You were depressed, resigned, and stressed working on fire department stuff.
I watched you come to life as we walked into Rusty Anchor. ”
“Of course there’s a difference. One is beer, and one is saving lives. You can’t even compare the value of the two to society.” I rubbed the back of my neck and sauntered into the living room, my gaze going straight to the photo of my dad and me on the shelf.
Anna followed me in and sat on the arm of the sofa. “It’s not society that matters here, Kemp. It’s you. Your happiness. Your life.”
I picked the photo up, emotions flooding me as they always did when I looked at it and remembered that moment.
I was eighteen years old. I’d finished weeks of training, conditioning, and studying and was finally a firefighter.
The photo was taken of me and my dad after the first fire we’d fought together.
We were dirty and tired and stunk to high heaven.
Even without the photo, I could still remember how my dad’s eyes had shone with pride.
My old man hadn’t been super expressive, but that day he’d told me how happy he was to have me as a son.
Anna sidled up beside me and gazed at the photo she’d seen a thousand times.
“I just want to be someone who’d make him proud,” I said.
She grasped my upper arm and squeezed supportively. “You are. The photo says it all. Can’t you see that in his eyes?”
I studied those eyes, that face I loved and respected. “He was a good man.”
My throat throbbed with the tightness of grief.
It’d been eight years since that horrific night of the wreck and the call that had me shifting my whole life from living on my own to moving back in here to take care of my sister.
Our parents had been way too young, with Natalie only twelve years old.
I’d been rocketed from living a fairly carefree life in my twenties, volunteering for the department and working construction, to suddenly being responsible for a preteen and all the bills that went with our family home.
The bigger challenge had been juggling my grief with my sister’s and getting us both through our devastating loss.
Lucky for me, my sister had a good head on her shoulders.
Some days I thought she was wiser than me.
“My mother always told me I was ‘going to do great things,’” I said, my voice husky. I swallowed yet another surge of sadness.
I could still hear her voice in my head, still see the love beaming from her smiling face as she’d said those words, from the time I was a little kid until well after I became an adult.
“I remember,” Anna said softly, her love for my parents evident in the thickness of her voice.
“Your mom was one of my favorite people, but that’s a lot of pressure to put on a kid.
I don’t think she meant it that way but”—she shook her head sadly—“there’s heavy expectation built into that one sentence. ”
My mom had been the most supportive, loving mom ever. “She wanted the best for me and Natalie.”
“She did. She wanted you to be happy and fulfilled and living your own dream. Not your dad’s.”
“This isn’t so much about dreams, Anna. It’s about helping people.
Doing the right thing. Whenever something bad happens and people say to look for the helpers,” I said, choking up, “my parents were the helpers. That’s what they did with their lives, never expecting any praise or reward.
It’s just who they were. Who they raised me to try to be. ”
Anna wrapped herself around my arm. “You’ve been one of them, one of the ‘helpers,’ for all your adult years.
It’s honorable, Kemp. But maybe now it’s time to do what makes you happy.
I don’t believe your parents would ever want you to follow in their footsteps if it makes you unhappy.
Besides…there’s at least a few hundred people, as witnessed tonight, who think the work you do at the brewery is a great thing. ”
I scowled, thinking how ridiculous that sounded. “Making beer isn’t quite what my mom meant, I don’t think.”
She let go of my arm and faced me, piercing me with intense cocoa-colored eyes.
“Don’t belittle what you and Holden created.
The brewery’s central to this community.
People love what you make, from the beer to the gathering spot on summer evenings to events like tonight.
They wouldn’t spend money on tickets and merch and the beer itself if they didn’t. ”
I scoffed. “Do you hear yourself? Making beer is frivolous compared to what my parents did with their lives.”
“You really believe they wouldn’t want you to be happy?”
“I’m happy, Anna,” I snapped.
“You’re happy when you’re at the brewery, thinking about the brewery, creating new flavors, doing publicity. You’re happy when you’re with Oliver. You’re not happy when you’re called out in the middle of the night or when you have to take a test or a class for the department.”
I didn’t know of anyone who was happy taking tests. They were temporary. Just something to get through. I was about to point that out when I caught the intensity in her eyes. Her beautiful, unwavering eyes.
I didn’t want to argue about this. Especially not after such a great evening.
“I’m happy when I’m with you too,” I said, curling my lips up in a smile I hoped she couldn’t resist. We weren’t going to agree on my career.
She softened, stepped closer, and wove both our hands together between us. “I’m happy when I’m with you too. I love you, Kemp.”
“Yeah?” I said, unable to stop my smile from growing and my chest from catching on those three words. I’d dreamed of hearing them from her lips for years.
“Of course. You know that. I’ve loved you pretty much all my life.” She shrugged as if it couldn’t be helped.
“I’ve loved you pretty much all my life too,” I said. “But I’ll go one better and say I’m in love with you. Hopelessly, recklessly in love.”