Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
Ian
I think there is probably a country song—or twelve—about a woman wrecking a man’s bed.
There’s a reason they don’t write any about destroying his kitchen.
“I’m speechless,” I tell Winnie as I take in the disaster in front of me. “Truly speechless.”
“I know, I know!” she says. “Just don’t look! I’ll clean this all up after the festival.”
“So…tomorrow?” The thought of this mess existing in my home for thirty-six hours is enough to make me tense up and start sweating.
“Maybe tonight. If not, definitely tomorrow.” Winnie flashes me a smile, blowing her hair out of her eyes like she isn’t surrounded by a mountain of dishes and mixing bowls, all dusted with a light layer of powdered sugar.
I didn’t even know it was possible to make this much of a mess with a no-bake dessert.
By the looks of the tray on its side in my sink, little lumps of charred dough that could pass for coal adhered to it, Winnie tried to bake the no-bake bourbon balls.
“The good news,” she continues, “is that my third batch of balls is the best. They’re actually not bad.” She pops one into her mouth and closes her eyes in ecstasy. “Mmm. Mm-mm, that is so good.”
That sound of pleasure she’s making is the only thing on this earth that could distract me from the mess in my kitchen.
That, and the fact that she’s stripped off her sweatshirt at some point and is in form hugging leggings and a sports bra. I see every curve of her beautiful body and my hands are itching to land on that waist, pull her in close, and kiss her low and slow.
“That’s excellent news,” I tell her. “Because the deadline to turn in your entry is in twenty minutes. Do you need any help?”
“Yikes!” She drops a spoon in the sink and turns right, then left. “What am I doing? Do you have a container for these?”
“Sure.” I fish a plastic storage container out of the cupboard. I don’t have the heart to tell her that bourbon balls really need time to sit and soak up the bourbon for the full flavor effect.
Which reminds me…
“What bourbon did you use?” I’ve been at the festival booth all morning and I told her to make herself at home in my kitchen.
I should have picked out the best bourbon for her to use to enhance the flavor.
“That bottle you had in the liquor cabinet.”
My stomach drops. My heart just about stops. “Which one?” I ask, looking frantically around the mess of saucepans, mixing bowls, and spilled nuts.
Then I spot it. “Oh, fuck,” I say.
“What? Am I going to poison someone or something?” she asks, bewildered, letting Barrel lick peanut butter off of a spoon.
I don’t even know why she has peanut butter out. That shouldn’t be in the recipe.
“Why would my bourbon poison someone?” Swallowing hard, I shake my head. “No, of course not.” I pick the open bottle up off of the counter. It’s half empty. Probably because she made three batches before she perfected them. “I just wasn’t planning to drink this bottle.”
Because it’s the very first bottle we filled at Four Brothers.
It has—had—my thumbprint in the wax on the seal.
I wasn’t planning to open that bottle until I retired as master distiller.
“Oh, no, I’m sorry!” Winnie dusts powdered sugar off of her sports bra. “I feel terrible.”
Instantly, I feel worse. The last thing I want is for Winnie to feel bad about it.
She looks so concerned and upset, I can’t tell her the truth.
I’m also distracted by the way her fingers brush over her chest. The way she bites her bottom lip in concern, gaze darting over to the bottle of bourbon. The way when she reaches way over the counter to grab the powdered sugar, I can see every inch of her very perky ass.
She’s distracting, that is for damn sure, but my bourbon has been opened. That shit hurts.
“It’s no big deal,” I manage to say, even though inside I might be crying. “I told you to use anything you want.”
It’s my fault.
No question about that.
I don’t want her to feel bad for my fuck up. I should have put that bottle away or pointed it out to her.
But I’ve been so off-kilter since she rolled into town yesterday in her truck. My head isn’t in the game and telling her that bottle is special never occurred to me.
“Is there anything I can do?” Her teeth dig deeper into her plump lip.
I want to brush over that tender flesh with my thumb and kiss the marks away. I reach my hand out, intent on doing just that…
“Ian?” she asks, sounding uncertain. “Are you okay?”
That jolts me out of the moment. She obviously isn’t sharing the vibe. I clear my throat and give her a nod. “I’m fine. And the only thing I need you to do is knock their socks off with your bourbon balls.”
They do have damn good bourbon in them.
Not that she has a chance with such a simple recipe against Miss Bettie but stranger things have happened.
Winnie laughs, looking relieved. “Phew. Good.” She starts loading the dessert balls into the storage container. “Hey, why was Buddy so hard on you at the diner this morning? I don’t think you deserved that.”
Grateful for the change of subject, I start loading the dishwasher with some of the bowls sitting on the counter.
“Buddy doesn’t like me because I turned down his daughter when she invited me to dinner.
He took it as a personal insult that I didn’t think—his words, not mine—that his daughter was good enough to date. ”
“Ah, I see. She wasn’t your type?”
“She’s only nineteen, which is definitely not my type. Plus, she’s mean.”
That makes Winnie laugh. She pushes the lid onto the container. “Buddy’s daughter? No. I don’t believe it,” she jokes. “Geez, how did Lucy raise such a crank?”
“Lucy is his stepmother.”
“I knew there was no way she was old enough to be his mother!”
“Everyone in Wanted likes to claim closer relations than actually exist. It’s a thing they all seem to do.
Unmarried couples call each other husband and wife.
Everyone is a cousin or an aunt, but not in reality.
It’s a gesture of affection if someone claims you that way.
Lucy likes Buddy.” I shrug. “I like Buddy too, truthfully. I feel special that he throws me out of the diner on the regular for no reason whatsoever.”
It’s true. It makes me feel a part of Wanted.
I shut the dishwasher door and reach for a sponge to start cleaning the counter.
“Stop!” Winnie says. “I promised you I would do that. Now let’s go before I miss the deadline.”
I blow out a breath and reluctantly set down the sponge. I don’t want to refuse her gesture.
But at the same time…
“It’s killing you to leave it like this, isn’t it?” she asks.
I can’t even deny it. I just nod. “Absolutely.”
Winnie brushes past me, patting me on the chest. “You’ll live. I promise.”
“You can’t promise that.”
She laughs. “I leave messes all the time. I can guarantee you’ll survive.”
“At what cost though?” I mutter, though her general cheerfulness is awe-inspiring.
“What are your brothers like?” she asks.
“Not like me. They’re all loud, social, and spontaneous. Well, maybe not as much Malcolm, my oldest brother. But Mackay and Dylan are very social.”
“It sounds like a fun way to grow up.”
Or a way to constantly be mocked. I love my brothers though. They always have my back and vice versa.
“There were definitely days my mother would not have agreed with you. Wrangling four boys was no mean feat.”
She laughs. “I bet you were the planner of the group, right?”
“I was. If you’re going to misbehave you should have a plan going into it. Do you have any siblings?”
“I have a brother who is older than me. He’s married and has two kids. We’re closer now than we were when we were growing up.”
“That’s awesome.” I grab Barrel’s leash off of the bench by the front door and hold it up to Barrel. “Sit, big guy.”
He does instantly and I clip on his leash.
“Why is he so well-behaved for you?” she asks. “It’s so rude.”
“He senses my rigid personality.”
Winnie doesn’t refute that.
“Look. He’s so photogenic just sitting there on his haunches. He could be wearing a bowtie for goodness sake.”
“He really does.” I rub Barrel’s head. “Are you going to tell me how he got his name?”
“It’s not really a story.” Winnie heads out the front door, brushing her dark hair back over her shoulders. “When Barrel was dropped off at the shelter he was so thin he was absolutely starving. It was terrible.”
I fell into step beside her, loosely holding Barrel’s leash. “Should he be hearing this? Will he be retraumatized?” I lean down and cover his ears.
Winnie stops walking. “If we just talk in a calm voice I’m pretty sure he has no idea what we’re discussing.
Just don’t say e-a-t. So anyway, that night after he’d been bathed and fed, we found him in the corner of the shelter devouring one of our co-workers' homemade cookies, which were really, really bad. Inedible. I think she forgot the sugar. So we told him he was really scraping the bottom of the barrel and somehow then he became Barrel.”
“How is that not a story?” I release Barrel’s ears. “That is the very definition of a story, Winnie. Poor guy. He thought he was snagging a good treat and it was a botched cookie.”
“Speaking of botched baked goods…here we are,” Winnie says. She holds up the container as we reach the festival.
The official booth for the various contests and events going on all weekend is right in front of us.
She’s still trusting me to walk Barrel but I hang back a little with him as she drops off her bourbon balls.
“No repeat of yesterday, do you understand?” I murmur to him. “Corn dogs are for kids. Even the name has ‘dog’ in it. You don’t want to eat that. It’s practically cannibalism.”
Barrel whines. He’s clearly not buying it.
I try a different tactic. “You don’t want to embarrass Winnie.”
Though I’m not sure anything would embarrass Winnie.
As if determined to provide me with an answer, Barrel suddenly takes off.
His movement jerks my wrist. “Whoa!” I tug him back. “None of that, now.”
If a dog can show disdain, Barrel is doing it now.