Chapter 13
Reese
Sitting in the truck with Clay shouldn’t feel so normal. It shouldn’t feel as if I could imagine us doing it again and again. It shouldn’t be something I’d want to do.
Except it was.
I was fucked.
“So, now that I know you have another brother, are there any other siblings I need to hear about?”
I chanced a glance in his direction before pulling onto the main road.
It looked like he’d recovered from being forced into a vehicle well below the type he was used to.
He sat, his arm propped on the open window.
At least he’d ditched the jacket and tie when I’d been changing.
The slightly dressed-down Clay, with an open collar and rolled-up sleeves, was almost as hot as the shirtless Clay.
Something about seeing him out of his “uniform” set the butterflies in my stomach alight.
“Nope, no other brothers. Kel obviously doesn’t work at the B&B, though he does come home during the off season.
” Sometimes I wondered how long he’d continue to do that.
Would he buy a fancy house in New York or California and live there instead?
He’s told me he’ll always come home to the Falls, but money spoke, and he’ll be seeing a huge payday sooner rather than later.
“You don’t want to play up his connection? You’re right, I researched your financials and little else.”
I hated being annoyed at the fact that he hadn’t bothered to research us.
Shouldn’t he have wanted to know something before coming down here and trying to work with us?
Unless he came down because of me? Was it really our interaction on the phone that drew him here, even more than the project?
I wasn’t sure which was more terrifying—his having an interest in me or in working with us. Wait? What did he say?
“How the hell did you get our financials?” That is not something I was prepared for him to have already.
“You probably don’t want to know. My team can get almost anything when motivated.”
I had a feeling he could be the same, and it would behoove me to remember that and take precautions.
Switching gears, I returned to a much less stressful topic.
“He comes home to relax, and truthfully I’d rather not have the place overrun with fans trying to get an autograph or women trying to get into his bed.
He already has his fair share of both. The Falls, when he’s home, should be a sanctuary.
Not that we can protect him entirely, but I’ll give it a go. ”
“Understood. So, if I have this right, the B&B is your immediate family’s business.
” He looked away, with an almost sheepish expression on his face, which did weird things to my insides.
Nope, nope, nope. “I may not have researched, but my grandmother did. She gave me a bit of a rundown when you disappeared on me the other day.”
“I did not disappear.”
“We’ll have to agree to disagree on that,” he added with a wink, the flirty gesture completely unexpected.
“To get back to the topic, yes, we run the B&B. The winery is a little ways down the road, with the brewery and the distillery past that.”
Clay nodded and turned to look at the land bracketing the road. The unused land stretched as far as the eye could see, even surrounding the B&B, though we liked it that way. “Tell me about them.”
“Overall, we’re still a pretty minor operation, even with all we have going on.
” I pointed out a side road as we drove past. “That leads to some of the barley and hops fields for the brewery. We don’t plant much.
The bulk of our material comes from suppliers.
We work with them and other vineyards for our grapes too. ”
“What about all of this land? Can you buy or lease it from the current owner? Sometimes, you have to spend money to make money, Reese. Growing more of your own crops would increase your profits in the long run.”
For someone who had done no research on us, he seemed to have a grip on what we wanted. Of course, that could be from his grandmother’s information.
“Oh, all the land’s ours. We own over three hundred acres, though most of it’s not used.”
“Three hundred,” shock colored his voice, and his eyes widened. It was good to know I could still shock the man. “How? What the hell are you doing with it?”
“Not a lot, as I just said, and yes, three hundred.” I slowed as the road curved ahead of us.
“We’ve been here a long-ass time, Clay. The first Henleys who settled here added on to the plot they had, and over the generations, we’ve acquired more and more, though little in recent years.
I think there’s some possibility of getting more if we wanted.
The problem is we don’t have the capital or the employees to work it all, so we use what we can manage, and the rest goes unused.
” The road straightened out again as the entrance to the winery appeared.
Henley Family Vineyards. Real fucking original.
I flipped my blinker and turned onto the winding road leading up the mountain.
“We have a lot of land on the mountain, and while we don’t want to destroy the beauty of nature, we could definitely develop some of it. ”
Driving past the tasting room and the few cars that were parked near the door, I pulled around to the side, where family usually parked. Sliding the gearshift to park, I shut the truck down. It wasn’t like I needed to keep it running for the air conditioning. We sat in silence for a few minutes.
“I’m assuming you have plans though,” he finally asked.
I shouldn’t want to be spending time alone with him, but somewhere along the way it morphed.
Sure, it was still antagonistic, and I wasn’t about to put away my sarcastic side, but it was comfortable.
Like we’d known each other for longer than the few days it’s actually been.
That’s just stupid. It was, but it was also the truth.
“Of course I do. My vision would be to have all our businesses meld perfectly with the setting, with the surrounding nature, and with each other. The beauty of our land and of Henley Falls is the landscape. No amount of growth is worth losing that, but I believe, if done right, we can make everything better.”
“It makes sense. The view from my room is gorgeous.” He paused and looked at me. His darkening eyes should have prepared me for what came next. “I meant the mountains, though the view the other day was mind-blowing.”
“Stop. We can’t.”
“Can’t what?” His brow rose, a subtle taunt hinting at his curiosity of whether I’d talk about what happened between us.
“You know what. What happened the other day can’t happen again.
” I shook my head. “It won’t happen again.
You’re here for business, and that’s how it’s going to stay and play out.
There will be none of that…that insanity again.
” Staring his way, I tried to push my will onto him.
Nothing in his face gave away his feelings on my edict, but then again, I didn’t care.
I wasn’t going to let something that should never have happened in the first place happen again and likely fuck everything up for my entire family.
“It was one and done. The final out. Strike three. Whatever you want to call it, it’s over. ”
Clay nodded, but said nothing, which I wanted to take as a good sign. Ha.
“Tell me about the winery?”
The abrupt change of subject, especially without his capitulation to my rules, had me glaring in his direction.
Maybe if I just drop the whole thing, like it never happened at all, we’ll both forget about it.
Girl, that’s the dumbest shit you’ve ever thought.
Inner me was absolutely right, but I was planning on hanging on to that hope for all its worth.
“It’s run by my dad’s twin and his wife, Uncle Russ and Aunt Dianna. Technically, the parentals own all the businesses we have while we work at them. Not that they don’t work. All the parentals do, but more behind the scenes at this point. We’re all day-to-day.”
“Parentals?”
I shrugged. “It’s the easiest way to group everyone in that generation together.
Otherwise, we’re all like, ‘well, my parents and my aunts and uncles.’ It gets annoying after a while.
So they’re the parentals, and we’re the cousins, regardless if Logan or Kellan are part of the group I’m talking about. ”
“From what I saw on your mantel, it’s a large group.”
“Ha. You can say that again. If you make it through the two weeks, you’ll likely meet everyone who lives in the Falls, but we range far and wide. Some of my family are wanderers, some fell in love and moved away, but a lot of us are still here. This is home.”
I wasn’t trying to imply others in my family didn’t feel the same way, but some of my cousins never lived here.
They’d come visit, but their life had always been somewhere else.
This town, our B&B, was my life. Sometimes I thought it was all I had and all I’d ever have.
That was why it was so important to make it the best it could be.
If this dream was going to be my shot at happiness, then I had to make it everything I could.
Clay’s touch on my cheek dragged me back into the moment.
It didn’t linger in one place, but the gentleness had my mind reeling and my heart racing.
Not two minutes ago I said I was going to pretend what happened in his room didn’t happen, and now my panties were practically jumping off my body. I’m an idiot.
“Where’d you go?”
Shaking my head, I let the move dislodge his hand. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does.” He leaned closer, his stare lingering on my lips. I should push him away. I knew I should. Did I? Abso-fucking-lutely not. “I think it matters a lot.”
I wasn’t about to tell him exactly what I was thinking, but I could give him something. “Family comes with a lot of pressure. Doing what I’m trying to do just compounds that. I want to do it right.”