Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Wynter
“What about that guy?” Autumn sucked a straw between her lips, but her gaze was on a man by the bar.
Autumn had dragged me to Curly’s Canyon Grill for dinner after a day of figuring out new marketing pitches for two small-barrel batches we were releasing this winter. A holiday special, but I was over my good cheer.
Since Autumn wouldn’t give up until I pass-or-smashed the guy she was referring to, I took a look. He was about my age, which never used to be a detractor, but guess what? He wasn’t fucking forty.
“I don’t like blonds,” I muttered into my drink.
She let out a sigh. “Why did it take me so long to realize that?”
Each week that went by, stretching into two months, more sympathy would fill her gaze. There was no moving on from a certain owner/CEO of a whiskey distillery.
I lifted a shoulder and stuffed a fry into my mouth.
Myles had left, and life had gone on. I missed Daddy, and talking to Mama wasn’t the same.
Not when it came to Myles. Daddy had understood that the way to Myles was through his work ethic.
Mama was all heart. I’d gotten to Myles through his business, and he wouldn’t let me in beyond that.
What had driven him away had something to do with the mysterious phone calls, but he’d never share.
Autumn sucked from her straw until she slurped the bottom. Then she clucked her tongue. “I’m not one to say you’ve gotta move on. You got your heart broken, and you were really into that tall-dark-and-tortured thing, but—”
“Autumn.”
She held a hand up. “Let me finish, please,” she said in her firmest teacher voice. “I don’t think you have to jump in bed with another man. I think you have to quit moping over the other man first, and you’re not. You’re not moving on. I find you hugging your childhood stuffed toy and crying—”
“Leave Bunyan out of this. And I was not crying.” Not after the first month.
She gave me her be quiet, please teacher look this time. “And Teller says you stare off into the distance at your desk.”
“I’m thinking of taglines.” Shitty ones.
Nothing sells top-shelf bourbon like Have a spirit to celebrate the Holy Spirit.
Or slightly better Deck the halls with bottles of Holiday Summit Bourbon.
I’d either lost my touch while on my hiatus to escape watching Daddy get sicker, or…
Myles had fucked it all out of me. Any feminism I had inside me withered.
“He also says your new recipes are uninspired and bland.”
I started to let out an indignant gasp, then slumped. Teller was right. The alcohol wasn’t speaking to me anymore. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Have you tried to talk to someone?” she asked gently.
I wrinkled my nose. “Mama said he went through a lot I’ll never understand, and—”
“About you, Wynter,” she said, exasperated. “A conversation with a professional that isn’t about him. About you and why you are still so heartbroken.”
“Because I still have hope.” I blinked back tears.
The confession had come without my permission.
“I feel like he’ll show up again. He’ll tell me he’s just as miserable and that he’s sorry and that he needs me.
Or something.” I willed the tears to go away.
We were tucked in a booth by the window, and I shifted my gaze to the deepening blue sky. The sun would set soon.
“What if he’s moved on? What if he’s happy back as the playboy CEO?”
Was she trying to make me sob? “Look, I’m pathetic, I know.”
“You’re not. But I worry about you.”
“I just need more time. And a slogan for the holiday specials because I’ve got nothing.”
“Maybe calling them Holiday Heartbreak would work better.”
I laughed, startling myself with a snort, which only made Autumn snicker harder. I tossed my straw wrapper at her. “Heartbreak Summit isn’t a bad name, but not for a Christmas release.”
“How about this—‘If you’re going to get trashed over him, make it quality. Make it local. Make it Heartbreak Summit.’”
I giggled. “‘Montana made heartbreak.’”
“Ohmigod, that’s good.”
“Teller would never okay it.” I let out a breath. “Hang in there with me, okay? I had such a long-term thing with Myles, mostly in my mind, that the complete end to it might take a minute.”
“That makes sense. I forgot you low-key stalked him much of your life. Do you really not know about his homelife before us?”
I shook my head. “Only that he’d been in the system for a while. He never talked about his parents, or lack thereof, or why he got pulled from his childhood home. He gets these calls and texts, and he always hides them. I don’t think his assistant even knows who they are.”
“Do you think it’s from the same person?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Is it the mystery that’s keeping you hooked?” She was back to using her professional tone. Concerned, trying to goad me into figuring out for myself why the hell I was sitting in the sandbox and refusing to move.
“Maybe,” I said just to get her off my back. I was descending into a pit of hopelessness.
“Okay, well, knowing is half the battle. You always were a nosy one. Speaking of nosy, who was the woman who stopped by the other day?”
“Mama wouldn’t tell me.” The lady had been angry, throwing her hands in the air and shoving her finger in Mama’s face.
I’d been walking up from the pasture, getting snuffled by my emotional support horse, and I’d seen them arguing.
The woman had driven a beater that rumbled like it had never been manufactured with a muffler.
When she saw me, she had almost looked ready to charge me, and then Tate had driven up.
The appearance of a man had gotten her to leave.
She’d looked haggard and gaunt and like she would keel over in a stiff breeze.
Autumn hummed. “Tate said Mama was spitting mad but told him it was nothing.” She rolled her eyes. “She tried passing it off as someone who took a wrong turn and got ornery, but we don’t buy it.”
“We seem to have a history of parents keeping things from us.”
“Truth.”
In my case, it wasn’t just my parents. A certain uptight man hadn’t shared much with me either, and I’d followed that big red flag like a beacon.
Myles
“Morning, Mr. Foster,” Braxton greeted as I strode by.
“Morning.” The word was polite, but the tone was “Fuck off.” Nothing against Braxton. My cranky tone was starting to become permanent.
I took the stairs, bypassing the elevator like usual. I needed the extra time on the stairs these days. Time to mentally prepare myself for not seeing a gorgeous blond with a sassy mouth behind the desk.
Mrs. Crane had been back for a month, and she’d given me a wide berth since she’d reentered the office.
I was becoming a next-level asshole, but I couldn’t help it. Anytime I got to a place where I wasn’t constantly thinking of Wynn, I’d get a call or message from Gianna.
That woman had ramped up her pestering to new levels. She was becoming increasingly insulting and belligerent. I knew how broke she was. The likelihood she would make the trip to Denver to make my life hell was infinitesimal, or I’d have hired extra security for the distillery.
As if to punctuate the thought, my phone buzzed.
Only twice had it been Wynn. The morning after I left, I’d gotten a message that said she was sorry I had to leave. I hadn’t replied. What could I say? Her taste was still on my tongue? My presence in her life would only poison it? I didn’t know how to be a Bailey?
Then a month later I’d gotten I miss you from her.
I’d almost changed my number. But the thought of never receiving random messages from her was too damn scary to contemplate.
I crested the top of the stairs and marched toward my office.
Mrs. Crane glanced up from her desk. Her reading glasses were perched on the end of her nose, and she looked at me with a don’t you dare lash out at me, or you know I’ll walk expression.
Half the reason I kept her around was because I didn’t need ass-kissing staff.
I could handle gratitude, even if it made me want to crawl out of my skin, but ass-kissing was infuriating.
No wonder Wynn and I had worked so well together.
My mood darkened.
“Mr. Foster, the project manager called.”
“What the hell’s wrong now?” I snapped, not at her personally, but the damn expansion was proving to be a giant fucking headache. Like my shitty mood had manifested the most inept contracting company.
“Nothing’s wrong. He has more questions.”
So many questions. Half the time I was talking to him, I wondered if they had fabricated their website and testimonials, and I was really their first client. Maybe the whole interview process had been an elaborate con, and now I’d committed millions to rookies.
But hey, I’d landed the national distribution contract. Mainline was even working with me on numbers until Foster House could meet the quantities they wanted to see.
The contract Wynn had been instrumental in landing.
“Have him call me tomorrow.” I needed to cool off. I didn’t know why today was terrible.
Days like this, not having Wynn in my life hit me more acutely than others. Was she thinking of me, too?
“Will do,” Mrs. Crane said. “I’ll tell him tomorrow at nine.”
She knew to catch me before the normal issues of the day tanked my mood further. Like a still going down. Or barrel supply issues. Or an employee found drunk on the job.
All of which had happened this week.
I shut myself in my office. I went to the window and glowered out. The peaceful view did nothing for me. Nothing helped me out of the gutter the days dove into without Wynn.
What was it about her?
I didn’t buy into our connection. Yes, we had a history.
I’d read her stories. That was it. As an adult, she’d been a breath of fresh air and perhaps the ego dent I’d needed.
Seeing her with her family had only made the longing for people of my own, a group who got me, grow stronger.
But those feelings did me no good, and Gianna would dive in like a wrecking ball anyway.
Mrs. Crane knocked on the door.