Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
Summer
Autumn was in the bar area of Copper Summit when I was done working.
When I’d asked Tenor if I could use some space to work remotely, he and Teller had made it happen.
If they hadn’t, Wynter would’ve made me share her desk, but there was an empty office on the top floor where I could look over the mountains that were once mined for copper.
Our view was pristine. On the other side, off of Bailey land, half the mountain had been carved away.
“Hey.” I slid onto a barstool. “Are we drinking here?”
Autumn frowned as she tapped through her tablet.
She was doing inventory and her auburn hair was piled on top of her head.
She was dressed in loose slacks, a white turtleneck, and a cranberry cardigan.
Since it was a Thursday, she’d probably come straight from her classroom.
Wynter hadn’t been tending bar as much now that she was so pregnant, and Autumn had taken over.
Teller insisted she was working too much, but Autumn ignored him like usual.
“We can. There’d be somewhere to sleep when we got shitfaced. ”
“It’s no fun to get plastered where family can see us.”
She smirked and closed the cover on the tablet. “You sound very Junie right now.”
“I’m not on stage, getting panties thrown at me.”
“I thought some dude threw his jock strap.”
“That was at last month’s show.” My country-star sister was making her way up the fame ladder, but she still had some very small-town-bar experiences.
“Let’s go to Curly’s.” She went to the safe to lock the tablet in.
My stomach rumbled at the thought of homemade buns and cinnamon butter at Curly’s Canyon Grill. “Are you taking over inventory for Wynter?”
“Yep,” she answered, popping the p. “Can’t have me doing man’s work.”
I frowned. Our parents weren’t like that. Neither were my brothers. Daddy had taught all of us ranch work and distillery duties. We’d settled into our preferences. Autumn taught third grade and sometimes worked the bar we kept to showcase the spirits via cocktails. “What work do you want to do?”
She shook her head and puffed a lock of hair out of her face. “It’s nothing. I’m just cranky today. Ready?”
The older sister in me wanted to keep pushing, but I was in a period of my life where I didn’t want to be prodded either. My sisters could poke me right back. So I left off. “Curly’s it is. We can complete the circle of feminism and disappoint Curly that we aren’t our brothers.”
She laughed. “You noticed he prefers them too?”
My sisters and I got booths in the back. We were Kerrigans. He put the Baileys front and center so the town could see its most influential family was visiting his establishment. Curly was a dick, but his restaurant served good food and there were few choices in a town as small as Bourbon Canyon.
Fifteen minutes later, we were getting seated at the second-to-last booth from the back. “Did you see the jumbo muffins he has at the counter?”
She nodded. “I might have to buy a couple of the strawberry-cream-cheese ones.”
We’d joked about drinking but both of us ordered our Coke with nothing but ice. The server dropped the sodas off and took our order.
I stirred my drink with my straw after she left. “We should’ve asked Scarlett to join us. I worry she’ll think I don’t want to include her anymore, but she’s been so busy with the littles.” And Chance had taken to her so thoroughly, with his own mom on the road so often.
A forlorn expression crossed Autumn’s features. “I’m sure she’s enjoying her new wife-and-mother role,” she said wistfully.
My heart went out to my sister. Autumn loved kids, but staying in Bourbon Canyon to work was like trading a work life for a love life. She’d used dating apps, but the options in town weren’t for her and no one else wanted to downshift from a bigger city to Bourbon Canyon.
She straightened and flashed me a forced smile. “Anyway, I got the impression that you wanted to talk, and that you didn’t want anything getting back to Tate.”
“Thank you.” Despite what Tate had said, he was the brother version of me. Sometimes a little too pushy and full of advice. I wanted a shoulder right now. I needed someone to help me be myself. I’d succumbed to being Boyd’s girlfriend and then his fiancée. A future bride.
Always labels. The girl with the homeless parents. A Kerrigan, not a Bailey. Eli Dunn’s girlfriend. Then other guys’ girlfriend, followed by You know, the one from the Copper Summit family? Then all things attached to Boyd.
Sunshine was a label I didn’t mind. It was more personal. I’d like to think it was me.
Autumn leaned her elbows on the table. “Besides, I can’t get all the dirt on Jonah with them around. Spill it.”
I gave her a flat look. Protectiveness toward him formed a wall. I hadn’t come to gossip about Jonah. “There’s nothing to spill.”
Her look was dubious. My brothers often treated Autumn like a sweet summer child, isolated from the worst of life, and thankfully, she was, but she was sharp. She sniffed out my bullshit before most people. “Boyd is such a pretentious prick, and I love how he got served some piping-hot humble pie.”
I gawked at her. “You didn’t like Boyd?”
“None of us did. But we wanted to support you.”
I opened my mouth. Slammed it shut. None of them? They hadn’t told me what they thought of him. Humiliation flared hot and bright, scorching the back of my neck. “Why wouldn’t you say anything? I would’ve if it was you.”
Her gaze turned knowing. “Yeah, you would’ve. Which is why we know how it feels.” Touché. “I also didn’t think you’d actually marry the guy. And then—boom—wedding. By then, I think we all thought it was too late and you just needed our support.”
Ultimately, it’d been their encouragement that had gotten me to cancel the wedding. They didn’t act like I would’ve, but the outcome was the same. “Jonah was looking for the bathroom.” I wouldn’t share why. I liked how he’d entrusted me with the reason. “He saw Boyd slap me.”
Her disgusted snort turned heads, but we ignored everyone. The trick in a small town was to act like we had nothing to hide. “We should’ve gutted him.”
“Jonah pinned Boyd against the wall with his cane.” The image would forever be imprinted in my mind.
“He should have bitch-slapped that cocksucker with his cane.” She shook her head, the green in her eyes sparking.
A couple glanced our way, and Autumn shot them a syrupy smile as an apology for swearing. I returned their stare with a militant glare that said mind your own business and you won’t hear her swear.
She nudged my shin under the table. Fair. She had to live here while I could leave, which I’d do as soon as my “honeymoon” was done.
She pushed an errant curl behind her ear. “What’d you do at his place?”
“Slept. Watched TV.” Talked. That part was my favorite. “He worked. Did you know he builds furniture?”
She cocked her head. “You didn’t?”
Why did everyone act like his job was something I should know? “He said he gets old barrels from Copper Summit and I hoped he and Teller were talking again.”
Sadness entered her eyes. “They aren’t close like before.” She took a long drink of her soda. “I think Teller worries about him when he’s not seen in town for a while. I hear him grilling the delivery drivers. Jonah changed after the accident and he’s never reverted back, but who can blame him.”
“Jonah blames himself for Eli.” He shouldn’t. The burden rested fully on my shoulders. Only I knew why Eli had gone to Jonah’s place that day and drunk too much.
Our food arrived and Autumn moved on from all things Jonah. She told me about her third graders’ antics, how she felt so much older than some of the new teachers ten years younger than her, and if it weren’t for Scarlett, she might’ve quit. I loved our incredibly normal conversation.
When it was time to go, Autumn scooted out of the booth. “I’m running to the restroom before I load up on muffins.”
“I’ll buy mine while waiting.”
The same server who’d helped us met me at the bakery counter. I ordered two strawberry cream cheese and two pumpkin cream cheese. Mama would have at least one. Oh wait, Myles’s brothers, Lane and Cruz, would be around too.
“Can you add one more of each?” I recalled the guys’ appetites. “Wait, two more. You know what? Do a half dozen of each.”
Autumn’s muffins would be my treat.
The server smiled and busied herself with boxing my order.
“Summer? Surprised to see you here.”
I turned, my stomach dropping as my brain registered whose voice I’d heard.
Jackie Weller.
The jealous punch to my gut was staggering. I pulled my coat around myself and didn’t bother faking a smile. “Jackie, hi.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be on a honeymoon?” she asked innocently.
She’d always been snide and snotty when she’d come around the Dunns’ place and I’d been over there with Eli.
She was going low, and I didn’t have the energy to go high. “I’m sure you’ve heard I didn’t get married,” I said flatly.
“Right.” She narrowed her eyes on me. “You were staying at Jonah’s?”
My family wouldn’t have talked, but I hadn’t been inconspicuous in my wedding dress crawling into Jonah’s truck. Word got around. “Is that what they’re saying?”
Humor danced in her blue eyes, but I hadn’t known how to take her when I was younger, and I wasn’t sure now.
Was she laughing at me? At the situation?
At the irony that we’d run into each other now of all times?
“They’re always saying a lot, but I’m sure it’s because people remember how it used to be. ”
I hated to ask. Don’t ask, I screamed at myself, but the question left my lips regardless. “How what used to be?”
“How you used to have a thing for Jonah.”
My heart skipped a beat. “I did not.”
She lifted a dark brow. “I felt so sorry for Eli. You never looked at him the way you did at Jonah.”
I stiffened. It had not been like that.
Had it?
The server plopped my muffin boxes on the counter. “Here you are, ma’am.”