Chapter 15 – Luke
LUKE
Ialmost slip in the shower when I hear the elevator doors beep. Normally, I keep my floor locked for elevator access unless I swipe my access key. I must have accidentally reset it.
Unless Ryan bribed the doorman.
Shit.
I turn the water off and throw open the shower door, grabbing a towel to wrap around my waist. Ryan moves fast when he’s in prank mode. Even taking a minute to dry off might give him the opening he needs. I run down the hall, water dripping from my hair, my damp footprints leaving a path behind me.
It’s not Ryan, though.
Eden’s face turns an electric pink as her eyes dip down to my hand holding my towel together.
“Sorry,” she blurts out. She spins around and covers her eyes with her hands, like she needs double protection against the sight of me mostly naked.
“I should've called first. The building let me up because I’m your girlfriend, but I’m really not and—sorry. This was stupid.”
“It's fine. Sorry, I don't normally run around my apartment in just a towel. I heard you moving and thought you might be Ryan trying to prank me.”
“Why would Ryan be trying to prank you?”
“Because I might have borrowed his lucky Richard Mille watch without asking,” I admit.
“It went with my outfit, and I forgot to return it before his tournament. He can be superstitious, and, well, filling my apartment with stinkbugs or replacing my mattress with a waterbed full of Jell-O wouldn’t be beyond him. ”
“Guys are weird.” Still facing away from me, she holds up her tote bag. “I was visiting Brinley, and I thought I’d stop by with your contract for the Twisted Devil holiday party. I can just leave it on the floor or something.”
“No, uh…is the contract ready for me to sign?”
“Yup.”
“Would you mind waiting while I put some clothes on? I promise, it won’t take long.”
“It’s fine,” Eden squeaks. “Just—just go.”
As quickly as I can, I towel dry my hair and throw on a pair of gray sweatpants and a white T-shirt. For a second, I consider putting on something nicer than what are essentially my pajamas, but in the end, dressing up would feel weird, too. I’m just signing something quickly, then Eden’s leaving.
Unless I can come up with a reason for her to stay.
When I emerge, I find Eden standing at the kitchen counter, looking at the prototype cherrywood whiskey bottle.
“What’s this?” she asks.
“It’s a sample bottle from our manufacturer. Showing us how Maura’s label will look on the cherrywood whiskey.”
“It’s beautiful.” She tilts the bottle, examining it in the light. “I love the color story. You don’t see a lot of liquor bottles in glass this color.”
“We wanted to visually imply the flavors. The dark red glass reflects the fruity undertones, obviously, but we tried to make it darker so it wouldn’t come across so literal.”
“Then you nailed it.”
“Well, you won’t know that until you try it.” I pause. “Do you want to?”
She looks up from the bottle. “I thought it wasn’t ready yet.”
“It’s not. My master distiller finished his initial mix, though. I’ve got a bottle in the living room.”
She hesitates. “I really should get back to my place. I have orders to place for the next Flair event.”
“Oh, come on. You can take a break for one night. We can take some pictures for your brothers if you really feel like your time’s wasted. I’m just curious what you think.”
And I really am. Eden’s taste is impeccable. The way she planned James and Maura’s baby shower proved it. She thinks about the customer experience in the same way that I do, from before they even engage with our product—parties or whiskey—to how they feel after it’s done.
“I guess I can do the orders tomorrow,” Eden says finally, and I grin.
“You won’t regret it.”
I grab two glasses and bring them to the coffee table. Eden sits next to me on the couch, leaving a good foot of space between us—no room for accidental hand touches or thigh brushes. I try not to be disappointed. Instead, I focus on watching Eden’s face as she sniffs the whiskey.
“I’m not a whiskey connoisseur, you know,” she says. “I know I'm supposed to smell it first, but I don't know what I'm supposed to be smelling.”
I shrug. “You don't have to smell anything. But if you want bonus points, tell me if there are any flavors you can make out, like fruits or spices.”
Eden sniffs again. “I think I smell…vanilla?”
“Good. That's one of the tasting notes we were going for. Now, you can sip it.”
She follows my instructions. “Maybe it's because you're in my head now, but I think I taste vanilla. And…almonds?”
“Very good. We'll make a professional whiskey taster of you yet.”
“Is that a real job?”
“No, unfortunately. Technically, our master distiller does a lot of taste testing, but there’s a lot more on his job description. Maybe one day, you can take his job.”
“Nah.” She waves her hand. “I spent way too much time trying to get the job I have. I'm not giving it up to drink whiskey all day.”
“What if the pay was incredibly generous?”
“Still. I like what I do. I’d rather be up until 3:00 a.m. placing party orders than have a normal schedule where I wake up every day and do something I hate.”
“You seriously make yourself work that late?”
“Not on purpose. Sometimes I just get into a flow and then, whoops, it’s way past midnight. I know, it’s not healthy.”
“That’s what happens when you’re addicted to success. I get it. I’m a fellow sufferer.”
She laughs. “I guess I am. What made you fall down the success addiction rabbit hole?”
“Probably playing video games as a kid,” I joke. “Hitting maximum score in games made me want to hit maximum score at life. What about you?”
I expect her to throw back a joke of her own. Instead, her expression turns thoughtful.
“I guess because it was the only way to get out of my brothers’ shadows,” she says after a moment.
“After my dad died, they made sure everyone in town knew I was their baby sister. They were protecting me, and no one should mess with me. It was kind of hard to forge an identity of my own, and I guess I thought starting my own business and being wildly successful would make people see me for me.”
Brinley told me that Eden’s father died, but I’d never stopped to think about the reality of it—how young she must have been and how it must have changed her.
“How old were you?” I ask in a low voice.
“I was twelve. It was sudden. A heart attack.” She tells the story with the same flat, practiced tone of someone who’s repeated it too many times.
“Jesus. That must have been awful.”
“It was.” She doesn’t embellish.
“What was he like?”
Her lips curve into a small smile. “Quiet. Solid. The kind of man who talked to the horses more than he talked to anyone else, but he was always there. He didn’t tell stories or ask a lot of questions, but he loved long drives listening to music, and he showed up for every one of my 4-H animal shows.
I knew I could count on him for anything. ”
“He sounds like a man worth missing,” I say quietly.
Eden’s breath catches, like the words landed somewhere unguarded. “Yeah,” she manages. “He was. Thank you. People usually don’t know what to say, so they say something about heaven and change the subject.”
In the warm lamp light, her hazel eyes take on the gold sheen of whiskey. She takes a sip from her glass, and my eyes drop to the empty hand in her lap. Should I reach for it and give her some kind of comforting squeeze?
No. That feels too personal. We’ve already been blurring the lines too much, kissing when we shouldn’t. I’ve been blurring the lines too much.
Before I can decide, she looks up at me. “What about you? Why do you really care about building something great?”
I could give her some bullshit about loving whiskey. About being proud of creating something great, something I could be remembered by. But if she gave me an honest answer, I owe her the same. With her ranch upbringing, maybe she'll even understand.
“I was a scholarship kid. My high school life was spent around children of multimillionaires, but I was just some middle-class kid. I couldn't afford the things they had, and it made me feel less-than. Maybe that sounds shallow and ridiculous—”
“It doesn’t,” she murmurs. “I get it. When you’re that young, it can feel more important than it is.”
My shoulders relax, even though I didn’t even realize the muscles were tensed. “Yeah. Eventually, I fell in love with Twisted Devil for its own sake. But at the beginning, I just wanted to prove that I was…well, that I was someone.”
“You are, Luke,” she says earnestly, and I roll my eyes.
“Whatever you say, wildflower.” The nickname slips off my tongue without me consciously thinking it. “Sorry. I don’t know why I said that.”
Eden goes completely still. She looks like a deer frozen on the road, waiting to see whether the car in front of her will swerve.
I could swerve. I could take back the nickname. The thing is, I don’t want to. It fits her. Wildflowers are resilient, delicate-looking but determined to survive, just like Eden.
My body automatically moves toward hers, drawn in like a magnet. Her soft lips are so close, all I’d have to do is lean in a few inches to close the distance between us. I doubt Eden would stop me. Every time I’ve offered, she always says yes.
Her eyes darken, and her tongue darts out to lick her lower lip.
Then she shoots to her feet and puts her glass down on the coffee table. “I should go.”
I blink, confused at the sudden shift. “What? You don’t have to.”
“It’s late. I really should place those orders. Thank you for the whiskey. It was—almondy.”
With one last shy smile, she practically sprints to the elevator. I’m left staring at the doors after they close behind her, wondering if I could have done anything differently to make her stay.