Chapter 4
Chapter Four
VIOLET
W ell, that went well.
I barely managed to keep my thoughts to myself as I watched Chase’s truck disappear. He hadn’t even wanted to stay for pot pie. It confirmed the worst possible outcome: I’d gone and made things weird.
Not the very worst outcome , I consoled myself.
At least he hadn’t overtly disapproved. But he’d done the next-worse thing. He’d given me the look I couldn’t read. I’d known this man for going on nine years, and too many parts of him were still a mystery to me.
I still knew what I needed to. Chase Greenleaf had been my savior. The man was a saint. He’d been broken himself when he’d damn near saved my life. He’d given his time, his money, and every shred of normalcy a thirty-year-old bachelor could ever hope for. And I’d taken, taken, taken. It was time I found a way to strike out on my own and give him back his life.
Jules picked up the call I placed on the second ring. My phone sat on my shoulder as I opened the oven and removed the pie.“You don’t have to worry about watching the kids next Saturday,” I told her after a brief greeting.
“Violet. If you keep canceling dates, your chances of ever having sex again reduce to nil.”
“First of all, I feel called out. Second, I won’t apologize for all the times I chose Netflix over chill. Third, I didn’t even cancel this time. I’m calling to tell you I told Chase about the date. He’s fine with it. He said he’d watch the kids.”
Silence from Jules was rare. The woman thought a mile a minute and her mouth was never far behind her thoughts. Especially when it came to Chase, she always had an opinion.
“I like it,” she finally decided. “No sheltering. No mollycoddling. Just rip that Band-Aid right off.”
I smarted at the imagery and redirected. No time for regrets. What was done was done.
“What the hell am I going to wear?”
Jules heaved a dispassionate sigh. “We’ve been over this.”
“No… You’ve made a preposterous suggestion to which I have never once agreed.”
“That blue dress’ll get you rode hard and put away wet.” Jules was matter-of-fact.
“That dress will get me arrested for indecent exposure.”
“Fine. Have it your way,” she huffed. “I’ll check my closet for a turtleneck and some mom jeans you can borrow.”
“I just want to feel comfortable,” I protested, wanting her to take pity. “The rest of me will be awkward enough, going on the first date I’ve been on in over eight years. And, by ‘comfortable,’ I mean ‘age-appropriate.’ I can’t run around in the kinds of things I used to. I’m not twenty anymore.”
“You’re not a hundred either,” Jules mumbled under her breath.
I didn’t expect her to understand. Jules still had the same tight ass she’d had when we were eighteen. She did questionable things like eat clean and run triathlons. I, on the other hand, carried the residual weight of two pregnancies. Since high school, my fondness for carbs had only grown.
“Baby steps,” I chided. The idea of going out with a man thrilled and terrified me in equal measure. I was certain the kissing part would make me feel like I was cheating on Todd. But Jules was right about my dry spell. The naked truth was, it had outgrown that designation some years earlier. It had now progressed to a D-4 drought.I pressed mute on my phone before shouting into the living room for the kids to wash their hands. No need to blow out Jules’s sensitive ears. She had a short fuse for loud noises or ruckus of any kind. That made it just as well that Chase was still game to watch Bri and Trey. Jules loved my kids by extension of being my oldest friend, but Chase just plain loved my kids. Those were two very different things.
“I’ve gotta hop off. Time for dinner,” I told Jules once I heard the shuffle of small feet.
“Hey—have they scheduled the trial dates yet?”
“Yeah. They’re not for another ten weeks.”
The unresolved nature of my lawsuit was yet another heavy burden on my heart. Just thinking about it made me bitter. The original suit had been filed six months after Todd’s death and taken nearly two years to get a verdict. Now, it had been more than a full year since we’d lost the case.
We—as in me and the widows of two other Tennessee firefighters who had died in the same fire as Todd—we’d all filed the same suit. Most survivors of fallen firefighters received decent benefits from the state firefighter’s fund. But all three of us and our children had been denied on a technicality: our partners had been killed out-of-state.
It was a circumstance the policies hadn’t been written to address. The state insurance coverage had been underwritten as just that. Payouts were entitled to survivors of Tennessee firefighters killed in Tennessee. But jurisdiction was becoming more complex. As catastrophic wildfire incidents grew nationally, an increasing number of relief crews fought wildfires across state lines.
No survivor benefits were why I’d had to take so much charity these past few years. They were why—in the darkest hours of my own grief—I’d had to pick myself up and find a job. They were why I lived in fear that, when they’d needed me most, I’d been stretched too thin to be there for my kids.
“I’ll be there with you,” Jules vowed. “Not just the days you have to testify—every day they hold open court. I want that judge to know who I am.”
“The last judge who knew who you were nearly placed you in contempt,” I reminded her.
“Then I guess I’m lucky they assigned a new judge.”
Everything about her comment reminded me why I loved Jules. Everyone needed a ride-or-die friend.
I kind of loved my office, a converted storage barn that had once housed tractors and farm supplies. Years after the last bag of fertilizer had been opened, the air still held a whiff of the scent. The ground floor had been converted into a showroom space for the events business I ran. Six smallish tables were appointed with different settings—everything from blue gingham on white with mason jars and simple plates for barbecue, to fine bone china and antique crystals. It gave clients more than a sense of variety in terms of our offerings—it gave a taste of the quality their guests could expect.
The second-floor loft was the space that housed my desk and all my files. Chase’s Irish setter, Jameson, had his own cushy setup in a comfy corner and stayed with me most days. The enormous center window had once been a shuttered cutout used to load bales of hay. Now, it was framed up with colonial panes that overlooked the orchards to the west, the lake due north, and the forest just beyond. There wasn’t an inch of this place that had a bad vista, but for my personal tastes, my office had the best view of the farm.
“Good morning. Noble Farms.” I spoke in my phone voice, which was twice as chipper as my everyday tone. Not that I made it a practice of sounding unfriendly—brides-to-be telegraphed vocal excitement. Sounding half as excited as they were was just part of my job.
“Oh, yes—hello! I’m looking to speak with the person who handles events. I’d like to book a date for a wedding.”
“I’m Violet, the events director. I’d be happy to help. Have you taken a tour of our event spaces?”
I already knew she hadn’t. If she had, she would remember me. Apart from my part-time events coordinator, who served as my boots on the ground who came on-site for each event, the events department at Noble Farms was a one-woman show.
“Oh, no, I haven’t toured,” the woman gushed. “But I’m sure we want to book you for our wedding. Our dinner at The Noble Pig was unforgettable. The way it felt? That’s how I want our wedding guests to feel.”
“Our chef is amazing, isn’t he?”
“Girl, everything was amazing. How far out are you booked? I’m hoping you’ve got my date.”
Two minutes later, I hung up the phone and wrote out the appointment in my calendar. The happy couple would be by on Friday at 10. Our touring hours were inconvenient for working people, but Noble Farms was in demand.
“Ready for our weekly staff meeting?”
A familiar tingle crept down my spine. Chase had entered the barn, along with his deep, rumbling voice and his sexy farmer vibe—a worn T-shirt that made his muscles pop and jeans that sat low on his hips and fit just right. Chase Noble Greenleaf was a tall drink of water, with deep auburn hair and a beard to match, and sun-kissed skin from his time spent outdoors.
Mention of our weekly meeting always made him poke fun. As he climbed the stairs to my office, he peered at me playfully with soft green eyes from beneath the brim of a worn baseball cap.
Focus, Violet. Today’s an important day.
“Right on time, as usual.” I managed a bright smile. Rising from my seat, I plucked the folder containing the report I’d painstakingly prepared off of my desk and headed to the conference table.
“How’s your day so far?” He pulled me into a friendly hug. Our customary greeting never failed to remind me how good he smelled, which never made any sense given how much he worked outdoors. He should have been all dirt and dust and sweat, but, by some strange magic, his skin held sunshine, and peaches, and forest trees.
“We booked two more weddings—December and June.”
He fixed me with a smile. “Does your boss ever tell you, you’re doing a great job?”
“My boss has an overblown sense of praise for my contributions.”
“Maybe my employee doesn’t like taking credit where credit is due.”
This was why I had to do what I was about to do. Even if the idea of doing it terrified me.
When the life insurance debacle had threatened to leave me broke, Chase had created a job for me on the farm, a job that centered around the only thing I’d ever done well. I’d been building my own interior design business when I met Todd, but after we got married, he hadn’t wanted me to work.
After I made it out of the worst of my grief, I tried for two straight months to find work with an established design firm. I didn’t get a single offer that paid a living wage, let alone one that would let me take care of my kids. That was when Chase had swooped in—told me people had been approaching him about renting the farm as a venue. He’d made it sound like becoming his events manager would be doing him a favor.
That turned out to be a bald-faced lie, which became abundantly clear a week after I’d accepted and received my first paycheck in an amount that was approximately two and a half times more than what the job was worth. After that, the perks just kept on coming. Flexible hours. Unlimited vacation. Full benefits for me and my kids. A 401k plan, to which Noble Farms made a substantial monthly contribution.
Chase had built me this loft office with his own two hands, complete with a full modern kitchen and an enormous day bed in the far corner that was perfect for naps. Not my naps, of course. When he’d given me this job, Trey had been an infant and Bri had been two. Chase had built an office where I could bring my kids. I’d made it my mission to pay him back.
“Let’s get down to business.” I slipped on the pair of glasses I didn’t strictly need. More than I cared about my mild astigmatism, I cared about looking official for my meetings. Chase giving me a fake job had made me hell-bent on earning real profits. I was determined to make all he’d done for me worth his while.
“If you’ll join me on page two…” I jumped right in. “I just closed the books on the second quarter. Net income was up seventy-six percent from Q1 and fifty-one percent year-over-year. The change was driven by expanding the schedule to accommodate more bookings but mainly by ancillary service sales.”
“I’ve been getting compliments on the wedding planner,” Chase commented without looking up, overplaying his straight face now. Man, he was laying it on thick today.
“The wedding business is doing well…” There was no point in not admitting it. “But not strictly because of planning. The affiliate program for preferred vendors is bringing in a nice passive income.”
Chase nodded as his eyes scanned, his brow furrowed in concentration as he read the numbers I’d put on the page. Not only was this good news—I was proud of the report.
“All of this adds up to something exciting.” My heart began to race. There was no going back now. “We can afford to hire another person. We can hire someone at a fair wage and still grow your profit margin by twenty-five percent. If your investment pays off like I hope, it’ll add up to more event business. Pending your approval, of course.”
Chase's gaze continued to skim over the paper. He seemed genuinely impressed, but I was making a big ask. Hiring me as a charity case was one thing. Now, I was asking him to grow his business for real. I was offering greater profitability, but I didn’t know whether he’d ever really wanted to commit to this. I waited in suspense as he took his sweet-ass time.
“This is missing something.”
My alarmed gaze flew to my report. “What?” I had to know. I never did my monthly reporting without checking it twice.
“Your projections for next year don’t account for your own increase in salary. Anyone who can create profit growth like this deserves a raise.”
I sighed. “Chase, we’ve been over this. You already overpay me. By a lot.”
“You’re right. We have been over this. Violet, you are not overpaid. You’re underpaid based on the value that you add.”
I gave him a look that told him I was not having this conversation again.
“Do you approve my new employee or not?”
Then I did the thing I rarely did—I stared him down. Stood my ground was more like it. Sometimes, I had to with him. If I didn’t set boundaries, Chase would give me even more than he did.
“Yes, you can hire your new employee,” he relented.
“Thank you.” I dampened the fierceness I’d just displayed, letting gratitude color my tone. “I know you’re a busy man, but I’d like you to be part of the interview process.”
“What Violet wants, Violet gets,” he quipped in a way that riddled me with guilt.
I wanted him to participate because it was his business and his money, because he was the owner of the farm. I needed him to participate because it was imperative he get along with the next person. Unbeknownst to him, the new employee would be much more than the second member of the event management team. They would be my replacement. Chase didn’t know it yet, but I was planning to leave.