Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Everett
This.
This is what I missed the nine years I was gone. Not just the lodge or the mountain or the familiar ache of home. But them. This chaotic, loud, deeply annoying family I somehow got absorbed into when I was ten and Roman Barrett decided I needed brothers whether I wanted them or not.
Roman catches my eye across the bar and raises his glass in a silent toast. I return it without thinking.
We used to be so easy. Before I ruined it by falling for the one person who came with a neon “DO NOT TOUCH” sign.
“Okay.” Nolan finally speaks, his voice cutting through the banter. “Not that I don't love a four a.m. sibling reunion, but we didn't drive six hours just to watch Caleb get elbowed.”
“Speak for yourself,” Roman says with a snort. “That's quality entertainment. Pay-per-view worthy.”
“We're here because we got your message.” Nolan's gaze lands on me, steady and serious. “Especially what you didn’t say.”
The warmth in my chest ices over. Right. Business. “It's handled.”
“Is it?” Roman's tone shifts. “Because the numbers you sent us say otherwise.”
Sierra's head snaps up. “What numbers?”
Shit.
Roman and Nolan exchange a look. The kind of look that says she doesn't know and should we tell her and oh crap this won’t go over well all in one silent conversation.
“What numbers?” Sierra repeats, an edge creeping into her voice. The same edge she gets when she’s panicking about our secret.
The same edge she gets when she's being kept in the dark.
But me, I’m storing multiple secrets from multiple someones. Some of them involve spreadsheets. Others involve my tongue in her mouth approximately three minutes ago.
“It's nothing,” I bite out.
“Bookings are down fifty percent.” Roman ignores me completely, turning to his sister instead. “Restaurant revenue's tanked. The mountain hasn't seen real snow yet this season, and people are canceling faster than we can process the refunds.”
Sierra's face goes pale. “Fifty percent?”
“It's a slow season.” The words taste like ash in my mouth. “It happens.”
“Not like this.” Nolan's quiet voice cuts deeper than Roman's blunt delivery. “The lodge is hemorrhaging money, Ev. You know that. That's why you called us.”
Three days ago. After I ran the projections for the tenth time and kept getting the same devastating answer.
But I didn't call Sierra.
Because we’re not friends. Because telling her the lodge is in real danger of failing is like admitting I'm failing. And I decided a long time ago, after she broke it off and drove the point home with a new boyfriend, that she didn't get to see me fall apart anymore.
“Why didn't you tell me?” Her voice is small. Hurt. And aimed directly at the brothers who've always told her everything.
“We just found out ourselves,” Roman says gently. “Ev's been handling it solo. Stubborn bastard. But it’s business and we have a hand in that.”
“Wait, what do you mean you have a hand in it?”
“They invested in the lodge. Ten percent each,” I say, gripping my glass hard enough to turn my knuckles white.
“You what?” Sierra's head snaps toward Roman as though the admission came from him.
Because even though I took a sledgehammer to a few walls when I kissed her, finding out her brothers are investors—well, that’s some next level building material for her to build a brand new one.
The only thing that will survive the apocalypse? Cockroaches and Sierra’s fucking wall.
She can build all the new walls she wants, but I better not so much as change out the mailbox without presenting the the specs of said new mailbox to a committee.
Maybe if I just promised to erect a wall between her and my cock, she’d fast track me through the process and give it the preservation society stamp of approval.
“When Everett took over and reviewed the books, it was clear the mountain needs to expand to profit year-around. With the way the money trended through the generations before him, some things needed to change to do that,” Roman says carefully. “We wanted to help.”
“And nobody thought to mention this to me?” Her voice climbs. “You're part owners and I'm just... what? The kid sister who doesn't need to know?”
“Shutterbug—” Roman says quietly.
“No, you can take my nickname and shove it straight up your ass,” she snaps, her narrowed eyes pinning him in place, daring him to say another word.
“Don’t try to placate me. It’s insulting. I’m not a little kid. And what you invest in is your business.” She takes the time to look at each of them separately. “Letting me be the last to know is shitty.”
The silence stretches a beat too long. Roman clears his throat.
“Sierra—”
“No. Caleb, you said something about ideas? Cool,” Sierra interrupts. “You’re up.”
“A brilliant idea,” Caleb corrects, recovering fast, entirely too awake for someone who just drove hours through the night. “An idea that's going to save this lodge and put Morgan Lodge back on the map.”
My chest tightens. “The lodge doesn't need saving.”
Four sets of Barrett eyes swing to me. Sierra’s bore clean through my skin.
“Everett.” Roman's tone shifts into something careful.
Something that sounds too much like the voice my father uses when he's about to tell me I'm being naive.
“If the bookings keep tanking and with the restaurant's barely breaking even, plus the weather—”
“I know about the weather.” The words come out sharper than I intend. “I know about all of it.”
“Then you know we need to do something.”
I take a slow sip of my drink to keep myself from snapping again. It’s not their fault. They’d tell me it’s not my fault. But I’m the one who took off for nine years. Maybe if I’d stuck around—maybe if I had been strong enough—I’d have caught the problem earlier.
Maybe I could have turned it around without bringing in investors.
“I’m handling it.”
Nine years… I probably would have spent five just trying to convince my dad to get his head of out his ass. And if he didn’t—when he didn’t—I’d have figured out away around him.
“By ripping out windows?” Sierra's sharp, accusing voice cuts through the room. “By 'relocating' a century of history?”
“That's not—” I turn to face her, and the sight of her still wrecks me. Flushed cheeks, swollen lips, hair mussed from my fingers. She looks like she just got thoroughly kissed by someone who knows exactly how she likes it.
Because she did.
By me.
And her brothers are standing five feet away, oblivious.
For now.
Well, except Nolan. I don’t know what he’s thinking, but he’s definitely thinking.
“The window seat stays,” I hear myself say.
Sierra blinks. “What?”
“I said it stays.” I run a hand through my hair, frustration and something softer tangling in my chest. “For now. I have more immediate concerns.”
“That's why we're here. Well, one of the reasons. The immediate concerns. The lodge needs something big. Something splashy. Something that'll get people here even without snow.” Caleb bounces on his heels, way too fucking energized for being up all night.
I usually find his boundless energy entertaining.
Right now, I just want to pop him in the mouth. Or tie him to a chair so he’ll just stop moving already.
“There's supposed to be snow,” I mutter.
“Sure. Any day now. But until then—” Caleb spreads his arms wide like he's about to announce the second coming. “We can have a festival.”
Yup, pop him in the mouth it is. “A what?”
“We do a massive event. Outdoor activities, food, music, the whole experience.”
“It’s a ski resort and mountain with no fucking snow with Christmas just over a week away. What whole fucking experience?”
Roman perks up giving him his full attention “Just give him a chance. He might be onto something here.”
“Event planning takes months,” I say carefully. “We have five minutes to plan the actual events let alone how to market them. Then there’s making sure it doesn't turn into a disaster. Or a lawsuit. Preferably both.”
“So we take a few days to set up.” Caleb waves off my concern like it's a gnat.
An inconvenient, logical gnat.
“Lock down the schedule, rally the troops, get the word out.”
“We’d hit peak kick-off season for events like this,” Roman adds. “Or what would be peak season if Mother Nature wasn't being a vindictive bitch.”
“Snow or Shine. We kick off at the end of the week.
Maybe a pre-festival warmup Thursday and head right into the weekend full of activities that carry through to Christmas Eve the following Wednesday.
Lumberjack competitions. Hot chocolate bars.
Ice sculpture—okay, maybe not ice sculpture if the weather doesn't cooperate, but you get the idea.”
“And how exactly do you propose we market this in the five minutes between now and Thursday to reel people in?”
“The lodge's history,” Sierra says slowly. “That's the hook. Heritage tourism. People want authenticity, not just activities.”
Caleb points at her. “See? She gets it. And, it just so happens I have a line on something else.” He shoves his hands in his pockets and rocks back on his heels.
My gut clenches.
My survival instincts immediately start composing my last will and testament.
“It’s a little outside of the box, but…”