I leaned over and grabbed a discarded t-shirt from the floor, pulling it over my head. Then I turned to face him, sitting cross-legged.
“I don’t know if you remember, but I dated a brewer when I was twenty-one,” I said finally. “He was fourteen years older than me, which should have been my first red flag, but I was young and stupid and thought he was cool and sophisticated.”
Cade’s jaw tightened. “I remember.”
“Suffice it to say, he wasn’t either of those things. He was, however, controlling and condescending, and made me feel pretty fucking horrible about myself most of the time.”
I grabbed the pillow from behind me and set it in my lap, my fingers plucking at the fabric, fluffing and smoothing it. My gaze dropped for just a second before I forced it back up to meet Cade’s eyes. This was my story. My history. And I owned it. Difficult as it was, I wasn’t going to sit here and pretend to be ashamed.
“But he also taught me how to brew. And I was good at it. Really good. Better than him, in fact, which royally pissed him off.”
“Of course it did,” Cade muttered.
“When we finally broke up—or rather, when I finally got the nerve to leave—that’s when I started brewing in my parents’ garage. I know you remember that.”
He smirked. “Hard to forget. Colin and I were underage, but you’d let us drink your test batches as long as we promised not to leave the premises.”
“You two were my best quality control,” I said with a fond smile, recalling all the times I’d gotten them drunk and stolen their keys before they noticed. “Brutally honest and always willing to drink another round.”
“We were dedicated to the craft.”
“You were dedicated to free beer.”
“That too.”
Cade’s smile softened, the teasing falling away. “So when did it stop being a hobby?”
“Like I said, it was just for fun at first, but then people started asking if they could pay me for it. Before I knew it, I had a whole cottage operation going.”
“And Mistletoe Bay Brewing Company was born.”
“Not exactly.” I rubbed my thumb over a frayed spot on the pillowcase. “I wanted to open my own place, but no one would take me seriously. I was too young, too inexperienced. Toofemale. The bank wouldn’t give me a loan. Investors wouldn’tmeet with me. It was … frustrating doesn’t even begin to cover it.”
I caught myself worrying the same frayed spot, pulling the thread taut between my fingers. Cade’s hand covered mine, gently stopping me before I unraveled the whole seam. His fingers laced through mine and squeezed.
A nervous-sounding laugh slipped out of me, but it faded as the memories kept building. “Anyway … I apprenticed under Tom Morrison at Seacoast Brewing. He encouraged my talent, even let me develop my own recipes, including a regular ‘Stella’s Special’ for his taproom. It did well. Well enough that my parents finally believed I could make a go of it.”
“I remember Colin saying they invested pretty heavily.”
I nodded. “Yeah, they put in the bulk of the money for me to get started. Tom kicked in some, too. By then, I had about fifty grand saved, and Colin gave me ten.” I smiled at the memory of my baby brother handing me a check, his face split into a sweet, goofy grin.
“And then you won that blind taste test against some of the biggest craft breweries in New England.”
“Damn right I did. Beat out breweries that had been operating for twenty years. With a beer I’d been making for less than two. Total validation, by the way.” I lifted my chin slightly, that old defiant fire sparking in my chest. “Proof that I wasn’t crazy. That I could actually do this.”
“You built something amazing,” Cade said, his voice suffused with pride. “All on your own.”
“Nah, I had lots of help.”
“But you did the work. You took all that bullshit and turned it into a well-respected, bad-ass business.” He brought my hand to his lips and kissed my knuckles. “That’s fucking impressive, Stella.”
My throat went tight. “Yeah, it is.”
His eyes were serious now, intense in a way they weren’t often. “You’re one of the strongest people I know.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, so I kissed him instead. Soft and slow, pouring everything I couldn’t say into the press of my lips against his.
When I finally pulled back, his eyes were dark and heavy-lidded.
