Sammie laughed. “It does too count!”
“Fine, fine,” he said, “what’s your question?”
“What’s your favorite book?”
“You literally just stole my question!”
“Well now I’m curious!”
They went on like that, questions back and forth, sometimes branching off into separate conversations, but always going back to their little game. The summer air filled Sammie’s lungs as the Chicago skyline crept ever closer.
Despite the feelings that had simmered in her for far too long, there had always been something unattainable about Kieran. Something that made Sammie keep her distance, the tentative attraction that came with being young and inexperienced. But a decade had passed. They were new people now, far more settled in who they had become. Sitting in his truck as highway miles rolled by, trading questions and smiles, he didn’t seem so far out of reach.
Some of Kieran’s questions were silly, some less so.
“Do you like your job?”
That one drew Sammie up short. She hesitated before answering. “I do,” she began, the words slow and measured. “I like what I do. The craft of it. Building a new recipe is my favorite thing, especially when it comes out better than I hoped.”
Kieran glanced at her, just a flick of his gaze before turning his head back toward the road. Sammie once more wished she could see his expression behind those dark sunglasses.
“But…” His voice was soft, soothing, pulling at her real answer.
“But,” she said, her voice almost too quiet with the windows down. “I think that it could be better. That I could be happier.”
“At Everly?”
Sammie shook her head. They were treading dangerous waters now, ones she’d been doing her best to avoid, even when she talked to her brother about this stuff.
“No.” Sammie tucked her hair behind an ear, fighting the urge to hide. Kieran waited, giving her time to continue. “Not there.”
Another long pause, and Sammie began to wonder if she should say more, if she should try to justify herself or backtrack. She had a good job, one that paid… maybe notwell, but it was enough. Enough for what she needed.
Most of the time.
She was opening her mouth, explanation at the ready, when Kieran finally spoke up again.
“Would you go somewhere else?”
That caught her off guard. “What do you mean?”
Kieran shrugged. “Would you take a job somewhere else?”
“Like somewhere else in Chicago?”
“Sure,” he said. “Or anywhere. You’re good at what you do, I’m sure there are places that would want to have you. All those medals you’ve got hanging in the brewhouse are all the recommendation you need.”
“Those aren’t all mine.” A few were though. Her recipes had done well in every competition they’d entered over the last year. Sammie sighed. “I’m not exactly in a high-paying industry. Everly’s production and distribution scale is big enough to sustain my current salary, I wouldn’t make as much going to most other craft breweries.”
She could tell Kieran had a response already, judging by the way he pulled his bottom lip between his teeth, physically stopping himself from saying anything else. Sammie huffed out a small laugh.
“You can say it,” she said. “It’s the same thing everyone else has been telling me for the last three years.”
Kieran frowned. “I don’t want to be like everyone else, sticking my nose in your business when you didn’t ask.”
Oh. Nobody ever hesitated when it came to telling Sammie their opinions on her financial decisions. “What if I want to hear what you have to say about it?” Because she did. She did want to hear what Kieran had to say, even if she knew it would sting.
“I think you’ve been handed a tough deal,” he said, reaching a hand up to rub at the back of his neck. That same hand fell to the console between them, an open offering. Sammie reached out, tentative, weaving her fingers with his. The touch was grounding, centering. An anchor that didn’t pull her down, but instead held her in place, steady and secure. “I think you have a house full of memories, and sometimes memories are all we have left of people. But that’s a lot of weight for one person to bear alone. I think everyone that’s been telling you to sell the place, they just don’t want to see those memories become something that weighs you down and keeps you from finding your own place in this world.”
