Chapter 1
Jamie
Of all the things jostling for top spot in Jamie Butler’s mind, pizza was edging into the lead. He tried to push the craving away –chief operating officers should put business before pizza– and focus on the life changing paperwork spread out on the table in front of him. But Jamie’s dyslexia made the words dance tauntingly and, compounded with tiredness, he strained to digest the nuances of the proposal. This was something which could change the future of the centuries old family distillery, as much a part of the Kintyre landscape as shortbread coloured sand and roaring surf. It needed time and deliberation, not a late-night decision such as the one his father seemed to be hankering after.
‘Dad, I think we should call it a day.’ Jamie – the sleeves of his white shirt crumpled up around his elbows – leaned his broad build over the desk to clear away the documents his father was still scrutinising. A stranger would barely know the older man had worked an eleven hour day with a terminal illness. ‘You have to rest, and we both have to eat. I’ll text Garyto come get you?’
‘I can rest when this decision is made,’ Jimmy Butler countered. ‘I need to know the company is in safe hands when I’m gone. I’m not having the Butler name associated with bankruptcy.’
‘It is safe.’ Jamie had to convince his father this was true and that selling wasn’t necessary to ensure the family were supported. No way would he let the future of the whisky distillery his ancestors had founded be compromised in any way. Yes, it was essential they keep morphing and adapting, but selling even part of Butler’s wasn’t the answer. Only, until Jamie had a better idea, he wouldn’t argue about it, because the stress wasn’t good for his father’s already diminishing health. ‘We won’t move any further forward tonight,’ he said. ‘Best to sleep on things and the Baron proposal will look clearer next week.’
‘It might look clearer, but will it ever look good?’ Jimmy stared dismally at the desk and shook his head. ‘I never imagined it coming to this. Considering a buyout from a big soulless conglomerate. That’s not the vision I ever had for Butler’s.’
‘It’s not my vision either.’ Jamie sent a text to his father’s part-time carer, Gary, who was over at the house helping prepare his father’s evening care routine. ‘I’ve been thinking lots about advertising since we pressed pause on the Gauci campaign.’
‘That bloody campaign. I wake up in cold sweats from nightmares of fifty-pound notes disappearing down the toilet and clogging up in the drains.’
Jamie suppressed the instinct to laugh. It wasn’t funny that they had pulled a million-pound advertising campaign at the last minute due to its being ‘the wrong kind of modern’, in the eyes of his father. But no advertising was better than the wrong advertising. And although ‘the wrongkind of modern’ sounded like an archaic reason, he understood what his father meant. The thing was, with the right adjustment in image, Butler’s whisky wouldn’t have to sell its soul. They just needed a tweak that blended the traditional with the contemporary to maintain the loyal customer base and keep Butler’s competitive amidst the continual springing up of boutique distilleries across Scotland. Not to mention, giving his father confidence that things would continue to thrive once he was gone.
Jimmy Butler manoeuvred his wheelchair out from behind the desk. Jamie tried not to examine his father too closely because Jimmy wouldn’t want his second eldest son to be concerned about his decreasing mobility, but there was no denying that this was exactly what was on his mind. It had been slightly over a year since his father had been given his Motor Neurone Disease diagnosis and although he was determined to maintain business as usual and avoid talk of the impact on his mobility, there were evident signs of the illness encroaching, the need for a wheelchair being one. The addition of a daybed in the corner of the office was another. Jimmy was stealthy in disguising his need for an afternoon nap each day – often citing that he was in a conference call or had a lot of emails to get through – but Jamie was aware that long, relentless working hours were no longer a possibility for his father. However, holding on to his dignity had to be and Jamie would help with that any way he could.
The truth was that his father’s illness was tearing Jamie apart inside. There was no other man like Jimmy Butler. After all, not many men would raise their nephews as their own, as Jimmy had done. Archie Butler, father to Jamie and two of his brothers, Cal and Niall, had been an abusive and cruel man, manipulating theirmother for years. When Amanda eventually left him – Jamie being two years old at the time – she took refuge with Archie’s brother, Jimmy, who was the antithesis of Archie: kind, respectful and hardworking. After Archie passed away, Jimmy adopted the three children, then he and Amanda added their biological son, Sean, before adopting triplets and raising all seven children with as much love and support as any human could need. It was testament to the solid foundation Jimmy and Amanda provided that all the children were grounded and thriving today. But the thought of there being no more Jimmy Butler in the world terrified Jamie. Hence, he desperately wanted to minimise his dad’s stress, get Butler’s star rising again and let his father relax and enjoy what time he had left.
‘Try not to worry about it too much.’ Jamie lifted a smart woollen coat from the stand and helped his father put it on, a small concession, provided no one else was watching. ‘Hey, did I tell you about that new ghost tour partnership Cal’s running in Edinburgh.’
Jimmy huffed out a chuckle. ‘I will admit to never thinking that had an ounce of mileage in it. But fair play to Callum.’
It was good that his dad was pleased about something. ‘It’s a great idea. A free dram of Butler’s at the end of every ghost tour and cashback on your ticket if you purchase a bottle. An extra dram if you see a ghost. Cal says it’s been a runaway success so far. Plus, there’s a lot of deid people in Edinburgh – a whole city under the city.’
‘Aye, although it’ll take more than a few ghost tours to keep us afloat.’
‘I know. But it’s not like there’s a shortage of people wanting to invest. It just needs to be the right kind of investment.And I’ll draw up a list of advertising agencies that might be a good fit.’
‘What about getting those folks in the marketing department to do it?’ Jimmy asked pointedly. ‘Isn’t that what we pay them for?’
‘Aye, sort of.’ Jamie rubbed his hand across his stubbled jaw. ‘But you let two of them go for not being up to scratch. I’m headhunting some others but, in the meantime, we’ll need to think on this one ourselves.’ His phone vibrated. ‘Okay, that’s Gary outside now.’
‘Maybe Gary would like to work in the marketing department,’ Jimmy suggested as his son pushed his wheelchair down the corridor. ‘Could probably do a better job than Poncy and Satsuma.’
‘Posey and Clementine. But maybe, Dad, aye. Hi, Gary.’ Jamie ensured his father was comfortable in his wheelchair for the five-hundred-metre trip to the house, then headed back inside to change into his running gear.
The chilled November air hurt Jamie’s lungs but the benefits of pounding along the mile-long road from the distillery to the village was exactly what he craved. That and the long-awaited pizza. When he reached the outskirts of Kinshore, he cut down to the beach and ran beyond the main village and back again to lengthen his workout. The pounding of the surf in his ears helped still his mind. He rarely ran with music. Why bother when you had nature like this as a soundtrack?
Large Margherita with extra mushrooms retrieved from Bob’s pizza shop, Jamie navigated the streets of the village he’d lived his whole life. He passed the turning for the local primary school he and his six siblings had attended, joggedby the pub where he met friends for the quiz on a Thursday night, then the nursing home where his grandmother had lived, and where he often called bingo numbers as a friendly gesture – the old ladies loved him. Kinshore was a small village on the Kintyre Peninsula in Scotland, and everyone knew Jamie Butler. It didn’t bother him that he was under the microscope far more than the average inhabitant, because until recently, Jamie’s life was uneventful, to say the least.
Jamie cut through the park. It was darker than the depths of a grave, but, having spent years here in his youth, he knew every curve of every pathway, every pothole, the dedications on each bench and exactly when he was passing them. This confidence meant all he had to focus on was the sound of his feet on the tarmac, the puff of his breath and the warmth of the cardboard box in his hand. It was tempting to sit down and open the pizza now. He’d done that once before, but he’d still been with Katie then, and somehow avoiding the relationship you were in to sit on a park bench in the dark and eat pizza seemed less tragic than doing it when you were single. Or was that the raw hurt thinking?
Raw hurt. It’s been three months.
Aye, three months after ten years, and she leaves for that dobber.
Upping the pace of his run always helped Jamie when dark thoughts chased him. He had to get home. There, he might be alone, but there was a fire and there was whisky. He pushed forward through the park, approaching the exit and imagined himself sprinting in a race, close to the finish line. It wasn’t easy. There was a reason Usain Bolt didn’t do the 100 metres holding a pizza box.
At the park exit, Jamie pitched left, slowing down to runsafely on the cobbles, the pizza held out in front of him to ensure it didn’t spill any of its contents.
Then. Slam!
The pizza box took the worst of the hit. Or that’s how it seemed at first. Squinting in the dim light at the figure in front of him covered in slathers of tomato and cheese sauce, Jamie might say that the man had come off worst.
