“I’d like to know if you both would want to do it with me. You can be as involved as you’d like. Put to use your strengths or interests. You don’t need to distill or work the whiskey product side of it.”
I try to gauge their body language or their gut reactions, but they’re not giving me all that much. I think I may have shocked them slightly.
“Jo, there’s a logo, bottle designs, creative things that I couldn’t even start to wrap my head around that I would want you to lead and own.” I take a seat around the round table at the center of the space. “Stevie, you make more noise about things than any other person on the planet. You don’t have to give up your shifts at The Whispering Fool. But I could see you helping me run the business side of this—and the public relations. If anyone can hype and help schmooze people in town about it, it’s you all the way.”
“So you’re saying you need us,” she says, squinting her eyes at me.
That was wildly accurate and far more so in the grand scheme of my life. I smile and nod. “I’m saying I need you, always have.” I tilt my head to the side. “I’m doing this, no matter what; I just want to know if you want a piece of it with me.”
Jo claps off the sugar on her hands and shifts out of her stool to stand. “It’s a fuck yes from me. I wouldn’t mind scaling back at the bar and leaning into doing more creative things.”
We both look at Stevie, who’s smiling, looking between the two of us. “Mom is going to run The Whispering Fool until she loses her marbles, and even then, there’s a part of me that knows she’ll never want to give much of that place up.”
She sits down and kicks her feet up, the chartreuse MIU MIU pumps front and center. “I’m keeping my podcast and nights at the bar—I still need to pay bills and feed Nashy. But I’m in.” Then she gasps. “Oh my gosh, Theo is going to be so jealous. I bet he could get bottles circulating with all of the schmoozing he does too.”
“When I was in Montana,” I say, looking at my sister, “I listened. All the time.” Pausing, I swallow the emotion that still holds. “It was how I felt like I didn’t lose”—I look around—“all of this and all of you.” I smile and wipe at the tear that escapes. “Wedid tasting flights of all your recommendations. I want to do that here.”
Stevie looks up at the ceiling, trying to keep from letting her welled tears fall. “Well, fuck you for making me cry before noon, Wynnie.”
“This feels right, Wyn,” Jo says, breaking through the dramatics of our middle sister. “You’ve always been brilliant, but taking something and making it even better is your superpower.”
“What are we going to call it?” Stevie asks. “The whiskey brand or the distillery, what should we call it?”
The firewood cracksloudly and sparks move up and into the air. Evenings in autumn are such a tease—they make us think that brisk nights and warm blankets are on the agenda until the next day, when summer teases her way back in. But tonight, after a big dinner with everyone I love in one room, I look up at the way the clouds move with purpose and feel content that maybe I’ve found mine as well.
I never thought I’d see this part of my life again, the one where my family had a late dinner together and then a drink around the firepit. I spent too much time thinking I didn’t want to have anything to do with it, then craving nothing more than to see them all one more time, to this—standing here, I don’t know if I feel like crying or laughing.
I smile right before I feel him. Large arms weave their way around my middle from behind, and the warmth and smell of him follow. “You look like you’ve had a good day, baby.”
As I lean back into him, his chin rests on my shoulder, and we look out at the same things—family, friends, the chaos of all of it when we come together. It isn’t perfect by any stretch, but I don’t want perfect, I just want them. And him.
“I did. Made plans with my sisters. We figured out a schedule to be at the distillery together and the things we can accomplish on our own. Oh, and I spoke with Lincoln Foxx for a while this afternoon. They want to host an event with us at Foxx Bourbon this spring.” I run my fingers along his forearms that hold me to him. “Whiskey Women Distillery and Foxx Bourbon,” I say with an unbelieving sigh.
He presses his lips to my neck and asks, “How are you feeling about all of it?”
I have a tattoo appointment set for next week and weekly therapy back on my calendar, but I know myself, or at least, I’m learning more about who I want to be. I have explanations, about my family, about the night I’d been taken, all of the pieces that had been left making me uneasy have now been accounted for. And after seeing Laney, thanking her for what she did, it was more than what I thought I’d ever be able to do. But big life things mean big feelings, and for me, that will always mean finding ways to manage them.
“I’m thinking I’m so fucking excited.” I close my eyes and hum at his touch and the way it feels good to lean on him, talk to him, have him ask me the question in the first place. “How about you?”
“I’m feeling like I missed you today,” he whispers quietly in my ear.
“Thomas,” my mom calls out from inside, peering out the kitchen window. “I thought you were going to help me here?”
“Hold your damn horses, Tallulah,” Tommy calls out. “Julian, am I going to see you for coffee tomorrow morning?” he asks as he starts walking toward the house. Before he headsinside, he says, “There’s this pour-over contraption that Jo brought over, said it’s foolproof good coffee.”
I think the only person who was sad about Julian checking out of the B&B is Tommy. Jameson was heading back out and Julian took the few things he brought with him on his travels and moved them into my place a few days ago.
“I’ll be there,” Julian says. “There’s something I wanted to talk with you about that can wait until tomorrow. Mind if I come by a little earlier. Say seven a.m.?”
“Thomas, if I didn’t mean right now, I wouldn’t have said it!” Mom yells from the window.
Tommy glances at me, and then looks down, smiling. Giving Julian a nod, he keeps his path toward the house, calling out, “What crawled into your panties today? Christ, I’m coming.”
Julian kisses the same spot on my neck again before I turn around. His hair is pulled half back, and the way the scruff along his cheeks barely hides his dimple beneath and frames his lips makes them look so damn kissable. I loop my arms around his neck, twirling a piece of his hair with my fingers as he lifts me up, just enough so that my feet hover off the ground.Weightless, that’s how I feel with him.
“Made some progress with a few pieces I’ve been working on for a while,” he tells me as he kisses me softly.
“Anything I can see?” I ask. I love watching him work and talking about the things he is passionate about.
