Page 18 of Whiskey Proposal
They take my cue and start the meeting. Grateful I don’t get grilled more on the Emerson situation, I’m able to relax and steer my attention toward work. But when it’s done and we all return to our regular duties, I head to my office. I have to check in with the Denver site, but first, I need to message Emerson.
Me: I work the tasting room tonight. I won’t be home until ten.
I wait, but there’s no reply.
Cruz enters my office and goes straight to the chair across from my desk. “How’s it really going?”
I blow out a breath. I can’t bullshit him, but there’s a caution, a protectiveness, around the subject of Emerson I can’t ignore. “She’s upset. At me and her dad.”
“Understandable. You?”
“What do you mean?”
He snorts. “You had to get married too. Not just your wife.”
My wife. If Emerson heard that, the fire in her eyes would be brilliant. “It’s an adjustment.”
His gaze drops to my left hand.
I keep my hands where they are, resisting the urge to cover my ringless finger. “It’s not real.”
“She okay with that?”
If I’d shown up with a diamond ring, her brother and niece might not have been a strong enough reason to stay. That girl would’ve run fast and far. “The bare minimum is fine with her.”
Not with me, but that’s to decipher another day.
Cruz sits for a few moments. He’s not being pushy, and I appreciate it. “What’s she like?”
Sexy. Stubborn. Vibrant. Vulnerable. A siren encased in glass armor. “She’s determined. Brooks and Hillary mean the world to her.”
“She’s not going to knife you in your sleep? The house and land would still be hers, and then all your shit too.”
He’s worried about me. And he’s right. I should be worried. Emerson’s a stranger, but she’s never felt like one. Hutch has been gushing about her for years. Then he asked me to find her college graduation program online and pull it up. I had to dig into the University of Colorado Denver archives to get it. After that, I was his personal Emerson stalker, and truthfully, I didn’t mind. Her socials are quiet, but sometimes, she posts a selfie that I stare at a little too long.
If she straddled me to smother me with a pillow, I might die a happy man. “I don’t think she’s murderous. Did Myles get to you?”
He reclines in the chair, his long legs kicked out in front of him. “He didn’t have to. She’s got the keys to your kingdom. You’re one heartbeat away.” He taps the side of his face, his gaze pinning mine. “But I’m thinking that heartbeat is spelling out her name.”
Don’t fidget. Don’t fidget. I never told him or Myles about what happened after the pitch, or that I planned to meet her later. Definitely not that she stood me up, or he’d be more concerned I might get offed in my sleep.
He sits forward, his boots thudding on the floor. “Holy shit, I’m right.”
I scowl. Why can’t he still be the self-absorbed prick he was at nineteen? I don’t want him that way permanently, just when it comes to Emerson. “You are not.”
A grin spreads his mouth wide. “You sly dog. What happened?” He thinks a moment. “The meeting in Denver. I knew you were cagey about that.”
“No, I wasn’t.”
He laughs, sounding like a damn hyena, giving me a glimpse of the irreverent little shit he used to be. “What happened? You kiss her? Sleep with her? Did you pull a Myles and take her on the private jet?”
“Wynter worked for him.”
“Yep. And he refuses to talk about the first time he got her on the jet, but she always gives him that look.”
It’s usually Wynter teasing Myles about their first flight together. I’d like to take a plane ride with Emerson. It’d mean she doesn’t hate me.
Grinding my teeth together, I stare out the window at the tall trees lining the parking lot and hugging the rickhouse. I’ll give him something so he’ll shut up. “We kissed and that was all.”
