Sweet Bitter Honey

by Liz Crowe

  Chapter Seven

  The day of her interview dawned with an inauspicious gloom. Lynette sat straight up, sheets in a tangle around her legs, nerves on fire and her body buzzing with a clearly remembered dream. One where Ryan Shannon, he of the sexy disembodied voice, was holding her, twining his fingers in her hair, pulling her close and kissing her like nobody’s business. She passed a hand down her damp neck. Allowing herself to flop back for a few more minutes, she worked her hand into her flannel pajama bottoms.

  She rubbed and stroked and pretended she knew what she was doing until giving up. The erstwhile boyfriend in college had been a virgin, too, and between them, they’d hardly figured out more than how to mutually masturbate and had managed to achieve actual penetration only by accident, which had scared her silly. By her own estimation, according to the few pop culture magazines she’d read in waiting rooms, she had never actually experienced true orgasm. Yet one more thing to put on her someday list, she supposed, although at nearly twenty-seven, she figured it would be more likely that she’d discover an oil well in the backyard than her own G-spot.

  Lynette groaned and rolled over, pretending she was not the most pathetic excuse for an adult female on the planet. She rose and hit the shower, ignoring her still thrumming body in favor of focusing on maybe, just maybe, landing a job today.

  “Honey! I made some breakfast.” Her mother’s thin voice floated down the short hallway.

  Lynette fixed a smile on her face, adjusted the one decent suit skirt she possessed and brushed her usual minimal amount of makeup on her face. She’d given up trying to tone down her freckles years ago and wasn’t about to start now, Sexy Voice Man or not. “Coming, Mom, hang on.” She ate, let her mother fuss over her hair that she had pulled tight into bun to, hopefully, minimize the shocking effect it sometimes had. “Thanks, Mom, really.”

  She stood and kissed her mother’s cool cheek, took her plate to the sink and stood there, trying to stay calm. She’d been through so many interviews that this one shouldn’t be rattling her so much. The thought of getting in front of Ryan the Voice was making her weak in the knees and the eggs she’d just eaten threatened a second appearance.

  God, Lynette, you are lame as shit. Get a grip.

  She jumped when her mom touched her shoulder. “Honey.” She tucked the ubiquitous strand of curly red hair behind Lynette’s ear. “Don’t worry. You’ll find something and hopefully there will be a nice man there you can meet and…”

  Lynette jerked away from her, furious and unwilling to guard her tongue. “Shut up about men, Mom. You had a man and what, exactly, did he do for you? Hmm? Die, that’s what, after he gambled away every dime he had. Please, do not tell me one more time that finding a man is the answer to anything.”

  She was immediately sorry for her harsh words but, unwilling to back down, grabbed her purse and second-hand leather portfolio. Hesitating a split second before opening the door, she sighed then walked out in to the warm morning, putting on her ‘hire me’ face one more time.

  The Ypsilanti Brewing Company was in its sixth year of business but had already broken more sales records than Lynette could count. In her due diligence research, she’d discovered that jumping on the craft beer bandwagon when he did had been a stroke of genius on Quinn Shannon’s part. The guy she’d talked to was Quinn’s brother, Ryan, who’d joined the company a few years ago. While the thought of brothers with that same voice made Lynette more than a little wobbly in the knees, she forced herself to focus on the tidbits she’d memorized about the company and the industry in general.

  With the market share of malt beverages currently almost fifty percent, the craft brewing business was now more than some bearded dudes in basements concocting random stuff. Lynette knew less than zero about beer generally, didn’t even really drink alcohol that much because it was too costly. How she could parlay her expensive marketing degree into some sort of organized, professional effort, like the panty-dropping voice had implied, escaped her even after all her research.

  She did have a new working knowledge of how beer was sold in Michigan and how adversarial and challenging relationships with distributors could be for breweries. There were a few names she could drop, like ‘Dogfish Head’, ‘Stone’ and ‘Bell’s.’ She’d watched about fifty YouTube videos of beer being made, so at least she could point to a fermenter and know that it was not a mash tun.

  She sighed, squared her shoulders and put on a light coat of lipstick. The parking lot was deserted, but the place only had about eight employees, which would account for the few cars in the lot, four of them late model pickups.

  A wave of terror made her grip the top of her car. Staring up at the red brick and glass façade of what was once one of the busiest and most successful plants for Ford Motor Company, she forced herself back under control. Which was when she also got her first whiff of a rich, breakfast-y smelling odor. It got stronger as she approached the side door. The amazing smell wafted around her, seeming to hold her in its embrace before rolling out into the warm morning air behind her while she stood in the open door. A man and a woman in rubber boots and heavy aprons were moving around the cavernous space, clambering up and down a metal platform, taking turns stirring a huge copper kettle with what appeared to be a boat oar.

  She stood, taking it all in, until a sudden movement to her left made the hairs on the back of her neck stand straight up. “Hey!” The voice that had haunted her since she’d heard it on the phone made her jump, stumble and trip over a thick hose snaking across the middle of the concrete floor.

  She cursed and tried to get her feet back under her, but her worn-down heel hit a patch of water and she sensed herself falling, in slow and embarrassing motion, right onto her ass. A better first impression had likely never been made, she reflected on her way down. Her purse went one way and her portfolio the other, scattering resumes, clippings and brochures all across the floor. The final indignity, however, was biting her tongue so hard it brought tears to her eyes and flooded her mouth with coppery-tasting blood.

  “Shit.” The Voice was at her ear now. Fury at him for letting her wipe out like that made her face redden. She scrambled to her feet and jerked her arm out of his reach. “Hang on there, Red,” the man had the nerve to say to her. She blew an escaped tendril of hair out of her face and attempted to tuck it away, straighten her skirt, gather her wits and not burst into tears all at once.

  “I’m fine,” she ground out, taking a wobbly step away from him. Meeting his eyes was not an option she allowed herself.

  “Here, let me…” He gathered up her random papers and shoved them into her folder. The mortification continued when she saw a spare tampon had rolled out of the purse and landed a few feet away. She reached for it at the same moment he did, connecting the top of her head in a very solid way with his nose.

  “Ow! Jesus,” he muttered, using that damn voice to send tingles along her spine. She grabbed her stuff, stuck her purse on her shoulder and headed for the door. There was no way in this lifetime or any other she would stay in there another minute. “Hold on,” he said, muffled, with a towel over his nose. “Aren’t you…” He looked down a piece of paper in his hand. “Lynette? Lynette Williams?”

  “Yes,” she said, giving up on the professional updo and letting her crazy annoying hair tumble down around her shoulders. Fuck this guy and his stupid slippery floor—she needed this job. “That’s me. Lynette.” She finally looked him full in the face. “Not ‘Red’.”

  He stood, gripping the paper in one hand and towel in the other, staring at her. Her early self-deceiving notions that the man attached to the voice that made her semi-orgasmic was a dumpy, bearded, fat guy with a beer in one hand evaporated, like so much smoke. She narrowed her eyes, realizing that he was blatantly checking her out without even pretending not to. She flushed hot again and acknowledged that she was doing the same thing to him.

  Ryan Shannon was six foot something incredible of pure man, with a shock of dark blo
nd hair and the most compelling gray-green eyes she’d ever seen. He rubbed his hand across his stubble-covered jaw at one point during their little moment, perhaps wishing he’d shaved. His broad shoulders were encased in an Ypsi Brewing Company T-shirt, which hugged the lean strength of his torso like a glove. She looked lower, at the light denim jeans and rubber boots then back up, forcing herself not to stare at any one area too long. When they locked eyes again, she had to take a step back at the intensity she saw there.

  He cleared his throat, and she was gratified to see that he at least had the decency to blush before turning away to answer a question someone had asked, breaking the connection. She watched his body move, lithe, athletic-looking and… She looked away, horrified for even contemplating the images that had started to flash in her head. Biting her lip, she glanced around, took a very careful step to the side and mentally started the whole thing over again.

  Chapter Eight

  “So.” Quinn leaned back and smiled at her. Lynette grinned, feeling comfortable in this man’s presence, at least. He had a mentoring, helpful vibe about him that his brother definitely lacked. “Lynette, you certainly blew away the rest of those folks in the group interview. I’m interested in hearing more about what you think you have to add to our efforts here.”

  “Well, from what I can tell, you guys are on the verge of taking this to the next level.” She crossed her legs, sensing Ryan’s gaze crawling all over her but keeping her focus on the other brother, while mentally shooting daggers at Ryan. “I’d say hiring a marketing professional is the right thing to do. It seems you have a decision to make—do you want to be a production facility and make your money on wholesale or to ramp up the retail efforts by expanding the pub, like we discussed in the group?”

  She let a beat of silence drag out then leaned forward, never taking her eyes from Quinn’s intent blue ones. “What I propose is to come up with a comprehensive plan that would allow you to make it a fifty-fifty proposition. That is, why not grow on both sides of the house? I think it can be done, but it will take a bit more IT infrastructure and more people.”

  She leaned back and clasped her hands on her lap. She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from turning to glare at Ryan, who sat to her left and was oozing a sort of sexy aura that was making her damp in inappropriate places. She allowed herself a glance in his general direction when Quinn did the same thing, willing Ryan to chime in and not sit there like a lump.

  “I told you,” Ryan said to Quinn while he kept his smoky gaze trained on her. “More people.”

  Quinn snorted and stood. “Lynette, I would be honored if you would join us at Ypsilanti Brewing Company as our new sales and marketing director. I’m prepared to offer you a starting salary of thirty-five thousand dollars a year, plus a bonus package based on meeting specific sales targets. We’ve just added health insurance with prescription drug program that would be available for you to buy into should you require it. I realize that it’s not a ton of money, but…”

  Ryan rose to his feet, staring at his brother as if he’d just offered Lynette the head brewer’s job. “Uh, Quinn, don’t you think we should…um…”

  Quinn frowned at his brother. “Ryan, she’s exactly what we are looking for.”

  The two men glared at each other. A tendril of uneasiness snuck in under the elation at the actual, real offer. It was small, granted, and she could probably get closer to sixty with her MBA at a larger company.

  “I’ll take it,” she blurted out, causing both men to turn and stare at her. “I mean, if you’re both in agreement, that is.” She raised an eyebrow at Ryan. “Seems this Mr. Shannon has some qualms?” She let the sentence dangle, half question, half accusation. Her heart pounded so fast it hurt. Her throat was slowly closing up when Ryan took a step toward her. She could smell the odors on him that would become familiar to her, malt, astringent hops, leather and sweat blended into a slurry of richness that coated her nerve endings. She forced a smile and made herself not take a step away from him.

  “What do you drink, Lynette? You know, when you need to unwind?”

  Ryan’s question threw her for a loop. She bit her lip, glanced at Quinn who was still frowning at his brother. “I don’t, actually. It’s too expensive.”

  “Huh,” he said, tossing Quinn a look Lynette could not fathom.

  “Great,” Quinn said, closing up a folder on his desk and grabbing his suit coat. “You won’t have to unlearn bad habits. If you will excuse me, I have a meeting at the bank. You can consider this a solid offer, Lynette.” He took her hand, clenched it hard. “Just ignore him.” He jerked his chin at Ryan, who stood to her left. “For now.”

  She watched him go, still processing what had just happened to her. She took a breath and faced Ryan. “I’m not always that klutzy, don’t worry,” she said, hoping to defuse some of the energy hurtling between them. At the same time, she wanted him to step closer, to put his hands on her face, her arms, her back, her… She shook her head. “Anyway, I assume I have some time to think about it?” She grabbed her purse, needing to be as far from Ryan as she could get, like right now. This whole scene was all of a sudden too much for her to handle.

  She picked her portfolio up off Quinn’s desk, determined to ignore the man standing and staring at her as if she was something nasty on the side of the road. “Excuse me.” She had to step closer to him to get by the chairs where she’d been sitting for nearly an hour. “I’m sorry if I’m not your first choice. I need this job, and I’m willing to give it a shot, but only if you stop looking at me like I just killed your best friend.” She stood in the doorway, keeping a safe distance between them, and shook her hair back.

  Ryan’s face reddened. “No, I’m, it’s…well.” He ran a hand down his face. “This whole hiring someone new was my idea. Quinn didn’t want to add any more employees. I’m glad it didn’t take him weeks to choose somebody.” He looked up at the ceiling, and in that split second, Lynette realized something about the distressingly handsome man she would be working with daily. He was uncomfortable here, in her presence. Maybe even more than she was in his. “You’ll be fine. We’ll teach you the beer side. You bring a skill set we lack.” He smiled, his chiselled face set in calm lines, his eyes sporting a sexy, mischievous twinkle. “Welcome to the team, Lynette.” He held out a hand.

  She stared at him, mesmerized by the message her brain was receiving but unable to comprehend. She finally had a job and with a man she wanted in ways she didn’t even understand. Well played, Lynette.

  “Thanks.” She shook his hand, turned and tried not to run out of the door to her car.

  Chapter Nine

  “Shannon!”

  Ryan looked up from his task and cursed when his skull connected with the solid stainless-steel opening of the giant fermenter. “Jesus,” he muttered, rubbing the knot rising on his scalp. If the voice matched the face he expected, his day had digressed from crappy to complete shit. He sighed and turned, meeting the angry stare of Lynette Williams. The woman had been marketing director for Ypsi Brewing Company for exactly six weeks and Ryan bounced from bizarrely obsessed with her to hating her ever-loving guts, when he was not fantasizing about fucking her brains out.

  “Yeah?” He forced his gaze away from hers. He knew what was up, but ever since the hot redhead had taken the reins of marketing, Ryan’s life had been a living hell, for many annoying reasons, not the least of which she was the sexiest thing on two female legs he’d laid eyes on—ever.

  When Lynette had been added to the mix, bringing with her a healthy dose of spread-sheeted, computerized reality, it had turned Ryan into a twitching nervous wreck. His brother had insisted they needed it to get to the next stage and kept forgetting that it had been Ryan who’d convinced him to hire a marketing director—but this particular marketing director was all sorts of infuriating. Ryan figured that this ‘next stage’ was either going to kill him or make him insane.

  He had called the production shots in the brewery from t
he beginning. Quinn took whatever Ryan and his staff made and sold it, not vice versa. It had worked for them. They’d grown from nothing to one of the most successful new craft breweries in Michigan inside of six years, doing it this way.

  Ryan respected the hell out of his brother, with his suave manner, his charming patter, clean-cut suits and the women who’d always flittered around him like moths to a flame—up to and including his model-gorgeous ex-wife and his new girlfriend, Audrey. But he cursed the man daily for hiring this fiery temptress who seemed to think that he would be scheduling his brews around her sales.

  She shoved a computer tablet under his nose. “Look at this.” Her foot tapped out a familiar rhythm, the ‘Ryan is a stubborn asshole and I’m telling Quinn’ one.

  He took a step back, trying to get her scent out of his nose. Luckily, she was in full-on bitch mode so he could be pissed and not horny. Besides, he had his own issues, trying to get Cole to answer his calls. The man was an expert at avoidance and Ryan was about to give up, let their smoking hot one-off be just that. He wiped the sweat dripping down his forehead and took the device. A graph flashed red, indicating that they were running low on their flagship hoppy lager.

  “Yeah, Lynette, I know. I updated the damn thing this morning.” He addressed his next comment to the empty fermenter that had fucked up his last batch of that very beer. He had a service call in on it but believed he’d identified the problem. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?” She yanked the computer out of his hand, brushing his arm with hers in the process, making him shudder and need some distance. “You’re sorry?”

  “Yeah. You’re deaf?”

  “No, you dickhead, I’m not. But ‘sorry’ isn’t gonna cut it this week. I made a huge sale of the Hopped Up Lager, and you know it. I put it here.” She tapped the screen, which flipped over to her shiny new sales reporting system that had become the bane of his brewing existence. “You saw it. I know you did because I see you logged into the shared file and—”