The Promise (Butler Ranch Book 1)

by Heather Slade

  When she reached the area that was almost directly below where he sat, he waved. Surprisingly, she waved back. More surprisingly, she ran up the path that would lead her directly to him.

  “I owe you an apology,” she began. “I could give some lame excuse, but the bottom line is I was rude to you, and I’m sorry.”

  “I’m sorry too, Peyton. I honestly didn’t expect to run into you at the market. Although I didn’t have much of a plan when I drove into town this morning.”

  Rather than look at him, Peyton looked out at the sea. “You probably think I should be over him by now, especially since we weren’t together that long.”

  “That isn’t what I think at all.” Brodie wished he could see Peyton’s eyes. Even if she looked in his direction, her dark sunglasses hid them from view.

  “Kade made our ma promise that I’d deliver this box to you if anything happened to him.” Brodie pointed to the plain cardboard box sitting on the ground near his feet.

  Peyton put her hands in her jacket pockets. He thought for a minute she’d walk away from him again, instead she leaned against a rock near his. “I know it makes me seem like a terrible person, but I don’t want it, Brodie.”

  “You might change your mind someday.”

  “Your brother knew me well enough, at least I thought he did, that he wouldn’t have done this.”

  Brodie waited to see if Peyton would continue. They sat in silence but for the steady rhythm of the waves crashing on the sand. She took several deep breaths, but didn’t speak, so he did. “Tell me why he wouldn’t have done this, Peyton.”

  Brodie watched as she took three more very intentional deep breaths, and then turned to face him. Again he waited for her to speak, and again she remained silent.

  Finally, Peyton shrugged her shoulders, and stood. “I’ll see ya around, Brodie.”

  He didn’t follow her down the path, and didn’t move from where he sat until long after he saw her drive away in the opposite direction, toward the highway that would lead her back into town.

  Brodie picked up the box, and carried it back to his truck. He opened the door and set it on the passenger seat. “Guess it’s you and me for a while, box.” He patted the top, and then splayed his fingers, as if by doing so, he could take in whatever of Kade’s energy remained in the belongings he wanted Peyton to have.

  2

  Stave officially opened ten minutes ago, but no one would be in to taste wine this early in the day. Peyton usually arrived somewhere around ten, and typically didn’t see customers until one or later, especially on Mondays. Most of the tourists left town Sunday night, but she and Alex decided to stay open on Mondays in case there were stragglers who wanted to order wine before going home. Stave was closed Tuesday and Wednesday instead.

  She kept herself busy taking inventory, placing orders with wineries on behalf of customers who joined case clubs, or just wanted a few bottles shipped to them, and planning the events Stave sponsored every week.

  When her father asked her to manage what was then a simple tasting room, shortly after Peyton graduated from college, she expected it to be more of a summer job. Almost thirteen summers later, it was her life, along with her two boys, Jamison, who was ten, and Finn, who celebrated his eighth birthday a week ago.

  “You’re back,” Alex stood near the tasting bar with her arms crossed in front of her.

  “I’m sorry, Alex.”

  “Forget it. And forget Brodie Butler and Kade Butler, and all the rest of the bullshit. We have a wine dinner to plan. Okay?”

  There was a dinner club that met at Stave once a month on a Monday night. It was a locals-only group, many of whom owned restaurants or retail shops in Cambria, or one of its neighboring seaside villages. It gave the wineries in the collaborative an opportunity to introduce new wines for the restaurants to consider adding to their lists.

  The dinner was prepared by a guest chef in Stave’s kitchen. Each one took a great deal of planning, but the commission Stave made on wine sales was well worth the effort. Planning started four weeks out, and began with a chefs’ meeting.

  “Who’s coming in today, Peyton?”

  “Peter Wells from Lark. I’m surprised you forgot.”

  “Right. Peter.” Alex rested the back of her hand on her forehead. “Damn that man is hot.”

  “Speaking of temperature, whatever happened with you two?

  “Tepid. The ingredients looked better than the entrée turned out.”

  “You’re mixing metaphors.”

  “Yeah? Who cares? It just wasn’t there, ya know?”

  “I know.” Peyton sighed.

  “He’s had a thing for you since college. I think he found me lacking as a substitute.”

  “Not interested.”

  “You’re kidding? Not interested?”

  “Stop it, Alex.”

  “All right, all right. What’s he makin’?”

  Peyton pulled out the folder for the April 3rd dinner. “Pasilla chile stuffed with shrimp and provolone as the starter.”

  “Oh gawd, I just remembered how hungry I am.”

  “I’m thinking of pairing it with the Charbono.”

  “Whose?”

  “Harrington’s.”

  “Mmm, yummy.”

  Getting lost in wine and food pairings was exactly what Peyton needed to get her mind off Kade Butler, although she found herself thinking more about Brodie.

  After graduating from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo with a degree in Agribusiness, Peyton received several job offers from wineries in Napa Valley, but she preferred the slower pace of the Paso Robles wine region.

  Her original plan was to work at her parent’s winery, Wolf Family Vintners, but working in their adjunct tasting room appealed to her more.

  After a few months on the job, Peyton approached her dad with ideas for expansion. Rather than offering wines from their family winery solely, she encouraged him to open it up to all the members of Paso Robles’ Westside Winery Collaborative. Tasting room sales skyrocketed, as did their profits. When a restaurant in the west end of the village closed its doors and the space became available for lease, Peyton approached her father again, only this time, Alex came with her.

  Her dad raised his hands in surrender that day, after Alex told him the collaborative’s board had also asked her to serve as their marketing manager.

  “This is your baby, Peyton, make sure it thrives. You too, Alex.”

  Peyton and Alex renamed what had first been the Wolf Family Vintners Tasting Room, and then the Westside Collaborative Tasting Room, to Stave, for the thin, narrow, shaped pieces of wood that form the sides of a cask or barrel. An average barrel had thirty-one staves, the same number of wineries in the collaborative.

  Between Alex and Peyton’s efforts the westside wineries’ sales far outpaced those of the other sub-regions.

  One of the first wine dinners held at the new Stave location featured wines made by Maddox Butler from Butler Ranch Winery. Peyton met Kade the night of the dinner, when he came as Maddox’s guest. From that night on, he made a point of visiting Stave whenever he was home on leave, and soon he and Peyton became friends.

  Kade asked her more questions than he answered, although Peyton didn’t ask very many. She knew he served in the military, in special operations, but no other details. He was often gone for weeks at a time, and then home for several weeks. It wasn’t long before she started paying enough attention that she knew when he was leaving, and when he expected to be back.

  After a particularly long Friday night, when a group of tourists decided to hang out far past closing time, Peyton got an email from Kade. He told her he’d be gone two weeks longer than he’d originally anticipated, but hoped to see her the night he got home. She responded by jokingly asking if he was suggesting they go out on a date. A few minutes later, another email arrived from him saying that yes, he was. Peyton panicked, and didn’t respond. With two young boys, and a heart that still hadn’t mended from her divorce,
she hadn’t given dating any thought, and didn’t plan to.

  The next time Peyton saw Kade, she wasn’t sure what to expect, but when he came into Stave his first night back in town, their conversation felt the same as those they’d had before the awkward emails.

  The night he told her he was flying out again, Peyton told him she’d miss him.

  “How much?” he asked.

  “A lot,” she confessed.

  “Then go out with me when I get back.”

  “Yoo-hoo, Peyton.” Alex nudged her.

  “Sorry, uh…” She caught the look that passed between Alex and Peter. “I think we should start with something lighter.”

  “Uh-huh.” Alex smirked. Peter looked lost, but offered to serve his signature oak-grilled artichoke instead.

  “Perfect. Then we’ll start with the Falanghina.”

  Alex came back into the tasting room after walking Peter out to his car.

  “I thought you were leaving too.” Monday was Alex’s day off. She only came in if there was a wine dinner scheduled, or they had pairings to put together.

  “I asked him to come back next week, for another planning session.”

  “Alex! Why? We’re fine. He doesn’t need to trek all the way back up here. We can finalize the wine pairings without him.”

  Alex stood with her arms crossed in front of her, as she had earlier.

  “Oh, wait. You want him to come back so you can hang out. I get it.”

  Alex shook her head. “Nope.”

  “Then why?”

  “Because, Peyton. It’s time.”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  There were so many reasons Peyton didn’t know where to begin. Her boys were at the top of her list. It had taken months before she was comfortable enough to invite Kade to spend time with them. They weren’t any more ready for her to bring another man into their family mix than she was.

  Jamison was three, and Finn had just turned one when Lang Becker told her that having kids really wasn’t his “thing,” after all, and he was leaving her for another woman who didn’t have any. He dropped out of their sons’ lives then, and never dropped back in.

  And Kade, well, their relationship had been complicated, and now that he was gone, she didn’t have it in her to try again only to have another man leave her and her boys behind.

  Plus, Peter lived in Santa Barbara, a two-hour drive if there wasn’t any traffic, and there usually was. They’d rarely see each other. Why bother starting something that had nowhere to go? She had two other guys in her life whose company she enjoyed immensely, and she didn’t have enough time with Jamison and Finn as it was.

  “I told you before I wasn’t interested.”

  “Peyton, come on.”

  “No, Alex. If there ever comes a time that I’m ready to jump back into dating, you’ll be the first to know. Until then, the subject is closed.”

  Alex groaned, but appeared to give up her argument. “At least we’ll get another meal out of him.”

  “Peter Wells is a phenomenal chef, I’ll concede that much.”

  Peyton finished cleaning up the tasting room, while Alex focused on the kitchen. All the while she couldn’t get Brodie Butler, not Kade, off her mind.

  Brodie pulled up to the ranch gates and waited while they creaked open. His father had them programmed to close each night at sundown, and not open again until sunrise. Their phones were programmed to open and close the gates as well. Sometimes he thought his father missed his calling. The guy was as tech-savvy as anyone Brodie had known when he worked just north of Silicon Valley.

  He parked his truck in front of the ranch house where he, his three brothers, and two sisters grew up. The house had been built by his grandfather, Broderick Butler. Broderick emigrated from Scotland in his early twenties, and settled on the Central Coast of California, where he found work as one of several hundred craftsman hired to construct Hearst Castle. There, Broderick met his wife, Brodie’s grandmother, Greer, a seamstress who also hailed from Scotland.

  The two scrimped and saved until they had enough money set aside to purchase the ranch land that was passed down to Broderick and Greer’s only son, Laird—Brodie’s father.

  The main house was built in the style of a historic Scottish Highland farmhouse with a dressed granite facade under a slate roof. The four front dormers were embellished with black shutters, which repeated on the windows of the main level. After inheriting the ranch from his parents, Laird added a porch which wrapped around all three sides of the u-shaped abode, so regardless of season, he and Sorcha could sit there in the sunlight. In the center of u-shape, sat a courtyard with a small pond, and an archway that led to a path to the original barn, which had been converted into part of the winery.

  Laird added two Scottish-style stone cottages, both two-storied replications of the main house. Like the original barn, many of the other outbuildings had been re-purposed for the winery. What had once been a hayloft was now an apartment with a barrel room below.

  When Brodie moved home after Kade died, instead of living in the apartment where Kade stayed when he was home on leave, he moved into one of the stone cottages with Naughton. Maddox lived in the other smaller cottage that sat closer to the winery operation.

  His sister Skye, who was two years younger than Brodie, lived in Paso Robles with her husband, and his youngest sibling, Ainsley, who was completing her doctorate at Stanford.

  There was usually a crowd for dinner at the ranch house, so his mother made enough food that if he and his brothers wanted to eat with them, there’d be plenty. Maddox sometimes invited winery staff to join them too.

  When Brodie climbed out of the truck, he saw his mother and father sitting on the front porch swing.

  “Is that my Brodie?” his mother asked in her thick Scottish accent. She met Laird Butler when he was traveling around Scotland right after he graduated from college. They met at the beginning of his trip, and were married three months later. Even in her late sixties, his mother was still a beauty, with fiery red hair, and deep blue eyes that he and all his siblings shared.

  “Yeah, it’s me, Ma.”

  “Did you find Peyton then?” she asked.

  Brodie didn’t want to tell her that he’d found Peyton, and she’d refused to take the box, but she’d know he was lying if he told her otherwise.

  “What’s this?” his father asked.

  “Nothing to worry about, Laird. Brodie was delivering something we found of hers.”

  Well, if his mother was going to lie to his father, maybe his lying to her wouldn’t be so bad after all.

  “Sorcha, you best not be meddling.”

  “Of course not.” His mother stood, “We’ll talk after dinner, Brodie.”

  Before he could follow her inside, his father motioned for him to have a seat. Brodie sat across from him at the small table where his mother and father often shared their afternoon tea.

  “Tell me what this is about, Brodie.”

  “Ma asked me to deliver some things to Peyton Wolf that belonged to her, and some other stuff from Kade.”

  “Ah. You were unsuccessful then.” His father pulled a tobacco pouch from his pocket, and filled his pipe.

  “How’d you know?”

  Rather than answer, his father nodded, and lit the pipe.

  “She wouldn’t take it.”

  “I see.”

  “I don’t want to tell Ma.”

  “Excuse yourself near the end of dinner. She won’t be bringing it up in front of me.”

  “Thanks, Da.” Brodie got a chill, and shivered.

  “Your ma made shepherd’s pie. It’ll warm ya.” His father set his pipe on the porch rail and motioned for Brodie to follow him inside.

  “I saw Peyton Wolf today,” Brodie told Naughton later when they were back at the house.

  Naughton nodded but didn’t answer.

  “She misses him.”

  “We all do, Brodie.”

  “Ho
w serious do you think she and Kade were?”

  “No idea.”

  It wasn’t unlike Naughton to be reticent. He always said he liked working in the vineyards because he preferred the solitude.

  “Didn’t you know her first husband?”

  “Yeah, Cal Poly grad.” Naughton shook his head. “Cheated on her before and during their marriage.”

  “That’s right, she went to Cal Poly too.”

  Naughton graduated from the university in San Luis Obispo with a degree in viticulture, the science of grape growing. Brodie followed his older brother Maddox to UC Davis, where they both majored in enology, the science of winemaking. Brodie went on to get a Wine Executive master’s, which combined enology and viticulture with business management.

  “She was an ag-biz major though, more like what you do. Lang was a vit major, but he never took it seriously. Not even sure how the guy graduated.”

  Brodie thought he heard Naughton say something under his breath, but he didn’t quite catch it. Sounded like his brother called Lang a dick.

  “He and Kade got into it pretty bad one night.”

  That surprised Brodie as much as it didn’t surprise him. Kade was a big guy with a nasty scar that ran across his left cheek. It made him look like a bad mother. When he wasn’t on a mission, he worked out two or three hours a day, and even when he was, that was how the guys killed their down time. Kade hated going out to bars because inevitably some drunk asshole would try to start a fight with him. Lang sounded like just the kind of douche that would’ve been in Kade’s face.

  “Older brother walked away from the physical stuff, but he didn’t hesitate to let Lang know exactly what he thought of him.”

  “What happened?”

  “He basically called him out as a loser and asshole for abandoning his kids, and for what he did to Peyton.”

  That was the thing about Kade—as intimidating as he was physically, it was his unexpected intellect that inflicted more damage than his fists would’ve. He was one smart son-of-a-bitch, and Brodie missed him so much, he ached. He could only imagine how Peyton must feel.