On the Rocks

by Kandi Steiner

  “It’ll break his heart,” I finished for him. “I know. He’ll be okay. He’s a Becker.”

  Jordan nodded, shoulders relaxing a little, as if that one fact was all the reassurance he needed that everything would be alright.

  “How’s the team looking?” I asked after a moment, taking the first swig from my beer.

  “Better than last year. The seniors are strong, and we have some good freshman blood rolling in, some sophomores who got tougher while on JV.” He shook his head. “But, still too early to tell how they’ll all work together. It’ll be a long summer of conditioning.”

  “And the parents?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Still assholes.”

  I chuckled, sipping from the can in my hand before letting it drape over the railing again. Jordan was the head coach of the Stratford High School football team and had been for four years now. He was the only man in the family who didn’t work at the distillery, who never had, who never wanted to. Part of me wished he were there with us, carrying on Dad’s legacy and helping solidify the Becker name in the Scooter Whiskey history book. But, I couldn’t blame him for not wanting to work in a dirty warehouse all day — and I couldn’t do anything but support him when I saw him on that field.

  Football was his everything.

  He’d played his entire life, and where my brothers and I took our aggression out on each other or enemies in the town or even strangers at a bar, he took his out on the field.

  And now, he was teaching other boys to do the same.

  He was one hell of a coach, and the parents knew it — whether they wanted to argue about who started and who rode the bench or not. And the single moms in Scooterton?

  Well, let’s just say they were more than happy with Jordan’s coaching.

  The married ones didn’t seem to mind much, either.

  “So, I heard you caused a bit of a scene at the distillery this week?”

  I cocked a brow. “You heard?”

  “Look, I try as hard as I can to ignore the football moms chattering behind me in the stands, but sometimes I swear they speak louder just so they can be sure I hear them.”

  “Like when they talk about how tight your ass looks?”

  “Or when they talk about you pushing your luck giving whiskey to a minor.”

  It was my turn to roll my eyes. “They have no proof.”

  “Do they need any? You know as well as I do that the people who run this town can find evidence for anything they want.”

  We both fell silent at that, each of us taking a swig of our beer as memories of our father filled the space between us. Crickets chirped to life, the sky taking on a purple glow.

  “It was the Barnett daughter,” I said, breaking the silence.

  “Mary Anne?”

  “Ruby Grace.”

  He balked. “She’s like sixteen, Noah.”

  “Nineteen,” I corrected, swallowing down another gulp of beer. “And she’s getting married. She was buying one of the single barrels as a wedding gift.”

  “Wonder who the lucky guy is.”

  “Some young buck in politics she met at UNC.”

  “Politics, huh?” Jordan’s gaze drifted somewhere beyond the horizon. “Guess he’ll fit right in, then.”

  I nodded, but my stomach tightened as I pictured Ruby Grace’s eyes — wide and taken aback when I asked her if she was ready to get married. I still couldn’t believe I was the first to ask her.

  I still didn’t believe she knew the answer herself.

  It made no sense, that I harbored some kind of sympathy for a girl who had looked at me like I was the mud staining her designer shoes. She and her family had never wanted for anything, and yet I felt sorry for her, because I knew without being around her for more than even three minutes that she wasn’t happy.

  She didn’t know who she was.

  Then again, did I at nineteen?

  A familiar tune sparked to life from inside the house, shaking me from my thoughts of Ruby Grace as a smile stretched on my face. I glanced at Jordan, who was smiling, too, and he looked back into the house as a long exhale left his chest.

  “I used to think she’d remarry, find someone else eventually. But, after the first full year of her playing this song every night, I knew I was wrong.”

  I followed his gaze, throat tightening at the sight of Mom and Logan dancing around the living room to Eric Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight.” It was the song she’d danced to the night she and Dad got married, and I’d watched them dance to it so many times in that living room that I’d lost count.

  But it was her son who held her now, swaying and smiling and acting like that song didn’t hurt a little for all of us. Logan exaggerated a dip with Mom in his arms before spinning her around the coffee table, and she laughed and laughed, her messy pony tail swinging with the motion.

  “I don’t think there ever could be anyone else,” I mused.

  Jordan nodded, each of us finishing off our beers, and I wondered what it felt like to love someone that much.

  I wondered if I’d ever know for sure.

  Ruby Grace

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  I crossed my arms, deadpan expression on my face as I glared at my best friend — though I was debating the title at the moment.

  The bonfire the Jensen twins had started was high and warm behind her, dozens of Stratford’s residents littering the space around it, as well as stretching into the barn and beyond. There were five kegs, an entire table dedicated to liquor bottles and mixers, and every single person held a red plastic cup that housed either beer or a mixed drink. Ages ranged from sixteen to fifty-five, though everyone seemed to have their own little sections of the Jensen property marked off for their clique. The last time I was here, I was with the high schoolers who liked to party in the barn next to the resident DJ. Now, I was somewhere in the in-between, not sure where to stand or where I fit in.

  The Black Hole was the main party spot in town, especially on Friday nights, and Annie had begged me to come with her since it was my first week back in town.

  And now, she was bailing.

  Annie cringed, forcing a smile through it as she gestured to her belly. “I know, I’m sorry. I really did want to come, but little man is rolling around so much tonight. I just want to go lie on the couch.”

  “I think that sounds pretty perfect,” her husband, Travis, said, wrapping his arm around her. He pulled her into him, kissing her temple as she melted into his side. When she looked up at him, they shared a longing look before he kissed her nose.

  And as cute as they were together, they weren’t cute enough to bail on me.

  “I didn’t even want to come here,” I reminded her, an almost whine in my voice. “You begged me, Annie. And now we’ve been here for an hour and you want to leave?”

  She apologized again, going on about how she’d make it up to me, she’d take me out for ice cream at my favorite little diner in town later this week, and she’d come over and help me and Mom with wedding planning, too. The longer she rambled, her little belly bouncing with her as she pleaded, the less I could hold my anger.

  My best friend was too cute for her own good.

  I sighed, running a hand back through my lightly curled hair — hair that had taken an hour to fix — before I conceded. “Fine. Let’s go.”

  Annie blanched. “Wait, I meant we would like to leave,” she said, gesturing between her and Travis. “As in, the two of us. You should stay. Have some drinks, catch up with people.”

  “Catch up with who, exactly?” I probed. “The girls I thought were my friends in high school before you and I both found out the hard way that they only hung out with us for our money? Or how about the boys who, even after graduating, are still boys, and are already tripping over themselves with the urge to ask me out… even though they know I’m engaged?”

  I glanced over at a group of guys I recognized from high school — some of them graduated, some of them seniors
now — and they all looked away simultaneously, sipping on their beers and pretending like they hadn’t been staring.

  Annie chuckled. “Okay. Fair point,” she said, but then her eyes flicked somewhere behind me. “Well, would you look at that. It’s your buddy from the distillery.”

  I turned, following her gaze over my shoulder, and immediately locked eyes with Noah Becker.

  He was standing with his younger brother, Logan, as they filled their cups from the keg. He smirked when I saw him, saying something to Logan before he started toward me, and I whipped back around, eyes wide.

  “He’s walking over here,” Annie whispered as Travis pulled to the side, saying goodbye to his buddies.

  “I noticed. Come on, let’s head out,” I murmured through clenched teeth, but before I could take even one step, Noah Becker was standing in the space in front of us.

  “Ruby Grace,” he mused, holding one of the red cups in his hands toward me.

  “Noah,” I nearly seethed. I didn’t take the cup he offered. “We were just leaving.”

  “We were just leaving,” Annie corrected, gesturing to her and Travis, who was a few yards away with his buddies now. “But, Ruby Grace, you were thinking of staying, weren’t you?”

  “No, I wasn’t.”

  Noah smirked, first at Annie, then at me. “I saw you were empty handed. Thought I’d be a gentleman and bring you another beer.”

  “That was so nice of you,” Annie said, practically melting in a cartoonish swoon.

  I glared at her.

  “I don’t drink beer,” I told Noah, my glare still on Annie.

  “Oh, I didn’t realize. Is it a man’s drink, too?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Honestly, yes. And it’s carby. I have a wedding dress to fit into.”

  Noah kept his gaze on me, but the corner of his mouth twitched a little at that comment. “Suit yourself,” he said on a shrug. Then, he lifted the cup he’d been offering me to his lips and drained it in three clean swallows before he stacked the other full one inside the now empty one.

  “Classy,” I mumbled.

  “Thanks. One of my many party tricks.”

  I waited for him to walk away, but he didn’t. He just stood there, one hand wrapped around that cup as his free one dipped inside the pocket of his faded blue jeans. I hated that I noticed the way they fit him, the way they hung off his hips, the edge of his brown belt just barely visible under the navy blue t-shirt he wore. It had a logo on it that I wasn’t familiar with, but combined with the low orange light of the fire, that shirt set off the cobalt in his blue-gray eyes in a mesmerizing way. His thick biceps strained against the fabric of the sleeves, and when I glanced at his face again, I realized he was checking me out, too.

  His gaze was fixed on my legs.

  I cleared my throat, crossing my arms over my chest as I shifted my weight. “Aren’t you a little old to be here?”

  “Aren’t you a little young?” he countered, taking a sip of his beer as his eyes scanned the scene behind me like he was suddenly bored.

  I scowled. “Look, if you came over here to berate me, feel free to leave.”

  At that, his eyes snapped back to me. He pinned me with that gaze, like I was a child or his next target — which one, I couldn’t be sure.

  “I came over here to bring you a beer,” he reminded me. “I was trying to be a gentleman, and I was going to apologize for upsetting you earlier this week at the distillery. But now, I’m not sure why I bothered.”

  Noah shook his head, his shoulder brushing mine a bit as he walked past me with my mouth hanging open like a fish. I blinked several times, digesting what he’d said before my cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

  Annie cringed. “I don’t think he’s being a creep, Ruby Grace,” she said as Noah walked away. “It seemed like he was trying to apologize. Maybe you should let him.”

  I closed my eyes, letting out a long exhale before I turned, jogging after him. “Wait!”

  He paused where he was, turning as I caught up to him. I swallowed when our eyes met again.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, running my hands back through my hair before I let them hit my exposed thighs with a slap. “I didn’t mean to be so rude. It’s just…” My voice faded, and I had a laundry list of excuses I wanted to spew — about the stress of the wedding, the fact that my best friend had toted me to a party I didn’t even want to go to and then wanted to leave an hour in — but, I knew Noah Becker didn’t want to hear my problems, so I stopped there. “It’s just been a hell of a week.”

  Noah nodded, waiting.

  “Anyway,” I continued. “Thank you for the beer, even though I didn’t take it. And for apologizing for the distillery.” I paused again. “I guess I should probably apologize for that day, too.”

  Noah tilted his head a little, his eyes curious. “So, are you going to?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Can’t you just not be a brat?”

  He chuckled at that, sipping from his cup. “I don’t think anyone has ever called me a brat, outside of my mom.”

  “Mom’s always right.”

  “Touché,” he said, tapping his cup with one of the fingers that held it before he nodded over his shoulder. “Come on. Let’s ditch this place for a while.”

  My eyes widened. “What?”

  “You don’t want to be here,” he reminded me. “And honestly, I’m bored out of my mind. There are some stables down by the creek. Let’s go for a midnight ride.”

  “We can’t just ride someone else’s horses.”

  “One of them is mine.”

  That shut me up.

  I shifted, tucking my hair behind my ears as I looked around us. People were already watching, whispering, wondering what in the world Ruby Grace Barnett was doing talking to a Becker boy.

  “We can’t leave together,” I said, lowering my voice as I folded my arms back over my chest. “People will see.”

  Noah furrowed his brows like he didn’t understand it, but when he followed my gaze, noticing the group of girls around my age with their eyes on us, he nodded in understanding.

  “Ah,” he said, sliding his free hand back into his pocket as he took another drink of his beer. “I see. You still give a fuck what other people think of you.”

  “No,” I said quickly, too quickly, blowing my faint attempt at nonchalance.

  Yeah. Clearly he’ll believe that.

  The truth was I did care — more than I wanted to admit. Our town loved to talk, and the last thing I wanted was to be the subject of anyone’s gossip.

  “No, that’s not it,” I said again, voice more steady, though it was still a lie.

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “It’s not,” I argued again, like a child. “I don’t care what anyone in this town thinks of me.”

  “Okay. Prove it, then,” he said, draining what was left of his beer before he tossed the cups in one of the trash cans nearby. He didn’t look over his shoulder to see if I was following him, just started off in the direction of the stables in the distance.

  I bit my lip, looking back where Annie and Travis were — were being the big key word. They were gone, and when my phone pinged, I looked down to a text from her.

  We’re heading out. Seriously, stay and have fun. Don’t let the old married couple drag down your night. Call me if you need a ride later. Love you!

  I groaned, sliding my phone back in my pocket as I glanced back at Noah. He was already on the other side of the bonfire.

  “Prove it,” I mocked, crossing my arms. “Whatever. I’m not a kid, I don’t need to prove anything to him.”

  But even as the words rolled off my tongue, I knew they didn’t reflect what I actually felt. I wanted to prove him wrong, to prove to him and everyone watching and maybe even to myself that I could do whatever I wanted and it didn’t matter what anyone had to say about it.

  Plus… I hadn’t gone riding since before I left for college. I used to love riding. That would be way more fun than sitting ar
ound drinking with a bunch of people I didn’t really care about… right?

  I told myself that was the reason I went jogging after Noah, telling him to wait up. It wasn’t because I was being stubborn, or defiant, or because I wanted desperately to put my money where my mouth was and prove to Noah that he didn’t know everything about me like he thought he did. And it wasn’t because it was him, or because I wanted to be near him.

  It was because I wanted an excuse to ditch that party and ride horses.

  Noah chuckled when I caught up to him, my breath labored. He didn’t say a thing as we walked, and when the voices and music from the party were out of range, the familiar sound of the creek and the crickets chirping came to life, instead. I sighed, my breath steadying, tension seeping out of me like water through a leaky faucet.

  “Better?” he asked when the sound from the party was completely muted by the sounds of Tennessee, instead.

  I smiled, shoving him in lieu of admitting he was right. I blushed a little when my hand wrapped around his bicep before I pushed him away, because even that brief contact reminded me how stout he was, years of raising barrels building him into a specimen unlike any other.

  He smirked, bouncing back from my shove easily before his eyes trailed down my legs. “Now, let’s see if you can ride in those boots.”

  Noah

  I didn’t know what made me do it.

  I didn’t know what made me fill a second cup up with beer after my own was full and walk it across the Black Hole to Ruby Grace Barnett. Part of me really did want to apologize for whatever I’d said that had upset her after the tasting at the distillery, but part of me also just wanted to talk to her — period. I didn’t have a reason, so I’d brought that beer, thinking it’d be an ice breaker.

  For a less stubborn woman, it might have been.

  But, whatever the reason, I was glad I’d gone over to talk to her, because regardless of her being feisty and acting like she didn’t want to give me more than two minutes of her time, she’d let that same part of her slip that she had at the distillery — the young girl inside. She’d let her guard down, confessed her anxiety over being back home, over being at the Black Hole. I didn’t know the complete reason why, but she’d needed someone in that moment.