Was she meant to do the whacking?
Maybe that was why they’d been brought together, and the signs of romance were intended for someone else close to her, like Doris.
“You’re the woman Luke mentioned,” he said bluntly, his voice deep but soft, like the rolling mountains around them. “The one who needs a job.”
Something about the way he said it irritated her. She hadn’t come to Luke begging for a position, nor had desperation brought her to his door. Not that there was anything wrong with desperation. She’d felt it before, and it wasn’t an emotion to be scoffed at. “I am Dottie Hendrickson. I might be interested in taking a job here, but I won’t know until I try your beer. I consider it my sacred duty to never sell anything I don’t believe in.”
Beau didn’t reply for a moment, just studied her.
“I told you she was something else, didn’t I?” Luke said, clearly pleased with himself. “She’s exactly who you need for your tastings.”
“Maybe,” Beau said, still not budging from the doorway. Dottie didn’t move either, and she didn’t look away. If he wanted to intimidate her, he’d need to do a better job of trying.
He smirked a little then, as if hearing her thought, and even that hint of a smile transformed his face into something more than handsome. Radiant was the word that came to mind.
Interesting, she thought, and stepped in past him.
Dust-packaging factory indeed. There was a front desk, currently unoccupied, and a somewhat sagging sofa to the left of the door. Behind the desk, the warehouse was full of large kettles and other equipment she didn’t recognize. On one side, it looked like they had a bottling and canning setup. Everything appeared clean, but not much else could be said for it. It did not appear to be a joyful place to work.
“You intend to hold tastings here?” she asked doubtfully. There was a wooden table surrounded by six chairs on the side of the door that did not boast the old couch, but the atmosphere was beyond lacking.
His only answer was a grunt.
She could hear her mother telling her, It’s not just about fixing good food, Dot. It’s about creating something memorable.
Food was tangled up with emotions, and she had a feeling beer was the same way. Or at least it should be. A plate of mac and cheese, with pulled pork and greens, was pure comfort. Surely there was a beer like that, one that brought out the same emotion or heightened it. But what emotion would anyone feel in this place besides the steady press of get out?
“Is this where I’d be working?” she pressed.
“Do you have a problem with it?” Beau asked, letting plenty of temper leak into his voice.
“As it happens, I do,” she said as she turned back to look at him. “Who’s going to be at these tastings? Buyers? Or are you holding them for customers?”
“Definitely some buyers, although we’ll likely need to go to bars too. As for the customers? Undecided.”
“Either way, you’re wanting them to come back, aren’t you? You’re wanting them to buy your beer.”
He just glowered at her.
“Then this simply won’t do. No one’s going to relax in here.” She waved an arm around the room, indicating the complete lack of decoration, of definition. “It says nothing about who you are, about why they should care.”
“We make and sell beer,” Beau said. “All they should care about is that it’s good.”
“Well, now we’re getting down to brass tacks,” Luke said happily, patting Beau on the back. “Let’s go lift a glass, shall we?”
His interjection came as a surprise. For a moment, Dottie had forgotten he was there, although she couldn’t say why. Luke was a big man, not easily overlooked.
From the flash of surprise on Beau’s face, she wasn’t alone in that.
He grunted, then nodded, leading them toward the table. As Luke and Dottie took their seats at one end, he walked off into the back without another word.
“This is going well,” Luke said, rubbing his hands together.
“Is it?” Dottie asked in genuine curiosity. Had Luke brought other prospective employees by? If so, how had those encounters gone in comparison?
“You have a way with people, Dottie,” Luke said with a smile. “He’s good at the business side of things but not so much the people side. Not anymore. It wasn’t just losing his wife, he—”
But Dottie didn’t get to see how much of Beau’s life story Luke would spill if left unchaperoned for too long, because his pocket started buzzing.
“What’s that?” she asked, her brow crinkling.
He pulled out a pager. “I still use one of these,” he muttered. “Got a cellular phone and dropped it in the toilet the next day.” He glanced down, and his face instantly went white beneath his tan. “It’s Leda. I forgot I was supposed to pose for her tonight.” He glanced toward the back as Beau reappeared, holding a small stack of glasses in one hand and a mismatched six-pack in the other. A couple were professionally labeled and the rest had handwriting on the stickers.
“I need to go, Dottie,” Luke said. “Maybe we can arrange this for another night? Or I can drop you off at your car, and you can come back?”
“I’m not waiting here half the night,” Beau blustered. He shifted his gaze to Dottie as he set down the six-pack and the glasses. “I’ll give you a ride back to your car after we finish.”
Something about the way he said it—after we finish—got under her skin in a way that told her it had been too long since she’d experienced any kind of pleasure with a man, or even in the sanctuary of her own bedroom. Many people thought a woman stopped caring about such things after she turned forty, let alone sixty, but those people were imbeciles.
“All right,” she said. “Since we’re here.”
Luke wasted no time leaving. He gave her a quick one-armed hug, clapped Beau on the back, and then stepped away from the table, breaking into a little run as he made his way to the door.
It shut behind him with some manner of finality, leaving Dottie and Beau at the table. He sat down in the chair Luke had vacated and nodded to the door.
“The mark of a man who isn’t in control of his own life.”
“Now, there’s nothing wrong with a man who wants to please his woman.”
He grunted, and she detected the slightest flush on his cheeks. “Let’s get started,” he said, pushing one of the tasting glasses across the table to her. Then he opened a bottle and poured a small splash for each of them.
“Beau Brown,” he said. “That’s our most popular one.”
Dottie took her time, sniffing the beer and then swishing it around the glass like she always did with wine.
A quick glance at Beau showed her that smirk was back, the one that made him more appealing.
“Don’t you know how to drink?” he asked.
“Don’t you?” she said pointedly, gesturing to his empty glass. “I don’t drink alone, and we’re not going to have nearly enough that driving will be an issue.”
He inclined his head, as if to concede her point, and poured himself a matching splash.
They both took a sip. Dottie hadn’t quite known what to expect. Her old Beau, the one who’d been her husband, had enjoyed beer, and she’d tried one of his brown ales once. The bitterness had nearly crossed her eyes. But this…this was more of an amber in color, and the flavor was mellow and almost sweet, like caramel, with only a small bite of bitterness to round out the flavor.
“It’s good,” she said.
“Don’t sound so surprised.” But he said it with amusement, not annoyance, and she could tell he was pleased. “So you wouldn’t be ashamed to sell it?”
“No, nor to serve it in my home.”
“It’s our most popular one, like I said,” he told her, lifting the bridge of his glasses with one long, tapered finger. “But it’s not as big as it can be. We’re not as big as we can be.”
“From what I’ve heard, there’s not much craft beer in town. Just you and a coup
le of others.”
“It’s going to be the next big thing, Dottie. Just you wait.”
“Do you think the town’s growth is going to explode, like Luke says?”
Something glimmered in his eyes. “I’m counting on it. The same thing’s going to happen to the beer scene, and we’ll be toward the front of the line. I’m going to do for beer what I did for soda.”
Dottie sputtered a laugh. “Now, you’re saying you invented soda? There’s nothing wrong with your confidence.”
“I never said there was.” He gave them each a clean tasting cup, then opened another bottle. Each of them got a small pour. “I didn’t invent it, but I’d like to think I refined it. Ever heard of Candy Apple Soda?”
“That’s you?” she asked, lifting her brows. It was a popular brand of craft soda, and for a reason—it was damn good. The strawberry rhubarb flavor made her feel like she was eating a slice of her mother’s pie, and her mama had been gone going on fifteen years.
“It was me. I sold it to a distributor to launch the brewery.”
She made a face. “That’s a shame. Those big companies are like sharks, eating up all the little fish.”
Amusement creased his brow. “Well, this little fish made a damn good profit.”
She couldn’t help but wonder where it had all gone. The brewery might be successful at distributing its beer, but the premises looked bare bones, like no more money had been spent on it than was needed. But it wouldn’t do to say that, at least not yet, so she settled for asking, “And your employees?”
He laughed and waved a hand at the empty brewery. “Who all do you think works here?” He nodded to the tasting cups. “This one’s my take on the strawberry rhubarb soda. We call it Serenity Ale.”
Again, it was like he’d read her thoughts, and she lifted the tasting glass for a sip. Her eyebrows popped up to her hairline as the taste washed through her. The other had been good, but this one was pure pleasure.
She studied him for a moment, surprised. “I wouldn’t think a man like you would make a beer like this.”
Another smile, the most genuine yet. “And what kind of man am I?”
“I don’t know, Beau Buchanan, but I’m starting to think I’ll enjoy finding out.”
Chapter Three
Dottie and Beau had tasted their way through small splashes of the other beers, most good, a couple not to her taste, discussing the various tasting notes, as they would do during tastings for clients.
She got another couple of smiles, especially when she described one of the beers, an experiment that wasn’t yet on the line, as sunshine in a cup.
“Do you always describe the things you eat or drink so colorfully?”
“Oh yes,” she said. “There’s little point in eating or drinking anything if it doesn’t make you feel.”
“One might think mere survival would be enough of a compulsion.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.”
Rather than fight her on it, he nodded as if thinking. They’d made it through the samples, so he stacked the empty glasses and fitted the tops back on the bottles.
“Would you like to take these home? Won’t be good for too long.”
“I’d be delighted. Thank you.” She could invite Doris to lift a glass with her on her porch.
He situated them in the cardboard sleeve and handed it to her.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Does this mean I have the job?”
He studied her for a moment, as if deciding on the spot. “Yes, I think you’ll do nicely if you can keep some of your opinions to yourself.”
“I can’t promise you that. I take great delight in sharing my opinions.”
He laughed a little, eyes sparkling. “Yes, I can see that you do.”
They spent a moment discussing the terms—he’d pay her by tasting, and the first would be on Monday—then they left the warehouse, which Beau locked, and made their way to his car.
They drove silently for a while, Dottie taking in the stars through the windshield.
They shone brightly tonight, and it jarred her slightly when Beau asked, “Are you married?”
Head whipping around to look at him, she saw a slight flush in his cheeks again. Delightful, that flush. It broke through his bluster like a hot knife through butter.
“No, I won’t make that mistake again. Newly divorced.”
He nodded tightly.
“Luke tells me you lost your wife. I was sorry to hear it.”
“Cancer. It was a long time ago,” he said, but the grief in his voice was heavy enough to fill the car.
“There’s no strict timeline for grief, I’ve found. My sister passed away years ago, but I still can’t talk about her without feeling the sharp bite of lemon bars.”
A huff of laughter from beside her. “There you go with the food again.”
“Do you have any children?”
She was glancing at him still, so she saw all the humor strip from his face.
“One son,” he said. “And he has four children. Three that he recognizes. One that he doesn’t.”
Interesting. She supposed the fourth child was illegitimate. What a funny word to use for a person. Although she didn’t know any of the people involved, she felt a pang of sympathy for the unrecognized child. There was a terror to being unwanted, one that had moved even her. Wasn’t it part of the reason she’d married Old Beau?
“And your relationship isn’t good,” she said, shooting him another look. It wasn’t a question.
“It’s not,” he confirmed, leaving it at that.
But Dottie wasn’t good at leaving wounds unpoked. The only way to achieve any measure of healing was to talk things through, to explore the hurt and learn from it. “I’m sorry for that. I was never blessed with children, but I have a niece like that. I love the girl, but there’s something missing in her. And she has a little boy, the dear soul, who gets dragged along while she tries to find it. That boy is everything to me.”
The craggy planes of Beau’s face softened, and she saw a glimmer of the man he’d been—the man he could be—if the troubles that preyed on him were lifted. “I feel that way about my grandchildren, but my son doesn’t let me see them often.”
“All we can do is give them our love,” she said, watching as he pulled into the lot where she’d parked her car, “and pray that it’s enough.”
He turned in his seat after he parked, studying her like she was a mystery he’d like to solve. Finally, he said, “Luke was right, Dottie. There’s something special about you.”
All compliments deserved to be acknowledged, so she said, “Thank you.” Then, thinking quickly, she said, “I’m having a small get-together at my house tomorrow evening, a celebration of my new home. I’d like it if you came.”
Surprise flickered in his eyes, and she could tell his impulse was to say no, to deny her. It surprised her how much she wanted him to fight it.
“Luke and Leda will be there too,” she said, hoping that might sway him.
He shook his head ruefully. “I can’t abide that woman.”
“And why not? Is your objection that she’s an artist? Because if so, you’re not going to take to me either.”
“You’re an artist.” He gave her one of those searching looks again. “I can’t say I’m surprised. I’d like to see your work.”
Another shudder passed through her, reminding her of how long it had been since she’d been with a man, and even longer since she’d enjoyed it.
“No, that’s not why I object to Leda. She’s controlling. You saw the way he ran out of the brewery. He’s afraid of her.”
She thought back to her own interactions with the two, deciding his assessment wasn’t totally unfair. Yet it seemed like Luke enjoyed being kept on his toes, and surely it was between the two of them.
She said as much, and Beau shrugged. “I suppose you’re right.”
“About tomorrow?” she pressed.
“I…I’m not s
ure. Something’s going on with my son. It’s taken most of my attention lately.”
“But I thought you weren’t speaking?”
A pained look stole over his face. “Oh, we’re speaking. When he needs something.”
His boy really did sound like Kate. She’d go months without hearing from her niece, and then the girl would show up on her doorstep with her son, River, in tow. She might stay for days or weeks. Or leave River there for Dottie to watch.
Perhaps she shouldn’t admit it, even to herself, but those peaceful times alone with River were what she preferred. Of course, they hadn’t been totally alone in the past—Old Beau had been there too—but it had always felt like it was just the two of them. And if that didn’t speak volumes, she wasn’t sure what did.
She nodded. “I’m familiar with that game. I wish you luck with it.” She retrieved a piece of paper from her purse and scrawled down her address and the time, as well as her phone number, before passing it to him. “If you can. I would like to see you there. Bring some of your beers, and perhaps we can even run a practice tasting with my guests.”
Something flashed in his eyes, like maybe he was partial to the idea and the images it summoned, but he just said, “We’ll see. Goodnight, Dottie.”
Dottie was awoken by a hammering on her front door. A quick glance out the window proved it was still a ways from dawn. It took her a moment to recognize her surroundings, and before she got to moving, she let herself experience a moment of gratitude that she was here, in this place she’d chosen for herself, and not in a cold bed with a man who didn’t love her.
When she got to the front of the bungalow, not a long walk, truly, she wasn’t surprised by who she saw beyond the glass. Because she’d been talking about Kate and River, thinking about them, and everyone knew thoughts could summon things into being. Although Kate didn’t keep a cell phone, and she moved too frequently to be reached by any landlines, she and River wrote occasional postcards to Dottie, and Dottie wrote back. In her last missive, she’d broken the news of the divorce and given her this address.
All the Luck You Need (Asheville Brewing) Page 2
