Page 4 of Gabriel & Skye

I stared after the car in shock as she rolled away, the taillights slowly disappearing into the distance.

1

Gabriel

Present day

“You know Trinity is running around telling everyone she’s getting a puppy,” my little sister — and the youngest of the Bassett siblings — Georgia-Blue tells me, like it’s something I don’t know. She’s leaning in the doorway of my office in the distillery where our whole family works. Our parents just retired, though our dad, Robert — or Bob, as he’s often referred to — is still largely involved in the major discussions. So I’m now running the show, even though I’m only the second eldest son, along with my four siblings, Grayson, who is the eldest, then Brooklyn, and the twins: Beau and Georgia-Blue.

The puppy thing all happened when Trinity met her friend Emma’s new little fur ball, Gizmo. She hasn’t stopped talking about it since.

I guess a kid needs a dog. This is what I keep telling myself, and I’ve almost psyched myself up for it. “Yeah, and your encouragement isn’t helping matters,” I mutter.

“I already said I’d take the dog to puppy school with Trinity.” Georgia rolls her eyes. Knowing her, that promise would last five minutes and she’d be making excuses of why she couldn’t make it.

“Has she sent you in here?” I look up at my sister, amusement in my tone. It’s not exactly hard to tell she’s a Bassett. We all have dark hair and blue eyes. Even my baby girl has inherited the exact same features.

Georgia laughs. “Not scared of your own five-year-old, are you, Gabe?”

I give her a withering look. Nope. I just don’t like disappointing my little girl. I’ve tried not to spoil her over the years, after we were left in the lurch and Tiffany never came back.

I reached out to her multiple times, but she just didn’t want to know. It broke me in ways I’ve never fully recovered from. Here I was thinking my wife needed a break to get her shit together and figure stuff out. I never once dreamed I’d be a single dad, and she’d be filing for divorce and disowning us. She didn’t even want visiting rights.

It’s been tough going, and some days I wonder how I got through it. I was never prepared for what happened. It still shocks me to this day.

“You know she’s my princess,” I sigh. “So she will win, eventually.”

Georgia laughs. “It seems you and Gray are getting along better after the fire.”

There was a fire recently at Gray’s cabin and I helped him and his new girlfriend — and divorce lawyer — Hartley escape before the whole place lit up.

“I guess a family emergency will do that to you,” I say pointedly. “And he confessed he doesn’t want to take over the family business since Pop has retired. His focus is on that land of his, down at Coyote Run. Though that’s no big surprise.” Mom and Dad both gifted us all a portion of the family property attached to the distillery. Over two hundred acres have been in our family for generations. And for as long as I can remember, Gray has wanted to build his dream house there when he started a family. He just had to divorce that cheating whore he married in order to find a woman who truly deserved him. They were married for ten years. That shit hurts.

We may fight like cats and dogs, but I deeply respect my brother for sticking to his family values. He knows what’s important in life, and I relate to that more than he thinks.

“He told you that?” Georgia gasps, bug-eyed.

“Sure did.” I nod. “You know what that means, George?”

“That you and Gray finally called a truce?”

It’s true we’ve been on and off at each other’s throats for years. But we always make up in the end. After the fire, everything changed. It was a wakeup call for both of us.

“It means he's been deliberately tormenting me this whole time, making me believe he wanted to be CEO for no other reason than he can.”

She has the audacity to laugh. “I guess that’s what big brothers are for. I should know, I have four of them…”

“I bet everyone knew but me,” I mutter.

Georgia shakes her head. “I didn’t know. I assumed Gray would take over when Dad retired just because he’s the eldest. I know you have been holding the fort for years. Mom and Dad know that, too.”

I grunt. Gray lived in Nashville up until his divorce, coming back and forth when he could to help out.

“Don't give me that look. I know you love him deep down.”

That I do. But it’s been difficult over the years. I guess when I took his place when he left for Nashville, I thought the title of CEO would go to me once Dad handed over the reins. At a family gathering a few months back, Dad made out Gray and I would both be taking on the role. I hit the roof, immediately on the defensive, and acted like a total dick at the dinner party in front of our entire family, including our cousins Callan and Trudy, not to mention Uncle Jack and Aunt Patti. Mom and Dad thought it would be nice to share their retirement with the family, and welcome Celeste — Callan’s high school sweetheart — back to Stoney Creek. What a fucking disaster that was.

I guess I see red sometimes, and there’s no stopping me. I’m known as the bull in the family.

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