Page 18 of Brewing Up a Bad Boy

“No problem.”

Silence settled between them, but her mind was running with so many questions. “Tell me about the job thing.”

“It’s just me trying to figure out what I want to do,” he said around a bite of banana bread.

“You’re a Miller. Lancaster-Spencer is what you do,” she reminded him.

“George can carry on the legacy. I’m not sure it’s for me,” he said.

“What would you do?” Genuinely curious about him, she told herself it wasn’t just because this was Alistair. She did need to go into the meeting with his family armed with knowledge.

“Beer brewing, like I told you online.”

“Oh, I thought that was a hobby. What drew you to it?”

“Remember that six weeks I did in the tasting rooms? During the first few months of my leave, I went back to partying and the like. Then stuff happened. The next thing I know, I’m stuck at home—”

“Were you confined to your house?” she interjected.

“Ha. No. COVID. I was seeing a therapist virtually who made me write a list of things I liked. Anyhow, turns out brewing and tasting were things I enjoyed. I ordered a beer-making kit, which was rudimental, but I made my first batch. I was sort of hooked.”

She was curious what else had made his list, but it wasn’t really relevant to the meeting that she was going to have on Saturday morning. “And kombucha?”

“That’s Owen’s idea. He suggested trying it after we became friends on a Reddit thread when he found out my family was in tea. That’s when I asked to join the Tea Society... I was surprised you accepted me.”

Looking down at the table, she played with the crumbs on her napkin. It seemed churlish to say she hadn’t. But she wasn’t lying to him or herself this time. “It wasn’t me. By the time I saw the request, you were a member.”

“Would you have declined?”

Shrugging, she wasn’t entirely sure how to answer that. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

A shuttered look came over his face.

“I’m glad you’re a member,” she admitted. “You’ve added a lot to the conversation. There have been a few moments when I think you’re mansplaining...but I just roll my eyes and move on.”

Alistair looked at the Breitling Superocean watch on his wrist, willing time to speed up so he could make things right with Poppy instead of sitting here torturing himself about things that he couldn’t change. Their trip to Milan still lingered in his mind. He wouldn’t have brought up the trip where they got engaged, but he remembered how nervous a flyer she’d been.

She’d been almost hyperventilating while they stood in line for the security screening. Distracting her was the only thing he’d been able to think of.

But remembering how she truly believed she loved him when he’d gone down on one knee... There was no mistaking the expression on her face when she’d put the ring on her finger and thrown herself into his arms. He’d caught her and kissed her. Getting the response he anticipated had been just a checkmark in a box.

As soon as she’d called her parents to tell them the news, he’d texted his dad to let him know that she was going to be part of their family. Her parents had been cautious and suggested they have a long engagement, but Poppy hadn’t wanted to wait to start her life with him.

Those were the words she’d used:I don’t want to wait to start my life with you.

Not that he’d paid any attention to them until she left him. On drunken nights, he could forget the fuckups of his life. But when he first went sober for a thirty-day stint—which he did frequently now—they became harder to forget. Those words, her face, they haunted him.

He had said the right words for the wrong reasons. Told a woman he hadn’t really taken the time to get to know that he loved her. Then tried to mold her into the wife his family wanted him to have.

To give her credit, she’d tried, and he hadn’t helped at all. His anger at her failures hadn’t been fair. But he’d been feeling a lot of pressure at his new executive position, and that had mingled with the guilt of not being honest with Poppy.

He’d thought he loved her, but all those doubts he’d had about himself combined with his dishonesty about the tea recipe had been a toxic cocktail for him. Making all of his good intentions disappear, leaving only anger.

No excuse for him being a dick to her.

“When did I mansplain?”

“Never mind. I don’t want to argue about it,” she said.

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