Page 40 of Saison for Love

“I’m guessing he won’t be pleased.”

“I’m guessing you’re right.” He gave another stir to the brew kettle, checking his timer. “Want to help me lauter after I add the spices?”

Bec grimaced. Lautering involved siphoning off the liquid and then cooling it. It was a pain in the ass. But she shrugged. “Sure. You’ve helped me enough times.”

He’d been doing pretty much all the scut work she’d needed done over the last few months. He hadn’t resented it at the time, but he had to admit, he was a little tired of doing it. “If this works out, maybe we can add it to the production for next spring.”

Bec frowned slightly. “Maybe. We’ll see where we are when spring rolls around.”

He gave the brew kettle another hard stir. The real question was where he’d be himself come spring. And if he’d have any say in what happened to Antero Brewing after he left for Utah.

…

Black Mountain Tavern seemed unnaturally still when he came to work at four that afternoon. It wasn’t usually lively at that time of day, but the whole place was sort of hushed, as if people were moving on tiptoe. Even the customers were more subdued than usual. They sat in the booths, leaning close together so that their conversations weren’t overheard.

He motioned one of the waitresses, Nora, to the side of the bar. “What’s going on?”

She shrugged. “Not much. Sort of quiet.”

“Has Stanton been in?”

She nodded. “Earlier this afternoon. I wasn’t here, but Joy said he was mad.”

Uh-oh. “Mad at who?”

“Pretty much everybody. You know how he is. He was yelling at the top of his lungs.”

Liam knew exactly how Stanton was—famous for blowing up at anything that didn’t go exactly his way. He was guessing the news about Peaches wasn’t making him a happy camper. “Is Peaches in the kitchen?”

“Somebody’s back there cooking. If it isn’t Peaches, who would it be?”

“Good question.” He poured a couple of drafts for one of the other waitresses, then headed back to the swinging kitchen door, pausing to listen for anything unusual, such as Stanton bellowing like a wounded rhinoceros. Then again, a bellowing Stanton wasn’t all that unusual.

He stepped into the cramped Black Mountain kitchen a little warily.

Peaches stood across from him, chopping up a pile of lettuce. Her face was slightly flushed, but the hand wielding the chef’s knife was steady.

Fortunately.

“Hey,” he said.

Peaches glanced back at him with a half smile, then went back to chopping. “Hey yourself.”

“I heard Stanton flew off the handle when you told him you were leaving.”

“He threw a fit. Lots of yelling. Fortunately I told him in his office, so when he tossed stuff on the floor, it was mostly paper. If we’d been in here, I might not have been able to fix dinner when he got through.”

“Any problems beyond the noise?”

She shrugged again. “He fired me. Told me to get out of his place. I told him I’d leave after dinner tonight. No way I’m going to make Misty and the other girls suffer just because he can’t control his temper.”

This struck Liam as going above and beyond the cause of fairness, but it was typical of Peaches’s code of ethics. “That’s nice of you. Have you told Ruth yet?”

“I don’t want to make her take me on now if she isn’t ready for me yet. Maybe I’ll talk to her tomorrow.”

Liam was pretty sure Ruth wouldn’t have any problems with taking Peaches on early. If anything, she’d probably have been glad to put Peaches to work today, but she was right about the waitresses and their tips. “Who’s going to cook here now? Any idea?”

“Mr. Stanton said he was going to go out and hire somebody this afternoon.”

That sounded like Stanton was going to grab somebody off the street. Given the way he’d cut back on spending at the tavern, whoever he brought in wouldn’t have the best of ingredients to work with. Peaches had been spinning gold out of straw for weeks now, but Liam doubted most cooks had the knack. The future suddenly looked rockier.

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