Page 70 of Golden Hour

“The best. She’s been working so much that it was good to get away.” Dan studies the phone and sighs before putting it away. “Did everyone hold down the fort?”

Reid nods to me and takes over.

“We had an idea while you were gone, Dan, and we’re working on it. As you know we have an employee who doesn’t drink…”

“Shiloh Abbott. Lovely girl. Does anyone know if she’s single? My lawyer needs to meet someone, ASAP.”

“She’s single.” I cough afterwards, my throat scratchy. My entire family glares at me. “Anyway, we came up with an idea for our sober folks who come in. Shiloh loves root beer, so we’ve been considering adding one to the menu. We can roll out some of our lower-performing beers to free up the funds…”

“Say less, I love that idea. Have you come up with a recipe?”

I look at Reid, and he nods. “We’re working on it. We’ve made a couple batches. It’s still a work in progress.”

“Great, I love it. Let’s do it,” Dan says, smiling. He looks at me, and his smile drops. “Your face got three shades of red when I mentioned Shiloh. What’s going on with that?”

My family leans in.

“Nothing,” I say.

“Thumper saw you out at the lake with her on New Year’s Eve. Him and Izzie snuck out there,” Cameron says. Thumper is Cameron’s best friend. He started dating his girlfriend, Izzie, a few months after they got stuck in a bank vault together when an ex of Thumper’s robbed the bank wearing a chicken costume.

My family’s chests are practically flat to the table to listen. Man, that beer looks delicious. I squirm in my seat.

“Are you interested in Shiloh? My lawyer saw her and was interested in asking her out. She was nice to him for five seconds.”

“Um,” I say, “I’ll ask her. We’re doing inventory tonight.”

“Great. You let me know, then.” Dan looks down at my beer. “Are you taking medication or something? Usually you’re on your second one by now.”

“I’m not drinking for the month of January,” I say. The crowd whips back, their backs board straight, flabbergasted. I don’t think they’ve seen me sober for a single meeting since I came home to help with the brewery’s finances.

“Good for you,” Emily says. “Truly.”

“That’s great, Jackson,” my mom says, her voice quivering with emotion.

Cameron moves the beer to Reid. “Here. You need it.”

Whitney broke up with Reid at Christmas. He’s been moping around the brewery ever since. Reid takes a big gulp and winces. The Prospector is extremely hoppy, even for us, and you can’t drink it quickly unless you want to crawl out of your skin.

We discuss a few more business matters, and I provide Dan with December’s numbers. He nods and looks at them, but mostly he drinks and eats salami.

“If there’s nothing else, I need to get going. I have my personal trainer in an hour, and if I show up intoxicated, he’ll make me do burpees until I throw up.” He stands and shakes everyone’s hand.

When he gets to me, he pulls me in. I’m almost a foot taller than him, but I’m generally intimidated by him.

“Talk to Shiloh.”

I’m not sure what this means.

Thinking about Dan’s lawyer dating Shiloh gnaws my stomach. I’ve met him once, and while he’s a nice guy, he’s not right for her. He doesn’t know what she likes or what gets her going. He hasn’t heard stories about Rory and doesn’t know what her childhood was like. He doesn’t know how her laugh gets higher the funnier she thinks something is. That she’s obsessed with Mandy Moore and chicken pesto sandwiches.

How she feels in my arms.

“You’ll be okay, just the two of you, with inventory?” my dad asks. The rest of my family studies me.

“Absolutely. I don’t think it will take too long.” My dad is closing the brewery early tonight; usually Wednesdays are the deadest days of the week. When we discussed who in the family was going to do it, most of them came up with excuses. Cameron had an ultrasound with Annie, Emily had to pack orders for her jewelry business, Reid mumbled something and my parents dismissed him because he’s sad.

Cameron nudges me on the way back to our offices. “There are no cameras.”

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