by Ivy Layne
I leaned in and inhaled the scent rising from the steaming bowl. It smelled pretty good. Still, since he'd come home for Prentice's funeral, I'd learned that my younger brother Finn was a genius in the kitchen. So far, neither of the Heartstone Manor cooks had been able to meet his high expectations, a fact he didn't keep to himself. I wasn't surprised he'd been banned from the kitchen, more that Ms. Haverty had lasted this long before booting him out.
“Try the soup and saltines, Buttercup.” Griffen reached over to rub a soothing hand down Hope's back. “And after, maybe a nap?”
“Maybe,” Hope conceded. “Only if you tuck me in.”
I smiled to myself at Hope flirting with Griffen. I’d known her since I was a kid, when her uncle Edgar had taken her in. Edgar had worked closely with Prentice for years, and Hope had been his assistant after she graduated from college. Between the three of us, Hope knew the most about Sawyer Enterprises. She’d been invaluable in keeping the company thriving with Prentice dead and Ford in jail.
She’d always been quiet and shy. I don’t think I’d ever seen her flirt with any guy, much less Griffen. They’d been close as kids despite their six-year age difference, and it was common knowledge that she’d had a crush on Griffen forever, but she’d never dared to flirt with him.
It had been Hope who’d spilled the beans about Griffen and Vanessa’s planned elopement all those years ago, giving Prentice half of the lever he’d needed to force Griffen out of the company. And the family. She’d been wracked with guilt over the part she’d played, but once done, it couldn’t be undone.
If you'd asked me, in a million years I never would have thought Griffen would end up married to Hope. They’d been friends, but she'd barely been a teenager when he'd been exiled. Given what she’d done, I’d figured he hated her. Maybe he had, but he didn’t now.
Looking at them, you'd never guess he hadn't been in love with her most of his life. He was fiercely protective. Over the moon that she was having his child. If it weren't for all the bullshit going on—our father's murder, Ford in jail, someone trying to shoot Griffen—Griffen and Hope might still have been on their honeymoon.
As it was, the newlyweds were making the best of the situation. I watched as Griffen dipped a saltine in the soup, urging Hope to take it. Her face looked green as she nibbled. Griffen noticed me watching. “Sometimes a little food makes the nausea better.”
“And sometimes it doesn't?”
“And sometimes it doesn't,” Griffen admitted. “How are things at The Inn?” he asked, picking up a sandwich.
I pulled my chair closer to the desk and reached for my own plate. “Someone called our produce supplier and canceled all of our orders,” I told him, “and Vanessa stopped by to extort fifty grand out of me. Also, Ophelia and Bryce demanded an open tab at the bar and gift shop. So, all in all, not too unusual these days. But bookings are strong, and we've laid out the sites along the river for the new cottages. Foundations are already going in.”
“That's good news,” Griffen said. “If Vanessa comes back, let me know.”
“I will. No offer to help with Ophelia and Bryce?” I asked and took a generous bite of my sandwich.
Griffen laughed and shook his head. “Savannah has had her team putting in all their extra time on the guest wing. Soon you'll be free of those two, and they'll be my problem. Until then, you can deal with them.”
“Can't argue with that,” I agreed. I glanced at Hope and saw that the stack of saltines was halfway gone. She still looked a little green. “Before we jump into business, I have a question for Hope.”
Hope set down her spoon, tilting her head to the side, her eyes thoughtful as they rested on me. “Is it about Daisy?”
“It is. Are you going to claim girl-code and refuse to talk?”
Hope took another spoonful of soup before she answered. “I don't know yet. Why don't you ask, and I'll tell you if I'm going to answer?”
“Does she have a boyfriend?” I was pretty sure I knew the answer, but I wanted to hear it from Hope.
Hope nibbled on a saltine. “Why are you asking?”
“Because I asked her out, and she said no.”
“Maybe she just doesn't like you,” Griffen threw in.
“Maybe, but I think she does. I think she wanted to say yes.”
“Then why didn't she?” Griffen asked.
I looked to Hope. “Did she say no because of the boyfriend?”
Hope hesitated, then shook her head. “If you tell her I said this, I'll smother you in your sleep.” She glanced at Griffen. “Or I'll have Griffen do it for me. Understood?”
“Understood. I protect my sources. Now, spill.”
“First, tell me why you're asking. Why do you want to go out with her? I know your reputation, and I know the last time you had a serious girlfriend was pretty much never. I love Daisy. She's one of my closest friends in the world and I'm the first person to say she could use a date. But not with some guy who just wants to sleep with her and move on. You know what I mean? So, if that's you, start with the moving on and skip the sleeping with her part.”
Chapter Eleven
royal
I took another bite of my sandwich, chewing as I thought. I definitely wanted to sleep with Daisy. I wanted to get her naked, wanted to lick every inch of her smooth, soft skin, wanted to see her eyes light with desire. I needed to know what her face looked like as she crested into orgasm. Had to see her sated and sleepy after. I wanted all of that.
But not only that. Not only sex. I wanted to see her laugh. A lot. I wanted to talk to her. To be with her. Sex optional—for now.
And wasn't that a new one for me? I usually started with sex and hoped for a quick getaway. Not with Daisy.
“I can't make any promises,” I said carefully. “I don't know her well enough to do that. Not yet. But I know I want to know her better. I like her. I'm absolutely attracted to her, don't get me wrong. Very attracted. But it's not just physical. I'm attracted to her. You know what I mean?”
Hope nodded. “Then I'll tell you this. The boyfriend isn’t a boyfriend. Not like that. I can't explain why because it's not my story and it's not your business unless J.T. decides to share. They love each other, but it's not romantic.”
She looked up at the ceiling for a long moment and took a breath, letting it out in a puff of air. “I think it's habit more than anything at this point. And I think you're right. I think she does like you. Knowing Daisy, that probably scares the heck out of her.”
A weight lifted from my chest at the knowledge that the boyfriend wasn't really a boyfriend. I wasn't the kind of guy who poached on someone else's territory, but the idea of bowing out had burned.
I wanted Daisy. I couldn't stand the idea someone else had gotten there first, had claimed her before I even met her.
If the field was clear, it was time to make plans.
“Any advice?”
Hope shook her head slowly. “Don't give up. Don't push too hard, but don't give up.”
“Thanks, Hope.”
She smiled and took another spoonful of soup before setting the spoon down with a clink. She rose, a little unsteady on her feet. Griffen shot up beside her, reaching out to wind his arm around her waist, steadying her.
“I'm sorry. I'm okay. I'm not going to get sick,” she said for Griffen's benefit, “but I need to go lay down. I'm sorry. My list is on the desk.”
“I'll walk you up,” Griffen said, already steering her to the door.
“You don't need to do that, I can get myself upstairs.”
“Shut it, Buttercup.” Griffen looked over his shoulder at me. “I'll be back.”
“Take your time.”
When they were gone, I dug into the roast beef sandwich and soup, pulling Hope's list in front of me to get a jump on the afternoon's agenda.
For most of my life, Sawyer
Enterprises had been made up of the businesses in Sawyers Bend and various larger concerns, including a logging company, several quarries, furniture manufacturing, and commercial real estate all over the Southeast.
Over the years, Ford and Prentice had sold off the quarries and the logging along with the furniture manufacturing, choosing instead to invest in a diverse array of businesses across the country.
For the most part, Brax oversaw the company's real estate investments. Tenn and I handled The Inn at Sawyers Bend, Avery the brewery, Quinn her guide business. Prentice and Ford had focused on managing the company's assorted investments. With Prentice dead and Ford in jail, Griffen and Hope had spent the last six weeks getting up to speed. Now it was my turn. I couldn’t wait.
Sawyer Enterprises offered an array of continually shifting challenges. So did The Inn, and I loved it there, but this was on a bigger scope, going beyond the hospitality industry to everything from tech to emerging resources to manufacturing. It was fascinating, and I was grateful Griffen had so easily agreed to let me join him.
I was ready when Griffen came back.
“She okay?” I asked.
He sank into his chair looking a little green himself. “Her doctor swears this is completely normal. If that's true I have no fucking clue how women do it. You have any idea how many times she's puked today?”
I shook my head. I didn't know, and I didn't want to.
“Too many, man. Too fucking many.” Griffen sighed and picked up his sandwich. “Hopefully, she'll sleep most of the afternoon and wake up starving for dinner. Did you take a look at her list?”
“I did. Do you want me to cover The Inn business while you eat?” Griffen nodded and I picked up my own list.
Before I could get started, our younger sister Sterling strolled in, throwing herself into the chair beside me. “I figured you two would rate better than soup and sandwiches. I hate to agree with Finn, but the new chef sucks.”
“You're welcome to take on the job if you think you can do better,” Griffen said, the corner of his mouth curled up in a half-smile. I expected him to deliver a set-down, but Sterling and Griffen seemed to have reached a semi-affectionate truce.
The youngest of the Sawyers, Sterling had a raw deal from the start. By the time she started school, her mother was dead, Prentice’s final wife, Darcy, had also died, and Prentice decided he was done with parenting. Not that he’d done much of that in the first place.
Sterling was mostly left to run wild. Miss Martha had done her best, but she’d had a house to run and the rest of us to distract her. Sterling had no one. She'd made it through high school mostly because the boarding school where all the Sawyers went was too afraid of losing Prentice's generous donations to kick her out. She'd been thrown out of three colleges before she managed to graduate and had spent her time since then drinking and spiraling out of control.
Griffen had taken her in hand when he moved into Heartstone Manor, and since then, she'd been a lot better. I hadn't seen her drunk in over a month. That was saying a lot for Sterling.
I had a disorienting moment of déjà vu when she looked at me—her golden hair, blue eyes, and perfect bone structure so like our cousin Bryce’s—and said, “There isn't any money in my bank account.”
“That's unfortunate,” Griffen said mildly. “What are you going to do?”
Sterling stared at him, nonplussed. “I'm going to ask you to put money in it. Obviously.”
“You can ask all day, but it's not going to happen.” Griffen set down his pen, his eyes on her patient. Gentle.
“What do you mean it's not going to happen? Dad always gave me money.” She leaned forward, ready for a fight, her eyes flashing.
“I'm not Dad,” Griffen said, still calm, refusing to give her the argument she wanted. “You've had a free ride for long enough. You want money, get a job.”
“That seems to be the theme for the day,” I added. Sterling raised one perfectly arched eyebrow in my direction. “You're third in line today. Fourth if you separate Ophelia and Bryce into two people.”
“Who was number three?” Sterling asked, distracted by her curiosity.
“Your former sister-in-law.”
Sterling's eyebrows shot up. “That bitch had the nerve to ask you for money?”
“She did, right after Ophelia and Bryce hit me up. And I told all three of them the same thing Griffen just told you. You want money? Get a job.”
“Are you going to give me a job? Or do you expect me to go all over town putting in resumes?”
I glanced across the desk at Griffen, who raised an eyebrow at me in question. I shrugged in answer. “Do you want to work at The Inn? It is tradition. The rest of us all put in time at The Inn when we were growing up.”
“Are you going to stick me in housekeeping?” Sterling’s upper lip curled in a sneer that again reminded me of Bryce. While I hadn't had a shred of sympathy for our cousin, who'd grown up with every luxury including his mother's doting affection, I did have some sympathy for my baby sister.
“I don't know. If you don't want housekeeping, what do you think you'd be good at? I expect you to do whatever job you get, not just clock in and collect a paycheck. You understand that, right?”
“Duh. You're way too much of a hard-ass to make it that easy.” She slouched back in the chair and eyed me appraisingly. “I don't know what I'm good at. I've never really done anything.”
“What do you think you'd like?” I had something in mind, but I wanted to see what Sterling would say first.
“I don't know.” She stared up at the ceiling, thinking. “I don't think I want to wait tables. Or work the front desk. Are there any jobs in the office? I'm good at organizing things.”
Griffen and I stared at her in disbelief, both of us remembering the state of her bedroom when we’d moved back into the house. It had been filthy, so disgusting that Griffen had refused to let our own housekeeping staff touch it until Sterling cleaned it herself.
Sterling shrugged a shoulder and straightened in the chair. “Okay, fine, I get why you guys are giving me those looks, but it's true. I was always in charge of throwing parties at my sorority, which takes a lot of coordination, even if it doesn't look like it. I know word processing and spreadsheets. I'm not totally useless.”
“I didn't think you were,” I said, hoping my idea was a good one. “Our head of event coordination has an assistant, and that assistant is about to go on maternity leave. She may be back, she may not, but the person we hired to fill in for her just decided to take a different position. If you're interested, show up at The Inn tomorrow by 8:30. I'll introduce you to Marcy, and we’ll see how it goes. It doesn't pay a lot, and Marcy will work you hard, but I think you’ll like it, and her.”
Sterling sat frozen for a long minute. “Really? You’ll give me a job at The Inn?”
“I'll hire you on a trial basis. In the end, it will be up to Marcy.”
Sterling stood and nodded. “I'll kick ass in event coordination, you'll see.”
“I can't wait.”
Sterling's smile was a little shy when she said, “Can I, um, ride in with you tomorrow? I don't have any gas in my car, and I guess I won't have any money to fill it until I get a paycheck.”
“I go in at eight, and I'd love to give you a ride.”
“I can't remember the last time I got up that early,” Sterling said. She leaned over and gave me a quick hug. “Thanks, you're the best, Royal. I swear I won’t fuck this up.”
“What about me?” Griffen said, sounding affronted.
Sterling sent him a saucy wink. “You're not bad, but Royal just gave me a job, so he’s my number one brother right now. If he fires me I'll give the spot back to you.”
“If he doesn't fire you because you have a job you like and you're doing well at it, then I'm happy to take number two. As long as you don't put Ten
n ahead of me.”
Sterling laughed, a sound I realized we didn't hear enough. For a party girl, she never seemed to be having that much fun. A moment later she was gone, closing the office door behind her.
Chapter Twelve
royal
That was unexpected,” I said.
“You okay with giving her a job?” Griffen asked, noting something down on the pad in front of him.
“I guess that depends on how it ends up working out. But I never would have thought she'd slow down the drinking the way she has. Who knows? She seems a lot less angry. Less reckless. That means a lot. And unlike the rest of them, she didn't revolt at the idea of working for a living.”
“Always a good sign. I assume Bryce wasn't interested in a similar offer?”
“I didn't exactly make Bryce a similar offer,” I admitted. “Mostly because he's still an asshole, and he's not my little sister.”
“Well, we have to put up with them living in the house once the guest wing is ready, but nothing in the will says we have to support them. If Bryce decides he's willing to lower himself to employment, maybe we'll find something for him.”
“You still haven't gotten to your lunch,” I said, stacking my empty dishes on the tray. “I’ll run down The Inn business while you eat.”
“Works for me,” Griffen said, picking up his sandwich again. “I'm starving.”
“Tenn is going to make an offer to Forrest Powell. If he works out, he’ll fill in for the time I’m spending here and put us a little ahead.”
Griffen ate as I went over construction details on the cottage expansion. While I was talking, my phone beeped. A quick look showed a message from Tenn.
Produce emergency averted. I don't care what the coin says, next crisis is yours.
“Tenn said he covered the latest emergency. We have to figure out who’s behind the sabotage at The Inn before it gets any worse. At first, it was canceled reservations and guests who thought things were missing from their rooms. Then the guy with the cockroaches—”