Chapter 1

Brooklyn

Present day

I've been thinking about the night on the hay bales more and more lately.

Probably because it's my daughter Blake's eleventh birthday in two weeks. Everything definitely changed when we found out Eden was pregnant.

It came as a massive shock to both of us. We were only nineteen when she was born. I remember how scared Eden was to even tell me the news. I suspected something was wrong because of the way she'd been kinda quiet and not her usual bubbly self for a few days before she told me.

She finally confessed after taking multiple pregnancy tests. I couldn't believe it, but I was anything but disappointed. Shocked, yes. But I'd always wanted a bunch of kids. I just didn't think it was going to be before I even turned twenty years old and did anything with my life.

In saying that, the whole process brought us closer. We were young, but we both knew what we wanted from each other. It just came earlier than we thought.

I couldn't get enough of Eden while she was pregnant. She was so cute and sexy, it still stirs me up to this day even though we're not together anymore, and haven't been for years.

We stayed together another five years after our daughter was born. We never had a fight about it, we just drifted apart. We were both so young and neither of us had experienced the world or had been out of our own little bubble — that played a huge part. Eden wanted to broaden her horizons when she finished her degree in design. She started working for an events business, learning how to host and decorate local weddings. She'd worked hard trying to manage the baby with help from both of our parents and our families, with me working and finishing my business degree. That part took a toll.

Just after Blake's fifth birthday, we decided to call it quits, both citing we were better as friends.

By then I was working full-time at the distillery and things were tough.

It felt fucking hard. Being so busy we just didn't know how to come together anymore, and I plunged a lot of my time into trying to prove myself at work, taking charge of the bottling process, and trying to be the best father I could for Blake.

We both put work and parenthood before our marriage.

I also never wanted to hold her back from doing other things she wanted to do.

We both cried when we signed the divorce papers. It was the saddest fucking day of my life because I still had a deep love and respect for her. But again, we were probably too young to get married, just months after Blake was born. We didn't know what the hell we were doing.

Divorce papers.

Another thing that's been keeping me up at night… A recent discovery I've made after searching for the papers. We've been ‘divorced' for three years.

Eden asked for a copy of them when I saw her at the local Bake n' Shake recently. The Bassett women — like most of the good folk of Stoney Creek — did their part and baked cupcakes and treats as well as displayed some new merch from the distillery. It was all to support the local highschool annual camp.

Now, Eden is applying for her new passport as her old one is in her maiden name. Her legal name is still Bassett, and I haven't had the gall to ask if she's going to keep it that way, even after all these years. It was during the rummage for the paperwork in my home office — somewhere buried at the back of the filing cabinet — that I found them.

My heart hammered in my chest, and my palms felt unnaturally clammy as I realized what I was looking at. I got the shock of my life.

She's still my wife.

The papers were never filed.

I had one fucking job to do… then again, I've never been very good at administrative tasks.

I‘m surprised I even found them since it's been years and I had no reason to pull them out. Both of our signatures are still there in black and white — I just forgot to file the paperwork. She asked me to do it when she had to go out of town for a few days, granted leaving me in charge was red flag number one. It was right after we got together with one of her lawyer friends who was just out of grad school, she gave us some advice and a look over the marital settlement agreement we had come up with. We did everything ourselves rather than go through the expense of lawyers that would charge a fortune. We agreed upon which assets to split, which to keep, a parenting plan for our daughter and splitting our joint bank account. Everything was amicable, we hid nothing. Eden navigated the whole complicated process online; she'd printed the forms and checklists to make sure nothing was left out. We filed the petition with the court, it was just a matter of our local jurisdiction reviewing our paperwork, and then the court-mandated waiting period to pass before we received our divorce decree. That would have made things official.

Oops.

I'm not even sure how that little detail could have slipped my mind, but here they are — unlodged — and very much pointing out the glaringly obvious; we're still married.

I've no idea how to tell her. And I don't know how mad she's going to be. Eden is pretty easy going for the most part, but this is next level. Are court documents this old even valid anymore? All good questions.

Luckily, she hasn't gotten even close to marrying anyone else in the past five years since we split.

That could've been precarious, since she's still unknowingly married to me.

I've never gotten close to remarrying either. While I have had my share of women since we split, nothing serious has ever stuck. I spent the first couple of years after the divorce solely concentrating on Blake's needs, only having a couple of one night stands here and there. It wasn't a priority to meet anyone new; my daughter was always my number one focus. We share Blake fifty-fifty so being there for her was and still is paramount. We both wanted to make things as normal as possible for our daughter.

The fact we're still very good friends — and divorced each other in the nicest way we knew how — still baffles a lot of people. It's not normal, I know that. Most people don't have that experience.

I think about my eldest brother, Grayson. He's thirty-eight and just went through a hell of a time with his divorce. His ex-wife made things really difficult, going for the jugular and everything in between. It eventually got sorted out, thanks to Hartley Chambers — who Grayson coincidentally had a hook-up with before he knew she was his divorce lawyer. They're together now and he's the happiest I've ever seen him.

My second eldest brother, Gabriel, who's thirty-five, has also been divorced. His wife left him years ago when his daughter, Trinity — now five — was a few months old. He raised her by himself and I have so much respect toward him for that.

It seems unfortunate that all three of us have been through a divorce.

There may be hope for our gamer brother, Beau, and his twin-sister Georgia-Blue, both twenty-five.

Georgia provides all the woo-woo in the family and says everything is written in the stars and you can solve most things with the appropriate crystal and by burning a sage stick. Also, the power of positive thinking is underrated, according to her. Beau, while tall, blue-eyed, and broad like the rest of us brothers, skipped the famous Bassett temper that my other three siblings have. Nothing fazes Beau, a lot like me.

I'm kinda like my two older brothers in stature, but prefer a cowboy hat and plaid instead of a suit. My hair is longer at the front than my mother would prefer, and I'm more tan from being outdoors. Even when I am distilling for the family business, I still get time to ride my horses and tend to my beloved garden; I grow my own vegetables and have a beautiful vertical wall herb garden. I've been trying out my hand at planting a mini-orchid because the soil is very fertile on our property.

Beau and Georgia both still live in their separate casitas of the family homestead, while Gabe and I built our houses years ago on what we affectionately call ‘the farm,' aka two hundred acres of land where our Bourbon distillery is situated along with the many acres of crops of barley and wheat that we grow. Grayson is in the middle of building his dream home on his beloved land ‘Coyote Run' which my parents gifted him years ago on the south end of the property.

We've all been part of the family business since we were born; Bassett Brothers Bourbon, which has been in the family for a couple of generations now. Our grandfather passed the business down to our dad, Robert — commonly known as Bob — and his brother, our uncle Jack.

Both of them have retired now. My mom, Gayle, worked in the business too, along with our aunt Patti, Jack's wife. Mom has officially retired, though she wants to help Georgia-Blue with the wedding venue next year after Mom and Dad have taken the big European vacation they've been planning. We've spent the better part of a year remodeling the old barn and converting it into its original state. Our cousin, Callan, who's tall and dark haired like the rest of us, but he has distinguishable ochre eyes and we all have blue, did most of the framework and all the woodwork and joinery.

We have other workers, but it's certainly an on-going family affair and we each have a role in the business.

I work in the cellar, managing production and bottling. I spend most of my time down the two flights of stairs in ‘the vault.'. The rickhouse, our storage warehouse, adjoins the production cellar and it might as well be my second home. The barrels are stored on ricks, stacked several high and aid the maturation process.

These days I have a production assistant, Jarrod, and a team of very capable staff who know the bottling and production procedure well.

I've loved this job since I started out all those years ago. Growing up I learned the ropes and took to the production side of things. It never interested me with other aspects of the business. Though I do have an input in design and marketing, I never get too involved. I don't like to delve too much outside my area and I despise computers and administration.

Gabriel is the man for that. He was freshly appointed CEO a couple of months back, and oversees every aspect of the distillery now that our parents have officially retired.

He's the only one that knows about this recent non-divorce phenomenon of mine.

I sigh, staring at the unlodged divorce papers on my desk.

They've been burning a hole in the forefront of my mind since I found them.

I know I need to tell her, and Gabe agreed when I confessed just recently.

The other thing I need to address with Eden is this Kirk business. She's just started dating a new guy, and granted I haven't taken her love life too much to heart over the years, but maybe that's because there hasn't been anyone serious.

My daughter just met Kirk not long ago and said they all got along really well.

I've never seen the guy, but something just doesn't sit right with me about him.

He's some fancy pants doctor from Nashville.

Maybe it's because I'm a jealous fucker after all. Something I didn't realize until I found those damned papers. Now I can't stop thinking about it.

She's legally still my wife — even if we haven't been intimate in years. There was that time we tried to rehash things briefly about two years after our first breakup, but we both realized it would be too confusing for Blake being so young, so we left it at that.

I plowed myself into work, and built my house on the family property. I now live in a massive homestead with stables for my horses, and a small hobby farm where I keep my animals; a pet pig called Mandy, two goats, Eliza and Elsie, and my newest addition, a rescue Donkey called Sawyer. I have rescue horses too, and not that I like to play favorites or anything, but my boy is a Tennessee Walking Horse named Bandit. I love him to pieces. I rescued him after my divorce, along with an American Paint Horse named Sailor — she's Blake's favorite. I currently have two others, a beautiful mare, Misty, and an ex-racing horse, Apollo.

It was around this time of rescuing more horses that I became a vegetarian.

I smile when I think about Eden's face when I told her a little while back…

Eden gapes at me in surprise. "What?"

"A vegetarian. You know, we don't eat meat." I've always been a steak and potatoes kinda guy, so I understand the surprise and curiosity.

"Seriously?"

I shrug. "It's really pretty shocking how badly animals are treated, Eden." I've always had a soft spot for animals, and after some recent footage I saw on a documentary, it really put me off.

"That I can believe."

And that's how it happened.

I guess you can teach an old dog new tricks after all. I'm always willing to try something new. Especially when I delve into the dynamics of how things work and grow. I like to challenge myself.

I love that Blake loves it too. She loves looking after the animals.

Blake is the best thing that ever happened to us. She's like an angel I'm certain was sent to us as a gift from God.

There's just this pesky little non-divorce thing that's rattling me, and what I'm going to do about it.

Obviously I have to tell Eden. I just don't want her to be mad. She doesn't get mad often, but this could be a different matter. She's always been one to believe in signs, but maybe this will prove to be a little too much.

I didn't do it on purpose, but it's still my fault. I acknowledge that.

And I know I need to fix it. But I keep asking myself — since I've made this recent non-divorce discovery — why have I now become a little more fixated on my wife than ever before in the last five years?

Why, oh why, indeed.

My wife. Fuck.

Why do I suddenly like the sound of that again? Even though I haven't thought about it in so long. We are cool with things. We've always been happy to stay friends. We both agreed. So why am I now feeling this pang of regret that we couldn't make things work? I thought it was done and dusted. I mean, it was… so why am I feeling like this?

Maybe I never really got over her. She was the love of my life, after all. Even when things drifted apart, I've always felt the connection towards her, that part never broke.

Perhaps that's why we've remained so close over the years, never really arguing about anything. That's an achievement in itself.

I like to think I'm a pretty happy-go-lucky guy. And raising our daughter, keeping her environment safe and calm, has always been number one priorities for us.

I'm meeting later with Eden at The Stone's Throw Cafe in town to discuss Blake's birthday party. It could be the right opportunity to bring up the whole non-divorce thing. I mean, it has to come out some time, right?

I tuck the papers into my backpack for safe keeping, and bring them along for the ride… just in case…