Chapter 8

8

MASON

W ednesday morning after the charity auction, I was waiting impatiently in the entryway of the distillery, watching box trucks being loaded for the day. The smells of the port were ripe in the air, and a stiff, cold breeze sent sprays of frost across the parking lot.

Safely inside, I leaned against the window and checked my watch. I had told Fia I would be here around nine and to meet me around then. I offered to send her a driver but she’d refused, sending me a smart-ass text back in response asking if I’d ever heard of a taxi.

Finally, a rough-looking yellow cab bumped across the parking lot, and Fia stepped out, clutching two to-go coffee cups for dear life as she fought against the wind to close the door behind her. She ended up kicking it closed, her hair lifting into the air and swirling around her head at the same moment I burst through the door to rescue her.

I pretty much shoved her inside the distillery and closed the doors behind us. She was laughing, though, her cheeks tinged a bright, angry red from the cold.

“What a beautiful day, huh?” She attempted to blow several strands of hair away from her face, but they stuck to her lips.

“Yes, lovely.” I reached up to smooth the strands away, laughing, and felt the sudden urge to just keep my hand resting on her freezing cold cheek. I pulled away, clearing my throat, and she set the coffees down on the service counter and hastily shrugged out of her coat.

“I brought you some coffee. I figured that’s all you do during the day, right? Drink copious amounts of caffeine and look at numbers until your eyes bleed?” She draped her coat over the counter, taking in the space around us. The distillery wasn’t open to the public. Sure, I had a few copper stills at the restaurant where we made the occasional small batch, but this place was my commercial headquarters.

We were standing near the service counter, where a few computers lay dormant and dark. Normally I had two or three people working here during the week handling the logistics of supply and demand for what batches we were currently brewing, but December was a dead month. Everyone was shutting down for the holidays, from our wholesalers to the farms where I bought my grain and barley.

“I do more than sit in front of a computer,” I replied, waving a hand down the snug, dimly lit hallway. “Ready?”

“This isn’t what I was envisioning,” she said as she thrust one of the coffees into my hand. Her brown eyes scanned the framed posters along the hallway, the series of labels for special batches, the awards, and the occasional picture of the crew who worked within the distillery.

“Did you think it’d look like the restaurant?” I took a sip and nearly spit the coffee back out.

Fia shot a look in my direction, smirking. “Too hot?”

“What is this?”

“An eggnog latte with extra vanilla and cinnamon syrup. You don’t like it?”

The sugar bloomed through me, making my teeth cringe. “I prefer my coffee black?—”

“Boring,” she said with a dramatic yawn. “It’s December, you know. It’s time to throw away any notion of health and binge on sweets.” Her eye glittered with mischief as she stood on her toes to look through a long glass window overlooking the malting room. She wore a tight, burnt orange sweater and even tighter jeans, showing off her shape, which made my mouth go dry.

I shouldn’t have been thinking about her like that. For the millionth time, I tried to remind myself that this woman was my best friend’s baby sister, not a grown woman with a body that looked like something I would really like to curl up against at night.

She turned to look at me over her shoulder, her dark, loosely curled hair falling over her back. “Although you do look like the type that takes their health very, very seriously.”

“That’s the malting room and our peat furnace.” I waved a hand toward the window and continued walking down the hallway, trying my best to not even look in her direction. “And yeah, I guess you could say that. I’m not a huge fan of sweets.”

“What are you a fan of, Mr. O’Leary?”

I glanced at her, noticing the smug grin on her lips that made her nose crinkle as she kept in step with me. “Work. Whiskey. The occasional football game.”

I opened a set of wide, metal double doors and led her inside. She ducked under my arm instead of stepping around me, her shoulder brushing my side. I clamped down on the sudden rush of adrenaline coursing through my veins at something as minute as a touch from her.

Suppressing a groan, I shut the doors behind us with a snap. “To the left, that’s the mash tun, and to the right, those are our washbacks, for fermentation.”

I had to raise my voice above the clattering of pipes and rushing water as I followed behind her along a narrow metal bridge overlooking the distillery below. She clutched the railing, and her cup of coffee, for dear life, taking nervous steps until we reached the far end of the room and met a narrow set of stairs.

I followed her down and stepped in front of her again, leading her through the maze of brewing equipment until we reached another set of doors. I noticed she was slightly flushed, her eyes locked on the noisy equipment. I was sure she had some idea in her mind about what this place looked like. A romantic notion, probably. Everyone did.

But as I opened the doors to the still room, her mouth popped open, and her eyes glittered nearly the same color as the four massive copper stills taking up the majority of the room.

“The still room,” I said.

“Whoa,” she murmured, catching her reflection in the polished metal. “These are huge.”

I nodded. “We make a lot of whiskey.”

She hung back as I walked forward, checking on a few things while nursing the impossibly sweet drink in my hand. I was nearly to the far end of the room when she finally caught up with me again, following me through yet another set of doors.

“This reminds me of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” She smiled as I shut the doors behind us. The maturation room, the final step in the distilling process, bloomed around us. Everything was dark wood, and the smell of charred oak hung heavy in the air as she gazed up, and up, at the racks of full-sized barrels arranged on shelves.

“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory? Really?” It wasn’t lost on me that we were the only people in the enormous warehouse housing thousands of barrels of young, aging whiskey. My foreman, Roger, was at the other warehouse for our clear spirits today, which was the reason why I’d reached out to Fia to see if she was available for a tour this morning. We’d be alone with plenty of time, and privacy, to talk about the finer details of our arrangement.

In reality, I’d been thinking about her since Saturday night and hadn’t been able to get her out of my head. I needed to figure out why.

“Did you always want to make whiskey?” We walked through the room toward a plastic table, chairs, and a row of counters with a coffeemaker. She hopped up on the counter with ease, crossing her ankles with her hands curled around her coffee cup.

I chose to sit in one of the chairs, facing her. “No, I didn’t grow up with the dream of turning a bootleg operation in college into all of this.”

She sipped her coffee, smiling around the rim. “What did you want to be when you grew up?”

“Are you going to ask my favorite color next?” I chuckled. “What did you want to be?”

She rolled her eyes, giggling a bit. “A cat doctor.”

“A veterinarian?”

“No, a cat that was also a doctor, but now that my frontal lobe’s developed, I’ve been debating actually using the degree my parents spent so much money on and getting a real job.”

I chewed my lower lip, hiding the smile that threatened to spread across my lips. “You’re a photographer. That’s a real job?—”

“What did you want to be? Before this?” She skillfully cut me off before taking another sip of coffee.

“A pilot,” I breathed, slouching, finding it hard not to feel comfortable around her. “Commercial, actually. I wanted to fly all around the world in the biggest cargo plane known to man.”

She smiled, swinging her legs. “ King of the Skies .”

“Precisely.” I swished the coffee around in the half empty cup before setting it down on the table beside me.

“Why didn’t you?”

“I’m colorblind.”

“Really? Like a dog?”

I shot her a playful glare. “The FAA doesn’t take too kindly to their pilots not being able to tell the difference between red and green .”

“Oh!” she exclaimed, nodding enthusiastically. “That’s it! I’ve been wondering why you hated Christmas so much, ever since you threw that horrible Christmas party for your office.”

I narrowed my eyes at her, noticing the devilish look in her eyes. “What are you talking about?”

She nodded certainly. “You can’t even see Christmas. Red and green are the official colors of the season, you know.”

I ran my tongue along my lower lip. “You’re not what I expected at all, truly.”

“Sorry to disappoint, darling . You could have hired a sugar baby, you know, if you wanted someone to fawn over you.” She took another sip of her coffee. Her cheeks were stained a soft rose in the dim lighting above our heads. “But I think you get enough of that already, don’t you?”

“If you’re trying to tease me, Fia, it’s not going to work.”

“I’m just stating facts, Mason.” She leveled a stern look at me, at least her attempt at one. “Don’t think I didn’t notice the way everyone at the auction last weekend not only gawked at you but melted in your presence. Everyone was looking at you, and you hated it. You really hate the attention?—”

“Everyone was looking at you ,” I cut in, and Fia held my gaze for several seconds longer than either of us should have. Something shifted in the air between us, the unusual, unexpected tension crackling like the air before a lightning strike.

She cleared her throat. “Remember how we were out on the balcony?” She crossed her legs, looking down at her lap. “I was going to ask you, before Colin interrupted us, why you were doing this.”

“Why I needed a date to these events?” I asked.

“More than that.” Her eyes met mine again. In the soft, amber light, they took on an array of warm fall colors. “You want this to feel real, like we’ve known each other for a very long time and you’re content.” She bit her lower lip and the motion made my head start to spin. “I thought maybe you were trying to make an ex-girlfriend jealous, or that you needed to impress an investor but… I looked you up.”

I arched a brow.

She looked a little uneasy as she continued. “On Wikipedia.”

“A fantastic and very credible source.”

“They cite their sources.” She frowned. “You’ve never been in a public relationship and you sure as hell don’t need any help with your business, so what’s the real reason?” She shifted toward the edge of the counter, her gaze holding on mine.

I wasn’t sure how to begin. It was messy and complicated—and not something I was ready to share. So, I deflected, like usual. “What was your reason for saying yes?”

Money. Fame. Connections. All three came to mind, but Fia just smiled softly, maybe a little sadly, as she shrugged. “I didn’t have anything else going on, and it’s the holidays. Being bored over Christmas is my worst nightmare.”