I’d bought my condo for the view. During the day, I could see all the way to the water. At night, the lights of the city twinkled in the darkness. It had cost me a shit-ton of money, but every night when I stood looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows, I knew it had been worth it.
I went to the kitchen and took a bottle of Glenlivit out of the liquor cabinet. Poured a glass and took a long swallow. It burned going down, spreading warmth through my chest.
Danielle texted me back with my flight details for Thursday. I blew out a long breath and took another drink of Scotch.
Home. I’d grown up in Echo Creek, a small town in the Cascade Mountains. Growing up on a winery sounded idyllic, but I’d been glad to leave it behind.
How long had it been since I’d been there? Eighteen months? More? That didn’t sound right. But I hadn’t gone back for the holidays last year. It probably had been that long.
I felt a twinge of guilt at that. It wasn’t that I disliked my family. True, my dad and I butted heads, and my siblings liked to give me crap for having moved away. But I knew my mom would like it if I came home more often.
I was just so damn busy. It was hard to carve out the time for a trip that wasn’t business related. And I’d have to endure the inevitable guilt trips. Why don’t you visit more often? Can’t you stay longer? Don’t you want to come back and join your brothers in the family business?
No, I fucking didn’t. But none of them had ever understood why I hadn’t fallen in line. Why I hadn’t taken up my proper place at the winery.
I was made for bigger things than running a goddamn wine business in a small town out in central nowhere. There was no challenge to it. No risk. And the potential rewards—particularly financially—were much too low for me. Money wasn’t everything, but honestly, it was most things. And I was good at making money. Great, even. I’d made my company a hell of a lot of money in the last several years.
I was respected here. People deferred to me. Trusted me with millions of dollars. I had my own office, an assistant, a penthouse condo with a priceless view. Enough money that I could have more or less anything I wanted.
I was living my dream, and I didn’t understand why my family couldn’t just be fucking happy for me. Why they had to harp on the fact that I wasn’t there all the time. My brothers had stayed. My sister would probably wind up back home after college. They even had my ex-wife. What the hell did they need me for?
I took another sip of Scotch and wandered over to the window, wondering what my dad had done that had Leo so riled up. Leo and I rarely saw eye to eye. He wouldn’t have called me over nothing. The big question was, did my dad know he’d done it? Were they expecting me to ride in with my MBA and save the day? Or was Leo going behind their backs to drag me into their mess?
I guess I was about to find out.
Thinking of home brought my thoughts back to Zoe. I went into the bedroom and set my drink down. With a glance over my shoulder—as if half-afraid someone would catch me—I pulled a small box down off a shelf in the closet.
There was only one thing inside. Zoe’s wedding ring.
I’d found it sitting on the kitchen counter of our old apartment the day she’d left me. The rest of her things had been gone. Her side of the closet, empty. Her drawers in the bathroom, cleaned out. She hadn’t taken much that had been ours—the things we’d accumulated together. I’d brought some of it to her later—the things I’d thought she’d want to keep—and given away the rest. But not her ring.
Keeping it was the stupidest thing. I didn’t know why I still had it. It wasn’t even very nice. We’d eloped when we were twenty—just a couple of poor college students. I’d saved for months to get it, and at the time, I’d been pretty damn proud of myself. Looking at it now, it was rather pathetic. Just a plain gold band with a tiny excuse for a diamond. Zoe had loved it when I’d given it to her—said she hadn’t expected a ring at all.
But we’d been different people, then. Young. Rebellious and wild. Idiots, really. We’d thought teenage hormones had been the real thing. Maybe they had, in their own way. But that hadn’t been enough.
It hurt to look at it, and I wondered why I did this to myself. I didn’t pull it out very often. Once when I’d randomly remembered it was her birthday. Another time on what had been our anniversary. Occasionally, thoughts of her would creep into my mind and refuse to let go, and I’d find myself right here. Nursing a glass of Scotch and staring at the cheap piece of shit I couldn’t bring myself to throw away.
I closed the box and put it back on the shelf. Maybe I’d get rid of it for good someday. A colleague of mine had proudly flushed his ex-wife’s ring down a public toilet. Another guy I knew had taken his ring off and dropped it in a garbage can in a park near his office.
I didn’t have my ring anymore. I’d lost it a few years after we’d gotten married. Zoe and I had been visiting my family for Christmas, and it had snowed. We’d been outside, embroiled in an impromptu snowball fight with my brothers. None of us had been dressed for the cold—no coats, hats, or gloves. Just a bunch of dumbass kids tossing snow at each other until our bare hands hurt. Back inside, I’d realized my ring had come off. We’d looked, but never found it.
It had been prophetic, in a way.
But I was past that now. Zoe and I hadn’t worked out. She hadn’t been happy, so she’d left. Moved back to Echo Creek. Started working for my parents. She was fine, and so was I.
In fact, I was more than fine. I was at the top of my game. Whether or not my family could appreciate it, my life was pretty fucking good.
I would do what I had to do. Spend a few days at home, look at their books, probably find a few errors. Argue with my dad. Talk shit with my brothers. Let my mom fuss over me a little. Then I’d be right back here, where I belonged.
Continue reading Broken Miles…
Dear Reader
Dear reader,
Gavin, Gavin, Gavin.
Did you expect his story would be next? Not everyone did. I’ve had a few readers tell me they thought he should be last, because he’s the youngest.
But, to the surprise of no one, Gavin wouldn’t wait his turn.
One of the biggest challenges in writing this book was dealing with a hobbled Gavin. He breaks his leg and suddenly he can’t be fully himself. The injury forces him to slow down. To look. To really see things, instead of charging in full speed ahead.
He wasn’t exactly happy about that. Which made it harder on me.
Don’t these Bailey boys realize I have their best interests at heart? No, they don’t, and he was just as stubborn and difficult as his brothers. But it’s easy to forgive him with that smile.
I hesitated a little when it came to making Skylar a writer. Being a writer myself and creating a character who does what I do feels… weird. Or maybe like taking a shortcut. But it really fit her personality, both in her love of quiet and solitude, and her interest in serial killers. Maybe I wasn’t sure about making her a writer, but she WAS one, so I just had to roll with it.
Sometimes these heroines are just as stubborn as their heroes.
I loved exploring a female lead who has to cope with anxiety. I know so many people who suffer from the same problem and it impacts their lives in many different ways. I did my best to be true to her and the ways she experiences anxiety, both mentally and physically.