Page 20 of The Prince Who Loved Me

And he took a step away. “Let’s get back home.”

Chapter 5

Brandi sat at the picnic bench at Belle’s Medicinal Brewery the next day. The plastic top served as her desk when it wasn’t raining. Many of the buildings were open anyway, and those that weren’t were full of machinery. Her employees were working the machines, making that delicious amber liquid.

The sun was almost directly overhead, but her manager stood beside her, blocking most of its rays. Even then, she had a hard time paying attention to him.

For one crazy moment last night, Brandi had been sure Sebastien was going to kiss her.

She had been excited to show him the building for the wine, and then embarrassed by the idea that she could be an innovator. She had tried to flirt her way out of it, but he hadn’t let it go until she confessed that she truly wanted to make the wine work. His blue eyes had darkened as he looked at her lips, desire plain on his face. It woke something up within her, to realize that this charming, giving man saw her in a light of more than friends. She’d been distracted all morning, from the moment she did her morning tour of the outbuildings to listening to updates from her manager.

Who was now giving her unpleasant news.

“Brandi.” Gerald held out an envelope, an unlit cigar in his other hand. “You knew this day was coming.”

She refused to take the letter. “If I don’t accept it, it won’t happen.”

Unless she had read Sebastien wrong, which was possible. They’d known each other for years. Surely she would have picked up on the wanting by now. She had made an art of it, to know when someone was interested in her.

“I tell you, it’s hard for me, too. I’ve been here forty years.Couldn’t have asked for a better place to work.” Gerald placed the envelope down on the picnic table top and slid it over with one finger. “You have a month to find someone new.”

Her stomach clenched. Actually hurt. All of her memories of Belle’s included Gerald, from when he was teaching her how to label the bottles to helping her run the place now. He even helped her come up with excuses to tell Wendy for missing work at Fountenoy Hall when they were in high school. “You’ve been here longer than I’ve been alive, Gerald. There’s no replacing you.”

“Yup, that’s what they said when your grandpa passed on all those years ago. And when Ms. Eulalee handed the reins over to you. Change is always happening. You have to embrace it when it does.”

She sighed and took the letter. “A month, huh?”

She must have imagined Sebastien’s almost-kiss. She was probably like one of his sisters to him. Good thing she didn’t cancel her plans for her date.

“After I take my wife on a second honeymoon, I’ll be here to help in any way I can. For a while, anyway.” He put the cigar in his mouth and mumbled the next words. “Probably going to move closer to the grandkids.”

“Okay.” She stood up and extended her hand. “I hate to lose you. And not just for me. Belle’s will be missing a piece of herself without you.”

“You’ll get along just fine.” He clasped his hand over hers and gave her a nod, then picked up his tablet and went back to the bottling room.

Weird that all her life changes were happening by envelopes lately. She tapped it against the table a few times. Opening it could wait until later, when her mind accepted its fate.

The check from her Grandma sat in her dresser drawer,waiting for her mind to accept that one, too. Her mom had still been sleeping when Brandi left that morning, for which she was thankful. The last thing she wanted was to be grilled by her mom about her inheritance.

For now, she’d just sit in the sun, looking at several lifetimes of her family’s heritage, listening to the chatter of people and the constant rolling sounds of the large machine grinding the malt corn. That suddenly became a high-pitched whine.

She joined Ona and another worker, keeping a close watch on the process.

“Sounds a little rough.” Ona patted the machine like it was a pet that needed soothing. “Once this batch is done, we’ll check it out.”

“Is this the first time this happened?”

“Yeah, so far.”

Brandi made a mental note to follow up later. “Keep me updated.”

“Sure thing.” Ona focused her attention back on the grinder, making sure the corn didn’t get clogged.

Everything else was running fine, from confirmation on local fruits to stacking the stainless steel containers and getting them ready for product. Brandi pitched in where extra hands were needing, knowing each job from working at Belle’s for so long, including scrubbing the mixing tank.

Brandi sat down at her desk rather than the picnic table and turned on her laptop. An idea that had been in the back of her mind for the past few months had come to the forefront late last night when she’d been lying on the cot, listening to her mother’s soft snores and trying to stop imagining what it would be like to run her fingers through Sebastien’s thick red hair.

Make. Belle’s. Hers.