Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 116455 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 582(@200wpm)___ 466(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 116455 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 582(@200wpm)___ 466(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
I closed my eyes and tried desperately not to replay that Thanksgiving night again in my head. The memory tapes were old and ragged from overuse.
Firecracker, you’ve always been mine.
My stomach flipped with a sickening swoop. I seriously did not have time for this. It was yet one more way the Wellbridge family was going to try fucking over the Honeycutts, and it damned sure wasn’t happening on my watch.
“Moving on!” I said with a cheerful energy that I didn’t feel in the slightest. “Honeybridge Mead is going to be selected as the official exclusive mead supplier to the largest Ren Faire organizer in the country. And it’s going to happen after we blow them away with our mead selection at Brew Fest, which is in only five weeks. Meanwhile, we have a tavern to run during the busiest season of the year and continue to be Honeybridge’s largest tourism draw for the fourth summer in a row, thanks to Frankie and her Instagram followers. That means staying focused on our goals, people. Frog Wellbridge is none of my business, and I’m not going to let him and his beautiful fa— uh, beautiful Porsche—distract me.”
Dan blinked. “Wait, what’s Frog?”
Instead of screaming my frustration into the entire crowded tavern around me, I simply ignored the question. I grabbed my tablet and headed around the bar to the host stand, where some new people seemed to be waiting for a table. Over my shoulder, I heard Alden snort.
“A frog is a slimy, warty little—”
“Hush,” Castor chided. “Frog’s a nickname, Dan. You know how Pop Honeycutt calls our sister Georgia Moonflower, and Flynn is Firecracker, and McLean is Moose? He gives all the Honeybridge kids these strange nicknames, and nobody really knows where he comes up with them, but somehow, they stick. And JT is… he’s Frog.”
“The kind who doesn’t turn into a handsome prince,” Alden added sourly. “No matter how much Flynn wanted to think so back in the day.”
I didn’t stick around to hear more. After seating the new customers, I made my way through the arched doorway to the meadery section of the Tavern and shut the door, relishing the relative hush of the room.
The pristine craft room was divided from the tavern by a huge glass wall. Customers loved sitting for a meal where they could watch the tanks, fermenters, and barrels in fascination. But for me… it was like my very own playroom.
I closed my eyes and inhaled the clean, yeasty, and slightly honey-scented air. This was my happy place. I’d never set out to become a mead maker. In fact, I’d never set out to own a tavern. To be honest, I’d never imagined myself staying in Honeybridge at all.
But things changed, didn’t they? Sometimes a child’s dream of what he wanted to be when he grew up didn’t pan out, and that was okay. Things happened that kept us from taking our original path, but that didn’t mean we were on a worse path, per se, only different. And there was joy to be found in the new path, too.
I loved my new path. I’d forged it myself when I’d badly needed to start something just for fun, just for me, and I’d worked my ass off. I’d convinced my Grandpa Horace to let me make some of his home-brew mead on-site at the Tavern as a way of livening up our offerings at a time when the business wasn’t doing very well.
“We’ll use local honey and make a big deal of honey wine at Honeybridge Tavern,” I’d suggested, with the kind of excitement and optimism that had come naturally to me back then.
Now five years and who-knew how many failed batches later, the meadery I’d founded on a lark had finally gained a reputation all over New England and beyond. It had helped breathe fresh life into the Tavern that Grandpa Horace had passed down to me, too, making it a destination for good food and excellent company. Hell, we’d even been featured by an Instagram influencer.
“It’s your legacy now, Firecracker,” Grandpa had said the night before he’d died. “Keep making me proud.”
I rested my hand on the side of a tank and breathed deeply for a moment. Grandpa had been my rock—the person I’d leaned on when the weight of everyone leaning on me had gotten too heavy—and the loss of him still hurt sometimes.
Was it any wonder I’d practically thrown myself at JT Fucking Wellbridge when he’d come home for Thanksgiving a few short days later?
Now, I was finally on the cusp of turning our mead into something bigger than me, bigger than Honeybridge. The Ren Faire contract was only one step in my plan to turn Honeybridge Mead into a worldwide phenomenon.
I had big plans. And I wasn’t about to let a hot pair of Brooks Brothers suit pants distract me from them.