Chapter Six
Two weeks later
Ross stared at the sample of the Kölsch he’d pulled from the vessel where he’d been resting it prior to serving. It had turned out better than he’d hoped, even though his reason for making it seemed so far in the past he barely recalled it. He’d taken a risk with it, given his typical adherence to the German purity law. He’d been disinclined to use adjuncts in his beers—it had been his early conviction that if he couldn’t make something delicious, unique, balanced and drinkable using the only official ingredients required of water, malt, hops and yeast then he had no business calling himself a brewer.
But the last few breweries he’d worked at, including Fitzgerald in Grand Rapids and a couple he’d consulted recently here in Detroit were doing some wildly creative things with all manner of additional, non-German-approved ingredients and he’d been inspired by them to give it a try on his own. Using an obergäirge lagerbier like a Kölsch, which, by its very definition was a challenge to get right was a risk, but he considered himself well capable of perfecting the delicate blend of German dry hops, light malt bill and correctly softened water. Which he had, setting its longer top-fermentation process using cool temps as if it were a lager with all faith that it would be perfect.
Then, he’d gone and done it—broken the rules, the Reinheitsgebot, the German purity law of brewing. But as he gazed at the color he’d managed to create and took a sniff, then a small sip, letting the liquid rest on his tongue for a few seconds before moving it to the back of his mouth then down his throat, he knew that he’d likely be doing it again.
It was the absolute perfect shade of hazy pale straw, with a slight tint of pinkish orange, just as he’d hoped. While he’d wanted to use prickly pears to create this, he’d been hard pressed to find enough of the fruit to make it work. After spending hours at Eastern Market with Liesl at his side on a random Saturday, he’d settled on using guava. Since the batch was small and he’d been trying to retain a small shred of his purity rules, he’d purchased three bushel baskets of the fruits and spent hours peeling them and running them through a second-hand juicer he’d purchased. His fingers had been dyed pinkish red by the time he’d finished and stuffed the pulp into an infusion bag, figuring that since he’d not gotten that much juice out of the batch, he’d use as much of the fruit as he could.
He’d decided to let the beer ferment almost all the way before adding the bagged pulp and fresh juice directly to the nearly finished product. This was a bit of a risk, since that was when the lightly hopped beer was reaching its peak flavor and adding fermentable sugars in the form of the fruit’s juice and pulp could throw the whole thing off, mess up the final gravity—any number of things. But it hadn’t.
He knew that Elisa loved a well-brewed Kölsch. He also knew that she’d likely freak all the way out at the thought of him adding anything, much less some kind of South American fruit juice to what she considered to be the prefect, crisp, subtle blend of ingredients. But she had also developed a penchant for drinking shandies in the summer—a style he personally found revolting in its bastardized sweetness. When he’d decided to make his first pilot batch something in homage to his woman, they’d still been on speaking terms, of course. Which was not exactly how things were running now that the beer was ready to be enjoyed.
He held the clear glass up to the light, letting the pink and orange shades he’d managed to concoct reflect around the large room. He took another taste, a bigger one this time, so he could gauge the mouthfeel. It was a Kölsch all right—that light to medium body was spot on but it had the most perfect dash of bubbly dryness he could only attribute to the fruit’s effect on the hops that set it apart from the usual. He smacked his lips and smiled, in spite of his low-lying, ever-present anger and frustration with the state of his life at the moment. The fruit notes were fairly dramatic, which wasn’t surprising given the complexity of flavors found in a single bit of guava. And every last one of them—from Indian pear, to mango, to strawberry, even a bit of rich pineapple—were present in this gorgeous-looking brew.
He knocked back the rest of the sample he’d pulled, rolling it around in his mouth to make sure he could describe it properly. “Damn, I’m good,” he said to himself while preparing to transfer the final product into his sterilized seven-fifty milliliter stoppered bottles. He dropped into the zone of this final stage of brewing, his mind drifting, giving him a few minutes to ponder what a total asshole he’d been to Elisa the last couple of weeks since Liesl’s hospital stay.
That whole scene had changed his perspective on a lot things, that much was certain. He would never, in his entire life, forget the moment he’d realized that his baby girl couldn’t breathe and that he, Ross, her father, could do exactly nothing about it. Her beautiful face had turned red first, and she’d started coughing as he’d sipped beer and glared at the television, nursing his butt-hurt pride and pondering how much he both loved and hated Elisa Nagel at that moment.
When he’d finally noticed her, she was clawing at her neck and gagging, gasping, unable to speak. Thanking the good Lord in His Heaven for having an ex-schoolteacher down the hall, he’d snatched her up and run to the Hendersons’ door. The old lady had known exactly what to do, using some kind of a pre-packaged shot-like thing which at least had kept his daughter from dying in front of his eyes. But after a couple of minutes, during which he’d frantically called nine-one-one, forgetting his own address in his panic, her eyes had rolled back and her tiny body had started bucking and shaking in the grip of the first seizure he had ever seen anyone have.
Ross shut his eyes, reflecting on the next few minutes that he’d held on to her, praying like he’d never prayed in his life, waiting for the medical help to arrive. And the rest of it was a sick, dizzying blur—the harrowing ambulance ride while the EMT guys had frantically given his baby mouth-to-mouth and pressed on her chest to keep her heart pumping, the hell of a busy downtown ER with its smells and noise and terror when he’d been forced to sit and wait while they’d saved Liesl’s life. Then, when Elisa had shown up, they’d seen the doctors and he’d lost his shit—no, it was all best left un-recalled, really.
His initial inability to reach her while he’d waited for the ambulance hadn’t registered with him—he’d been so focused on praying his child away from death. Later, he’d only thought about it in the most abstract sense, as if he couldn’t focus on it because to take his focus off Liesl would only lead to another disaster. He had internalized it all, like he’d always done, and still blamed himself for the whole thing. So when Elisa had her little nervous breakdown in the hall, he’d been only half-aware of where she’d gone in her head right then.
Now, of course, he understood. She’d explained it to him. And he got it. He did. He’d initiated her deprogramming from that bastard who’d hurt her physically and almost ruined her emotionally. He’d initiated the reunion between her and her first child—the son she’d had stolen from her by that same man who’d declared her ‘useless’, ‘unfit’, and worse. He knew damn well that she’d regress. But at that moment, he hadn’t fucking cared.
His own thick swirl of emotions had been too raw, too confusing for him to process, hence his embarrassing breakdown. And since then, he’d kept his distance as he attempted the process of understanding himself and her and their future together. He missed her—everything about her, but most especially her body, lips, fingers and tongue. But he had zero idea how to handle how he felt about her, about the damn restaurant that he knew had been his damn idea in the first place, about how he imagined their life together as a real family and a properly married couple.
Hence he’d been sleeping on the couch this last week, after spending the first week post-allergy terror sleeping on the floor next to Liesl’s bed. The upshot of this, since he’d been used to a steady diet of satisfying sex, even during the month they’d been falling apart in other ways—he was horny as hell yet stubbornly unwilling to reach out to the one person he wanted to help him alleviate it. In a fit of self-denial, he’d stopped jacking off—which was quite a feat since it meant he’d been walking around for the last ten or so days with an aching back, neck…and balls.
The grueling rounds of allergy tests had left Liesl as cranky as a nest of hornets, which didn’t help. Elle had taken a bunch of days off in a row from the restaurant to help with the doctor visits and their itchy, bitchy fallout. But she wandered around like a ghost of her old self—thin, with huge dark circles under her eyes, and quiet. So, he’d left her alone. In short, they were one sorry-ass group of people under one roof.
As he finished filling the last bottle, the name of the beer appeared to him, so vivid he figured that it might have been visible to others in a cartoon Ross thought-bubble. He smiled to himself, somewhat grimly, and plastered plain white labels on the bottles before writing ‘Adjunct Lovers’ on each one in his neat, blocky lettering.
The next couple of hours spent cleaning and putting the bottles into the cooler he’d just had installed the week before were cathartic. He’d finally felt secure enough about Liesl’s physical condition to leave her with a sitter for a few hours and wasn’t ashamed to admit that he needed a break from her—and she from him, no doubt. Elisa was at the restaurant, as usual on a Saturday night, so he figured he’d spend some quality time on his second favorite activity.
He looked around his space, pleased with its level of tidiness. A glance up at the clock he’d placed on the old metal desk made him blink. He’d been here for over three hours, and he could barely remember an hour of it. It was as if he’d been moving in some kind of a dream-state or a weird, limbo fog. It sucked. His phone buzzed with a text from Austin, his oldest friend from brewing school and owner of Fitzgerald Brewing in Grand Rapids, where he and Elisa had met.
You need to come out, his friend had sent. Tomorrow. We’re going up for a guys’ weekend at Trent’s house. Make it happen.
I don’t know, he replied. I’m sort of afraid to go away that long right now.
I know. But she’ll be fine without you a few days. It will do you both some good.
Ross lowered himself into his favorite new furniture find—an old Eames-style chair he and Liesl had procured from the back of somebody’s garage sale in the past month and pondered the concept that his friend was referring to Elisa, while he meant Liesl.
Maybe, he typed, then waited to see if Austin replied. When the other man didn’t, Ross admitted, It’s kind of shitty right now. I don’t know if I should go. I don’t know if I want to go.
That’s all the more reason TO go. Stop at my house. We’ll head up together from there.
He tossed the device onto his desk with a curse. He was always letting Austin railroad him into shit—most of which was pleasant but some of which got him into more trouble than he wanted. He leaned back and propped his booted feet up on the matching, somewhat rickety ottoman, hands laced behind his head. Maybe he could use some guy time, escape the nest of women he inhabited for a while.
Maybe he needed to talk to the woman who still wore his engagement ring, but who hadn’t exchanged more than five words in a row with him since their daughter had been released from the hospital. He groaned and swiveled the chair, putting his feet on the floor and leaning forward, relieving some of the pain in his lower body. He missed her so much it hurt him all over, but he’d dug this hole and had zero experience in how to pull himself out of it. The longer they went incommunicado, the worse it got. And the worse it got, the more he worried that it would never be good again. He was willing to own his part but didn’t know how to explain that to her.
“Fuck,” he said as he got to his feet. “Fuck. Fucking mother-humping shit-kicking ass wipe.”
“Poetic,” Elisa called from somewhere in the increasing gloom.
He flinched then winced when his body tingled at the sight of her shadow emerging from the door that connected his space with the restaurant’s storage room. The distinct sensation of a burgeoning erection under his cargo shorts made him curse again.
“Can I help you with something?” He turned to the desk and pressed his fists on it, hoping to distract himself with pain. It didn’t work.
“Did Austin get hold of you?” She was keeping her distance, which pleased and infuriated him in equal measure.
“Yes.”
“Okay. So, are you going?”
“Why?”
“Well, so I can make arrangements here, for Liesl.”
“I don’t know yet.” He stomped over to the cooler and walked in, willing his dick soft. After he’d gotten himself under a bit of control, he turned to exit through the flapping plastic barrier but found his way blocked. “Excuse me,” he said, not meeting her gaze but wanting to so badly he had to bite the inside of his cheek not to do it.
“Ross, look at me.” Her voice lacked its vague, ghostly quality. It held an edge he recognized. And one that his poor, neglected cock reacted to so fast he grunted and gripped the door frame. “God damn you, man. Fucking look at me.” She got a grip on his beard, something he’d let get a tad too scraggly lately, and pulled his chin down. Her ice-gray-blue eyes blazed. Her color was high and she practically oozed something he understood, something he wanted, something he had to handle, for them both.
“We need to—”
He yanked her to him, cradled her face between his hands and kissed her, gently at first, relishing it and her so much he got dizzy. She responded in turn, going up on her tiptoes and wrapping her arms around his neck. He got serious with the kiss as the sweet press of her body against his drove him, parting her lips, tasting the corners of her mouth, groaning when she met him halfway.
Without breaking their lip lock, he walked her backward until her butt hit a pile of pallets he was saving for some unknown future use. For now, they’d do as a prop so he could get at her, touch her, feel her all over, taste her. He let his lips trail down her neck, as he tugged the silky ropes of her dreadlocks so her head tilted back, exposing the wide expanse of her skin.
When she grabbed his hand and put it between her legs, he grinned into her neck then pulled away, leaving her gasping and so god damned sexy he wanted to take a picture so he could always see her this way.
“What?” she asked, popping open his shorts button, unzipping him and shoving his pants and underwear down so fast his bare ass was exposed before he knew it. “God, Ross, please, I need you…so badly.”
He smiled and drew her close, trapping his erection between them as he rubbed a finger across her full lips. “I always need you, Elisa.”
“Later,” she said. “We’ll talk. I promise. But so help me if you don’t get inside me in the next few seconds I am going to scream.”
“So help you, eh?” He slid her jeans down, taking a moment to note that he didn’t have to unzip them at all. “You’re too thin, my sweet,” he whispered when she yanked off her shirt and bra and stood before him, lit only by a shaft of moonlight angling in one of the large windows. “Ah, Jesus, Elisa.” He cupped one breast, letting his thumb graze her peaked nipple.
She shivered and leaned back against the pallets. He kept teasing her breasts, using his lips on her neck, her shoulders, then on her nipples while teasing the hard metal ball in her hood.
“Come on my finger, my love,” he demanded, loving the way her flesh reacted to his words. “I want to feel it.” He sucked one of her nipples then shifted so he kept pressure on her eager clit with his thumb and penetrated her with his other fingers.
Her pussy gripped him as she held on to his arm, her hips thrusting against his hand. He wanted to come so badly he had to count backward from a hundred to keep from doing that very thing. He rode out her burst of fluid and the tight pulse of her sex then moved his lips off her nipple and up her neck to her lips.
“Beautiful,” he said, his voice hoarse. “God, but I have missed you, my Elisa.”
She reached down to stroke him but he stopped her.
“No. I’m on the edge already, but I’m not coming anywhere but inside you.” He sucked the essence of her off his fingers, watching her turn around, put her hands on the pallets, spread her legs and arch her back.
When he gripped her hips and slid slowly into the soft glove of her body, something in his mind dinged, pushing through the thick cloud of lust that currently fogged his logical mind. She arched more, giving him that angle he craved, the one that made him feel buried balls-deep inside her. He withdrew just as slowly, relishing both the sensation of it and the sight when he looked down and watched. He moved faster and faster until his entire universe exploded behind his eyes and he had to go up on his toes with the force of his climax.
Shivering in its aftermath, he draped himself over her thin frame, holding her close while their bodies continued to move. He placed small kisses along both her shoulders, lifting her hair to get at the sweet nape of her neck, until she shifted forward, releasing his still-hard dick and turning to face him.
“Thank you,” she said, her voice gone small and odd again. She put her fingers to his lips then dragged them down his beard. “This is messy. You should clean it up before you go up North.”
He blinked, confused, still horny but willing to wait since she seemed to have punched through their wall with this little encounter. She reached down for her shirt and jeans then helped him put himself back together between teasing kisses and sexy whispers.
“Hey,” he said, once his brain released that thing he’d realized right before he’d lost it in the midst of his monster orgasm. “You taste different.”
She raised an eyebrow. “I’m about to have a period. That must be it. What did you make? It smells good.”
“No, it’s not that. It’s more like… Hey! What’re you doing? Maybe I was saving that for a surprise.”
He ran over to the cooler she’d just walked into, forgetting for a second that she tasted like she had when she’d been pregnant with Liesl—something distinctly different from the usual monthly cycle. She was eyeing the hand-lettered label of one bottle with skepticism. “I thought you were making a Kölsch. What did you use that for?” She pointed to the juicer he’d cleaned and stored in one corner. “And what in the world is this name about?” She pointed to the words Adjunct Lovers, her eyes stormy.
Ross took the bottle from her, then her hand and led her back out into the warehouse. No time like the present. He took two clean glasses down from the metal shelf, opened the bottle and poured out the servings.
Elisa clicked on a lamp and glared down at her glass. “What,” she demanded, pointing to it but not picking it up. “In the name of all that is right with the German purity law, is that?”
“That, my beloved uptight German babe, is a Kölsch that was fermented with the addition of the fresh juice of about a zillion guavas. Oh, with a bunch of the pulp infused in it as well.” He held up his glass, admiring the perfect color again. “I made it for you, my love.”
She crossed her arms, still not touching her glass. “You put fruit in my Kölsch.” She didn’t phrase it as a question. “What kind of a barbarian have you become?”
He chuckled, tasted it then rolled the chilled glass between his hands. “It’s even better when it gets a little warmer.”
“You’re one sick puppy, Hoffman. I am not drinking that…that abomination.” She took a step back.
“Say what you will but this is the way of the brewing future, my inked-up treasure. We must learn to evolve and be flexible within it.” He downed the drink, noting that it had changed even in the hour since he’d bottled it. If anything, it was better—more complex, more a blend of the light malts, hops and fruit. And the color had also deepened, moving toward a deeper pink. “Look. It’s the same color as your…” He jerked his chin at her. She blushed bright red. Delighted, he moved closer and put his hand between her legs, feeling the warmth of her pussy. “I made it this color on purpose, Elisa. For you.”
She sighed and kissed him but shook her head when he offered her glass to her. “I’m sorry. But no. One of us has to adhere to the Reinheitsgebot. I guess that’s going to be me.” She stroked his still hard dick outside his shorts, making him shudder and put the glass down so he didn’t drop it. “I’m going home. I suggest you put that nasty shit away and join me. Try not to get killed on that horrible contraption on your way?” She raised an eyebrow as she slid her hand up his shirt and pinched his nipple. “If you’re going away tomorrow for the whole weekend, I want to get my fill of you first.”
“We need to talk, Elisa,” he said, grabbing her hand and keeping her close. “Now. Not that I don’t want to fill you up some more, of course.”
She grinned and raised her lips to his. “I am sorry. And I’ve just today hired a new chef. So, I’ll only be here every other Saturday, starting this weekend.”
He frowned. “But…you love it here. And I’m not about to be that guy—the one who makes you choose between me and your job.”
“So, you’re withdrawing your ultimatum then?” She kissed his neck.
He closed his eyes, loving the feel of her in his arms, the sound of her voice in his ears.
“Yes. Consider it stupidly offered and eagerly withdrawn.”
She pulled back and eyed him. “You were right, though.”
“Hold the phone,” he yelped, reaching back to turn off the lamp. He preferred seeing her lit only by the moonlight. “I’m right? Hell, yeah.” He gave a little fist pump then slanted his lips over hers, probing with his tongue, delighting in the way she pressed against him, eager for him again.
“No, no, stop.” She broke away and took a step back from him, hands on her hips. “I need to say this.” She looked at the floor, then up at him, her odd-shaded eyes shining in the dark. “You were wrong to make this into some kind of a contest between you and my work at the restaurant. Between my family and my work. That was stupid and selfish and it made me very angry.”
“No? Really?” He leaned back against the desk, sipping at her serving of Adjunct Lovers.
“Don’t be an ass. Just listen.”
He nodded and continued to sip.
She took a deep breath. “I think that I’m putting off a wedding because I wanted to make sure.” She paused. He kept his mouth shut, although he wanted to yell at her. “To make sure that you were happy with me, with us, with our life. And when you kept getting so mad at me for focusing on the restaurant—which was your idea—”
He held up both hands. “I know, I know, I know, already. Go on.”
“Well, I just thought…well, I worried that you’d never be satisfied with me. That I’d keep making the wrong decisions and making you mad and…oh, shit.” She swiped at her eyes. “I promised myself I wouldn’t do this.”
Guilt filled his gut, roiling up his chest and into his throat, turning the delicious beer he’d had to acid. “Elisa, I’m new at this. I mean…” He cleared his throat. “Other than Evelyn, I’ve never spent more than two, maybe three nights with a woman in my life. I thought that was the best way. So I could be, you know, footloose or whatever. Uncommitted. Unconnected.”
She nodded then gave a quick shiver.
“Come here, you stubborn god damned woman.” She went into his arms, wrapped hers around his waist and buried her face into his chest. He rested his chin on the top of her head and kept talking. “Until Evelyn, I never wanted to spend more than a night or two with the same woman. And you know how that ended with her. And then, all of a sudden, God, or karma, or fate or something dropped this skinny, smart-assed, too-big-for-her-britches lady brewer in my path and I, all of a sudden, didn’t want to ever spend a night away from her.” She leaned back, keeping her arms around his waist. He nodded and kissed the jewel in her upraised eyebrow. “But we got to some weird point, you know? There was the baby, which distracted me. And the restaurant, which distracted you. And then one day I woke up and wanted you around more. A new sensation for me, you see.”
She leaned in to him again and he was reminded once more of the unique nature of her taste. Deciding to leave that for a different discussion, since this one was so loaded already, he disentangled them and held on to her arms, peering into her eyes and willing her to understand what he was attempting to relay. “I don’t know how this part of a relationship works, Elisa. I’ve never been here. Never thought I wanted to be here, but God help me, I do. I really fucked it up with that ignorant ultimatum. I’m sorry.”
She nodded and sniffled.
“I’m sorry, too. And I have to say something else.” She wiped her lips and faced him squarely. “You, Ross, are not to blame for Liesl’s allergy episode. That wasn’t your fault. It would have happened no matter where she was or who she was with. I thank God every day since then that you were with her because no one could have handled it better than you did.”
He stiffened as memories of that horror show filled his brain like poisonous smoke. He didn’t realize he’d closed his eyes until she told him to open them. “I adore you, Ross Hoffman. You are my hero. My rock. My Viking. My love.” She picked up his hand and kissed his palm, then put it alongside her face. “I am sorry. And I promise never to do that again.”
“You promise never to get mad at me again? That’s rich.”
She let go of him and smacked his arm. “You know what I mean,” she said with a glance over his shoulder. “And go ahead and pour me some of that treacle. Austin told me he was going to let you brew it there so I’d better check your method before you go and screw up thousands of gallons of perfectly nice Kölsch instead of only ten of them.”
He grinned and poured them both a fresh glass. She took it, sniffed it and by the light of the moon, he saw her dubious expression change to surprise. She sniffed again then took a small sip, doing the same thing he’d done—shifting it to the back of her tongue, then swallowing. “Hmmm,” she said, taking a larger sip and moving it around her mouth. “It’s got kind of a shandy-esque thing going on, doesn’t it? But I still get the dryness of the hops you used. Not bad, Hoffman. Not too bad at all.”
He grinned around the rim of his glass but let her keep tasting without his editorial comment. “I mean, the nose is all ‘Pow!’” She sniffed again. “Here I am! The fruit in your beer!” She sipped again, then once more. Her smile lit up his heart. “By God, Hoffman, you didn’t ruin this Kölsch, you…you enhanced it. It’s…fucking incredible.” She drained the glass and stuck it out for more. He filled them both and pulled her onto his lap in the Eames chair and they drank and talked and drank and talked, and for the first time in weeks Ross believed once more that his life was, indeed, perfect.