“I didn’t stay over!” Paige blurted out before I could say a single word, standing up so quickly she nearly knocked over the creamer. “I just came by to get some old papers and letters for the historical society, and the breakfast was out, and well, Hunter just insisted that I stay and have a bite…”

“Oh. Oh, right.” Of course she hadn’t stayed over. Not my strait-laced sister.

Relief flooded me, but it was doomed to be a short-lived relief as my brain piped up helpfully that Paige’s defensiveness suggested she must have a certain desire to stay over, even if she hadn’t acted on it. My traitor of a brain further added that wait, what was I doing feeling relieved, anyway? Paige and Hunter were consenting adults, they could do what they wanted. My feelings didn’t matter.

They didn’t matter one little bit.

“Well, I’ll just leave you to that snooze-fest of a discussion, then—” I said as casually as I could—it felt like trying to talk around an open wound—while I used all my willpower to walk instead of run over to the counter to grab a bagel before making a dignified retreat.

Unfortunately for that whole ‘dignified retreat’ plan, Hunter came into the dining room at that very moment.

Seriously, what was it with that man and timing?

“Ah, Ally, won’t you join us for breakfast?”

“Nah, I’m good,” I said, starting to back away. “I’ve got a lot of work to do…”

“Really? Martha was just telling me that you’d spent half the night doing work. You ought to refuel before you collapse.”

The man had a point.

He saw me wavering and added, “A shipment of mangos came in this morning…”

Shit. I really loved mangos.

Also, I was this close to fainting.

Also also, if I didn’t tell someone who actually got it about my ideas, I might actually literally explode.

“Well, alright,” I said, sitting down.

“I’ll go fetch the food!” Paige said, and before Hunter or I could protest that she was a guest, not our servant, she was in the next room; in the next breath she returned bearing a platter of sliced mangos and blueberries and strawberries and a pitcher of coffee. “The crepes are almost done, cook says.”

She scraped enough mango slices onto my plate to keep a small orchard in business, and for a few minutes I occupied myself with getting enough of that sticky syrupy goodness into my insides as was humanly possible. Then the dam burst, and I began to tell Hunter all the ideas that had been percolating in my brain overnight.

Hunter started off the conversation leaning back in his chair, a detached smirk on his face.

Three minutes in, he was leaning across the table toward me, his eyes lit with interest, gesturing almost as wildly as me as he expanded on the ideas and tossed out names of artistic types he knew who might be able to help us get the product in on time.

He had some good suggestions, but also a few that showed he knew as much about the advertising business as I did about traditional Chinese tea-brewing, and I was so involved in shooting down the more disastrous ones—and, okay, maybe also a little distracted by the way his eyes flashed when he was impassioned, and how he leaned forward, subconsciously rolling up his sleeves and revealing those toned biceps— that almost all the food was gone from the table before I realized that neither of us had given Paige a chance to speak all breakfast.

“Shit, I’m monopolizing this whole thing, aren’t I?” I said, breaking off to look at Paige. “And you drove out here for that society thing and everything.”

“Oh, don’t apologize,” Paige insisted. “I’ve got everything I need, and I love to see my little sister at work.” She stood, giving me a hug around the shoulders. “Not enough to miss a shift at the florist shop, though, so I’m going to beat it and leave the fine detail to you guys without my supervision. See you next week at Mom’s dinner?”

“Can you think of a way to get me out of it?” I said with a sigh, and Paige laughed.

“Let me walk you to the car,” Hunter said eagerly, standing and helping Paige into her jacket.

“Why, thank you, Mr. Knox.”

“Please, call me Hunter, I insist.”

The cook brought in more food then, steaming and fresh from the griddle, but even a platter of bacon and blueberry pancakes with chocolate syrup, eye-catching though they might be, couldn’t distract me from the sight of Hunter walking my sister out, his hand on the small of her back.

He leaned close to her, murmuring something in her ear that I couldn’t catch.

But I did catch Paige’s delighted giggle.

I looked at the bounty spread out before me, food more elaborate and delicious than any I’d ever had the privilege to eat before, and suddenly, I wasn’t hungry at all.

I felt a lot like being sick, to be honest.

Then I saw Hunter turning back from the car towards the house, and I hastily speared something and put it in my mouth. It tasted like ashes, but I chewed furiously. I couldn’t let him guess how I was feeling.

Hunter sauntered back into the room as casual as a cat. “How’s the food?”

“Fine!” I said, not looking up. I could feel his gaze on me, scrutinizing me, and I took another bite of food, a bite so casual it could have been written up for violating dress code. “So. What do you think about the pitch?”

“Honestly?” He paused, and I tried not to hold my breath. “I love it.”

I looked up, startled. “Wait, really?”

I mean, I knew the pitch was great. But I was so used to having to fight to prove myself that I’d thought I would have to fight him, too.

“Hell yes,” Hunter said. His grin was wide and unaffected. “You actually get it—the tradition of the family, how to honor that legacy while bringing it into the future. I’m one hundred percent behind that.”

His words lit a warm fire in my chest, the sweet warmth of validation enfolding me like a wool blanket.

I was good at my job. I knew that. But it was nice to hear someone else say it.

“Where to begin?” he said, almost to himself. “There’s so much to do, and the board’s been fretting for ages, they’re already impatient, got to have something to show them—but can’t neglect Chuck, he’s on my ass about deadlines and revenue, if he gets an excuse…”

I cut in. “What about a sizzle reel?” I suggested.

Hunter gave me a look so blank it could have used a name tag.

“A long ad,” I clarified. “Like a movie trailer, except…for advertising.”

“Of course, of course.” He still didn’t look sold, though.

“It’s the perfect way to showcase the new direction,” I went on. “We can get the cameras in here, get the board to see what we see in these grounds, in the distillery—we can capture that sense of history, that love—”

I bit my lip, as if I could keep that word from having leapt out of my mouth.

Hunter didn’t seem to have noticed. “We need the rebrand by the anniversary party, though. Can you have it done by then?”

I raised an eyebrow in my best Scarlett O’Hara fashion. “Mr. Knox, you are talking to the person who finished a sizzle reel for Ladybird Lipsticks in three days on a budget that wouldn’t buy you half a shoestring. On this, I won’t even break a sweat. In fact—” the idea came to me in a flash of light—“we should theme the anniversary party around it. That will show the board how serious you are about this whole thing!”

Hunter grinned, grabbing my hand to press his perfect lips to it. “Allison Bartlett, you are absolutely brilliant.”

I grinned up at him like my face was fit to bust, my heart soaring high above me. Everything was perfect. I was on top of the world.

Then Hunter ruined everything.

“And Paige could help!” he suggested, dropping my hand to reach for his cell phone. “Event planning, that’s her thing, right?”

That soaring heart of mine? Plummeted faster than a hot air balloon that someone’s taken a cannon to.

“Sure,” I said through gritted teeth and a smile that felt like it had been shellacked on. “That’s totally her thing. What a great idea.”

“Oh no, did I stumble into a sister argument?” Hunter asked, still grinning that annoyingly hot grin. He could at least have the decency to look ugly when I was angry with him. “Was it her thing first, and then you decided you wanted it to be your thing, and then she wanted her thing back, so you had to compromise with a different thing—”

“It’s none of your goddamn business!” I snapped.

There was a moment of pure frozen silence.

I had overreacted. I wasn’t supposed to care. I couldn’t let Hunter know I cared.

I turned away, trying to pretend that I just wanted more coffee, and that I wasn’t hiding the tears trying to escape from my eyes.

Hunter’s hand rested gently on my shoulder. “Ally…”

“It’s nothing,” I insisted. I forced a shaky laugh. “You know how I am before I get my morning java…”

“Ally,” Hunter said again, and his voice was as gentle and concerned as his hand. I wanted to let him hold me tight and soothe me with his voice. “Tell me the truth. Are you really okay with me seeing your sister? I don’t want to hurt you.”

Was that hope in his voice? Oh, I wanted it to be hope so much, I wanted him to want me as much as I wanted him. I could feel the heat from his hand through the fabric of my shirt, and oh, I wanted, I needed that hand on my skin, stroking me, caressing me, pulling me against his strong, hard body as if he never planned to let me go…

But he didn’t want me. He wanted Paige. Anything else I thought I heard was just me being delusional.

“You aren’t hurting me,” I said, and through the haze of pain I was proud of how steady my voice was. “I’m completely fine with you dating Paige. In fact, I couldn’t think of anything better.”

With that, I choked down the rest of my coffee and made a private resolution to keep my nose to the grindstone and let my workaholism block out any inconvenient emotions for the duration of this project. I could do that. Sure I could.