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“Sammy, I don’t understand.” I open my palms, scared of what lies in my hands. “I don’t want this. Take it back.” It feels like I’m holding a bomb.
“I can’t.” His eyes are shriveled like dried-up prunes. “Listen to me.” As he leans in, his voice turns ominous, black. “They are going to take you if you don’t run. If you don’t run, Delilah, you are next.”
Before I can speak, Sammy reaches behind him and pulls out a gun.
My eyes flash wide.
Ashen, his lips part. “I’m sorry, Lady. I’m so goddamn sorry.”
I flinch, scrabbling backward on my hands and heels, waiting for the bullet to tear through my skin.
“Please, don’t. Please don’t do this…”
A ghoulish smile spreads across Sammy’s mouth as he lifts the gun, puts it beneath his chin, and pulls the trigger.
1 Cole
She’s fucking gorgeous. Clean, sexy lines. All curves. No leaks. Just the way I like it. My hands move over smooth wood planks made from American white oak. The gorgeous honey color of the stave. Its smoke and vanilla scent. There’s nothing like raising a barrel.
Nothing like a good glass of whiskey.
The whiskey that’s in my blood. That fuels the fire in my veins.
It’s my legacy, my curse, and what pulled me back home six months ago after a successful bull-riding career.
Long before bulls or women, it was always whiskey.
Weston Whiskey.
Black tattoos flexing on my forearms, I pull long staves of wood from their shelves, then lay them out in a geometric pattern. Every single barrel is tabled to ensure there’s no leaning. Despite the neon orange sponges in my ears, I can hear the chatter of my raisers, the hum of the machines, and the croon of Randy Travis’s voice from the speaker.
My father, a fourth-generation rancher, loved woodworking. When he and my uncle started Weston Whiskey in their twenties, my father wanted to make barrels himself. He was the first to build a cooperage in Montana since Prohibition. He trained all of us on whiskey, but I was his only son to take an interest in building the barrels. By the time I was fourteen, he was proclaiming me the fastest raiser he’d ever seen.
“It’s your birthright, Cole,” my father told me as we laid out those pieces of wood in our barn. He passed me his glass of whiskey and let me steal a sip, even though I was underage. “It’s in your blood. It’s up to you to carry on this tradition.”
A promise I failed at. A promise I intend to right.
At the sound of laughter, I tug the sponges out of my ears.
Bo and Leon, two of the raisers who work under me, snicker as they toss scrap wood in a bucket.
Cy, another member of our team, adjusts his protective glasses. A smirk twitches his lips. “You gonna make love to that barrel, boss, or…?”
“You want to be on this team?” I counter with a glare. “That means you shut your mouth and work. I won’t have bullshit in my coop.”
Cy gulps. “Yes sir.”
Tucking the sponges back in my ears, I keep my eyes on the guys, making sure they get back to the barrels. I take pride in the handcrafted process. By now it’s science. I could raise barrels in my sleep. In ten years, I’ve never had a leak.
With a crew of four, we make four hundred barrels a week at Weston Whiskey. Most we use to age our whiskey; the rest we sell to bring in additional income for the ranch.
I wipe sweat from my brow, tuning out the world around me, the low conversation from my guys. I assemble the staves—thirty-one of them—into the temporary steel ring, making sure they’re evenly distributed. The width, the size, the wood, it all comes into play to create that perfect barrel.
A crunching sound and soft voices drift from outside. I grit my teeth and look up, catching sight of my youngest brother, Wells. He leads a group of tourists through the open garage door. Our two distillery cats, Waldo and Jelly Belly, lazily trail after the tour.
Lifting a hand, I motion for Cy to stop the saw.
I tug the earplugs from my ears as the group filters into the room and give Wells a glare. He knows better than bringing a group back when I’m here. All I want to do is raise barrels, not make conversation with strangers.
