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Miller grabs my plate and fills it with tater tots. When he hands it back, he leans close to whisper in my ear. “Sorry to disappoint, but there is no piercing.”
What is he talking about? His breath against my skin and his earthy scent have short-circuited my brain. Piercings? What piercings?
Chapter 10
Is ‘I didn’t mean to do it’ a valid excuse in a court of law? ~ Text from Miller to Peace
Miller
“Happy birthday!” Elder sings as he drops a bunch of mail on my desk.
“It’s not our birthday.”
“I know.” He rubs his knuckles over my hair and I spring out of my chair to chase after him. No one messes with my hair.
“Nuh-uh,” he sings as he bolts. “It’s your day for admin duty.”
I swallow my growl and stop my pursuit. Elder’s right. I need to get the paperwork in order. Since both of us hate sitting behind a desk, we made a deal. We each devote one day a week to administrative tasks. Today is my lucky day.
I collapse in the chair and glare at my computer. I hate it. Technology is not my thing. Brody’s the computer genius in the family while I avoid all things electronic.
Out of the corner of my eye, I notice the pile of mail Elder dropped off. I sigh. At least it’s not email. I grab my letter opener. It has a mug of beer on the top of it and the logo forNaked Falls Brewingetched into the side.
The first letter is an advertisement for office supplies. Trash.
The second letter is an invoice from a bottle supplier. I put it in the pile of ‘shit to deal with’.
The third letter is a foreclosure notice. What the hell? What kind of scam is this? We lease the brewery building from Winter Falls. They can’t foreclose on us.
I smooth out the paper before grabbing my reading glasses. I make sure the door is shut before I settle them on my face. No one needs to know Miller Bragg wears old lady glasses in order to see enough to read.
Dear Ms. Spring,
Under the terms of your loan, we hereby notify you of the following. You are in default because you have failed to pay the required monthly installments. You are at risk of losing your home to foreclosure. If you do not bring the loan current, a foreclosure may be filed in court.
I drop the letter and rock back in my chair. Holy shit. Eden is broke. They’re threatening to foreclose on her house. But how? She must have used her home to secure a loan for her business.
Is this why she’s opposed to the expansion of the brewery? She’s hanging on for dear life? Why the hell didn’t she say anything?
I stand and grab the letter. I’ll go talk to her. We’ll work something out. I nearly make it to the door before I realize she’ll crucify me for reading her mail. But it was an accident. I snort. She’ll never believe me. Not with our history.
I can’t give her the letter when it’s already been opened.
Think, Miller. Think. There must be some way out of this. I scan the room and notice the pile of empty envelopes near the printer. Duh. I’ll put the letter in a brand-new envelope. Simple.
I stuff the eviction notice into another envelope. There. All good.
I’m at the door again when I realize this won’t work. The envelope is completely blank. There’s no delivery or return address on it. Eden would realize I opened her mail before the envelope touched her mailbox.
I grab a pen and write the address from the old envelope on the new one. I’m smiling at my good thinking when I realize the addresses were printed on the original envelope.
Not a problem. We have some labels somewhere. I’ll print out labels with the addresses and Eden will be none the wiser.
I switch on the computer and printer before placing a sheet of labels into the printer tray. I sit down behind the computer and freeze. Shit. I have no idea how to make a label. I only know we have the labels because Elder and I had a fight about him wasting money when he accidentally bought two boxes of them.
I Google how to print a label.Go to mailings and select labels. I search the taskbar but don’t find an icon for mailings. Where the hell are mailings?
I Google where to find mailings. Open a Word document and select Mailings from above. They could have mentioned opening a Word document before.
