"Did you order enough?" He clicked on the link and peered at the screen.
"I ordered what you told me to order," I said. "Then a little more, because I didn't think it was enough."
He swung his face away from the screen to scowl at me. "You didn't think?"
I forced myself to hold my ground and not take a step back. "It's going to be a big weekend. Riley and I are?—"
He cut me off. "Did you think to check with me?" His tone was cooler than the cool room where the kegs were stored.
"You were resting," I said, trying to match his tone. Either he trusted me to run the place in his absence, or he didn't. Middle ground was something we rarely found between us.
"I was approachable by text, as you know. Even if you had to wait a few hours for a response." His chair creaked beneath him as he sat back.
"I made the call," I said. "I did what needed to be done. Like I said, this is going to be a big weekend. If we run out, who are they going to blame?"
"You," he said flatly. "Because you were running the Frosty Brew in my absence."
"Exactly," I said, just as blunt. "And I'd shoulder that blame. I made a decision that meant I wouldn’t have to do that. We won't run out." I closed my mouth before I added 'you're fucking welcome.' He probably saw it on my face.
He and I were uncomfortably alike at times. I looked like him and I had his temper. And his inability to back down from a fight. Us Ferguson men were as stubborn as they came.
He nodded once, sharply. As close as he'd ever get to agreeing with me. Fuck forbid he'd admit I was right. Asshole.
"It better be a big weekend." He turned back to his computer.
My heart dipped. I'd never admit he was right either. In this case, there was a possibility he was. But only a possibility. A busload of tourists was due within the next couple of hours, but they'd pulled out this late in the past. Sometimes the road up here got impassable. Fallen tree. Ice. Or the bus broke down. Any number of unforeseen things could fuck with the whole weekend. None of that would be my fault, but I'd get the blame, regardless.
"It will be," I said. If I had to drive everyone up here on the back of a quad bike, one by one, that's what I'd do. If only to prove to him I wasn't the dumbass he seemed to think I was. If I didn't look like him, I really would wonder if I was adopted. He seemed to care a whole lot more about Whitney than me. Fair enough, I cared more about her than I did about him too, but she was my sister. A parent shouldn't choose one kid over the other. Because she went away to university and I didn't, who gave a shit? Him, obviously. Yet, he still insisted I'd take over the pub someday.
What the fuck was with that? Either he trusted me or he didn't.
"Who's that girl who was helping?" He didn't look up at me while he spoke.
I should have known he'd hear about Leah lending a hand in his absence. He probably had a camera behind the bar, watching our every move. I should have had Riley eat her out there, so he could watch. Maybe I still would.
I shrugged. "She's a friend of Whitney’s." Since Whitney could do no wrong in his eyes, he'd have a higher opinion of Leah as her friend than mine.
"Oh yeah?" Now he glanced over like he didn't believe me. "She new in town?"
"Does it matter?" I asked. "She was here when she was needed. Even took food to Gavin with Fiona." My dad and Gavin Clarke went way back, like everyone else in this place.
Dad grunted. "I like to know who's coming and going in my pub."
"I would have texted you to let you know, but we were busy," I said.
That was bullshit, I wasn't going to text him to ask his permission for Leah to help. I didn't need his approval to spend time with her. Since he only gave his approval grudgingly, I'd learned to more or less live without it. That didn't stop him from withholding it as often as possible.
"Don't knock her up," he said.
I smirked. He'd gotten my mother pregnant when they were both seventeen. They married when they were eighteen, right before she lost that baby. They'd been making each other miserable ever since.
I'd never bring up the subject with him, but I suspected he cheated, at least a couple of times. With tourists, of course, because gossip spreads faster than wildfire in a town like this. For all I knew, he had another couple of kids out there he didn't know about. Whatever, he wouldn't give a shit about them any more than he did about me. Unless they were highly paid lawyers or doctors or some shit. Then they'd be his new favourite child.
"I have no intention of knocking her up," I said. Not for a while anyway. We had plenty of time for that. Or for adopting. Pregnancy would be hell for her arthritis. I wouldn't put her through that. I wanted all of her, her body, mind and heart; not for her to suffer. She belonged on the back of my quad bike, or riding my cock, not lying in bed in pain.
Besides, I wouldn't want any kid to inherit my asshole gene.
"Good. Tell Riley not to knock her up either." He gave me the briefest glance.
