Page 5 of It Happened in Vegas

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SNOOTY EXPERT

KEATON

I leftmy truck parked where it was and strolled down the main street of Holly Creek. We grew up here, and I could mark each store by the families who owned them; nowadays more of my generation took over.

On the corner, down from Vivian’s, sat the hardware store run by my old high school buddy, Ace, and his father, Bruce. A combo hair salon and ladies’ boutique held court on the next block, run by the homecoming queen of my high school class and her mother. I passed Flora’s Diner, where Chelsea and Maisy’s mother must be baking peach pies by the smell of it spilling out into the street.

Neighbors and friends and family all waved hello and smiled, some stopping to talk and catch up on the news or the latest gossip along this main road through town. Blink and you’d miss out on a quaint place, the only home I’d known.

I wasn’t at all like Vivian, who studied in Paris and saw the world with her husband; hell I didn’t even possess a current passport, which was why I’d missed out on her elopement with Richard in Denmark.

She liked to remind me now and then that, at my age, I could uproot my home and business and live anywhere. She thoughtafter I completed filming on the reality show out in Denver that I’d be raring to upend my life, move away, and make sweeping changes. But why? I found contentment right here in Holly Creek.

Life since Brewed for Love aired brought plenty of changes, as it was. More tourists gravitated to the area, curious about me and my brewery, along with some crazy fans as well. I took the time to install better security around my home and at the Hops last year. And every single time I posted something online, it blew up with a group of ever-growing female fans.

Like that shirtless video of me chopping wood last fall—it went viral overnight. What the hell did women see that was so sexy about a man chopping wood? I still received requests in my DMs for more of that type of content.

I took it all in stride though, because at the core of it, I was still me. Keaton Kingston, proud of the business I built and excited for the future... and looking for love.

I didn’t find it on Brewed for Love, though. And despite keeping in touch with a lot of my friends from the show—the ladies in particular—I came to the conclusion that it was the wrong place to be looking for love to begin with.

My arrival at the Hops stopped my thoughts from going down the paltry rabbit hole of dating as a reality TV star, and the hot summer sun made me extra cranky about it all. Thankfully, inside, the cool air hit me like a reward for surviving. Air conditioning was my big splurge last year with some of my earnings from the show. One thing this converted Victorian home didn’t have.

I had surprised some people in town when I started remodeling this old mansion into a brewery. Set for destruction, I bought it at a tax sale for cheap. It’d seen better days. But it called to me the minute I stepped foot in it. I loved the old carved wood throughout and the wooden floors. It took about ayear of remodeling and adding on, but the end result was worth it as an eclectic mix of old and new.

We served light fare over lunch; but mostly the beer I brewed was the draw. For a Monday, the lunch crowd was thin, only a few regulars from town. Behind the counter, Jessa was polishing a row of glasses in her usual attentive way. Hard to say if she loved this place more than I did. I had several exceptional employees here, but I counted on her the most, like my right hand.

“Afternoon,” I said, stepping behind the bar.

“You’re back,” she replied, not looking up.

“Meeting ended quicker than I thought.” I sighed. “We’re getting a new logo and such, designed by Richard’s snooty new marketing expert.”

Jessa nodded toward my office with her chin. “You mean the snooty one sitting in your office chair right now?”

I blinked. “What?”

She smirked. “Better hurry. She could be marking her territory in there.”

I marched toward the office, heart already thudding with a weird mix of irritation and curiosity.

Sure enough, there was Sophie, comfortably settled in my chair at my desk, laptop open, a beer flight of four different brews next to her like she owned the place. She glanced up with her brown eyes crinkling, giving me a playful wave that should not have hit me so hard in the chest—but damn if it didn’t.

“You?” I stuttered.

“Yep. Your snooty new marketing expert.”

“You heard that?”

“Yes I did.” She chuckled and shook her head. She appeared so at ease in my chair, like she belonged there.

“Sorry,” I mumbled. “Didn’t think you’d be working from here. I must have missed that in the meeting.”

“Since I’m tasked with working hard to make your dreams of expansion come true, I can’t very well do that entirely off-site. There are things I’ll need to know and to test and to experience, in order to create the perfect marketing campaigns for you. Because that’s what snooty marketing experts do, in case you didn’t know.” She arched a brow with a tilt of her head, her lips curved and teasing.

I quickly recovered and leaned against the doorframe, one arm high above my head. I couldn’t miss the way she bit her lip. “It’s not exactly a spacious office for two.”

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