Page 4 of Wild Return
Lights buzz overhead, illuminating the rows of wooden bar stools and tables. Sydney strides between them to the double doors of the main entrance. She pulls on the doors, checking they’re locked.
“Charlie shuts everything down at the end of the day, but I always give it a check.”
She speaks in a clipped and professional tone. She’s got her armor up, and I didn’t help matters by pulling her hair earlier like some kid in the schoolyard.
I stride to the double doors and pull on them, making them shake.
Sydney folds her arms over her chest and glares at me. “You just saw me check them.”
I scan the edges of the door, looking for signs of forced entry and weak points. With two kegs missing in the past month, it’s got to be theft, which is why I’ll be spending my nights on site for the foreseeable future.
“Just doing my job.”
She huffs out a breath and strides toward the door that leads back to the brewery floor. I’m halfway across the room when she flicks out the lights. The sudden darkness disorients me, and my foot catches on a bar stool. There’s the scrape of metal against floor as my knee connects with the stool.
“Fuck.”
I hear a pleased huff from Sydney and smile despite the throb in my knee. She wants to forgive me, but I’ll have to endure pain and humiliation first. Fair enough, for what I did to her.
I follow the thin streak of light to the brewery floor and find Sydney waiting with a smirk on her face.
“How long you gonna keep punishing me for, cupcake?”
Her smirk turns to a frown, and she turns away. “As long as it takes.”
The door between the tasting room and the brewery floor is made of thick metal. Sydney heaves it shut and slams the bolt home.
“The tasting room entrance is for the public. Once it’s shut for the day, this can be locked up.”
I fall into step beside her as she strides across the brewery room floor and to a silver panel linked to the tanks.
“This is the fermenter gauge. In the high season we have a night shift running, but at other times, Barrels has a remote link. But I like to give it a check before I leave.”
“Barrels said you like to work late.”
She peers at the fermenter gauge and punches in a number. “Did he now?”
She’s not giving anything away. I want to ask why she works so hard. If it’s because she doesn’t have anyone to go home to. But I steer the conversation to something safer.
“I hear you got back into town six months ago.”
She raises her eyebrows. “You seem to know a lot about me.”
I’ve kept track of Sydney’s every move for the last four years, but if I tell her that now, she’s likely to accuse me of stalking her. “And that you moved in with your brother. How is Nate?”
The fermenter gauge beeps, and she turns a dial one notch to the left.
“He’s just gotten married again. Hang around long enough and you’ll meet his new wife.”
She snaps the lid shut and strides to the next tank.
I press my lips together and ignore the dig.
“Have you worked at the brewery since you got back?”
“I thought you knew everything about me?”
I lean against the wall and watch her pressing buttons and adjusting like a pro. It doesn’t surprise me that six months in and she’s practically running the place. Sydney is smart and competent, and Barrels obviously trusts her. She’s the operations manager, and when he told me that, I swelled with pride. Sydney’s come a long way in four years. And she won’t admit it, but she might not have done if she had been saddled with me.
