The Bluff (Graham Brothers, #2)(89)

Decided, I square my shoulders. “Could I talk to you for a minute?”

James stops mopping and leans on the handle, looking as exhausted as he does frustrated. I want to walk over and brush the hair out of his eyes. But my James Graham manual tells me touching him right now isn’t what he needs.

“I’m really sorry about earlier,” I say. “I should have anticipated—”

“It’s not your fault.” The way James says this seems to imply he thinks it’s his fault. Which is wrong, wrong, wrong.

I shake my head. “We can agree to disagree on that. Anyway—I’ve got pie to go along with my apology.” I hold it out, but James only eyes it warily. So much for softening him up. I set it down on the table which, only an hour ago, held all the desserts. Fishing my laptop out of my bag, I locate a folding chair and set it up in front of the table.

“Can I show you something?”

James seems to be thinking, and his eyes soften a little as his gaze moves over me. With a bone-weary sigh, he says, “Sure.”

I indicate the chair. “Want to sit?”

“Standing is fine.” He leans the mop against a wall and crosses his arms over his chest.

Tough crowd. Guess this is as receptive as he’s going to get. I can only hope he’ll lighten up when he sees what I’ve made for him.

“First of all, I want to say thank you for being willing to host today. I had hoped it would be a preview of things to come.” I grimace. “Without the whole fire-marshal-kicking-everyone-out bit.”

James doesn’t smile. I draw in a breath and pull up the presentation I’ve been working so hard on this week.

“Since today didn’t go as planned, I have something else to show you.” I click the mousepad to pull up the slideshow fully on the screen. “I’ve been working on something of a launch plan for Dark Horse.”

He flinches at the phrase launch plan, but I still think it’s going to be fine. I mean, who WOULDN’T flinch at the idea of a launch plan after a disaster like today? I start moving through the slides, walking him through each point of the plan, the timelines, the budgets, my suggestions—all of it. I have an outline for all the social media, for PR, and other grassroots marketing.

There is a whole section on different themed events Dark Horse could host, as well as ideas for the tasting room and a potential expansion into the connected back building, which as of now, will be empty. We could have a whole wall of board games for people to play or a collection of vintage arcade games—functions for the space itself beyond the beer to keep people here and happy. I am nothing if not a fount of ideas, and after the conference, I have been overflowing with them.

I’m not sure how it’s possible for a person to grow MORE silent, but I swear, James’s silence is expanding like some kind of black hole. It’s sucking all the air out of the room, which I’m sure is why I’m practically panting as I reach the just-over-halfway point. His silence is starting to suck away my confidence too, and I mess up the slides, accidentally skipping ahead to one showing financials, which finally gets a reaction out of James.

Not one I’d like, since his eyes go wide and his jaw finally opens. It’s more of an unhinging, and I’m thankful when he snaps it closed again. I was a little afraid it was going to hit the floor.

“Don’t worry about those numbers just yet. Pretend you didn’t see them.” I wave my hand in front of me, Jedi style. “Those weren’t the numbers you were looking for,” I say, realizing I am not simply crashing and burning like a plane. I’m crashing and burning like a meteor passing through the earth’s atmosphere. I’m about to make impact, and I think the crater from my landing is going to be visible from space.

“Harper and Collin helped with this part, so we just made some projections based on Collin’s gym.” I had spectral phone calls with James’s siblings this week, getting help with some of the finer details regarding finances and expenses James never shared with me.

“You talked to my family about this?”

The harshness of his tone hits my bloodstream like an infection, like a poison. I’ve been able to stave off his bad vibe with the force of my hope. But now, everything in me sinks as I realize the colossal misjudgment I’ve made.

I shift on my feet, digging my fingernails into my palm. “They were able to fill in the blanks on some of the things I don’t know offhand,” I say, knowing how defensive I sound.

“You didn’t think to ask me if I wanted them involved in that?”

“They’re your family. On top of that, they’re investors and had the original business plan with all the numbers I haven’t seen. I just thought—”

“You thought wrong.”

I swallow and take a step back, my hand hovering over my laptop. My brain scrambles, seeking a way to salvage this. If I could just get back on track, I could show him the examples of other successful breweries I put together and the—

James slices a hand through the air. “Just stop.”

“But I haven’t gotten to the part where—”

“Just … stop.” James’s hands drag through this hair, and his eyes are wild. “I can’t do this with you.”

BOOM. Impact of my crashing and burning is more painful than I thought. I swear, those few words from James have my teeth rattling and my bones aching. Because they sound much, much bigger than a reaction about my slideshow. There is a finality to them, a resignation that has my nerves firing and my stomach bottoming out.