Love, Chocolate, and Beer (Cactus Creek #1)(74)

“But it’s unfeasible. At least for our business. We’d be in the red the entire time.”

“So what’s the alternative? Attempt to rebuild everything we have here somewhere else? And I’m not just talking about the shop.” Luke shoved his hands through his hair in frustration.

Quinn banged her fists on her desk. “I can’t believe he’s being such an opportunistic dick!”

Luke sighed. “That’s the part you’re going to really hate. See, Noah owns most of the commercial property here in town. Remember how I told you Dani mentioned that some of the mom-and-pop businesses are having a tough time keeping up? Well, even without selling, by just accepting that third winery’s offer, he can help five of those businesses from shutting their doors. He doesn’t like the reality of increasing our lease to keep theirs feasible, but there it is. Plus, with the isolation of some of his properties—”

“Don’t tell me, Dan and Barb’s little grocery store?”

“Yep. If they shut down, it’s unlikely he’d get another tenant for a one-story building in the middle of nowhere, which would force him to sell the whole lot. If he did, he thinks a big box store might be the only one to offer. Apparently, they’ve been sniffing around. Despite my hating the position he’s putting us in, I do admire his doing what he can to prevent those kinds of city changes around here. He won’t say it but I think he has a soft spot for small-town life.”

Quinn flipped her head back in defeat. “You’re right. Now I really hate this guy.”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “Me too.” But honestly, he didn’t. Noah was truly a class act. Not only had he offered a more than generous deferred payment extension on the collateral loan so Luke wouldn’t lose his recipes, but he’d also prepared an extensively researched list of comparable relocation properties.

Quinn’s gaze fell back down to the ground and stayed there. “Luke, I just don’t think...”

“I know,” he broke in quietly. There was no way he could ask Quinn to take this sort of risk, this kind of sacrifice. Yet again. “I know,” he repeated more to himself. This was an impossible choice before them. While staying would in fact mean operating in the red, leaving would flush the thousands they‘d invested in this new shop right down the toilet.

Damned if we do, damned if we don’t.

Studying her pained expression, he added with as much hope as he could muster, “But we have a few months to come up with an alternative to maybe finding a way around…that.” That being exactly what they were both thinking.

Luke frowned and looked away. The reality of the situation was staring them both down and winning. Because no matter which route they decided to take, they both knew there could be a shared outcome he never thought he’d ever have to face.

The end of their business partnership.





CHAPTER THIRTEEN


DANI STARED at the coffee dripping into carafe. Her head was a mess—her heart too.

She needed to come clean with Luke.

A task infinitely more difficult with each Valentine surprise the crazy man doled out.

Every few days for the past two weeks, just when the high of the last surprise would wear off enough for her to man up enough to try and tell him, BAM, he would sweep her off her feet with another touchingly sentimental gift or gesture. He was impossible.

And she was falling irretrievably more in love with him every day.

The fact that he was working so hard to stay positive about his business situation was just compounding her guilt. He downplayed it a lot, telling her ‘the small lease increase’ was the reason for his being more stressed than usual lately. She couldn’t very well call him on it and say that she knew it was more than a ‘small increase’ without explaining everything.

So she kept putting it off. Even though the whole thing was making her crazy.

What made this all especially tough was the shortage of available sane people to save her from her burgeoning madness. She couldn’t go to Derek because she was probably the last person he wanted to talk to these days—and the guilt still ripping her up on that front really shouldn’t be in the same room as her Luke-guilt. Of course there was always Rylan. But knowing that Quinn would surely kill him for keeping this sort of thing from her put him on the bench as well. That left Xoey. Ah Xoey, with her life philosophy that we should all be a) unafraid to jump into love ass first and b) unashamed to ‘exchange if not satisfied’ every ninety days.

Again, there were no sane people to help her through this.

It didn’t help matters any that lately Xoey seemed to think Dani’s life was a soap opera she could tune into on demand. So now, instead of talking during their regular doughnut and coffee weekly breakfasts like they used to, Xoey was totally obsessed with grilling Dani about Luke’s latest Valentine instead. And that was before she knew about the photos—

Speak of the devil. The sound of a key turning her front door lock had Dani pouring the coffee. Without even a hello, Xoey put down the doughnut box, settled on the couch, and held out her hands expectantly. Dani sighed and handed over the keepsake photo album Luke had insisted she keep when he’d first started his romantic crusade. Last week, Dani had made the colossal mistake of mentioning the album to Xoey, which of course, led to Xoey spending every day since being a royal pain about it being available for her viewing pleasure today.