Savor (Billionaire Bachelors Club #3)(41)
Author: Monica Murphy

“Slow your roll, my friend,” Gage says, shaking his head with a chuckle as I fall back into my chair, my head spinning. “You need to sober up first. Look at you, three shots of double vodka and you’re done for.”

“Whatever,” I mutter, my mind filled with images of Bryn. Smiling Bryn. Beige Bryn. Naked Bryn. Sad Bryn.

I frown. I never want to see sad Bryn again. I need to find her.

I need to go make that woman mine once and for all.

Chapter Fourteen

Bryn

“GIRL, YOU BETTER clean out that chicken coop and something quick! That rooster looks ready to tear into his girlfriends. He sure don’t like walking in shit!”

Sighing, I toss my phone—the very iPhone Matt let me keep despite having purchased it for work purposes—onto my mattress and exit my bedroom to see what my grandma is hollering about now.

She’s standing at the kitchen sink washing dishes. I wish we could afford a dishwasher but that’s so not happening. Staring out the window, she’s watching the chicken coop in the backyard, a fragile-looking structure one of the neighbor boys built for her a few years ago.

“What did you ask me to do?” I sound resigned. Of course, I am, when the only job I can seem to find in this godforsaken town is doing odds and ends for my grandma around the house. I didn’t get that job at the Soap-n-Snip, answering the phone and sweeping up hair. Stacy Jo Nesbitt got that job. She graduated two years after I did, and she already has two babies to take care of.

She deserves the job far more than I do.

“The chicken coop, baby doll. It’s a shit storm of epic proportions and that snotty, mean-as-hell rooster hates it when the crap piles up.” Grandma cackles again. She loves saying crazy things, shocking people. As she gets older, it gets worse and usually I ignore it or laugh with her.

But today, the very last thing I want to do is laugh. It’s hot outside, and I don’t want to be out there scooping up chicken crap.

“You want me to clean it out now?” I ask, my shoulders slumping.

“I sure do. Look at that cock.” Another cackle. “He’s gonna peck the head of every chicken out there if you don’t take care of it and quick.”

I go to stand next to my grandma and see that she’s not exaggerating. The rooster is strutting around in the small fenced-off chicken yard, pecking the head of every poor innocent chicken that approaches him.

Typical male. That rooster is a complete ass**le.

“Fine,” I say with a sigh. “I’ll go clean it.”

“Don’t forget your waders,” she calls to me as I head toward the garage. “And a bucket and a shovel so you can scoop up all that crap!”

I grab the bucket and the shovel she uses special for the chicken coop then slip on the old rubber boots I bought at Walmart years ago that I’d wear when it rained or snowed, which is rare but still. They’re white and hideous, scuffed up after years of wear, but I don’t care. I’m wearing an old ratty tank top and a pair of denim cutoffs along with them. The people of the great Napa Valley would probably shit themselves if they saw me, but I’m out here in my grandma’s backyard with no one around for miles.

I’ve got nobody to impress.

Rounding the side of the house, I head for the chicken coop and open the gate, thrusting the shovel out to hold back the rooster, who’s a mean old jerk that would love nothing more than to jump me from behind and spur me with his claws. He’s done it to me before, and I nearly had a heart attack, he scared me so bad.

But this time I’m prepared. You can’t turn your back on him or he’ll sneak attack you, like your worst enemy.

God, if I really thought about it, I could learn a lot of life lessons out here cleaning up the damn chicken coop. I laugh and shake my head as I start scooping up the chicken poop, which has somehow piled up into little mountains along the inside of their caged area.

It’s really freaking disgusting.

It’s been a month since I left New York City and went back to St. Helena. I went to the winery early the next morning and cleaned all my personal belongings out of my desk. Gave my notice at my apartment, not caring that I had to pay another month’s rent for breaking the lease, even though I was leaving at that very moment.

I just wanted the hell out of there.

It took me a few days to pack up all my stuff, finalize some things, and get everything prepared for the move. But when I was finally ready to take off, all packed up and headed to the gas station before I went roaring off into the sunset, I decided to check my mail one last time. And found a check from DeLuca Winery—three months’ wages. Severance pay, it said on the notes line.

That check both burned my ass and thrilled me down to the bone. I didn’t want to take his pity pay, but I also wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth, as my grandma would say.

I never did quite get that phrase but whatever. It fit.

So I went to the bank, deposited all that money and then hit the road. It took me six days, but I finally made it only to find myself with no prospects, no energy, and sadder than I’ve ever been in my life.

I miss Matt. I was dumb, running away from him and my feelings. He’d been so willing to face the troubles beside me head on, and I walked away. Let him go, let him slip right through my fingers like he didn’t matter.

God, I’d been such an idiot—I could tear up right now just thinking about it.

But crying over our lost relationship isn’t going to bring him back or bring me peace. I messed up, and I needed to face facts. Chalk it up to a mistake made and a lesson learned.

Don’t let a good man go, is what my grandma told me when I explained to her what happened a few nights ago. I’d held onto my story, my blow up with Matt for weeks until my grandma finally found me crying on the back porch and point blank asked what the hell was wrong with me.

That had been her one sentence of advice when I finished.

Don’t let a good man go.

Too late, Grandma.

Sighing, I rub at my forehead with the heel of my hand before I start scooping up more crap. I should’ve worn gloves, but I forgot. At least I’m not touching the poop directly, thanks to the shovel.

God, what a transformation I’ve undergone. One month ago, I was in New York City staying at the most beautiful hotel I’ve ever seen in my life, and now I’m digging out chicken shit.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

I fill up practically the entire bucket with chicken poo, constantly thrusting the shovel in the rooster’s direction when he comes at me, always on the defensive around that guy. I’m starting to sweat, I probably stink and my feet feel all squishy and disgusting in the rubber boots.