I Crave You - C.C. Wood Page 0,2

a chance to respond because my brother chose that moment to return.

“Hey, Brody! Feeling better?” J.J. asked.

Brody’s eyes stayed on me for one more moment before he broke our staring contest and looked at my brother.

“Yeah, man. Thanks for getting my jacket cleaned up.” No trace of a slur in his words. It was as if all that throwing up had cleansed his body of alcohol. Or maybe he was just Satan in disguise. Good thing this wedding wasn't in a church or else Brody probably would have burst into flames when he walked through the doors.

J.J. grinned. “No problem. The minister just cornered me on my way back. It’s almost time to start.”

Brody took his tuxedo jacket from J.J. and shrugged into it. “Great. Let’s get this done.” He glanced at me. “Good to see you, Cameron.”

I tilted my chin up slightly. “You too, Broderick.”

Ignoring my use of his full name, Brody just grinned and walked out of the bathroom with my brother trailing behind him.

Guess it was time for me to take my seat. After all, there was a train wreck in the making.

1

Present Day

I inherited my intense love for rock n’ roll from my dad. He introduced me to classic rock at an early age and I still loved it, even if it was several decades older than I was. Right now, AC/DC’s Back in Black was blasting from my Bluetooth speaker as I organized and de-cluttered my office.

To be completely honest, I hated cleaning. No, more like despised it with every fiber of my being. The only thing that made the activity remotely tolerable was listening to some damn good music while I did it.

As it was, I had to get things organized because my silent partner, college roommate, and best friend, Sierra, was coming to town. When I’d asked her how long she'd be staying, her only reply had been, “A while.”

With Sierra, that time frame could mean a few weeks, a few months, or even a couple of years. She worked remotely for some computer firm and made beaucoup money. So much money that she asked me if she could invest in my small business. At the time, I’d needed every penny of capital possible because I was twenty-two years old and no bank in our hometown would give me the time of day when it came to a start-up loan. It hadn’t mattered that I had a five-year plan, cost and profit projections, marketing plans, and a million other details organized. I was just a kid, and a girl at that, therefore I couldn’t possibly be successful.

But I was.

While Farley was a small town, it was surrounded by other small towns. Places that didn’t have cute little ice cream shops that served homemade ice cream in fun flavors and delicious concoctions with crazy names like “Sundae Roadkill” or “Texas Ice Cream Massacre”.

When I’d opened Crave, I hadn’t just marketed to the people of Farley, I'd invested in advertising within a thirty-mile radius.

And it paid off.

Business wasn’t just good, it was great. I’d never be a millionaire but I was definitely comfortable and getting better every year. In another ten years, after I bought out Sierra, I could hire a full-time manager and not have to come into work almost every single day the shop was open, which was six days a week.

Even though it was a lot of hard work, I loved my job. I got to make ice cream in nearly any flavor I wanted. When people came to my shop, they left with a smile on their face and a delicious, frosty treat. As far as careers went, it was pretty damn good.

Oh, and I didn’t answer to anyone but myself. Or Sierra, but she didn’t hound me for information. I think that even if the shop wasn’t turning a profit, she wouldn’t have cared. In fact, I was almost certain she’d just invested so we could work together even when she wasn’t on the same continent.

Which was about to change for the first time in two years. Sierra was coming to visit. I was incredibly excited but also stressed. While I kept the front of the shop and the kitchen spotless to keep the health department off my back, my office was one step above a dumpster fire. I had stacks of paper everywhere; invoices, payroll, order lists. Basically, anything and everything a small business owner should really keep organized in a file rather than in haphazard piles that tended