"Mr. Montgomery, Mrs. Montgomery is here to see you, shall I send her in?"
Jake's assistant, who was only a few years older than her, flashed her a polite smile as she set the phone down. "You may go in, Mrs Montgomery."
"Isabella is fine," she told her. "Or Ms. Swan."
His assistant flashed a polite smile. "Mr. Montgomery insists on calling you Mrs. Montgomery."
Isabella raised an eyebrow but murmured a thank you before heading into Jake's ostentatiously sized office. He was on the 34th floor and it was regularly a ten-minute elevator ride to reach it with all of the stops. He was on the phone on his desk, his heels kicked up and rested on the desk and suit coat hanging behind him, showing his loosened tie and suspenders, looking very much like the Wall Street poster boy that he was.
He smiled when he saw her and held up a finger to indicate that he would be done in a moment. Isabella sat down in the leather arm chair across from him, feeling her exhaustion start to creep in as she sat down. It was Thursday and she had worked about 60 hours already this week. Most days, the time flew by when she was in the office. But as soon as she left her own office, she lost that energy.
"Hey babe," Jake greeted after he hung up the phone. "How's it going?"
"Good," she replied. "What about you?"
"Fantastic," he grinned. "Hungry enough that I might have to take a bite of you though. I like your hair like that."
Isabella rolled her eyes but grinned.
"Hey, before I forget, that was my brother on the phone."
"How's Tom?" Isabella asked. Tom was younger than both of them, finishing up his final year of undergraduate studies at Harvard.
Jake smiled, his shiny white teeth and dimples flashing. "He's good. He's booked us for Vegas this weekend before he gets too far into midterm season."
"Vegas?" she asked with a frown. "As in leaving tomorrow?"
Jake laughed. "Yeah, a bit spontaneous but you know how he gets. And I haven't seen him in months I feel like!"
"I thought we were going to Broadway this weekend? We've had tickets for months."
Jake blinked at her.
"Oh, shit that's right, babe. Why don't you call Sandy up? Make it a girl's thing?"
"Like I did with that gala last month? Or our weekend trip to the Hamptons in June?" she asked with raised eyebrows. "When Bollig needed someone to go out with?"
"Hey – you know he was going through a rough patch since his wife left him," he defended one of his best friends.
"Yeah because he cheated on her all the time," Isabella replied dryly.
"Look babe," he said, undeterred. "I'll make it up to you, yeah? We can do whatever the hell you want next weekend."
"I'm in Los Angeles for work next weekend," she reminded him. For the third time.
Jake flashed her his dimpled smile. "The weekend after that."
"If you say so," Isabella muttered, upset, but clearly on the brink of dropping it for the time being.
"Would I ever lie to you, babe?"
~O~
As it turned out, if you run a small business that relies on money from tourists, one doesn't always get a weekend off. Isabella and Edward worked at the distillery on Saturday, having the place to themselves until the afternoon tasting tour of the day. Since it was the off season, they only had the one tour.
It had never been uncommon for Isabella to work on the weekends and she thought nothing of it, but Edward had been apologetic.
"Ye can stay here if ye like, just because I have to be there does no mean that you do," he had said as she had started to lace up her boots at the front door.
"I'll entertain myself there," she replied firmly.
Edward frowned.
"If you're going to go, so am I," she added.
Edward gave her a look before obligingly holding the front door open for her. He followed her out, zipping up his coat against the increasingly chilly weather. The frown stayed on his face the entire time he drove them to the distillery. He knew next to nothing about her but he wagered she was used to Monday-Friday jobs with predictable hours.
He had grown up in a family where weekends had been sacred. His parents had never worked on Saturdays or Sundays and the five of them spent so much of their family time together in those few days. Once his mother died and they moved to Skye, his father took a turn in the rotation and would work one Saturday a month.
Isabella looked at him questioningly as they got out of the car.
Edward sighed.
"I feel bad about having ye do work on a weekend," he admitted, avoiding her soft and curious stare.
"I don't mind it," she replied honestly. "Why do you work if it bothers you?"
It was rare to have her engage in a conversation with him and as a minimum, he figured he owed her honesty.
"I dinnae used to," he admitted as he pulled the key out of his pocket, walking with her to the staff entrance.
Isabella walked across the threshold of the open door and waited for him to continue.
"But once the economy crashed there's been a lot less people going on the tours and buying whisky. I cannae afford to pay Jasper or Carlisle or Robert…or Ian or James even, to work the hours they used to…it's better if they work on the boats with the fishermen at the harbor when they can."
Isabella nodded in understanding, a frown on her face.
"If ye own the business, ye get paid last, ye ken?"
Isabella gave a rueful half smile but nodded again.
They walked down the hall until they reached the office. Edward unlocked the door and opened it for her. "I'll turn the heat up," he said upon noticing how cold it felt in the room.
He cringed, considering what the costs would be to heat the building now that it was getting colder.
Isabella rewarded him with a grateful smile as she moved to settle behind the desk where she had left all of her things.
"And we should find ye some warmer clothing now that winter is starting to move in."
Isabella opened her mouth with a protest on her lips but upon seeing Edward's raised eyebrows, she closed her mouth.
"Ye'll need more than just the gray jumper of yours." The worn gray crewneck sweatshirt with faded "University of Pennsylvania" letters was a staple in her wardrobe from what he had seen.
"It's a perfectly good sweatshirt," she disagreed defensively.
"Unless ye'd like to wear it all winter, it might be a good idea to get ye something ye can at least….at least rotate it with."
"Perhaps you're right," she conceded primly, recognizing the laundry challenge.
"Give a wee holler if ye need anything," he said with a chuckle.
"Thank you," she replied, sitting in the chair with her coat still on her. She met his eyes and smiled briefly at him before turning the legal pad she had all of her scribblings contained on.
Edward left the room and went about the regular routine of preparing the lobby and the still house for a tour. He turned on all of the lights and other power sources, turned up all of the heating, and selected the usual whiskies that they used for the tasting tours and left them over in the room the tours ended in. As he went through the motions, his mind settled on his wife, as it seemed to every free moment, he had the past week.
They had been married for a week now and he was still unsure how to coexist with her.
Their wedding and wedding night held nothing but fond memories. Dancing and drinking with her and swaying along with her while his friends and families danced around them to Loch Lomond had been exactly how he had envisioned his wedding night.
It had all been so real.
Her happiness had seemed so genuine that night, including after they left Isles and settled in his house and shared a few drams.
Even making love to her, she had seemed sincere in her passion.
When she woke up the next day and only spoke when spoken to and remained quiet and withdrawn, he had been disappointed. It had taken some thought in the wee hours of the morning for him to realize and accept that the ache in his stomach was disappointment, and likely beyond just that, regret.
He had never taken advantage of a woman in his life.
But the next morning, when his wife would barely speak to him after drunkenly sleeping with him the night before, he felt damn sure like he had.
As the days passed and she remained quiet and somber with him, his sense of dread grew worse. For one of the first times in his life, he truly had no idea how to go forward. He did not know if she wanted space to work on Sleat and nothing else or if she needed his support and friendship.
Truthfully, if she did need space, he wasn't even sure he could give it to her.
That part of her, that sparkly, bright, shiny part of her that he had seen on their wedding was in there. He didn't know why she kept it locked away.
But he felt stubbornly certain that it was there.
So, he had done the only thing he could think of…what he had seen his father do with his mother throughout their marriage and in the time she was sick. It was the least and the most he could do.
Make sure she was cared for and had everything she needed.
~O~
Sunday was busier than Saturday had been.
Both Jasper and Carlisle joined her and Edward at Sleat. Carlisle and Edward had work to do in the still house as the latest batch they were making was a critical stage of creation that could not wait until Monday.
Isabella joined Jasper out in the lobby and watched him greet the guests that were coming in. He was just as charismatic as he had been when she had been on the tour, easily establishing a rapport with each of the nine visitors that were following him on the tour. Five were from America, two from Japan, and two from Canada. By the looks of it, they were all engrossed in everything that Jasper was saying as he introduced himself and told them a bit about Sleat.
She stayed at the front desk in case anyone came in, but other than answering one phone call to provide the tour times to a future visitor, it was quiet. She entertained herself by getting familiar with the front desk systems and processes, or lack thereof processes with anything technological. She was examining the credit card reader in an attempt to discern both whether it worked properly and if it was a chip reader as she knew was increasing in popularity in Europe.
It was a surprise when she heard Carlisle's voice from the hallway to the office behind her.
"Esme, love, I just got yer message, what's wrong?"
Isabella froze.
"Is she doing okay?" he asked and paused, waiting for a response. "And what about Chase? Has he had any episodes lately?"
Isabella frowned, wondering if she had ever met a Chase. She didn't think so but given how many people they had crammed into the Isles Inn, it was possible that one had been named Chase.
"That's what she said? Will she get evicted? Has she found her landlord?"
Carlisle was silent for some time.
"If she's been laid off, those child support payments will not be enough to cover Chase's medical expenses."
Chase was a kid then.
"Esme, I know, I know," he soothed quickly after his latest statement. "It will be awright. Elizabeth…love…shh, it's okay. Shh, I know. I know she's yer baby sister."
Isabella waited. She had never heard Carlisle get upset about anything.
"Yer not doing nothing," he assured her gently. "We are already sending her all that we can afford to…even with Jasper contributing," he sighed, "I know, I ken…I dinnae think it is enough either. I…I know…we will think on it," he promised surely. "We will figure something out."
There was another pause and she could hear footsteps across the concrete as he paced.
"Bloody American health care…so bloody expensive," he growled. "There must be a program…an assistance, something, something from their government maybe, something that can help kids with medical problems. We can look into it tonight, sweetheart. There has to be something."
It made Isabella's heart ache to know that Edward's aunt and nephew were in such clear distress over her sister. She didn't understand the entire story, of course, but she felt that all too familiar pang at seeing the effects of the financial crisis hitting people she was interacting daily with, people who had showed nothing but kindness to her.
Kindness she was not confident she deserved.
"It is no fair, I know," he agreed before growling, "There are no bloody jobs for anyone anywhere nowadays after what happened. Those greedy bastards in those banks have ruined lives. Hell can only come too soon…"
Isabella didn't hear the rest of Carlisle's thought.
She had crouched in front of the small trash can behind the desk and vomited.
A brief glimpse into more. Another chapter will be posted in the next couple of days (it's a promise).
Wishing you wonderful starts to a kind 2020.