Isabella and Jake were enjoying a rare Saturday afternoon together. By her count, it was the first time they had been under the same roof on a weekend in about eight weeks.

Granted, they were enjoying it in separate parts of their spacious house, having barely exchanged more than four words since waking up.

Over the past few months, they spent less and less time together, and it was a trend Isabella didn't care to consider, chalking it up to one of her grandparent's favorite sayings in that for everything there was a season…and this season was just busy. If she was being honest with herself, she knew her marriage was not thriving.

But, since she was not being honest with herself, she stuck with the busy season theory.

Isabella had been nursing the same gin and tonic for the better part of the three hours, working on a presentation that she would be giving on Monday morning. The more she stared at it, the more minor tweaks she made. Her lips moved as she silently read through and memorized the content. Admittedly, this was redundant given how long she had spent researching the development opportunity.

Jake was somewhere in their basement, tinkering with his enormous bar and reorganizing his vast and expensive alcohol collection. It was his favorite entertainment spot and if they were all in town and off of work, she would often find him and his college buddies drinking and smoking until the early morning hours. She rarely went down there, the smell of smoke irritating her.

Isabella lifted her glass to her lips and paused as her eyes narrowed as she assessed the slide in front of her. It was really the heart of the presentation with all of the key financials and expected return on investment. She was so lost in the thought that she barely heard his yell.

"ISABELLA!"

She nearly dropped her glass in surprise. She had never heard her husband sound so frantic.

"ISABELLA!" he yelled again, more desperate.

Carelessly tossing her glass and laptop onto the table she leapt out of her chair and ran to the basement. As she darted through the house, she racked her brain of how he could have injured himself.

He was on the phone, one hand holding it against his ear and the other running his hand frantically through his hair.

"She's here," he asserted when she hurried into the room. "She's here, Dad. What is it? What the hell happened? What's wrong with Tom?"

Isabella's brows furrowed in concern as she approached him.

It was so quiet in the basement that Isabella could hear her father-in-law's grainy reply.

"Your brother…son…he was doing one of those ridiculous motorcycle races…I don't know if they were drinking or doing God knows what, but something caused him to lose control of the bike and he crashed into a containment wall."

Isabella held her breath.

"They pronounced him dead at the scene."

Isabella wasn't prepared for what happened next.

"NO!" Jake roared as soon as the words left his father's mouth.

Jake threw his phone against the nearest wall with such force that it scattered into pieces as he continued to scream, "NO!"

Isabella could not unfreeze herself.

Jake turned his rage to his alcohol collection and started grabbing bottles of whiskey, rum, and vodka and smashing them against the bar, the floor, the wall, everything. Isabella felt the alcohol run on the polished stone floors against her bare feet but could not move.

"God fucking damnit! No! Not fucking Tom! Not MY FUCKING BROTHER!"

She hated herself for it, but in that moment, she couldn't do anything as he destroyed thousands of dollars of alcohol and wrecked his custom-made bar and punctured gigantic holes in the wall.

It was only the beginning of his grief.

His rage and destruction would overwhelm their big, empty house for a long time to come.

~O~

It was particularly cold one of the days of the following week.

Winter was creeping in and while they were blanketed by the sea air, there was an undeniable chill to the air that left many of Isle of Skye's inhabitants shivering.

When it got below freezing, the key to Sleat's employee entrance got stuck.

And wouldn't unlock the door.

Isabella, Edward and Ian all stood at the door as Edward jiggled and shook the metal key against the freezing metal.

As Edward grew increasingly more frustrated and his movements got more aggressive, his muttered strand of curses got more colorful.

"Weaselheaded mangled hellbeast," had been her personal favorite.

Minutes had ticked by and Isabella hadn't even noticed that she had started to dance on her toes from the cold seeping through her jacket.

"Awright, lass?" Ian asked her in concern.

Isabella nodded but tucked her arms instinctively closer to her chest.

"Yer nose is all red like a cherry, ye must be freezing," Ian disagreed.

Before Isabella could protest, Ian had unwrapped his large plaid scarf from his neck and wrapped it around her. The musty smell of wool immediately assaulted her nose, but the cool wind hitting her neck was blocked.

"Ye'd make a bonnie reindeer for Santa's sleigh," he said with a warm chuckle, tapping the tip of her, admittedly cold, nose.

"I'll keep that in mind," she replied dryly.

"Did ye know the best thing about being on Skye?" he asked conspiringly. She raised an eyebrow and he continued, "We're so bloody far north that we are always the big man's first stop. So close to the North Pole, ye ken?"

Isabella laughed at the absurd comment, despite herself.

"Some may think it's Norway or the likes," he continued, "But it's nae true."

"Of course not," Isabella agreed dryly.

Ian's shoulders straightened as he grew more confident in his embellishing.

"In fact, Father Christmas makes practice runs with his reindeer over the Highlands in the weeks leading up to Christmas. I bet ye being the Yank ye are dinnae know that, aye?"

"Yank?" she asked in amusement.

"Aye, but we'll forgive you for it," Ian winked.

Isabella laughed under her breath, shaking her head.

"I think if we're lucky, we might be able to spot one of his practice runs. What do ye say to trying, huh Bella? Santa chasing some night?"

At that precise moment, they heard the recently unlocked door being yanked from the frame.

Isabella just shook her head with a chuckle and walked into the proffered open door, easily walking under Edward's raised arm.

She was far enough into the hallway that she didn't hear the grunt Ian made when Edward threw a sharp elbow into his ribcage.

~O~

The second full week at Sleat had been similar to the first.

With Edward's help, Isabella had finally gotten a firm understanding of Sleat, all of its assets and liabilities, suppliers and sellers. Now that it was in order and she was understanding all of it, she was unsure how to proceed.

They needed a business plan.

Or at least a plan to get through the recession.

Admittedly all of Isabella's career had been when the economy had been booming, so this was unfamiliar to her and prompted her to be slower in her process than normal.

Isabella learned that Fridays were particularly slow for the distilling process.

Around lunchtime there was a knock on the office door. Isabella gave a distracted hum to indicate that they should enter. Edward appeared with the big white takeaway box and a sheepish grin on his face.

"Keeping yer w-"

"-wife fed, yes, it's a good idea," Isabella finished with a soft chuckle, already moving some papers aside to clear a place for the food.

Edward's lips turned up into a wry grin. "Aye," he agreed.

As they ate, Edward asked a few questions about her day and they ate in companionable silence for the most part. Isabella vaguely wondered if Jasper would emerge with a couple of drams of whisky as he had last Friday when they had worked.

Therefore, when there was a knock on the door, she was hardly surprised.

Both of them called their permission to open the door. Isabella popped another prawn into her mouth as the door opened and the proceeded to cough and get it stuck in her throat when a man in a suit appeared.

Edward looked at her in concern, but she held a napkin against her mouth and waved him off. He turned his gaze back to the man and seemed to remember his manners as he stood up from his chair.

"Hallo, how can I help ye?" he asked, shaking the suit's proffered hand.

"You must be Edward MacDonald?" he replied. Isabella immediately recognized the posh English accent; he must have been from the London area.

Edward nodded.

"My name is David Andrews," he introduced. "I work with a company called Diageo down in London."

"Welcome to Sleat. Please," Edward said, gesturing to one of the other chairs in front of the desk, "Have a seat Mr. Andrews."

Isabella hastily pushed aside some of the seafood, trying to remember what Diageo was. She had recently heard the name but did not remember in what capacity it had been in. She stood up and offered him her hand. "Isabella MacDonald," she offered confidently, as if it wasn't the first time she had ever called herself that.

If Mr. Andrews was curious if she was wife, sister, or cousin, he didn't let on.

"A pleasure," he said as he shook her hand with a charming smile.

"What can we do for ye, Mr. Andrews?" Edward asked as they settled into the chairs around the desk.

"Actually, it is what I hope to be able to do for you," he replied in his particularly proper pitch.

Edward raised his eyebrows but nodded for him to continue.

Isabella felt her lips thin as David began his spiel.

After a few sentences of fancy words said with a charming accent, she surmised what the man wanted.

To buy Sleat Distillery.

Like every year, I am continuing the tradition of posting a chapter on my birthday. As a I begin another year, I am reflecting on how grateful I am to have you all care about this story (and other stories I). Reading and writing is an underrated type of magic.

This is the last brief chapter before the action really commences.

All the love.