Own Me (The Wolf Hotel, #5)(65)

“Hey, Violet.” I make quick introductions. “How was the drive from Philly?”

“Fine.”

“Weird having a driver pick you up?”

“Yeah, kind of,” she admits sheepishly.

“I’m still getting used to it too.” She and I, we’re not all that different. Neither of us grew up in Henry’s world. “There’s a coat hook over there. Get comfortable.”

Violet drops her backpack on the floor in the corner and then sheds her outer things, save for the knit cap. She’s swapped her usual hoodie for a more stylish chunky white cable-knit sweater.

“I like your hat. Where did you get that?” I ask.

“Um … I made it.” She fidgets with the cuffs on her sweater.

“Really? You know how to knit?”

“Yeah. Gramma taught me how. I sat around a lot over the last few months, so at least this way I had something to do.”

Sat around next to her mother’s bedside, watching her slowly die, she doesn’t have to say. My heart aches for the girl, for what she had to witness. Something like that changes you forever. “Well, it’s very cute and it looks great on you.”

Her eyes roam the boxy space until she points to the wall. “Blah gray.”

I laugh. “See? I wasn’t lying.” The walls are bare, devoid of personality.

“So … this is your office.”

“Actually, my ‘office’”—I air quote with my fingers—“is a literal closet in the back that we decorated. But here is where the magic happens. Doesn’t look like much, does it?”

She shrugs. “And that’s all soap over there?”

“Most of the first batch, yeah.” My nerves flutter. “We go live on the website Monday, and I don’t know if anyone is going to buy any of it.” It’s one thing to have Peggy Sue demanding that I have a batch of sage soap for Greenbank’s church bazaar. Is award-winning Nailed It Branding going to see Farm Girl Soap Co. as its first epic failure?

And I didn’t mean to dump my insecurities on the poor girl within a minute of her walking in.

Violet picks up a packaged bar from the nearby table and holds it to her nose, inhaling. “I’d use it.”

“Yeah?” I smile. That’s a good start. “Come on. Let me show you around.”





“It looks like homemade fudge.” Violet leans over the counter, propped up by her elbows, as she watches me slice a block of mint-scented soap into measured rectangular chunks.

“Funny you should say that because a little kid back home bit into a peppermint chocolate bar at the Christmas market.” I’d been experimenting with new scents for the holidays and found a chocolate fragrance oil online that I liked.

Her blue eyes widen. “What happened?”

“He spat it out and told me my fudge tasted like soap.” I laugh. “It’s all natural and nontoxic. Wasn’t going to hurt him.”

“He’ll never look at fudge again without remembering you.”

“Probably not.”

I was nervous about how today with Violet would go, but within no time of her arrival—after the five-second tour, five-minute mockery of my closet office, and an overview of all that Nailed It and I have been working on these past months—she seems to have stepped out of her hard shell, revealing a quick-witted, curious girl who asks a lot of questions and smiles far more than she scowls.

“And you’ve been making these since you were my age?”

“Maybe even younger, I think? This lady in our church used to make vanilla-scented gingerbread men soaps for the Christmas bazaar. I thought they were the cutest things, and I wanted to make something like that to give to friends and family. Homemade gifts are always more special, right? So she showed me how. From there, I started reading up on how to use herbs and flowers from around the farm. I experimented with scent ideas, learned how to layer scents, what worked and what didn’t.” I laugh, shaking my head. “Once, I mixed lavender and eucalyptus. Bad idea. My mother complained about it for weeks, even though my father and I couldn’t smell anything. Anyway, there’s this little tack room in my family’s barn back home, so I moved out there and kind of took over.”

“The pictures on your website.”

“Yes. That’s the room.” Violet actually paid attention. “An indie business magazine did an article on me this summer. They dressed it up a bit. It doesn’t look that nice in real life.” I smile as I remember that day. Margo arranged for it all through her friend, Ryan McCleary. Jed tried to impress my supermodel friend by farming in a button-down shirt and tie, and then Margo showed Ryan her brand of appreciation in the pond out back. “I’ve only ever sold these at the local church bazaars and farmers’ markets.”

“What made you go big?”

I pause. Compared to the path I was heading down—supplying a major department store—a little rectangular rental space in New Jersey isn’t much. But it’s mine. “Henry did.”

She picks up a broken sliver of soap, holding it to her nose. “What? He’s not rich enough already, he wants his future wife to make bank too?” There’s a hint of something I can’t pick out in her tone, but it feels like a slight. My urge to defend Henry sparks.