Page 29 of Bourbon Girl, Part 3

charge the amount of mash loaded into a pot still for a batch distillation

THE STRIP mall parking lot baked under the late September sun as I walked across the cracked asphalt, clutching a manila folder that contained three pages of typed recommendations.

I'd spent most of the night crafting the proposal after signing my college papers, channeling my anger and disappointment toward Jett into something productive.

The tour office door stuck slightly in the humid air, and I had to give it an extra push to get inside. The smell of burnt coffee and Teresa's sickly perfume hit me immediately, taking my breath.

"Bernadette!" Marv looked up from his cluttered desk, dabbing his forehead with a fast-food napkin. "We don't have any tours today."

"I know," I said, approaching his desk with more confidence than I felt. "I wanted to give you this."

I placed the folder on the one clear spot among his scattered papers. Teresa, perched on the edge of the desk in a lime green blouse that hurt my eyes, leaned forward with obvious curiosity.

"What's this?" she asked, her voice sharp with suspicion.

"A business proposal," I said, addressing Marv directly. "Ideas for turning the tour operation around."

Marv opened the folder and began reading. I'd outlined everything from social media strategies to partnership opportunities with local restaurants, from improved customer service training to seasonal themed tours.

"This is... comprehensive," he said, genuine surprise in his voice. "Where did all this come from?"

"I've been thinking about the business a lot," I said. "Observing what works and what doesn't. These are actionable changes that could increase bookings and customer satisfaction."

Teresa snatched the papers from Marv's hands, her manicured nails clicking against the pages as she flipped through them.

"Social media partnerships?" she scoffed. "Themed tours? This is a bourbon business, not a theme park. We don't need a two-bit tour guide to tell us how to run our company."

I kept my voice level. "You need someone to tell you how to run your company. Even a two-bit tour guide can see you're going in the toilet."

Teresa's mouth screwed up into a little bow. "That's not true."

Marve reclaimed the papers. "It is true, Teresa. Bernadette's right. You said you came back to change things, so let's change things."

"I'll leave you to talk," I said. "But I'm happy to help any way I can in the time I have left."

"You're leaving?" Marv asked.

"I'm going back to Arizona at the end of the year," I said. "But that only leaves us ninety days to turn things around."

I left the tour office, feeling resolved, and twenty minutes later, I pushed through the glass door of the Two Guys Detective Agency, the bell chiming my arrival. Linda's voice carried from the back office.

"—can't just disappear for three days without telling me where you're going, Octavia! We have a business to run!"

"It was surveillance work, Linda. Sometimes that requires irregular hours!"

"Hello?" I called.

"Bernadette," Octavia said with a welcoming smile. "Do you have news?"

"Sam Church wasn't my father," I said without preamble. "He was very nice about it, gave me some old photographs, but it's another dead end. I'm back to square one."

Octavia crossed her arms. "That's frustrating, but not unexpected." She bit into her lip. "Have you considered submitting your DNA to a genealogy tree?"

I shook my head.

"It's not cheap, and it takes time, but DNA testing through ancestry networks has become incredibly sophisticated. You submit a sample, and if any relatives—even distant ones—have also submitted samples, the system can identify potential connections."

More waiting, more uncertainty, but also a scientific approach that didn't rely on fading memories and incomplete records.

"I'll think about it," I said finally, turning to leave.

"Take your time," Octavia said. "But don't give up. Sometimes the answers find us when we're not actively searching for them."

I left, hoping she was right, because at the moment it was hard for me to remember why I'd started this journey to begin with. So far, nothing good had come from my impulsive trip to Kentucky.

My mind went to Dylan, then to Jett, and I blinked back tears.

Nothing good at all.