Something sizzled in his veins, hot and desperate.
He’d told Christine the partnership wasn’t selling. It was practically a guarantee of employment. She’d be a fool to leave.
Her chin thrust out resolutely as she drank her wine, as if she was planning when she’d tell him, how she’d tell him.
He tugged at his collar.
Their eyes met across the crowded bar. The buzz of conversation dulled, faded, receded, until it was just the two of them acknowledging they had no future.
She backed down first, her gaze dropping to the bottom of her wineglass.
Slade pushed through the crowd to reach her. He tossed a fifty on the bar and dragged her out of there and to his truck.
“Satisfied?” he said as he gripped the wheel, anger coursing through him. He felt ready to snap. “You knew those winemakers would be there. Did my performance disappoint?”
She didn’t say anything, just plucked at the hem of her skirt as if she was unsure of her position in the truck, at their winery, in his life.
She was, he realized. For all her bravado and organized lists and invasion of his personal space, she was worried about her future.
“You risked a lot coming to work for us. Your livelihood. Your reputation.” Maybe even her heart.
Like that’s possible.
She was kindhearted. That didn’t mean she could ever love him.
He started the truck, pulling out into traffic.
She kept looking out the window.
There was something else wrong. But what?
A snatch of conversation with her former employer returned. “What did Cami mean when she mentioned taking you back and reblending?”
Nothing but road noise answered him.
He’d had enough silence to last him a lifetime. “It’s crap, isn’t it? Your next release for Cami. Is that what you’re worried about?”
Slowly, as if she was older than Old Man Takata, she turned to face him. “You saw what they’re like. They enjoy the good life, like it’s owed to them. But underneath there’s a fear, and fear drives them to make bad choices.”
Slade had a sinking suspicion that he wasn’t going to like what she was about to say.
“Cami and Ippolito Cellars are a victim of their own success.” She slid out of her shoes and tucked her feet beneath her, angling sideways so her body faced his as he drove. “It happens sometimes. The stars align and a winery achieves unplanned-for success. You can’t keep up with the demand. You sell out, and you wait patiently for the next vintage to mature.”
“Cami doesn’t strike me as a patient woman.”
Christine finger combed a lock of blond hair along her neck. “No. She bypassed college to learn about wine making from her grandfather. She’s got too much to prove to her father, not to mention the wine world. That’ll drain your patience pretty quickly.”
“And so...” He accelerated onto the freeway.
“And so, she pressured me for a short-term solution and I found one.” Her fingers plucked at the skirt hem again. “Ippolito Cellars had been known for varietals, primarily Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay. But blends are popular and you can make them with excess wine you or someone else has. We decided to make a red-wine blend, since I’d had some success with it at another winery. I blended several samples from bulk wine producers until I hit on a taste I liked. Then I arranged to buy three wine types we needed—Petite Sirah, Carignane, and Zinfandel. To be delivered when each type was properly aged three months later. At that time, they’d send new samples, I’d taste them, hopefully approve, and off we’d go to blending.”