The High Price of Secrets(29)

                Finn was surprised. Surely she intended returning home long before Christmas?

                “I don’t have any other demands on my time.”

                “But your family? They’ll expect you back for Christmas, won’t they?”

                Tamsyn shrugged. “As far as my immediate family goes, it’s only Ethan and me and he’s recently engaged. I think it would be nice for him and Isobel to enjoy their first Christmas together without having to worry about me tagging along. The rest of my family is big enough and noisy enough not to miss me too much. Besides, I’m needed here now.” She gave him a bright smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

                There was a note to her voice it took him a moment to place—she was feeling lost and vulnerable. He didn’t doubt for a second that her family would miss her over Christmas, but she obviously felt they didn’t need her. If anything, she needed the voluntary position here in the community more than they needed her.

                The realization knocked his impression of her back a couple of notches. No matter which way he turned it, she was looking less and less like the spoiled little princess he’d built up in his mind. Had he been so determined to see the worst in her that he hadn’t opened his eyes to the person she really was? Obviously the scars that Briana had left had gone far deeper than he’d thought if he was incapable of seeing the good in a person anymore.

                After all, he thought, looking out over the garden, would someone who didn’t understand hard work or dedication have worked so diligently to expose the carefully cultivated loveliness behind the weeds?

                “I’m sure the old guys at the center will be thrilled to have you. You’re far easier on the eyes than their usual coordinator.”

                “Oh, I’m sure the novelty will wear off soon enough,” she said, brushing aside his comments even as a delicious blush spread up her chest and neck before tinting her cheeks with a delicate pink.

                “Well, I had better get back to work,” Finn said, rising to his feet.

                “What is it you do exactly?” she asked, getting up to lean on the railing that skirted the edge of the veranda.

                “This and that. At the moment I’m developing a new idea.”

                “Oh, hush-hush, is it? Tell, and you’d have to kill me, is that it?”

                Finn chuckled. “No, nothing like that. I used to be in I.T.,” he said, downplaying the company he’d established on the internet and then sold for several billion dollars a few years ago. “Nowadays I dabble in all sorts of things, including the vineyards around us. The owners here and I are partners in this lot.”

                He opened his arms to encompass the surrounding land.

                “I’m impressed,” Tamsyn answered with a smile. “I’ll bet this is a lot more fun than being lashed to a computer all day.”

                “Different strokes. What I did was fun at the time. Leaving it was even more so as it gives me the freedom now to do what I please, although I’m more of a silent partner with the vines. We grow for supply to the local wineries and it turns over a good living.”

                He started to walk toward his car, Tamsyn following him.

                “I enjoyed the coffee,” she said, “and the lesson in how to make it. Thank you for coming over.”

                “No problem. Say, are you busy for dinner tonight? I was wondering if you’d like to come up the hill and eat with me. Beats eating alone.”