you want to die on the hill of nibbles, be my guest.”
“I do, thank you. Surrounded by nice cheese platters.”
“Now, where cheese platters are concerned, I think we are on the same page.”
“Have you ever done this before? I mean, restaurants. Or, things like this.”
“No. Not specifically. But hotels, and there were restaurants in the hotel. So while I didn’t oversee food service specifically, I’ve definitely seen what works and what doesn’t. Though I’m sure that what works in Manhattan won’t necessarily be the gauge for what works in Copper Ridge. And there, you get to be the expert.”
“Because I’m so exceedingly local?”
“Yes.”
“Why does that not feel like a compliment?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Sounds like your baggage to me.”
She snorted. “All right. I’ll get in touch with you once Lindy gives her opinion.”
She moved past him, and he caught the scent of her. Vanilla. Just like always. And suddenly, he was thrown back to a different time, to warmer days...
He shook his head, ignoring the tightening in his gut.
“Do that.”
The sooner she did that, the sooner they could get started. And the sooner they got started, the sooner they could be done.
MUCH TO SABRINA’S CHAGRIN, Lindy was ecstatic when they arrived at the shop later that afternoon. It was perfect as far as she was concerned, everything about it. She had absolutely no qualms and was ready to get the ball rolling immediately.
It was funny, because Lindy seemed to be fueled by her enthusiasm to make the winery a complete and total success and throw in Damien’s face the fact that she didn’t need him at all, and that in fact, she could do more without him around.
Sabrina, on the other hand, was fueled by something altogether different and that was her desire to work with Liam and emerge unscathed. She felt like she was continually reevaluating that situation. At first, she had wanted to avoid him, but if avoidance was the primary goal then it was difficult to make the case that she was all right. Difficult to make the case that she had moved on in any regard.
Not that she had ever pretended she had. Not to herself. And to other people? She just didn’t talk about it.
Maybe moved on was the wrong phrase. It was just... She didn’t trust herself. Her father had always told her to be cautious. To lead with her head, and not with her heart.
Back when he’d talked to her.
He had said that passion was faulty, and feelings were lies. And she had worked so hard to comply with that. To be quiet so that she could spend time with her dad, since he couldn’t handle endless chattering. To be the one who took after him. Not like Damien, who was always volatile like their mother.
She had rebelled once.
The first time she’d set eyes on Liam Donnelly—when he’d come to work at the winery—she’d been sure her chest would crack open and her heart would spill right out in front of him. Like every feeling, every need, every desire she’d shoved down all of her life had risen up to the surface and begged for release.
And then he’d looked at her. She had been certain, utterly certain, that he was the first person to truly see her.
She had known it was wrong. But he made her feel right, and after so many years of feeling like an alien in her own body, vying for her father’s attention the only way she knew how, it was magical to her.
Until the end. The end when everything had fallen apart, and then she’d set about to make everything around her as wrecked as she’d felt inside.
But it was over. She wasn’t that girl anymore. She really never had been. She’d had a moment of insanity, and that was done and never happening again.
Sabrina was going to handle being around him now. She was not going to give her sister-in-law any extra grief. Lindy had had enough. She didn’t need to deal with Sabrina’s baggage on top of everything else. Especially since Sabrina’s baggage was...well, stupid in a lot of ways, she supposed. Nothing was worse than having Liam confront her with what had happened between them. With him making her voice everything.
Because it made what had happened between them feel small. And in her mind it was so large. But she was reluctant to admit that he had a point. It wasn’t like the situation would have been any better if he had slept with her and then disappeared.
But that was the worst part, actually. It was the part that was so hard to explain to people, including him. Maybe especially him, because if she did it would make her sound even more like she was a pet-boiling whack job.
The lingering tenderness made sense to her though. And it hurt all the way down. She had trusted him with all of herself, and more than that, she had trusted in her own feelings for him. They had been wrong.
And that was the bitterest pill to swallow.
That the one time she’d decided to believe in herself, to trust her gut, her gut had been nothing more than a fluttery case of hormonal butterflies.
“This is amazing,” Lindy said, walking slowly across the wooded floor, her high heels clicking on the surface.
Sabrina pressed her fingertips against the door, right where Liam had put his hand earlier. She pulled it back.
“It is,” she said, stepping inside after her sister-in-law.
They had brought along the other tasting room employee, Olivia Logan, who was a funny little woman even though Sabrina quite liked her. She was a prim creature, with a lot of very lofty ideas about right and wrong, and sometimes got a little too judgmental for her own good, but she’d become a good friend to Sabrina over the years.
“This will be too far for me to drive every day,” Olivia commented, sniffing.
“It’s fine,” Lindy said. “Nobody will expect you to come down here. You’re welcome to continue working up at the winery. But, just in case, I did want you to come down and see it. Because I want everyone to feel like they have input.”
Lindy almost overinvolved the winery staff in her decision-making, in Sabrina’s opinion. Though she knew the whole “we are all in this together” thing was kind of part and parcel with her gaining control over the winery.
Damien had been much more about it being a Leighton family business. And only Leightons got a say in what happened. Her family was all about their standing in the community, all about their money.
Perhaps that was one reason she was sympathetic toward Olivia, even when she was a little bit difficult.
Olivia Logan was a member of the founding family of the county. The Logan family had been here since the 1800s, the first to settle both Gold Valley and Copper Ridge. They had come from Independence, Missouri on the Oregon Trail. And Olivia still carried their name.
Sabrina didn’t have a famous name, but she knew how family pride, a lot of interest and concern with family reputation and standing could shape you.
And what happened when you demolished said reputation.
Of course, Damien hadn’t exactly helped the reputation. But she’d always had the feeling their dad didn’t expect as much from Damien as he had from her once upon a time. As if he was given a pass because he was never supposed to do well. Sabrina knew her dad felt like the fact that Lindy had ended up with the winery was ample evidence that their son had made a mistake marrying outside of his class. That she had somehow taken advantage of him.
Sabrina just hadn’t