All I can say for sure is that I’m ready to have sex again. Maybe it’s the change of scenery and being out of that damn house for a while, but that part of me is awake in a way it hasn’t been for a long time. Cecelia and I always had a great sex life, and I miss that. Plus, I think I’m getting carpal tunnel in my right wrist.
But it’s not like I can date just anyone. Caroline, Mason’s fiancée, has offered to fix me up, but I’ve met many of the women who work at her cosmetics company, and they’re mostly on the hunt for a MRS degree. No thanks.
And there have been a few others who have made their intentions clear.
Christina Daniels hung around a lot when Cecelia first went missing. They had been best friends. She was glued to my side at the funeral and was ready to move in if I’d let her. She even showed up on one of my business trips. But no way. I didn’t like her before Cecelia died, and she repulsed me after.
But it wasn’t just her. in the beginning, the home phone rang off the hook, and Lilly dutifully took messages from women who knew me from high school, one from my days at the Naval Academy, and from across Silicon Valley. It doesn’t help that shortly after the accident, I was listed as one of the top five most successful tech entrepreneurs in the Valley, as were several others who’ll be at the wedding. That fed the beast even more.
Some days I saw the message list and wondered how Lilly had gotten everything else done, but she always did. I always just dumped the list of messages in the trash. Eventually, the calls slowed down. Lilly continued to take down numbers, but I finally told her that if I knew the women in question, they’d have my cell number, and I’d know how to get a hold of them if I was interested.
I look over at her again. Her eyes are still closed. Sitting next to her on the bus was genius. If nothing else, it will feed the gossip mill with my friends. I half-listen to Dillon and Mia discussing the poker tournament that will begin this evening after dinner.
I’m in a daze as I watch the Italian wine country roll by. We pass hill after hill of grapes. At the end of each row is a rose bush, and I know they’re not there for looks. If aphids are going to chew on the plants, they’ll start on the roses and give the gardeners a chance to intervene.
Greer stands at the front of the bus and announces that we’re on Bellissima property. I start to gather my things, but twenty minutes later, we’re still driving down the road. This place is huge.
I tap Lilly on the shoulder and wait until her eyes open. “We’re almost there. Are you okay to stay with the girls tonight?”
She nods and straightens in her seat. “Of course. That’s why I’m here.”
It seems I need to remind myself of that too. Maybe it’s the jet lag and romance of being in Italy, but suddenly I’m getting all kinds of ideas.
“Also, it is a free European vacation,” she adds with a grin.
She seems almost flirtatious, and it makes my heart beat faster.
After a few more minutes, we pull up in front of an actual castle, and I take in the centuries-old limestone.
Andy boards the shuttle. “Welcome to my childhood home—the original Bellissima.”
As I understand it, Andy has about eight brothers, and as they grew up, his father decided to expand the business outside of Italy. He sent one son to the champagne region of France, and he grows grapes and bottles there. There are also sons in Germany, Eastern Europe, South Africa, and Australia, and Andy oversees their US operations. As the next generation comes of age, they’ll grow into other regions around the world, all the while remaining a multibillion-dollar, family-run business.
Greer stands next to her husband. “I have the schedule of events and options for you to keep yourself amused during your down time. On property, we have plenty of great walks and hikes. There’s also the pool, and the barn will hold the poker tournament later tonight. Mia is hosting those of you who are playing, and she has some plans.”
“She can’t change the rules,” Landon grumbles.
“Nope, she can’t,” Andy assures him. “But you’ll see when you arrive this evening at seven. Dinner will be served at ten.”
“I know many of you probably didn’t get lunch on the yacht, so feel free to enjoy wine and antipasto in the barn this afternoon,” Greer adds, as Andy looks at her adoringly.
“See you all at seven.” Andy and Greer step off the bus, hand in hand.
Everyone files after them, but Katrina is asleep in her spot. Lilly sends me along to catch up with Bex, who is spinning a yarn for Corrine and Jackson, while she deals with the situation. I watch her rub my daughter’s arm lightly.
“Katrina?” she calls. “We’re here. Wake up.”
I stop at the bottom step and listen. Katrina groans as she stretches.
“Jet lag is just awful,” Lilly says.
Katrina yawns. “I agree.”
“Come on. Let’s go see our room and figure out what we’re going to do this afternoon. Your dad said he was up for a walk and maybe a tour of the winery. I would bet since sixteen is the drinking age here, you might be able to do some tasting.”
I don’t hear anything, but I’m sure Katrina is all smiles. I have mixed feelings about her drinking, but I’d rather she drink in front of me than do it with her friends behind my back and get into trouble.
“Now hear the warning,” Lilly adds. “If you overindulge, I can promise that will be the end of it for the rest of the week. But if you can take small sips and drink lots of water in between, you should be able to enjoy wine at the wedding.”
“Do you think my dad will go for that?” she asks.
“I’ll talk to him about it, but you have to take small sips. You’ve not had a whole glass of wine before. You’re a lightweight and could easily get drunk and stupid.”
“I’ll be good.”
“There will most likely be someone’s date who takes pictures this week because they’ll be valuable to the tabloids. Whatever you do, remember that you don’t want to see yourself splashed all over the gossip rags drunk and stupid.”
Shaking my head, I sneak off the bus and don’t hear the end of the conversation. It’s almost as if Lilly has channeled Cecelia.
Chapter 4
Lilly
Since we’ve had lunch, we decide we’ll start with a tour of the vineyard. It makes sense to get the lay of the land since we’ll be here for the week.
“One of Andy’s nephews is going to meet us in an hour,” Nate reports. “He’ll be our tour guide.” He disappears into the room across from the seating area.
I don’t see my luggage yet, and there are two queen-size beds in this bedroom. Bex doesn’t mind sharing with me. I get the girls’ things organized, still wondering where my stuff is. I hope I’m not supposed to be sleeping in a different part of the house. I mean, there’s certainly plenty of space, and a part of me would love that, but Nate would struggle with the nightmares and drama from the girls.
I’ve opened every closet, and I’m now down on my knees looking below the beds.
“Are you looking for your clothes?” Katrina asks.
I stand up and blow a wisp of hair from my face. “I am. I’m beginning to wonder if they put me in servant quarters.”
She looks at me, confused. “Why would they do that?”
“Some people look at nannies, housekeepers, and house staff like servants, and they put them in rooms in other parts of the house.”
Katrina is not pleased about that at all, which makes my heart happy. Then Nate reappears and holds up his hand against the rising drama. “They put Lilly’s luggage in my room.”
“Are you going to sleep with Daddy tonight?” Bex asks, giggling.
I’m sure I turn a thousand shades of red. “No, you get the privilege of snuggling with me.”
“They thought you were our mom?” Katrina asks, and I see tears in her eyes.
I walk over and sit next to her. “They don’t know our story, sweetie. They saw two children and two adults and thought we were all
together. No one is going to replace your mom. We only get one.”
Katrina wipes her eyes and stands up as if nothing happened. Her teenage emotions can turn on a dime. “I’m ready.”
“Can I have a minute to change?” I ask, looking over at Nate. “Or if you all want to go together, I can get showered and rearrange everything while you tour the vineyard. Maybe you need some good father-daughter time without the nanny?”
“We can’t go without you,” Bex says, taking my hand.
“I want you to come,” Katrina says.
“Nothing needs to be moved anytime soon,” Nate assures me. “And don’t worry about a shower. Just change, and then we can go.”
My stomach is in knots, but I nod.
I walk into Nate’s room next door and open the closet. His pine, leather, and citrus scent washes over me. His suits have been hung in a neat row, and I run my hands over them. He doesn’t wear a suit often, but he looks hot when he does. I open a drawer and find my lacy underwear next to his boxer briefs. I can’t even imagine what he looks like naked. These must hug everything because they don’t seem big enough to fit.
I hear the girls and Nate murmuring, but I can’t make out what they’re saying. I quickly lift my dress over my head and peel myself out of my bikini. In the mirror, I can see that I got a little pinker than I would have liked. I’m going to need to be careful.
I drop my suit on the ground and quickly replace it with a white cotton bra and panties. It’s about comfort at this point. I pull on a pair of capri pants and my favorite pink sweater set. Slipping into a pair of white Keds, I’m ready to go.
I stick my head back in the room to find Bex talking to her dad and Katrina staring at her phone.
“Are we ready?” I ask.
Everyone looks at me and nods.
The girls leave the room first, and Nate’s behind me. “I hope you found everything okay.”
“I’m really sorry about that.”
He gives me a shrug. “It wasn’t your fault. And it was kind of exciting. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen someone’s unmentionables.”
I smirk. “It’s a good thing the housekeeper does the laundry. You wouldn’t want to see Katrina’s choices.”
“I’m thinking I should be sending her to an all-girls, Catholic boarding school with very strict nuns.”
I shake my head. “My father did that to me, and I learned all sorts of naughty things.”
Nate stumbles. “I’d like to hear those stories—to understand what I would be signing Katrina up for, of course.”
I give him the side-eye. I look up ahead and see that the girls have reached the golf cart and Andy’s nephew. “I think we have other things to worry about.”
Katrina is all smiles and is already flirting with our tour guide, who is much older than her.
Nate balls his hands at his sides.
I stop and face him, turning my back to the cart. “If you tell her she can’t see him, she’ll be all over him, even if she doesn’t like him. Don’t say anything. Sit with Bex, and we won’t leave the two of them alone.”
“I’m going to kill him.” Nate is going all alpha dad right now.
“Look at me.” He’s staring at his daughter. Then his eyes shift to the man who’s looking at his daughter. I tap him on the chest. “Look at me, please.”
He finally refocuses his attention.
“He’s harmless if we’re here. If we react, they’ll take their firting where we aren’t around.”
Nate nods.
“We can do this,” I promise.
Jackson Graham and his fiancée, Corrine Woods, soon join us. Corrine runs the nonprofit Cecelia started, the Lancaster Foundation, so I get to see her often, and I adore her. It seems they’re coming on the tour, too.
“What great news,” I say with a smile. Now I can rearrange the seating in the golf cart. I can see that we’re going to be one too many to sit haphazardly. “Katrina, you and your sister sit with your dad in the second row, and Jackson and Corrine can sit in the third row of seats, and I’ll sit with—what is your name?”
“Tony.”
I nod. “Tony. We’re so excited. Katrina just turned sixteen. She can taste the wine, can’t she?”
He nods, but I can tell that dumps cold water on him. That’s right, Tony. You’re probably twenty-five. Hands off Katrina.
Tony drives us around the various parts of the vineyard, showing us the grapes they grow. “We have mostly reds.” He points out the acreage of cabernet sauvignon grapes, and the merlot grapes. He spends a lot of time explaining the traditional Italian chianti, which is a mixture of sangiovese, sanaiolo, and syrah grapes.
“Do you have tasting rooms like Napa where we can sample these wines?” Corinne asks.
“Of course, and some of our better wines from around the world will be here for the wedding,” Tony says.
After the tour of the fields, we go into the press room and see workers busy with the large vats.
“Right now, we’re bottling grapes that came from our farm in South Africa,” Tony says. “They had a bountiful crop, and didn’t have the ability to bottle it all there.” He points to a large vat. “The grapes have been cleaned, and any sign of mold is removed. We then dump them into this vat that will press out the juice. A fine mesh at the bottom prevents the skins, stalks, and any seeds from passing through. From there, the juice is poured into a cask with some natural chemicals that start the fermentation process. After two years, it’ll be poured into our bottles and marked with the South African label.”
We spend two hours wandering the vineyard and tasting. When Tony returns us to the castle, I can tell Bex and Katrina are both tired. “Anyone up for a nap before dinner? The schedule says it will be served at ten. And Nate, you have just under three hours before you have to be down for the poker tournament at seven.”
“I should lie down if I’m going to do anything tonight,” he agrees.
It doesn’t take much convincing to get the girls to join me back in the room.
As we walk through the hallways, Katrina holds my hand and pulls me away from her father. “Why do men care about my age?”
I look at her and decide I should be truthful. “You have the body of a woman and the innocence of a child. At home, the age of consent is eighteen in most states. I don’t know what it is here.”
“I can give my consent,” Katrina insists.
I look at her and move her bangs out of her eyes. “If the boy is over eighteen, and you’re sixteen, only your father can give consent. If you give consent, the boy could still go to jail and forever be branded a pedophile. Do you know what a pedophile is?”
She nods.
I hold her hand as we walk, slowing down to let Bex and Nate pull farther ahead. “This is what I know about your parents. They met when they were in middle school.”
“I know this.”
“Did you know your parents were twenty-one when they lost their virginity to one another?”
“How do you know that?” Katrina asks, seeming bewildered that I know something about her parents that she doesn’t.
“I’ll show you sometime. Your mom was like you and felt she was ready, but she also knew her parents loved your dad. If she and he were to get caught or, God forbid, get pregnant, it would’ve ruined her relationship with her parents, as well as your dad’s.”
“She could have gone on birth control,” Katrina explains.
“Your mom wouldn’t have done that without telling her parents.”
“Doesn’t it shrivel up and fall off if you don’t use it?”
I try not to laugh. “No. I haven’t used mine in a long time, and last I checked, it was still there.”
“How old were you when you lost your virginity?” she asks.
I debate telling her my story. It’s not that exciting. “I was in college. I waited a long time for the right boy, and I thought I’d found him, but after a while he changed and wanted to see other people. That’
s why I say you want to choose carefully, because you can only give it away once.”
She sighs.
“Look, even if we put you on birth control, you need to use condoms. Do you know how to put one on?”
Katrina can’t look at me.
“When we get home, I’ll teach you. You need to do both, and it’s important you know how. The birth control pill just keeps you from getting pregnant. A condom keeps you from getting any STDs.”
“What if it’s his first time, too?”
“You still need him to wear a condom. You can’t trust anyone when it comes to your body.”
“Is sex fun?”
I take a deep breath. I know I’m skating on thin ice, but if I’m not open with her, she likely won’t share with me. “The first few times often aren’t. No one really knows what they’re doing, and guys think it’s all like a porn movie—which it isn’t. They often don’t understand a woman’s anatomy. I’ll tell you a secret: I spent my first ten years of being sexually active responsible for my own orgasms.”
Her eyes grow big.
We’re at the room now, but I stop her. “I know you think everyone but you is having sex. I promise that isn’t the case. Don’t be in too much of a hurry.”
Katrina offers me a hug and we join Bex and Nate inside. Well, sort of. Bex is crashed out in the middle of the bed. I shake my head. So much for me getting some rest. I walk into Nate’s room where my things still are, quietly so I don’t wake him. He’s not on the bed.
Instead, I catch his reflection, and he’s standing in a towel, just out of the shower. He has my bathing suit bottoms in his hand, and I chastise myself for leaving them on the floor, even as I turn a thousand shades of red.
Quietly I exit his room and head to the other bathroom, though I don’t have my shower supplies. Still, I turn the water to cold, strip down, and step in.
I find I like Katrina’s shampoo and conditioner. It’s much nicer than mine. When I get out, I towel-dry my hair and redress in my same clothes.
When I walk out of the bathroom, Nate waves to have me join him in his room. I say a silent prayer to anyone listening that he didn’t see me earlier.
Showdown: Tech Billionaires Page 4