“Message received,” she muttered and strode toward the open door buttoning her jeans and her shirt because she had a wet spot on her tank.
August kept pace with her even if he limped. “I don’t think you really know what you’ve got yourself into, Kitty Cat.” His voice was low and dark in her ear. “But you’ll learn soon enough.”
She stopped and opened her mouth to sear him, but he took advantage. Kissed her hard. Fast. Deep. Thoroughly. And stopped just as abruptly. His beautiful eyes glittered, and his high cheekbones were stained with a touch of pink.
He was so beautiful she couldn’t look away. Her lips buzzed and felt like they were liquid fire. Tentatively, she reached up to touch them to see if they felt the same.
“Why’d you do that? No one will take me seriously if they think we’re sleeping together.”
“You’re mine,” he said flatly. “And we will be doing a hell of a lot more than sleeping together.”
“August.” She tried to think of something placating to say, but that really wasn’t her forte, and he looked in no mood to be placated. She didn’t realize she’d reached out to take his hand until he seized hers and pulled her to his side. He kissed her knuckles.
“Now let’s go meet our crew.”
*
Later in the week, Catalina stood in the middle of the damaged Verflucht tasting room and stared up at the gaping hole in the ceiling. She could picture the chaos: broken wood and glass and bodies, fear, blood, wine, confusion. She shivered and shifted her attention to the actual tasting room.
Plywood had been nailed across the massive front window, but a shaft of light from the door she’d left open and the light that pooled down on the floor spilling in from the windows of the upstairs apartment illuminated the tasting room enough that she could see two jacks had been installed to keep the ceiling stable and all the glass had been swept up and disposed of.
The bus had been towed out. Police caution tape was across the building as were notices from the city planning department that the building was closed and off limits.
“Rule-breaker,” she mocked herself.
She wasn’t supposed to be here. Not really. She’d dropped August off at a doctor’s appointment and rather than wait, she’d wanted to take a quick peek at the tasting room to see how much wine had survived and what varietals. They would need the wine for the Bluebonnet Festival where August told her he had booked space in a large tent with other area wineries. Beer and local distilleries were also participating, but August had chosen to just focus on Verflucht.
It felt strange to be downtown in her home-town. She’d avoided it for so long, and even now she felt like she was skulking. She’d made no effort to contact anyone—no friends from high school, not that she’d had many. And definitely not her family.
She began to sort the wine and stack it, case by case, by the back door. She’d come load it in her rental Jeep after she picked up August and stopped off at Char-Pie. The peanut butter pie there was worth kicking the rumor mill into high gear for. She was tired of hiding—not that she had been exactly hiding. But it sure felt like that. She’d been in town three days and other than picking up August at the hospital and going to the grocery store, she’d stayed on the ranch reading Pete and Derek’s logs, working with the vineyard and cellar crew to get up to speed, and trying to not think about August or his medieval proposal.
Which was all she was thinking about.
She hefted up another case and placed it with the Tempranillo. Dang, there wasn’t a lot of that. Bad luck. A lot of Sangiovese had survived. Not her favorite grape, and it never thrived the way it did in Italy, but you couldn’t blame growers for trying. Farming was challenging and struck a competitive chord with her as well. She knew she strived to work with nature, but sometimes that little competitive imp would rise up, fist raised, and shout, “En garde.”
She smiled at the image of her challenging nature to a duel.
“I figured you’d come running the second August Wolf crooked his little finger,” the dark, sneering voice of her oldest brother Bo—not Beau or short for Beauregard but Bo—hit her ears like a spate of bullets.
She barely stopped her cringe and instead forced herself to pick up another case of wine, put it on the appropriate stack and then faced her brother. He stood tall and thick in the doorway of the tasting room.
Blocking her exit.
She squared her shoulders. “Hello to you, too.”
Bo crossed his arms and leaned against the doorframe, neither inside nor outside the tasting room. He looked good in a hard, angry, dissolute way.
“Think you’re too good for us now that you’re back in the millionaire’s,” he sneered the word, “bed.”
Her mouth dropped open. It shouldn’t have. Her brother had always been a jerk to her and rude and disrespectful. The list could go on and on, but it had been so long she’d forgotten.
“I’m not in his bed,” she said.
She should have kept her mouth shut.
“Yet.”
Why had she even bothered defending herself to him? She didn’t need to explain herself. She’d been independent from her family since she’d left home right after high school graduation. She’d supported herself through college and beyond.
Bo spit a stream of tobacco on the cement floor.
“Seriously gross.” Cat nearly jumped out of her skin. “You shouldn’t even be here.”
“Figures you’d stand for the Wolfs and not your own blood.” He looked at the stacks of wine. “Anything here I can sell? You got so much he wouldn’t notice some cases missing, especially since the whole town is still hung up on the accident.”
“People died and several were injured!” How in the heck was she related to him anyway? Shame, which should not be hers, slithered through her and chilled her in the damaged room with the dim light.
“Wine. It’s so pretentious.” Bo stalked into the room, all bad-boy attitude and an angry grace. “Typical. And stupid. August and his asshole brother Ax have one of the biggest spreads in Texas and more water than they should, and that idiot wants to make wine? On a ranch?”
Cat closed her eyes. Water and land. They had been the focus of her father’s constant griping and attempts to manipulate. He’d learned it from his father no doubt, who’d feuded over water access with August’s father, and now Bo apparently had picked up the battle cry.
The sound of cardboard and tape ripping had her striding across the tasting room floor, her boots a sharp rap, rap, rap on the cement floor that still bore the skid marks from the bus, the stains from the wine, and some rusty discoloration she didn’t want to think about.
“What are you doing? That’s Verflucht property,” Cat said.
“I thought wine had corks.” Bo wrinkled his nose looking at the colored screw top. “What is he making, grape juice?” He laughed, unscrewed the top off, and then tilted the bottle to his lips like was an extra in a pirate movie.
“You’re going to have to pay for that bottle.”
Thirteen years away had not been enough.
“You found her.”
Her father walked into the tasting room. Cat shifted her attention away from her brother who’d spit out the wine with a curse.
“This tastes like crap,” Bo said.
She wasn’t sure whether to laugh or worry. Tonight she’d scheduled a tasting at the house since Cruz had agreed to help at the Bluebonnet Festival this weekend. Axel had reluctantly agreed to help as well.
Cat looked at her phone, her heart jumping. Surely August should be done with his appointment by now. He’d promised to text when he was finished. What if the doctor had found something wrong?
“Fourteen years and no hello?” her father asked softly. “That’s not very nice, Catalina. Try a different bottle,” he urged his son, who had a disgusted look on his face.
“Like hell,” Catalina said, swiping a new bottle out of Bo’s hand the minute he ripped open another case with his bare ha
nds. “It’s called stealing. And I have no problem calling Chief Shane Highwater.”
“Right. Like you’d turn in your own kin.” Her dad stepped into her space and tugged the bottle from her fingers. “You are my daughter, and you owe your family loyalty and a whole lot more.” He looked around the tasting room, satisfaction gleaming. “Serves that arrogant rich boy right that a bus plowed through the building. I was all set to buy it. I almost had all the financing, and then he swaggered in, the damn phony cowboy with all his Portland hipster flash and big ideas, and bought the entire building. Offered way more than it was worth. Cash. Bastard.”
Good for August.
“But now that you’re back, trailing after him like you always do, I figure you can make it up to me. Figure he’s got you lined up to be his winemaker or whatever, as his real one is still flat on his back.”
Cat grit her teeth. He could not hurt her. His words could not hurt her ever again.
“We’ll work something up, you and I. You’ll have access to a lot of product and everything that little turd touches turns to gold.”
“Tastes like crap though.” Bo had helped himself to another bottle, a merlot. “People really pay for this?”
“A lot.” Bill Clemmens rocked forward on his feet.
“What do you reckon we can get for it?” Bo looked at their dad, who grinned.
“Like the way you think, son. You can load up the unbroken cases. We can help your sister sell them. Maybe cut you in on a slice of the action.” He slid a sly look her way, and Catalina’s stomach heaved.
“Not going to happen,” she said sternly.
“We are helping out.” Her father smirked. “All this wine here not locked up securely. Anyone could get in here.”
“Anyone did,” she spat back.
“You always did have a bigger mouth than brains,” he told her. “Bo, looks like we’re catching another lucky break. Your sister here can hire you on her crew.”
“I am not working for her.”
“I said hire. You can be on the payroll. You don’t have to actually work, but you will have easier access to the ranch and wine and pretty much anything else. Nice little side business for us.”
“Get. Out,” Catalina said.
With his finger and thumb, Dad pressed her lips together so hard her eyes watered.
“Keep your damn mouth shut,” her father growled. “I’m just thinkin’ out loud. I’ll get a plan together. You owe your brothers. You owe me. Nothing too big. Nothing you can’t handle.”
Catalina vibrated with outrage. Could she kick her own father? Hit him? No doubt Bo would retaliate.
Her father released her. Smiled.
“Welcome home, Catalina. It will be good to have you back in the family.”
So many retorts raced through her brain she was developing a headache.
Her father was dumber than a fence post if he thought she’d help him to steal from August. Anger shook her, but what was worse was the sorrow. Her father didn’t care for her. He never had. She’d always been a nuisance, a burden because she had refused to be a tool for him.
He wiped his hands on his pants as if she’d dirtied him.
Her lip throbbed, but she wouldn’t give him any satisfaction. And he was wrong. She would quite happily skip into the police department and report her father or any of her brothers for stealing or harassing or threatening Verflucht or her or any of the Wolf family.
Bo prowled through the tasting room, probably looking for something to steal.
“Come by the house for dinner one night,” her father urged. “We can catch up. I’ll be in touch. Grab a couple of those cases,” Bill told his son. “And not one you opened.”
Bo easily tucked a case of wine under each arm. The reserve. Of course.
“Thank you so much for the gift,” her father called out loudly as he headed toward the door. “Very generous. And I appreciate all the other ways you’ve offered to help. It’s wonderful to have my baby girl home where she belongs. I look forward to catching up for dinner.”
Cat’s mouth dropped open.
“Axel, good to see you.”
Cat’s heart thudded to her boots as Axel pushed in through the door. Bo did his best to smash into him, but Axel was too quick. His hard gaze tracked the cases Bo held. Bo flipped him off without missing a stride or juggling either case of wine.
“Hope your brother’s feeling better. Going to take a lot of work to get that building back in order. The historical society and planning commission are so touchy about the historical buildings. Looks like I dodged a bullet by not buying this dump. I think it’s cursed.” Bill laughed. “Of course, your brother always had an odd sense of humor. Guess we’ll be seeing more of each other now that my baby girl is going to be working up on your ranch. And she’s offered Bo a job.” He clapped Axel on the shoulder hard. “Good times ahead.”
Cat bit back a swear word and then another. But dang. Her father had thrown her to the Wolves literally and figuratively. And her lip really hurt. She wasn’t sure she could speak properly if she were so inclined.
Of all the people to overhear that conversation—but, of course, her father had done it deliberately. To hurt her. To piss off Axel. To drive another wedge between the brothers. To gain leverage over her. Her eyes closed as memories she’d practically spend half her life shutting away tumbled out to her consciousness again.
Ruthless she shoved them back behind the sagging door of her mind. She was stronger now. Independent.
“Mind telling me what he was doing here?” Axel demanded silkily. “And why your brother is stalking off with two cases of Verflucht reserve?”
*
August Wolf limped down the street toward his tasting room. He had an appointment with a structural engineer from the city as well as his original contractor. The insurance company had already had a rep out even though August had emailed them photos and the police report, and they were waiting on the results of this meeting before they would decide on his claim.
Was that Bill Clemmens ducking out of the door to his winery? What the hell? If he’d upset Cat… August pushed himself faster even though his body still hurt, although the swelling in his knee and ankle was going down.
Attending the AEBR final night a couple of nights ago to watch his brother ride hadn’t helped either, but it had been worth it to see Axel show off a little and unwind with Diego and that cute kid’s mom. It made his increased pain and tiredness and throbbing head totally worth it to see his brother trying to wow a woman. This was why he’d come home—to be part of his brother’s life, so seeing Anders killing it on the pro circuit and watching him ride and having all three brothers in the same place for the first time in forever was worth all the pain and aggravation Axel or life blew his way.
August watched with narrowed eyes as Bill turned back toward the boarded-up entry and was obviously talking to someone. Probably Cat. He was her father, but still, a protectiveness Cat would find way over the top flared in him. And that was before he saw Bo exit the winery with two cases tucked under his arm. He looked like a linebacker off sides hoping to avoid the yellow flag from the ref.
What the…August had to stop for a moment and try to suck in air. Damn, his ribs hurt more than his shoulder, ribs and knee combined. But he wasn’t seriously concussed and should heal fine. He’d scheduled his shoulder surgery for after Christmas, wanting to be finished with harvest and the holiday festivities so he didn’t have to think about that.
He should be back to normal when the bottling of the next vintage started.
So this was what it was like to feel like an old man. He straightened up and strode down the rest of the block like he owned it. If Axel and Anders could work through far worse injuries, he was not going to be the pansy brother.
He paused in the doorway—the dim lighting inside made it hard to adjust from the glaring sun outside. But he could hear. Axel was there. And he had not liked seeing Bill or Bo with Cat. Time to run interference
. Verflucht was his and Cat’s.
“No way in hell are you giving your brother a job in the vineyard, which will give him access to the ranch.”
Axel always got quiet and cold when he was pissed.
“I’m the winemaker. I’ll hire the crew I want. Not you. Verflucht and the vineyard are August’s not yours. He doesn’t interfere with the ranching interests.”
“The contract hasn’t even been drafted up for you to have partial ownership and you’re already opening the gates to your family. I told August you couldn’t be trusted. I will not let that man or either of his sons on my property.”
“That’s an awfully high horse you’re about to fall off of, cowboy.” Cat had her arms crossed, and she too sounded pissed. A shaft of light lit up her hair that haloed around her head for a second before she scraped it back with a sharp flick of her hands. “Assume much?”
“You’ve been in town a few days and already you’re offering your brothers jobs and letting your dad knuckle-drag two cases of the most expensive wine out the door without even a thank you. If that’s how you’re going to be the winemaker and vineyard manager, my brother will be broke in a year. Con-fucking-gratulations.”
“Hey!” August advanced across the cement floor, each step shooting pain all the way up to his hip. “Don’t talk to her like that.”
“Like what, the voice of reason? One of us needs to because it’s never going to be you. The Clemmens will rob you blind, and no way will any of them have access to the ranch. Ever. Not even if you marry her in the damn East Barn you’re always going on about, and she births twin sons in a manger constructed by you, resurrecting your long-dormant shop skills. Bill and Bo and Ben are not coming on our land.”
“The vineyard is mine.” August stepped into his brother’s space. “Cat and I will do the hiring. Cat and I will decide who comes and goes on the vineyard.”
For a moment August thought Axel was going to slug him. It had been a long time since they’d gotten into a knockdown, drag-out, fists flying up in the air fight. August had always started them with his mouth and his attitude. Axel had always finished them—winning decisively. And then he’d make August’s humiliation worse by taking care of his injuries and taking the blame, so their father hadn’t been pissed at him.
A Bride for the Texas Cowboy Page 12