At Wits' End: An Enemies To Lovers Romantic Comedy

by Kenzie Reed

  I’m impatient to get running, but I know that Sienna’s going to say hi to everyone in town first. Partly because she’s outgoing and friendly and likes everyone who’s not a Witlocke or a member of the Greenvale Ladies’ League, and partly to mess with me.

  Angus, a tall, sandy-haired guy with a lean runner’s body, nods at me with a cool expression, then strolls off to start stretching. Pamela’s already poisoned him against me. No surprise there.

  Sienna and Pamela hug each other and do that girl thing of admiring each other’s hair, each other’s outfits, each other’s everything. Guys don’t do that. I mean, we might say, “Looking good, man,” if we haven’t seen someone in a while, but never do I ever greet Graham by telling him how great his new shirt fits him or how his new haircut suits his face just right. Maybe we should. Maybe guys would be less cranky if we cheered each other on more. Never gonna happen, though.

  “We need to talk after this run,” Pamela says. “Can I meet you back here in about an hour?” She shoots me a sidelong glance, then smirks at Sienna.

  “But of course.” Sienna nods enthusiastically. “We do have some things to discuss.”

  I shudder to think about how that conversation’s going to go.

  “Hey, Pamela,” I say, raising a hand in greeting. “I’m right here. Sienna’s husband. How’ve you been? Lots of fun lawsuits to keep you busy?”

  She smiles, her eyes murderous. “Hey, Donovan. Hurt my friend and I’ll gut you. If you think I’m kidding, I’ve got a teething baby, I haven’t slept this year, and prison sounds very, very restful right about now. Also I’m pretty sure that no woman jury in the land would convict me.”

  “This has been a pleasant chat. I can’t think why you and I don’t get together more often.” I loop my arm through Sienna’s and steer her away.

  “I need to say hi to some more people,” she protests. More and more people are showing up. It’s the golden hour for running, cool and mildly breezy, and the parking lot and trail are full of familiar faces.

  “The sooner we do this, the sooner you get it over with.”

  She heaves a martyred sigh, but follows me over to a flat grassy spot.

  I show her how to stretch properly and explain the training regimen. It involves running one minute, walking two minutes, and repeating this ten times. Then a rest day, then a session of running two minutes, walking four minutes, and so on. She’ll gradually build her way up to a 5k – cursing me with every step, I’m sure.

  “Oh God. Incoming,” she mutters just as we’re about to hit the trail. Carrie and Tonya are making their way towards us, and they’re wearing twin jogging suits in shades of pink and purple.

  “It never ends, does it?” I sigh.

  “Well, you had to take us to the most popular jogging spot in town.”

  “It’s the course we’re running for the Fall-fest, it makes sense to train here.”

  Carrie and Tonya slither over to us, flashing matching feral smiles. “Glad to see you two lovebirds made it. This is certainly an unusual way to spend a honeymoon.” Carrie arches an eyebrow.

  “Hey!” Marcus, Carrie’s ex, makes his way towards us. He’s got dyed, thinning brown hair with a combover, a paunch lapping over his jogging shorts, and cologne that arrives about a minute before he does.

  Heather, Marcus’ former secretary now wife, remains behind with a crowd of other joggers who are warming up on the grassy spot by the beginning of the trail. She keeps a wary eye on Carrie, who spent a night in jail for slugging her in the face when she caught Marcus playing hide the salami with her in his office.

  Heather is thin, tan, and jogging with a full face of makeup. Yes, Marcus is that cliché. He’s fifty, and he dumped his forty-year-old wife of twenty years for his twenty-five-year-old secretary. And they both live and work in this town; Carrie is stuck seeing him parading his new arm-candy around all the time, and I understand why she’s pissed at him. I’m just not enjoying being one of the many people who’ve gotten caught in the cross-fire.

  “Quit harassing them!” Marcus snaps at Carrie. “I know what you’re doing.”

  Carrie glares at him. “I’m not harassing them.” She twists to face us and flashes a smile that looks like a death’s-head rictus. “Am I?”

  “Not at all,” I say smoothly.

  “Just having a little pre-jog chat,” Sienna assures Marcus.

  “You shouldn’t even be here. We’ve got a restraining order.” Marcus pats the cell phone that’s strapped to his flabby upper arm. “I’m going to call the police.”

  “Knock yourself out.” Carrie stares at him, and the air is thick with mutual hatred. He stands there scowling. A long, uncomfortable moment drags out until finally Carrie speaks again. “Heather was the one with the restraining order. And it’s expired. A week ago, in fact.”

  Marcus blinks and swallows, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “We’ll get it renewed.”

  “Not without cause. And you have none. Yet.” Carrie’s eyes glitter with a mad light.

  “Marcus?” Tonya coos sweetly.

  “What?” he snaps.

  “Trim your ear hairs, for God’s sake. Or braid them.” She and Carrie high-five each other and stalk off, noses in the air. Marcus glares in their direction.

  “Like she didn’t get enough in the divorce settlement,” he mutters.

  Sienna’s smile twitches a little.

  He sighs heavily, self-consciously raising his hand to touch his ear, and turns his attention back to Sienna and me. “Anyway, glad to see things are going well with the families. Mr. Ferguson is going to be here some time over the next few weeks, looking over the land and finalizing the subdivision plans. You understand, he’s also looking at a few other locations, and if anything were to happen to jeopardize this deal…”

  “Other locations?” Sienna says indignantly. “He’s already gotten the permits approved. My understanding is that his company has put down a two-million-dollar deposit to hold the property until September, and then the deal goes through. And the only way he could back out would be if any member of the Witlocke or Ribaldi families sued the other family, or filed a police report, or was caught in the act of physically assaulting a member of the other family. It’s in the contract. I mean, we’re also not shopping the property around, either, and the real estate market is hot right now. So if he has doubts, we may need to reconsider.”

  “You can’t reconsider, you’ve all signed the contract. He’s offering you a price that’s well above market value, and you know it. That money gets deposited Monday. He wanted to wait until after the wedding. And after what happened with Jonathon, he’s a little twitchy right now. Maybe when he comes to town, we can all get together for lunch,” Marcus says. “Reassure him that everything’s going smoothly. Everything is going smoothly, right?” His anxious gaze bounces from Sienna to me and back again. This deal is going to put an enormous commission in his pocket, enough for him to retire on, and he’d marry me himself if it would help the deal go through. And if he and I weren’t both already married.

  “Smooth as glass,” I assure him. “However, I also want to remind you that I have a team of excellent lawyers on retainer and if you, or Mr. Ferguson, screw us over in any way… Well, the last person who tried to screw me over is living under a bridge. Literally, not figuratively.”

  Some of the color drains from Marcus’ face. “I should be going,” he says. “I’ll call you to set up lunch.”

  I grab Sienna’s hand, and we start walking. “Beautiful day, huh?” I say.

  She glances back at Marcus, her brow furrowed. “Except for the jogging part,” she says, distracted. “Are you sure it’s not going to drive you crazy having to run beside me at the pace of a geriatric snail?”

  “I’ll suffer through it. And after we finish, I’m going to come back and run a couple of miles on my own. You won’t need a ride back right away, right? You’ll be hanging out with Pamela and Angus, and verbally eviscerating me?”

  �
�Something like that. I do need to visit Aunt Fernanda this afternoon, though, so we can’t be out here too long.”

  The next twenty minutes go reasonably painlessly. Winding through the forest, with the sun filtering through the oak leaves and bathing us in golden-green light, isn’t the worst way to spend the morning. My watch beeps every sixty seconds to alert me when Sienna needs to slow down. I’ll pick up a jogging watch for her this afternoon too.

  We keep to the left so faster runners – which is everybody – can pass us on the right. As we move down the path, we get a lot of waves, and a lot of friendly – and outright curious – looks. A Witlocke, and a Ribaldi – side by side. And nobody’s bleeding.

  It’s kind of nice leaving the rush and hustle of Los Angeles behind and being back home in a town where everybody knows everybody. Nice, and sometimes awful, of course. The small town gossip makes everybody feel like they’re living under a spotlight, and the glare from that spotlight can burn awfully hot.

  Sienna’s flushed and panting when we make our way back to the beginning of the trail.

  “That wasn’t so bad, was it?” I grin at her. “Sweetheart.”

  “Eat a bag of dicks. Dear. You made me jog.”

  “Yes. Yes, I did. And you made me sleep in a barn.”

  A loud, gloating voice yells out at me, “Looking forward to eating our dust at the relay, Donny-boy?”

  It’s Fraser, from the high school lacrosse team, with Brooke Cornwall, Sienna’s old nemesis. Other than me, that is. I semi-dated Brooke occasionally, although we were never exclusive. Brooke was viciously jealous of my interest in Sienna, and she and her friends were catty to Sienna out of spite.

  I hate being called Donny, and Fraser knows it. Apparently he and Brooke are married now. How delightful. They’re a Ken and Barbie picture of plastic handsomeness. Fraser even has the thick dark hair that doesn’t move, although in his case it’s because of mousse.

  “Actually, we were just talking about what kind of dust sandwich we’d be serving up to you,” Sienna says loudly. Then she mutters to herself, “God! That was lame. I give myself a two out of ten.”

  “Oh, really. Care to put money on it?” Fraser’s eyes gleam with malice.

  “Forget the money. Make him wash your car every day for a month,” Brooke says gleefully.

  “Ha!” Sienna scoffs. “When you lose, you have to come to my uncle’s dairy farm and shovel manure every Saturday morning for six months.”

  “You’re on!” Fraser brays, flashing big white teeth. “And I don’t want to see any scratches on my car, Donny-boy. Also, bring your own supplies, please.”

  They smirk at us, then jog off – holding hands.

  “Gross,” Sienna says.

  “Seriously.” I shake my head.

  I nudge her. “You realize that we have to win now?”

  She looks at me in dismay. “Damn it. Yes, we do. Me and my mouth.”

  I stare at her. Her mouth… She has the cutest little rosebud mouth. It was the second thing I noticed about her. The first was her wild, glorious black explosion of curls.

  I’ll never forget the first day I saw her, at the Greenvale public playground near where we’re standing right now. I was six. She’d just moved back into town. Later, I was to find out that it was because her mother’s second marriage had failed and her mother had moved back to Greenvale with her.

  Poised on top of the jungle gym, she looked like a little fairy child, wild and untamable. Something about her tugged at me, called to me. I pointed at her. “I’m going to marry her,” I told my dad.

  “She’s a Ribaldi, so no, you’re not,” he said sourly. He barely spoke to me for days afterwards. Back then, I had only recently learned that I was adopted, and it had left me feeling shaky and unsure of my place in my family.

  Here we are years later, and my marriage to Sienna is what’s going to save my father from losing the family vineyard and legacy.

  Funny how things work out.

  Chapter Ten

  SIENNA

  The Ribaldi Winery is located in a brown gambrel-roof building at the top of a hill, overlooking our sloping vineyards, with their famously red volcanic Jory soils. Red and white geraniums are planted in wine barrels on either side of the barn-style double front door, adorned with Italian flags. The black iron window boxes overflow with red coleus, ferns, and trailing ivy. There’s a small scattering of filigree metal tables and chairs set in a flagstoned patch with a vineyard view.

  I’d love to quadruple the size of the seating area and add full meals, but there’s a long list of emergency expenses that we can’t even afford, so that will have to wait.

  Sitting in the office, I glance out the window and try to cheer myself up with the fact that the parking lot is full. We’re busy today because it’s not only a Saturday, it’s a tasting day. The Ribaldi Winery will sell wine any day of the week, but we only hold tastings on days that, according to the biodynamic calendar, are fortuitous. There’s a big sign out in front of the winery saying which days we have tastings, but there are also biodynamic apps and calendars that identify the proper days.

  My aunt and uncle were passionate adherents to biodynamic winemaking, a hundred-year-old practice that involves planting, pruning, fertilizing, harvesting, and even drinking wine by following the phases of the moon.

  According to this system, the moon moves through different phases – fruit days, when the moon is in Aries, Leo and Sagittarius; flower days, when the moon is in Gemini, Libra, and Aquarius; leaf days, such as Cancer, Scorpio, or Pisces; and root days, when the moon is in Capricorn, Taurus or Virgo. Fruit and flower days are good days to drink wine. Leaf and root days are not good days to drink wine.

  Today, with the moon in Sagittarius, it’s a fruit day. Thus, we have a tasting. Is this true, or is it all superstitious hooey? Some of the top winemakers in the world swear by it, and there’s no denying that the Ribaldi wines are absolute works of art, so who am I to argue?

  As I watch the customers, I see Sara hurrying up the stone path from her father’s house, which is about a quarter mile from the vineyards. That means that Francesca, the sole employee at the winery today, called her for help. Francesca must be slammed; I’d be helping her myself if I wasn’t busy going through the books. And Sara’s volunteering, to help out family.

  She does it a lot, and it just isn’t fair to ask of her on a regular basis. Yes, she’ll collect tips, but she refuses to take a salary, and she’s been working at her father’s dairy since before the sun came up. She shouldn’t have to run her butt off like this. She should have time off. Same thing with Cesare. Cesare is the main mechanic and farmhand for the dairy. Uncle Vito’s not getting any younger, and he’s mostly passed on the dairy farm to Rocco and his kids. But since Aunt Fernanda had her stroke, they’ve all pitched in to keep her vineyard afloat, and it’s like them each having two full-time jobs.

  I walk over to the window, open it, and yell, “Thank you, Sara! Keep track of your hours!”

  “Fuggedaboutit!” she yells back in an exaggerated fake accent.

  “You will take my money and like it! Eventually! When I have money!”

  She hurries through the front door of the winery with a cheerful grin.

  I look back down at Aunt Fernanda’s hand-written records and shake my head slowly. “Aunt Fernanda, what have you done?”

  Normally, I find balancing books to be almost meditative. The certainty of numbers soothes me. You can rely on numbers. They don’t break your heart or stand you up or propose to you and then pack up and run off with–

  Er, anyway, numbers, to coin a phrase, can be counted on.

  It’s why, when everything fell apart for me, I chose to major in accounting.

  When I was twenty-two years old, I had graduated from Washington State with a degree in viticulture. I’d been given the awesome job of assistant vineyard manager for my aunt, who’d needed help after my uncle passed away.

  Simon was the sexy cellar rat
from the Witlocke vineyards. Now, technically a cellar rat just means someone who works in the wine cellar, prepping and filling barrels, running the bottling machines, and generally doing the grunt work, but it turned out to be a bitterly apt term for him.

  Those were some low times for me. My mother had stood me up at my college graduation, I was feeling shaky and insecure, and gorgeous, charming Simon swooped in and promised me a lifetime of devotion. I was sold. He quit working for the Witlockes and, since he was dating me, my aunt hired him to work at her winery. Big mistake. It turned out that he hadn’t actually quit working for the Witlockes – they’d fired him after he hit on both Jamie and Toni, repeatedly, while dating a yoga teacher in town, and also money had kept disappearing from the till at their winery.

  And none of those A-hole Witlockes warned us. I can’t blame Donovan for that one, because he was in L.A., but his parents knew and didn’t say a word. They just let a lech and a suspected thief work for us, date me, and propose to me. Then the police came looking for him one day because of an out-of-state warrant that he’d also neglected to mention. I tried to call him, sure it was a misunderstanding. Nope. He never answered, because he’d skipped town – along with my aunt and uncle’s pickup truck and a hundred cases of our best vintage of Syrah ever, and approximately ten thousand dollars from the safe. He’d left with the yoga teacher.

  It was mortifying. It was devastating. Everyone in town knew within days, and I looked like an absolute fool. Cops located Simon in New Jersey a few weeks later, in a hotel room with two hookers. The money was gone, the wine was gone, the yoga teacher was gone. He had overdosed on cocaine but they revived him. He went to jail, but the damage was done.

  The one bright spot in all of that was that my mother, for once, came through for us. She had received a big cash settlement from one of her husbands. She replaced the stolen ten grand, and she paid for me to start over in Seattle, giving me the funds to go back to college and major in accounting.

  And for years now, numbers have been my happy place.

  Today I’m finding no solace in numbers. Looking through my aunt’s books is giving me a full-fledged anxiety attack. I guess it’s because it’s personal. For once I wish I could make the figures on the page tell me some pretty lies, but the fact is, there is more money going out than coming in. Sales are good, but they’re down from last year. We need to hire several new employees. We need a cellar rat of our own to help the winemaker who’s worked with Aunt Fernanda the last several years, we desperately need more people to operate the winery, we need a marketing director…the list goes on. The property sale won’t be going through until September first. How the hell are we going to survive until then?