by Mae Wood
“She seems nice. Is she an Elizabeth or a Jessica?” Marisa asked, ignoring her husband, as she scooped some lavender lemon sorbet onto a spoon.
“What are you talking about?” I said.
“Five foot six, eyes the color of the Pacific, perfect size six . . . You really don’t know what I’m talking about? You have three sisters. How do you not know what I’m talking about?”
“Just like you can’t name the Voltron teams, I’d bet.”
“I don’t even know what Voltron is. So how about I stick with Sweet Valley for now? Is the Snatch still in the picture?”
“Done with the ice cream already, beautiful?” Trip asked her softly, rubbing small circles into her back and taking the empty bowl from her hands.
I shook my head at my best friend in a futile attempt to warn him of the quicksand he had just set foot in. Don’t struggle. Don’t fight. Just extricate yourself as smoothly as possible and move on. Poor bastard has so much to learn about being married.
“Bethany and I went out a couple of weekends ago. I haven’t seen her since,” I said, trying to divert Marisa’s attention from Trip’s marital misstep and take one for the team.
“Did she meet Grady?”
“No.”
“So, she is on her way out and doesn’t even know it yet. Bless her heart. But I like Sweet Valley. She doesn’t look like she’d talk about her snatch in public.”
“I’m not interested in Drennan like that. Will you give it a rest?”
“No, not when you were trying to use X-ray vision to see through her clothes and she was all but ready to maul you.”
I shook my head and focused on my beer, but Marisa’s usually not wrong about people. Maybe the wine rep is really into me and it’s not just a sales thing. Too bad cradle robbing isn’t a look I go for.
“Sweet Valley is totally DTF and you know it,” Marisa continued.
“DTF?” asked Trip.
“Down to fuck,” she offered with a crooked smile. “Occupational hazard is getting to learn texting lingo in sexual harassment cases. What did you think it meant?”
“No clue. Dice that fennel? Digging the field? Dunk those ferrets?” Trip said in between sips of beer before pulling his wife into a hug. “So, beautiful, I’m thinking—”
His voice dropped so low that I couldn’t hear, but Marisa’s blush was evident. They pawed at each other nonstop. I’d grown accustomed to it in the year they’d been together, but they were drawing looks from some of the other documentary refugees. Time to call this before they ended up going at it in public somewhere between the symposium and their hotel room.
“Hey, I’m going to take an around the world tour of the desserts. Someone has to have some bread pudding. Y’all want to join me?” I offered half-heartedly, providing the social out we all knew Trip and Marisa wanted.
Trip stretched his hands over his head and faked a yawn. “It’s been a long week for me. Boston. I’m bushed.”
I rolled my eyes and finished my beer. “’Kay. See you tomorrow at breakfast?” Without waiting for a response, I wandered off. I’d be lucky to see them by lunch.
I scored some apple bread pudding with a bourbon crème anglaise and walked over to the cash bar for a stiff drink. I was not in the mood to chat up purveyor reps for tastings. I just wanted a drink.
Perching my bourbon and soda on a small high-top table, I dug into my dessert and surveyed the crowd. Eventually I found her, chatting with one of the presenters at the wine talk I’d attended Friday evening. I think the guy wrote for the Wall Street Journal or LA Times or something big like that. Maybe she knew him from her time at Food & Wine.
I kept a casual watch on them as I moved onto my second bourbon and soda, this time accompanied by a warm banana pudding. She was still talking with him and it didn’t escape my notice their subtle dance of him edging toward her and her edging away. Her body language read loud and clear to me. Dude needed to stop.
Chapter Ten
Drennan
If I thought I needed an out when I ran into Bert, I was wrong. I needed one now. Desperately. The New York Times’s wine critic was being more than friendly. I’d first met him while I worked in New York and it was a great opportunity to keep our family’s wines on his radar. I wouldn’t classify the few dinners I’d shared with him as dating. We’d never kissed, much less slept together. He was too pocket-square for anyone I’d be interested in. In New York, he was definitely Upper West Side, but with a park view, while I proudly announced my address as Fort Greene in Brooklyn.
Although now that I thought about it, that dinner at Per Se in April was a touch too friendly. Maybe those accidental kicks under the table had been an attempt at footsie. Lancaster wasn’t being so understated this time. His hand grazed my shoulder and trailed down to my elbow where it lingered. Oh, fuck. No mistaking this. Tingles ran down my spine and not the sexy kind. The creepy kind. I needed a nice way to get out of here without offending a powerful wine critic. My eyes darted around the room, looking for someone I could use as an excuse to leave my conversation with him gracefully.
I saw no one I knew. Fuck my luck. How is that even possible? Where did everyone I know go? Going for another drink would only invite his continued company. The bathroom indicated that I intended to come back to him. Then my eyes landed on Lickable Man. Now the man I’d tried to avoid earlier in the evening was the man I needed to run to. Best option I had.
“Lancaster,” I said, taking a step out of his grasp.
“When are you in New York next? David Chang is opening a new place and I will get us a table.”
With a noncommittal nod I scooted back a bit farther, craving space from him. Not cool, I thought, as he touched me again on my arm.
A glance found Bert at my side, his hand protectively on my bicep, tucking me into his side. “Hey, there you are.”
“Right where you left me,” I confirmed, letting my head rest against his chest and savoring the false intimacy of the moment. Bourbon and baked desserts. Oh, God, he even smells like heaven. And if he was going to play it this way, I was going to enjoy it.
“Bert Forsythe,” he offered his other hand to Lancaster who shook it while finally giving me a bit of breathing room. After a brief chat, that saw me lacing our fingers together and snuggling even closer in hopes of getting lucky and feeling his scruff, Lancaster excused himself. Whether in search of a fresh glass or fresh meat, I didn’t care. I was happy to be off his agenda for the night, but less than happy to have my Bert cuddlefest broken up.
As Lancaster’s form faded into the buzzy crowd, Bert let me go. The coolness at his absence surprised me.
“So what’s up with the wine guy?” Bert asked.
He knew who I’d been talking with? Maybe this isn’t entirely one sided.
“Just talking business.”
Bert raised an eyebrow. He wasn’t buying my bullshit. “Wine?”
I nodded, and not wanting to focus on Letchy Lancaster, changed the subject. “So you’re a really good swimmer.”
“Thanks. I swam in college, but it’s not like I was at Stanford or Michigan, so I’m not that great. Did you swim in college? UC Davis, right?”
“I stopped competitive swimming after high school, but yes, Davis. Where did you swim?”
“Vandy.”
“That’s still D-1, so color me impressed.” He paused for a second and finished the drink in his hand.
“So you were in the medley relay, right?”
“Yeah, I was. I hadn’t gone off blocks in almost ten years.”
“Your start was fine and your stroke is nice.”
“You watched?”
“Yeah, I did.” He watched me swim? Of course he watched me swim. He was looking at me. I knew it, but my brain was a little befuddled by his nearness. And what else is there to do at a swim meet? Of course he watched me swim. Watched my team swim and come in second out of five. Probably doesn’t mean anything.
“I noticed you were hangi
ng up in the bleachers. Teenage nephew?”
“No. That’s my son.”
I felt my eyes get big as I struggled to suppress my surprise. “That’s cool he came to your meet,” I said, downplaying my initial reaction. Okay, so even if he’s thirty-five and he’s got a fifteen-year-old, that would have made him, what? Twenty when his son was born? I continued, “Is he a swimmer, too?”
“Not anymore. I tried my hardest, but he’s a soccer player. It rules his life. In fact he got into Vandy, but not for sports. Right now he’d have to try to walk on the soccer team and it’s pretty unlikely that he’d make it, so he’s not sure he wants to go to Vandy.”
“Smart and sporty, like his dad,” I angled. Okay, so his son is seventeen or eighteen. I looked at my now empty wineglass.
“No, smart like his mom.”
The train lurched and screeched on its tracks. Was it going to derail on its way to Lickable City? Please say you’re divorced, I prayed. Please say the rumors are true and you’re divorced.
“She’s an orthodontist in Cordova. We have joint custody.”
And we have a winner. Let’s see if we can pull this train into the station. This was it. All of my attempts at seduction were worth nothing, but give him an opportunity to shoo away Letchy Lancaster and he was as game as I was. Damsel in distress was clearly his thing and an angle it had never even occurred to me to try. “Where are your friends?”
“Gone for the night.”
“So,” I said, twirling the stem of my wineglass between my fingers, “one of the restaurant consultancies out of Atlanta is having a private reception in a suite back at the hotel and showing some really awesome wines. If you want, you can come with me. I mean, if you’d like—”
“Sounds great.”
We walked the couple of blocks back to the symposium’s designated hotel, our steps falling in sync. After giving my name to a fresh-faced intern, we were given a swipe card to access the hotel’s top floor.
“Wow. Way to keep the riffraff out. Do you have territory all over the southeast? You seem to know a lot of people here.”
“No, I just cover Tennessee and Arkansas and parts of Missouri for the wine distributor. I don’t know anyone really well, but I know a lot of folks through wine.”
“You said you worked at Food & Wine straight out of college. That’s impressive.”
“It wasn’t solely on merit. My parents called some people they knew.”
“Regardless, still impressive.”
We stepped off the elevator and were greeted by another intern who reclaimed the access card and directed us to the suite.
“Are you sure it’s okay you brought me? I know I’m crashing.”
“Yes. Absolutely. My invitation was for a plus one. Hello, Plus One.” I shrugged out of my motorcycle jacket and dropped it onto a sofa littered with purses, swag bags, and jackets. “If you want to drop your jacket here, that’s cool. I heard there are a couple of Argentine vintners here, but some of the more famed French houses are doing tastings, too.”
Bert looked at me quizzically. “‘Come on,” I said. “I know it’s a Southern food symposium, but are you really only going to serve wine grown south of the Mason-Dixon Line in your restaurant?”
“You’re right about that.”
“Okay, Plus One, let’s start tasting.” I extended my hand to him and when our bodies met for the third time that night, the desire to press against his length was unbearably urgent. I didn’t let go of his hand as we approached the first table and neither did he. “I’m interested in your white Bordeaux,” I told the rep behind the black-skirted banquet table, “but walk us through what you’re showing.”
The rep began his memorized spiel, but I didn’t pay a bit of attention. My focus was entirely on my hand caught in Bert’s. Large, warm, and soft. I drifted off into a land of tangled bedsheets and deep, satisfied moans.
“Let’s start with the Bordeaux, since that’s what you’re here for,” said the rep offering me a generous pour for a tasting. I came back to reality, cursing that I wasn’t ambidextrous. I needed my right hand to hold the glass or I’d end up spilling wine all over the place. Damn. Bert gave my hand a small squeeze and ran his thumb across the back of my hand before letting me go. I longed for the connection.
“Thank you,” I said to the rep, taking the glass of wine. We sipped. He gestured to the spittoon at the end of the table. I shook my head. I needed the warmth of this alcohol in my bloodstream right now, if I was going to be able to keep a cool veneer. I set the glass down and we were guided through the rest of the tasting flight.
As we turned to explore elsewhere, I picked up the glass of Bordeaux to bring with me, letting my eyes scan for the next stop on our tour. Bert quickly stepped to my left side and claimed that hand in his right. I sucked a quick breath in, not expecting him to resume our chaste touch. “I’m a lefty,” he whispered, his breath ghosting over my ear and neck. “This will work better.”
Warmth and tingles coursed through my body and I relished the sensation. I could only nod. Words and sounds didn’t make sense. The room dissolved into white noise. I took another sip from my glass in hopes of not giving away my thoughts and headed across the busy suite toward another table.
“Drennan!” I turned and saw Gaspard, coming towards me for la bise. After the obligatory air kissing, I made introductions.
“Bert, Gaspard’s business is in design. He does work for restaurants, tasting rooms. Gaspard, Bert is my plus one.” The words slipped through my lips and I felt red. Calling him “my” anything felt right in my head, but wrong on my lips. “He owns a restaurant in Memphis.”
“Ah,” said Gaspard, his French-Canadian accent making the sound soft. “Have you seen the sketches I sent to your cousin for the refresh of the tasting room?”
“Not yet. I’m sure they are lovely. I saw what you did at Nopa and you really captured the spirit of the kitchen in the design.”
“Ah, thank you for that kindness. Having to work in San Francisco, or really anywhere in California, is never a hardship. Just don’t make me go to LA. I won’t keep you and your plus one, as you call him. Please let me know about the sketches. I’m eager to know your reaction.”
We chatted a few more minutes before he left in search of another client to greet. “Sketches of a tasting room?” Bert asked.
“Yes, so my family owns a winery in Napa. We’re redoing the tasting room. Not a complete overhaul, but just paint and upholstery. A makeover, not a facelift.”
“So that’s how you landed at Food & Wine.” I nodded. “And why are you hawking wine in the Mid-South?”
“I wanted some direct experience with our end purchasers, who are mainly retailers and restaurants. I called one of the wholesalers we work with and he said that Memphis and Little Rock were expanding quite nicely and it would be a good opportunity for me to get some experience with my boots on the ground.”
“So, you aren’t really a wine rep.”
“I am right now and for a few more months. I want to go through a little more than an entire revenue cycle with the distributor and clients so I can take the most of this opportunity.”
“Very strategic,” he said.
I nodded, appreciating the compliment that had nothing to do with my body. “What winery?” He smiled, a small dimple appearing in his scruffy cheeks.
“von Eck.”
I saw the recognition dawn in his eyes. “Wow. That’s a serious wine.”
“Yeah,” I said through pursed lips, knowing that his view of me just changed and I wasn’t sure if it was for the good.
Chapter Eleven
Bert
Holy fuck. Her family owns von Eck. She’s a von Eck. von Eck’s up there with Inglenook as one of the oldest wineries in California, Opus One type quality, but it’s pretty small and its low end stuff approaches a few hundred dollars a bottle—wholesale.
“I’m the plus one to wine royalty tonight?”
She shrugged, the t
op of her striped shirt sagging at the neckline and giving me another glorious view of her boobs. “Something like that. Come on, Plus One, let’s explore.”
With the revelation she’d become more relaxed and chattier with the other guests, but she kept me close by. As she moved on to her second true glass of wine, rather than a tasting pour, I’d accepted that my name had changed from Bert to Plus One, telling folks she’d picked me up in a 7-Eleven, pried the Boone’s Farm from my hand, and now was educating me. Once ending the education comment with a wink and a smack to my ass for all to see while a wicked smile crawled across her pretty face. Yeah, this will be fun.
In a lull, I caved. “You’re off to California in the spring, then?”
“Sometime at the end of November, early December.”
I scrolled through my mental checklist. Hot. Check. Fit. Check. Flirty. Check. No mention of Paleo or burpees. Check. Limited time in Memphis so I’m not a complete bastard when this ends. Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner.
I excused myself to find a bathroom. I locked the door behind me. Classy. Everything I hope that Grady doesn’t do, but knew he probably does. I looked in the mirror and breathed. I’m going for it. I reached into my jeans pocket, pulled out my phone, and began to text.
I typed. I backspaced. I typed. I shook my phone to clear a paragraph. Damn. Should have brought a glass of wine in here with me.
I breathed deeply once again, typed, and pulled the trigger, hitting send on a message that tells Bethany we’re through. I glanced at the time. It was approaching midnight and she was going to know immediately what I was doing—the opposite of a booty call. This was me clearing the decks so that someone else can warm my bed.
CrossFit Bethany: RU serious???
Me: Yes. Sorry.
CrossFit Bethany: You are a bastard.
I smiled as my reply popped up almost simultaneously—Me: I am a bastard.
CrossFit Bethany: Fuck U.