Then He Kissed Me
Page 28
Giuliana scooted over to allow the other woman to perch a hip on the sofa cushions and considered the question. “It was all a dream? My apartment didn’t really burn last night, my car wasn’t bashed in, and I’m not actually relegated to using my office as a bedroom?”
“Not the last, certainly,” Allie said, frowning. “You should have bunked down at the farmhouse.”
Liam’s warnings about squeals and heavy breathing had been hard to forget. “I was perfectly comfortable here,” she lied, sitting up. She could smell smoke on her hair and realized she’d have to buy or borrow toiletries along with underwear and clothes and shoes and … just about everything. Daunted by the idea, she slid back to prone and closed her eyes. “On second thought, I am asleep.” If she could manage another hour or two of snooze time, maybe all that lay ahead wouldn’t feel so overwhelming.
Pulling the afghan higher on her shoulders, she murmured to her sister, “You don’t need me for anything right this minute, do you?”
There was a telltale hesitation. “Of course not.”
Even before their mom died when the sisters were sixteen, fourteen, and twelve, Giuliana had been like a second mother to Allie. So there was no way she could ignore the younger woman now. Opening her eyes once again, she rose up on her elbows. “Is there a problem?”
Her sister bounced on the cushions, the dimple at the side of her mouth flickering. “Jules, I’ve had the most brilliant idea!”
“Does this involve blindsiding Penn with another wedding proposal?”
Allie grinned, unrepentant. “But look how well that turned out.” Her arms flew wide. “I’m obnoxiously happy.”
It was hard not to smile in the face of all that unrelenting good cheer. And it was hard not to feel that Allie deserved every mote of it after the sad outcome of her first wedding attempt. Love and marriage could work if the couple was the right mix of personality and heart. Allie and Penn, and Stevie and Jack, proved that.
Some pairings, however, clashed, and a woman who worked at a winery understood that, too.
Allie’s eyes narrowed. “Uh-oh. ‘What’s wrong?”
Giuliana tried shaking off her lowering mood. “Tell me about your brilliant idea.”
Her sister seemed to sparkle. “It’s about the Vow-Over Weekend.”
Of course it was about the Vow-Over Weekend scheduled for the last days in June. “That’s what we’ve all been working toward,” Giuliana confirmed. Not only was it the fiftieth anniversary of the sparkling blanc de blancs that they bottled exclusively for weddings, but it also signaled the end of the year they’d agreed to give Tanti Baci to get back on its financial feet.
Allie bit her lip. “You know reservations have been a little slow coming in…”
Even though they’d been busting their behinds to get the word out that the winery was hosting a series of events to celebrate their wedding wine and the couples who’d toasted each other with it at their nuptials for the past fifty years - up to and including an on-site justice of the peace who would be on hand to help happy couples renew their vows. “You’ve done the best you can, Allie,” she assured her younger sister.“ Yes, yes, but you won’t believe what I’ve found out. What we can really use to create excitement. The legend -”
Giuliana groaned, her hand lifting to cover her eyes. “Not the legend. I’m begging you. Please don’t talk about the legend.”
“What legend?” It was a new voice. Grace’s.
Giuliana dropped her hand to inspect her fellow refugee. The night before, their taxi had dropped the other woman at the small bungalow of Kohl’s sister Man. “You didn’t have to come in today.”
Grace shrugged, looking fresh and wide awake in a pair of jeans and a simple button-down shirt embroidered with the Tanti Baci logo - a delicate ivy garland with heart-shaped leaves. “Man lent me some things. So why not work?”
Allie beamed at her. “And as a member of the tasting room staff, you should learn all the Tanti Baci legends.”
“If you’re going to tell bedtime stories, I’m going back to sleep,” Giuliana declared. Suiting action to words, she snuggled back into her blanket and closed her eyes. She could use the twenty, forty, or sixty winks that it would take for her sister to impart the family’s tall tales. But she couldn’t tune out her sister’s voice.
“There are actually three,” Allie was saying. “I’m sure you know a little of the winery history. Alonzo Baci - my great-great-grandfather - along with the great-great-grandfather of the Bennett brothers, the original Liam Bennett, were partners in a silver mine north of here. When the ore ran out, they bought this property and decided to grow grapes. They also both courted the same girl -”
“Anne,” interjected Grace. “I know that much. And that Alonzo won her. Their original cottage is the one you renovated last year in order to use it as a wedding venue.”
“Exactly,” Allie said, sounding pleased with her pupil. “That romance caused a big feud between the Bennetts and Bacis that has waxed and waned over the years, because our business dealings are still tangled. To this day, the Bennetts hold some interest in Tanti Baci.”
“In the winery,” Giuliana felt compelled to point out, though her eyes were still closed. “Not the land.”
Allie let the comment pass. “Anyhow, legend number one is that there was some sort of valuable silver or silver-and-gold treasure that’s been lost since those early days.”
“We found a diary hidden in the rockwork surrounding the fireplace in the cottage,” Giuliana said, cutting in again. “If there’s a clue about this supposed treasure in the pages, we haven’t found it.”
Allie sighed. “Perhaps we’re looking for the wrong kind of clue.”
“So what’s the second legend?” Grace asked. The eager note in her voice made Giuliana grimace. She was surrounded by romantic fools.
“Our papa always said that if you take your true love into the wedding cottage,” Allie said, “you’ll see the ghosts of those great lovers, Anne and Alonzo.”
Under the blanket, Giuliana crossed her arms over her chest. “So I’m sure you and Penn have given them a great big howdy, is that right, Allie?”
With her eyes closed, she could still hear her little sister’s delicate sniff. “Maybe.”
Point scored. Giuliana wiggled deeper into the cushions and let drowsiness envelop her. “Onto load of baloney number three,” she murmured.
Her sister sniffed again. “Jules may scoff, Grace, but maybe she shouldn’t. You know that we’ve been retailing our blanc de blancs sparkling wine, to be served exclusively at weddings, for fifty years this month.”
“On the website it says you keep a record of the name of each and every bridal couple who has toasted with it.”
“Exactly,” Allie confirmed. “And you know what else the website says…”
The women finished the thought together. “Not one of those couples has ever divorced!”
A cute marketing ploy, Giuliana admitted to herself, feeling sleep beginning to overtake her again. She supposed some slick ad man from San Francisco had been paid well for the idea in the days when the winery had money for such things.
“I haven’t played that up enough,” Allie admitted. “When I’ve been publicizing the Vow - Over Weekend and drumming up interest from the papers and other local press, I haven’t been spotlighting that - and it’s a winner angle if you ask me.”
Grace’s voice sounded as if it came from far away. “I love that story.”
Yeah, but it was a story, Giuliana thought. And when she woke up next, she’d have to make clear to her little sister that it was a lousy idea to push something so blatantly false. It didn’t pack any punch when it could be proved so patently untrue.
“Thank God for the Internet … not to mention the meticulous records of some of my predecessors in the winery’s PR office.”
Giuliana drew her hand under her cheek and hoped she wouldn’t drool. She was so tired. Surely Allie would abandon this silly idea
without her big sister’s input.
“I’ve been checking … and my husband Penn has been checking, and Stevie and Jack got in on the hunt, too.” Something about the thrill in Allie’s voice roused Giuliana just as she slipped into sleep.
Her eyelashes fluttered. “What? What are you talking about?”
“I think it’s true. I think no couple that ever toasted each other with Tanti Baci blanc de blancs in their glass has ever divorced.”
Head muzzy, Giuliana struggled into a sitting position again. She worked her fingers through the tangles in her dark hair and tried straightening the thin cotton lapels of the summer robe she was still wearing over her nightshirt. “That can’t be true.”
“It is true,” Allie insisted. “At the twenty-five-year anniversary, a lot of follow-up work was done. It hasn’t been that hard to check on those older marriages. Genealogy sites came in handy, too. The more recent ones have been even easier to track down.”
“That can’t be right,” Giuliana declared again. “You can’t know all of them are still, urn, happy unions.’
Allie waved her hand. “I’m not playing marriage counselor here. But I’m telling you, according to the four of us - Stevie and me, Jack and Penn - we’ve confirmed that the Tanti Baci marriages are still legal and binding.”
Voices outside the office door had her little sister on her feet. She cast a look at Giuliana’s dumbfounded expression and said, “You need confirmation?”
In seconds, the room was crowded with both her sisters and their spouses. Giuliana’s gaze roamed from face to face. “People. No divorces? This can’t be…”
But they were already nodding.
Giuliana swallowed. “You can’t know.”
Allie frowned. “We know, okay?” She glanced around to give her husband a little smile. “And all romances aside, it is a great publicity’ angle.”
Maybe she was still asleep, Giuliana thought. That had to be it. She was dreaming all this. The crowd in the room shifted as another body made his way into her office. Liam. It didn’t startle her to see him - he’d been disturbing her sleep for years - nor was she amazed that even while slumbering she’d go dry-mouthed at the sight of him.
“What’s a great publicity angle?” her dream man asked her youngest sister.
“You know our books? The ones that list all the Tanti Baci brides and grooms? We’ve gone through them line by line. None of those marriages ever ended in divorce.” Allie sent him a winning smile. “Isn’t that fab?”
You’d have to be a keen observer of the man to notice the slight stiffening of his always-cool expression. “You can’t know that.”
Allie looked disgruntled. “You and Jules. What’s going on with you two?”
Giuliana stifled her hysterical urge to laugh. Her gaze met Liam’s, and though she thought she should shift it away, it stayed on him as she tried to explain. “We’re just, um, uh, surprised, I guess. I mean … you’ve been through all those record books?
“Almost. We’re missing one - which is why I was in the closet. But as soon as I find it, I’m going to expose the truth to the world!”
Expose the truth to the world. Giuliana’s stomach plunged. She was wide awake now. As a matter of fact, she wondered if she’d ever sleep again.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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The SUN rose on romance for me when I was 11 years old and caught my first glimpse of that certain teen hottie on the cover of a Tigerbeat magazine. Practical even then, I realized that my chances of meeting dazzling coverboy were slim, so I wrote my own reality in a series of romantic stories
(I was already dreaming of becoming a published author) that I shared with my best friend. Today, those stories are locked away in a box. The key is lost, thank you God.
It was near the SURF in Santa Barbara that I found the real man I would share my life with. We met my freshman year at college during the Halloween Dance. He went as The Wind. I didn’t understand it then, I don’t understand it now. However, after our first meeting he called me “Princess” when he saw me (later found out he couldn’t remember my name) and I discovered he could play the “Peanuts” theme on the piano. Diplomas, first jobs, and a few years later, we married and now have two sons.
Like waves crashing onto the SAND, my dream of becoming a published author never ended. But still practical, I worked for a number of years as a technical writer and computer programmer. Then I rediscovered the joy of romance novels between rounds of Lego-building and reading GOODNIGHT MOON to my young sons. Mom had always said I could do whatever I wanted, and now I knew that I wanted to write books that provided entertainment and emotional satisfaction.
SEX (threw that in to keep you reading!) is not what my books are all about. Sure, there’s sizzle on the pages but there’s also drama and then there’s the suspense of discovering how two people can find their happily-ever-after. I believe in those, by the way. So come on, let me tell you a love story. Let me take you to warm, sexy, and romantic California.
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Copyright
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THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
Published by the Penguin Group
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
A Berkley Sensation Book / published by arrangement with the author
PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley Sensation mass-market edition / January 2011
Copyright © 2011 by christie Ridgway.
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Titles by Christie Ridgway
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HOW TO KNIT A WILD BIKINI
UNRAVEL ME
DIRTY SEXY KNITTING
CRUSH ON YOU
THEN HE KISSED ME
***********************************************************************************************Praise
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Praise for the novels of Christie Ridgway
“Christie Ridgway writes with the perfect combination of humor and heart. This funny, sexy story is as fresh and breezy as its Southern California setting.”
-Susan Wiggs, New York Times bestselling author
“Delightful.”
-Rachel Gibson, New York Times bestselling author
“Tender, funny, and wonderfully emotional.”
-Barbara Freethy, USA Today bestselling author
“Pure romance, delightfully warm, and funny.”
-Jennifer Crusie, New York Times bestselling author
“Smart, peppy.
-Publishers Weekly
“Funny, supersexy, and fast paced … Ridgway is noted for her humorous, spicy, and upbeat stories.”
-Library Journal
“Christie Ridgway is a first-class author.”
-Midwest Book Review
“Christie Ridgway’s books are crammed with smart girls, manly men, great sex, and fast, funny dialogue. Her latest novel … is a delightful example, a romance as purely sparkling as California champagne.”
-BookPage
“Ridgway delights yet again with this charming, witty tale of holiday romance. Not only are the characters sympathetic, intelligent, and engaging, but the sexual tension between the main characters is played out with tremendous skill.