Autumn in the Vineyard shv-3

by Marina Adair

  Miss Francesca tried not to roll her eyes. Holly was a big control freak stuck in a pint sized body with bouncy brown curls and cherub cheeks. But Frankie wasn’t fooled because, like her favorite uncle, Holly fancied herself the all supreme hall monitor of the world, which explained the notebook entitled FRANKIE’S DIRTY JAR RECORD. It was three-quarters full and meticulously kept. Every questionable word uttered or bad attitude observed by her highness resulted in a twenty-five-cent fine.

  Frankie paid the girl fifty bucks upfront, hoping to win her over and praying it would last her a year. That was only four months ago. And she was no closer to the first and almost of out credits.

  “You’re right,” Frankie said, blaming Nate for her piss-poor attitude. Being mad at him didn’t mean she had the right to make a little girl upset. “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s okay.” Holly plucked another leaf from the pile. Fold. Press. Tuck. Fold. Press. Tuck. “I’d be mad too if Mommy had taken away my glue gun and made me do baby crafts.”

  Well, now Frankie just felt petty.

  Deep concentration creased Holly’s little face and her tongue peeked out the side of her mouth. Her fingers moved with graceful ease over the leaf, efficiently folding and tucking until it resembled—a rose.

  Huh? Frankie picked up a new leaf and tried again. Fold, press, tuck, fold, press—

  “Crap.”

  Holly finished her rose, placed it on her massive “Perfect” pile and jotted down another tally. Then she picked up two leaves, scooted across the carpet, and took up residence next to Frankie.

  “Like this,” she said, slowly folding and pressing and tucking, patiently walking Frankie through the steps. Every few folds, her little fingers would smooth down one of Frankie’s creases or tighten her last tuck. Finally, Holly handed her the floral tape and let Frankie wrap the wire that made up the stem. And with the tape secure she speared it with a pushpin and—

  “I did it!”

  “This is the bestest rose ever,” Holly squealed and, bouncing on the carpet, clapped her hands in front of her face. Finally, Frankie could see the appeal. The kid was kind of cute when she wasn’t lecturing. “Here, try another.”

  The two worked in silence, making one rose after another. Frankie was barely able to keep up with Holly’s pace. Not only was the girl faster, but she didn’t have to throw away every third rose. Baby crafts my ass.

  “If you change your mind about the wedding—”

  “I won’t.”

  “Okay,” Holly sighed, obviously disappointed that she wouldn’t get to wear a princess gown. “Can I tell you a secret?”

  Frankie secured a pushpin. “Um, sure.”

  “When my baby sister moved in with my family, she cried all the time. Even at night when we’re supposed to be eyes tight, lights out,” Holly began quietly, focus tightly glued to her rose. “I was sad cuz I didn’t like her and I wanted to send her back.”

  “I imagine that it’s hard to like a screaming baby.” Frankie thought of her new roommate and felt an immediate bond form with the girl.

  “Yeah.” Holly slid her a worried look. “Mommy told me that I didn’t have to like somebody to love them.”

  “Yeah,” Frankie laughed. “And it’s not like you can send a baby back.”

  Holly raised a condemning brow.

  “Sorry, girl talk makes me nervous.” And she was really nervous right now. Her hands were kind of clammy and her head felt a little light.

  “I bet if you asked Mommy about marrying Nate, she’d say that same thing. Maybe you should use your words when he comes back with ice cream. He’s buying Rocky Road,” Holly said rubbing her belly. “And whipped cream. You can have some of mine if you want.”

  Frankie didn’t hear anything past marrying Nate and when he comes back. Because that was it. Girl talk was officially over. Frankie shot to her feet and, knocking the “Perfects” into the “Whoops,” effectively mixing the two piles, looked at the front door.

  Holly stood also, blocking the exit, her little pigtails bouncing. “What’s wrong, Miss Francesca?”

  “I want to go home,” Frankie blurted out and knew it was true. She didn’t want to go to her little 1920’s bungalow right off Main Street that she’d sold last month, or her grandfather’s house. No, Frankie wanted to go to her beat up old Victorian with all of its creaks and dust bunnies and hug her alpaca.

  “That’s okay. Mommy says it’s normal on playdates to get scared,” Holly reasoned.

  “This isn’t a playdate. And I’m not scared. Regan,” Frankie shouted down the hall, dragging out both syllables of her friend’s name. “Your daughter’s psychoanalyzing me again.”

  “Holly,” a stern voice came from the doorway. It was way too low and way too amused to be Regan, and way too sexy to be anyone but—

  “Uncle Nate,” Holly squealed, rushing past Frankie.

  “Hey there, kiddo,” he laughed.

  Frankie turned around and, whoa, go easy indeed. Golden boy leaned against the doorframe of the kitchen entry with Holly shrink-wrapped to his legs. He was covered in saw dust, a sweaty tee, and that DeLuca charm Frankie had seen at work more times than she could count on the local public at large. He cradled a squirming pink bundle of ten fingers and toes in one hand and enough testosterone to melt Frankie’s panties in the other.

  She knew that she was supposed to be mad at him. He’d kissed her, taken her to court, and then invaded her space, but she found herself melting at the sight of him and his two nieces. Who knew men and kids were such a potent combination? Frankie wondered if they were as good of a chick magnet as a Frisbee and dog.

  “You taking it easy on Frankie?”

  Holly lifted her right hand, no Band-Aids present, as though giving an oath. “Yes, sir.”

  Nate raised a disbelieving brow.

  “She wants to go home,” Holly said, swishing back and forth, blinking up at her uncle while innocently ratting Frankie out.

  “I’m just tired,” Frankie lied, fumbling for her motorcycle keys and helmet. “Plus I already made a dozen roses so that paid for the water I used. If you can tell Regan thanks.” She turned and knocked her helmet off the corner of the couch and it went rolling.

  “Holly, it’s time to get in your PJs anyway,” Nate said, his amused eyes firmly on Frankie. “Say goodnight and go wash up. After I walk Frankie to her car, we can have ice cream.”

  The girl did and after Nate ruffled her little fountains of curls as she ran by, her bare feet sounding like a charging herd of alpacas on the hardwood floor, Frankie grabbed her helmet and made a move for the door.

  Nate pushed off the doorframe and stepped in front of her. “Unless you want to stay?”

  “Nope.”

  “I know you can’t eat ice cream. If I had known you’d be here I would have brought something nondairy,” Nate said, adjusting the bundle like a football. Frankie froze. “But I bet Regan has some left over pie. It’s fig. Hey, are you okay?”

  Frankie nodded, and wasn’t she a big fat liar. The truth was she was thrown, knocked over by something as small as him noticing that she didn’t drink milk. She was tempted to forgive him of everything, take him up on his sweet offer and start over. Which made her not only a liar but pathetic.

  “Have you met Sofie yet?” Nate asked, walking toward her.

  Frankie, knowing what she’d see, a cute little bundle of poop and tears, took a huge step back. “Yup.”

  Nate raised a brow and took another step closer, boxing her in. “Had the chance to hold her?”

  Frankie either had to look at the baby, and risk sending it into tears, or jump out the window. A glance behind her and a quick calculation of how far the drop was, and if the grass below would act as a cushion, later she was moving toward the window, ready to take her chances. Then she saw the screen and knew she was screwed.

  Hugging her helmet to her chest, she explained, “Babies and I don’t mix all that well.”

  “Ah, come on. She’s
got a fresh diaper and was just fed, she’ll be an angel.” Now he was teasing her. He had to be. Otherwise he was just being mean because it was obvious that she was rattled.

  “I’m not good with babies.” But when Frankie put her hands out in what she thought was clearly the universal sign for hell no, he took a step closer. Either it was a misunderstanding or Nate wanted to make her sweat, because instead of cuddling the wiggling poop-maker back to his chest, he grabbed her helmet and replaced it with Baby Sofie.

  Frankie looked down to make sure the baby was actually in the bundle of pink cotton because it felt so light and, wow, the kid was knocked out. Dark little lashes rested on her chubby cheeks, her tiny chest rose and fell with each steady breath, and she smelled like baby powder and new car. Peaceful, cute, not so bad.

  Frankie looked up at Nate and smiled. He wasn’t smiling back. The good news what that it was his turn to be rattled. His gaze dropped to sleeping Sofie and back to Frankie and all of a sudden the room felt like it was getting smaller. The sexual energy that always seemed to buzz between them, heightened to the point of being palpable, surrounding them as though it was just her and Nate and—

  It wiggled. The kid made some grunting noise and her eyes snapped open, hazy and milky at first, and then—boom—locked on to Frankie and wouldn’t let go. It was as though Sofie was trying to incinerate Frankie with her gaze. Her face went from peaceful to tomato in two seconds flat, getting redder and redder as her lips puckered tighter and tighter, until—she exploded.

  It wasn’t just a cry. Frankie could handle a cry. It was more like a demonic screech, pulled up from the depths of Hell and released on the room.

  “See,” Frankie said extending the very pissed off package back to Nate. “She doesn’t like me.”

  “Sweetheart, she’s a baby, she doesn’t like anyone,” Nate said, sticking out his finger and fitting it in the tiny hand.

  Only she really didn’t like Frankie. Her screeching became wails and the kid’s face was so purple Frankie wouldn’t put it past her to stop breathing all together. How could she explain to one of her two best friends that she’d broken her baby? Just by holding her?

  “Really, I can’t,” she said, a bubble of panic rising up. “I told you I’m not good with kids and”—breathe, Frankie, breathe—“I can’t do this.”

  Nate must have realized that she wasn’t screwing around, that she was about to reach DEFCON 1 and lose it, because his smile vanished and suddenly he was behind her, his strong arms around her, supporting Baby Sofie from underneath.

  “It’s okay,” he soothed. For Sofie’s or Frankie’s sake, she couldn’t be sure, but Sofie dropped the theatrics to a steady wet-sniffle and Frankie felt her breathing return to somewhat normal. “She just needs to be reassured that you’ve got her.”

  “But I don’t have her,” Frankie whispered. She’d never had a maternal touch. And it had never bothered her. Until now.

  “Sure you do. Just put your hand here. Good. Now the other hand under her head.” Nate deftly repositioned Frankie’s hands to where the sniffles continued but didn’t elevate, and tightened his arms around hers, firmly holding her against his body. He gently swayed back and forth. “She likes to be held tight and rocked.”

  Frankie realized that she liked to be held tight and rocked too. It was soothing and kind of nice. Like being wrapped up in a warm, snuggly, man-cocoon.

  She turned her head to say thank you, thank you for not laughing when he easily could have, and thank you for letting her know that regardless of what was going on between them, in that one moment, he had her. Only she froze.

  Nate, who had rested his chin on her shoulder to watch Sofie, was inches from her mouth. All she had to do was move a smidge to the right and up and they would be kissing. He seemed to be reading her mind because his gaze dropped to her lips and his hands, no longer on the baby, slid around her stomach.

  “Frankie,” he whispered, his pinkies dipped beneath the hem of her jeans, and she saw it coming.

  He was going to kiss her.

  And she was going to let him.

  She should have tossed him the bundle and burned rubber out of there, but she couldn’t. All the oxygen left her lungs in a single whoosh, her legs felt like she’d just harvested an entire vineyard, and instead of pulling away she felt herself leaning back, further pressing into Nate’s hard chest, and tilting her head so that—

  “Whoa, hey there,” Gabe said.

  Frankie jumped forward as though all the lying had finally caught up with her and her butt was on fire. Nate did some fancy footwork of his own, moving him a safe three feet in the other direction.

  “Sorry about that. Didn’t mean to interrupt,” Gabe said, all smiles and no sorry.

  “I was just showing Frankie how to hold a baby,” Nate said, taking Sofie back and handing Frankie her helmet.

  “That was some lesson. Looked like you were about to get to the part about making one of your own—”

  “Do you have a point?” Nate asked. “For being in here?”

  “You mean in my own home?” Gabe smiled at Nate even bigger. “I just came to check on things. Holly’s worried that Frankie doesn’t like you and she wanted to make sure you were using your words. But I can see that that isn’t a problem. Well, maybe the using your words part was, but—”

  “I gotta go,” Frankie said, picking up her keys. Bad enough that she was in a DeLucas house helping make decorations. But now she’d been caught fraternizing with the enemy. And she’d liked it.

  CHAPTER 6

  Nate swung hard. Pain exploded, starting in his left thumb and shooting up his arm at the same pace and volume as the long list of choice words he rattled off. When he ran out of original phrases he started repeating. Even that didn’t help.

  “You might want to put ice on that.”

  Nate popped out his ear buds and turned around to see Frankie, standing on the back porch, nibbling on one of those toaster pastries she seemed so fond of. Mittens was dining on the other half.

  “How long have you been standing there?” Nate asked, pretending his thumb wasn’t about to fall off.

  “Since you started singing to Skynard,” she said around bits of dough. “Figured you for more of a classical kind of guy.”

  “Skynard is a classic.”

  She jammed the rest of the pastry into her mouth—whole—and shrugged. “I was thinking Mozart, but whatever.”

  She skipped down the steps and walked toward him through the ankle-high mustard weed, those hips of hers moving with quiet confidence. Today she wore her usual uniform of a tank top, ripped jeans, and boots—black and badass—but instead of the ball buster attitude she normally favored, she looked a little unsure. Untouchable, yes, but unsure all the same.

  Nate knew it was because of the almost-kiss and never-going-to-happen conversation last night. Afraid she’d take him up on his threat to share the master and, idiotically hoping they’d pick up where they left off, Nate had chosen to sleep at his other house. Not that he’d slept. Even after a shower and a beer—both ice cold—he’d spent the night thinking about Frankie and how incredible she felt.

  She stopped next to the pile of new cedar planks that Tanner had dropped off earlier that morning and looked at his hammer sticking out of the dirt. “You want to use my nail gun? Goes faster and less chance of splitting the wood.” She looked at his hand. “Or your finger.”

  For about six-tenths of a second, Nate considered bringing up the kiss. Considered just getting it out there in the open and having a mature, matter-of-fact discussion about the insane sexual zing between them—and how acting on it would be a mistake. They both had a lot riding on this land, and getting distracted in something that would never, in a million years, work was just plain stupid. But he couldn’t do it.

  Because motorcycle boots or not, Frankie didn’t look like Frankie. For the first time since, well, since they were kids, that tough girl attitude etching her face, shoving back her shoulders, o
r shooting that pert nose of hers in the air was gone. She looked vulnerable and tired, the kind that went bone-deep. And quite possibly a little nervous.

  “You got one?”

  “Yup, but not sure I should let you use it. A mistake like that with real tools could cost you a hand,” she said, trying for smug, but he could tell she was relieved. They were avoiding the sex in the room, so to speak, at least for now. “What are you building anyway?”

  “A bed for Mittens, since the hood of my car is no longer an option.” He eyed the alpaca, who’d waited until he’d safely maneuvered himself behind Frankie before making a raspberry sound in Nate’s direction.

  After his first night here, Nate had welcomed the morning with hoof scratches on the front bumper of his BMW and a Mittens sized dent on the hood.

  Frankie reached around Nate—a sweet flowery scent sucker punched him, catching him completely off guard—and grabbed the folded up blueprints out of his back pocket. She waved it in front of his face. “And you think that this is the answer?”

  He grabbed for it, but she was quicker, spinning away and unfolding the paper.

  “I found a place online that sells blueprints for camelidae friendly, green-habitats.” Nate had spent most of last night trying to distract himself from the taste of her on his lips by surfing the net for the perfect solution to Mittens.

  He knew that, although Frankie acted as though she couldn’t care less if the alpaca went AWOL, she wouldn’t get rid of the miniature camel. And Nate couldn’t risk the thing eating what little vines there were. He needed those grapes and was determined to strike a deal with Frankie when the time came, but two well-placed bites and a headbutt later and Mittens would scale the only thing keeping him from an afternoon snack.

  “Camelidae habitat? Is that educated people’s talk for an alpaca barn?” Frankie asked, amusement tilting up the side of those pretty lips.

  And there was the familiar battle. The one that had been raging between them for a decade. While Nate had opted for college, majoring in enology, Frankie had taken the hands-on approach, working the vineyard as her grandfather’s apprentice. Which meant that she thought he was a starched sellout, and he thought she was shortsighted to place her entire career at the mercy of a fickle man. He agreed with her that wine came from the heart, but what she refused to acknowledge was that at the heart of winemaking was science.