“She did. That’s why I told her about your mother. Once everything’s out in the open, you won’t have to exclude her anymore. She can finally understand what’s going on.”
Silence stretched out between them until Ethan groaned. “I wish I’d never met you.”
He watched the impact of his words upon her dispassionately, noted the tightening of her lips, the paleness that replaced the natural warmth in her cheeks.
“It was inevitable, Ethan—Tamsyn finding out about your mother. It was going to happen eventually.”
He shook his head. “I want you to leave.”
“I told you before and I’ll tell you again. My contract isn’t with you. I’m not going until my job is done.”
“If you had any decency, you’d go.”
“It’s because of my integrity that I’m staying. Besides, Tamsyn needs someone in her corner right now who’s willing to be honest with her. I will not desert her.”
Ethan stared hard into her eyes. She didn’t so much as blink, meeting his gaze in a full-on challenge.
“Just stay out of my way,” he growled.
“That’s going to be hard to do,” Isobel said. “We have the wine-tasting shoot this week. Can we at least be civil to one another?”
“Civil, you say? I don’t feel terribly civil right now. I can arrange for one of the others to be there in my stead.”
She shook her head. “No, that won’t do. The focus of the new brochures is the Masters family ethos. As head winemaker and new head of the family, you have to be involved.”
To his surprise, Isobel stepped closer and laid one hand on his chest. “You’re a good man, Ethan Masters. I know you love Tamsyn, I know you wanted to do what you thought was best for her.”
“And yet you still went ahead and told her anyway. We’ll never be able to go back, Tamsyn and I. Nothing will ever be the same.”
“Change can be a good thing.”
Isobel’s hand dropped away from him and, as much as he hated to admit it, he felt its loss immediately. He didn’t want to be that weak—to allow her to affect him this way. His response, when it came, was sharp and clear.
“I hope for your sake it is. You say that Tamsyn is your friend and that you wanted to help her, so if this ends up blowing up in our faces, with our mother leaving Tamsyn feeling even more rejected and betrayed, then you ‘helped’ her right into a whole new world of heartbreak. A world I tried to protect her from ever entering.”
Before she could respond, he spun on his heel and stalked back out of the cottage. The fury that had driven him there had abated but it had been replaced by a cold, hard anger that sat like a leaden ball in his gut.
* * *
“Well, that went well,” Isobel said to the empty room after Ethan had left.
She sank down onto the sofa and hugged her arms around her. She’d known he’d be angry but she’d expected a full-on explosion of it—not the intensely controlled version Ethan had brought to her just now. It made her begin to wonder if Ethan had come to terms with the news about Ellen Masters himself. As she turned the thought over in her mind, it occurred to her that he probably hadn’t even had time to properly grieve his father’s death, either.
Being as controlled as he was—as responsible and conservative as he was—he had to be undergoing a massive internal struggle with himself. Her heart ached for him. She knew what that struggle felt like, should—in an ideal world—be able to help him with this. But their entire relationship, if you could call it such a thing, had been flashes of passion interspersed with flashes of disagreement. It was the original push-me-pull-you type of attraction she’d never understood in others. Didn’t understand in herself now, either, to be honest.
Isobel looked across the room and out the picture window that faced the vineyard. The Masters was all about stability, longevity and growth. All of which formed strong foundations in their family. She’d undermined that stability by taking it upon herself to tell Tamsyn what she had today.
She still believed she’d been right to do it—but at what cost to everyone else? Ethan was right that Tamsyn would be very vulnerable when she confronted her mother. If the meeting went badly and the rift was still in place between her and her brother, would she even be willing to turn to her family for comfort? The thought of that, more than anything, sat very heavy in her heart right now.
She couldn’t regret what she’d done. But she could ache, with all her heart, over the pain it had caused for both Ethan and Tamsyn.
The next few days proved busy, a fact for which she was grateful. Tamsyn appeared to be none the worse for the revelation about her mother, although Isobel noted that from time to time her attention would wander, her expression become pensive. Personally, Isobel felt that Trent should be very strongly supporting Tamsyn right now but he remained as scarce as he’d been through the duration of her stay to date. When Isobel pressed Tamsyn about this, her friend merely brushed her concern aside, saying he was busy in the city and that she was okay.
When the morning of the wine-tasting shoot dawned, Isobel rose early, her stomach tied in knots. She scowled at her reflection as she brushed her teeth at the bathroom mirror, reminding herself she was a professional and would continue to behave that way no matter how distant or rude Ethan might be.
Ethan. God, the very thought of him sent a spear of longing through her body, making every sense come alive. She had it bad, but infatuation was like that. They’d barely seen each other since he’d confronted her here at the cottage, but even if they hadn’t had their falling-out, she doubted she would have gotten much of his time. He was incredibly busy at the winery, pulling long hours with his team as the harvest from their reserve block arrived. New barrels had been brought in and even though Isobel had taken shots of the entire process, Ethan had kept his distance from her.
Today, though, it would be only the two of them. The new brochure would feature each family member in their role at the vineyard. The photo of Raif and his father, Edward, working in such obvious unity had been the family’s pick for the vineyard part of the operation. Tamsyn in her office, her wall planner filled behind her, a phone to her ear and her day planner in her hand, had been designated for the accommodation and events along with a surprisingly poignant photo Isobel had taken of the bride and groom during bridezilla’s special day last weekend. Cade and Cathleen together with the chef at the restaurant had photographed well in a lighthearted moment that had been an absolute joy to capture. Now it was Ethan’s turn.
Isobel checked the smaller daypack she carried with her when she worked, making sure her camera batteries were fully charged and that she had additional memory cards if she needed them. Ethan was delightfully photogenic, she’d discovered in the surreptitious shots she’d taken of him to date. The camera loved the sculpted lines of his face and the way the light fell upon his bone structure. An all-too-familiar ache throbbed low in her belly, forcing her to remind herself that for today, he was only a subject. One to be captured in the course of his work—that was all.
Ethan was prepared and waiting for her at the winery when she arrived. She checked her watch quickly—no, she wasn’t late and yet he had that look about him as if he’d been waiting for her for some time. She cast her eye across the setting he’d created—the bentwood chairs set at a crisp-white-linen-covered round table with a row of barrels behind them and the handcrafted stone walls visible as a backdrop. The lighting was to be augmented with strategically placed spotlights that Isobel had hired specifically for this shoot, and she could see them standing off to one side.
“Good morning,” Ethan said as she drew closer.
Isobel felt an indefinable frisson ripple down her spine. So he was going for civilized today. She could live with that.
“Good morning. Thank you for setting up in advance today.”
He nodded i
n acknowledgment. “Do you need a hand with the spots?”
Isobel considered the lighting in the area. It was dim, but had a distinct ambience that lent itself well to the solemnity of the process she knew was about to be unveiled to her camera. If she made the right adjustments it was possible she might not need the spotlights after all.
“I think I’ll leave them for now,” she said. “If you could sit there, at the table for a moment, I’ll do a few test shots and see.”
Ethan did as she bid without comment. Isobel moved around him, her camera poised and ready for action. The minute she caught him in her viewfinder, her stomach clenched. He was so incredibly beautiful in the most masculine kind of way. A persistent buzz of awareness set up deep inside her but she fought to ignore it. Taking a step back, she scrolled through the photos she’d just taken.
“Stay where you are,” she instructed. “We’re going to need additional light after all.”
She fussed with the spots, taking more shots, until with a grunt of satisfaction, she knew she had the right juxtaposition of light and shadow.
“Okay, we’re ready to roll,” she said, lifting her camera to her eye again. “Now, just start talking and leading me through the wine-tasting process. Use two glasses on the table, as if you have company.”
She waited for Ethan to move. He appeared to hesitate, as if to say something, but then he reached for the gold-labeled Shiraz on the table. Instinctively, Isobel began to shoot.
“Wine tasting is an adventure that engages your senses,” Ethan started, his voice deep and smooth and sending a thrill of delight through Isobel that she couldn’t ignore. “It’s more than just taste, although taste is vitally important and highly individual. It also involves you visually, engages your olfactory senses and plays on your emotions and memories at the same time.”
Isobel’s finger worked the shutter button unconsciously as Ethan opened the wine and gently poured a sample into each of two empty glasses on the table. His voice provided a background commentary that stroked her senses to boiling point, making it more and more difficult with each shot to keep her focus on her subject and not on what his passion for his subject was, in kind, doing to her.
Ethan lifted one of the glasses from the table, angling the bowl slightly away from him, and began explaining about color and tone. Isobel was so caught up in his words that she forgot she was supposed to be merely a silent observer, and found herself speaking up.
“To be honest,” Isobel interjected, “My wine expertise has always come down to what I like the taste of and how much I like that taste. I’ve never really stopped to consider color or density.”
Ethan turned and gave her a smile that just about made her toes curl. Clearly, in this moment, his animosity had been forgotten. “Then you’re seriously missing out. Put the camera down and come here. Try it.”
“But I thought you only had an hour for me today.”
He shrugged. “So I’ll have to make up time somewhere else. This is important. The better you understand the method, the better the photos will be, right?”
Isobel didn’t answer, she merely placed her camera down on the table and sat opposite Ethan. She felt absurdly pleased when he gave her a nod of approval.
“Let’s see if we can’t instill a better appreciation of the process of tasting wine, hmm?” he said.
“You make it sound like a ritual,” she commented, picking up her glass and doing as he’d done earlier, tilting it and studying the color and clarity with the same absorption she usually reserved only for her proofs.
“It is, in a way. And there’s nothing wrong in making a ceremony out of it, in showing our appreciation for the work that’s gone into bringing this bottle to the table all the way from the vine.”
Ethan’s enthusiasm for his subject shone through in his every gesture and every word. If at all possible, it made him even more attractive to her, and as he continued to lead her through the formalities of using her senses to see, smell and taste the wine he’d chosen for the shoot she felt herself falling for him just that bit more. Ethan the vintner was a far cry from Ethan the authoritative brother and family head. He was just as deliberate and in control, but it felt easier and more natural to let him take the lead in this arena where he was so clearly an expert...and where he was using his expertise to enhance the pleasure she’d find in the experience. As she tasted her wine and allowed the carefully formulated final product roll around in her mouth, she wondered briefly what it would be like to see him year-round—to observe him work through every step of his magical process, turning harvested fruit into a sensation of aromas and flavors that gave her a new appreciation for his art.
See him year-round? What on earth was she thinking? She was transient and she liked it that way. Seeing a man like Ethan Masters year-round would mean staying in his world, because he certainly wasn’t the kind of man to uproot himself to live in hers. A man like him had roots that went deeper in the soil at The Masters than those of the vines that striated the fields around them. He wouldn’t accept anything less than a permanent, lifelong commitment.
She didn’t do permanent. Had never wanted to.
A shocking afterthought penetrated deep into her heart.
Until now, perhaps.
Twelve
To give herself some distance from her thoughts, Isobel deliberately set her glass down on the pristine white cloth and reached for her camera again. As she did so, a drop of wine from the rim of her glass tracked down the outside of the bowl and along the stem, spreading onto the base until it leaked into the finely woven linen, leaving a stain.
As she had with her presence here.
Ethan liked everything neat and organized, with every piece tucked into place. Isobel brought mess and chaos with her everywhere she went. She’d brought it to Ethan’s life. The thought came to her sharp and swift, and it hurt. She still believed she’d done the right thing by sharing with Tamsyn the information. But only now did she fully appreciate the repercussions of what she’d done. Only now, when she really considered what it might be like to be part of his family, did she think of the damage she might have done to all of them by opening the door between Tamsyn and the secret the rest of her family had made the decision to keep.
This family, these people, they were intertwined with one another just as much as the vines were on the frames they grew along. Each dependent on the other for its success, its support. And she’d potentially undermined that.
It just went to show that she was better off on her own. Whenever she spent time with a strong family or community, it only went to prove to her that she had no idea how to belong. No idea how to be anything other than alone.
“I’m sorry, Ethan,” she blurted.
“For the spot on the cloth? Don’t worry. We’ve seen far worse.”
“No.” She shook her head. “Not that. I mean for telling Tamsyn. I know you had your reasons for keeping the news about your mother to yourself. Whether I agreed with them or not I shouldn’t have interfered.”
Ethan sighed and rose from the table. “No, you shouldn’t have interfered, but I won’t accept your apology, either.”
He wouldn’t? A sudden spurt of anger flared and, just as quickly, extinguished inside of her. He wouldn’t. No, of course not. She was the outsider here. The interloper who’d well and truly set a cat among the pigeons.
“That’s okay, I understand,” she managed to say through lips that felt as thick and unresponsive as rubber. “Look, I think I have everything I need here today. Let me run these through my computer and I’ll forward you a selection to choose from for your brochure.”
“Isobel, wait.”
His voice was a command, not a request. It was so like him, she thought with a rueful twinge of recognition.
“You want me to take some more shots?”
“No.” He brushed her question aside with an impatient movement of his hand.
A hand that had done exquisite things to her body. A hand that had left her panting and demanding more—which was exactly what he’d given. A tiny shudder rippled through her. This was torture. Very different from what had been threatened toward her before she’d vacated the country she’d last been in, but equally as devastating emotionally.
She stood silently, awaiting his next move and wishing he would get to whatever it was that he wanted to say. Once he was done, maybe he’d finally let her go to gather her scattered nerves back to some semblance of order again. But his words, when they came, knocked the air straight out of her lungs.
“I owe you an apology.”
She didn’t know what to say, how to act. She let instinct take over.
“No, you don’t. I was in the wrong. I acted without really thinking it through.”
He mustered a half smile. “I can’t say I’m thrilled with the way you went about it, but you were still right. If anyone deserved the full story about our parents it was Tamsyn. I should have told her from the start, when I’d found the discrepancy in my father’s personal accounts. If not then, certainly when I found out that our mother was still living.”
“I...I don’t know what to say.”
It was a new sensation for Isobel. Normally she had no trouble blurting out whatever came next in her mind. But this? An apology from this incredibly strong and proud man? She knew how hard it must have been for him to back down like this.
“Then don’t say anything. Just listen. Tamsyn and I had a long talk last night. She’s still mad at me, and rightly so, but I accept that I was being overprotective. I do still try to shelter her—she is my little sister, after all, and I doubt my need to shield her from things will ever go away entirely. But she’s an adult—one who had every right, just as you said, to know what I knew. We’ve discussed it all. Our memories of our mother, the little we got out of our father, the information the solicitor gave me—everything.”
One Secret Night Page 11