Fast Lane

by Margot Radcliffe

  Cole shifted in his seat to face her and his knee bumped the side of her thigh and stayed there, burning a hole in her jeans. She hated that she didn’t hate it, that she, a person who didn’t deserve to derive any pleasure from another man ever, was, in fact receiving it.

  “Now, see there, that’s what I want to know, what makes one year better than another and all that. I know what I like, I know what people tell me is good, but I want to know that my vineyard can produce a product that’s reliable year after year.”

  “You’re certainly in the right place,” Blair said, her fingers tingling with the prospect of talking about the process. This was her wheelhouse and she could talk a person’s ear off about what it took to keep grapes healthy, soil science, weather management, the works. “And I’m happy to answer anything you’d like. But while there are a lot of factors in the differences in wine from year to year, the largest one is simply weather. If it’s cooler with low sun, grapes are slower to grow, which is good for some grapes but not as good for others like cabernet, which needs more heat to ripen fully. That’s why our cabernet sauvignon grapes are planted where there is full sunlight as opposed to sauvignon blanc, which you want to ripen slowly to retain a more refreshing taste.”

  A lot of people would be bored by just that small amount of grape information, but she saw that Cole was making notes on his phone. “This is great. Do you know what kind of grapes grow best in Louisiana?”

  Blair looked at him. “I’d say the climate in Louisiana is too hot and humid for a profitable winery based on wine grapes and that anyone who told you otherwise is either a liar or a not very well-researched person.”

  Cole looked at her doubtfully. “Well, now, I’ve been to wineries there before so I know they have to be growing something.”

  Blair shrugged. “My guess would be they were fruit wines or made from grapes like muscadines or something. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but the varietals that could work there aren’t popular or especially hardy, which just makes grape growing, something that’s already challenging, even more so. And honestly, you probably wouldn’t be getting a return on your investment. Another practice is that wineries are making wine with grapes they’ve had shipped in from somewhere else. If we have a surplus harvest, for instance, we sell our grapes to other wineries.”

  Cole stared at her. “Well, now, I’m again going to go back to my earlier statement about mouthy women. A nicer lady would have tried to break all that news to me gently like before trashing my hopes and dreams, but you just let it loose.”

  “I’m just trying to be factual with you. Muscadines are the only variety of grapes that grow well in southern climates and there’s not a large market for that wine. There are some vineyards that live by it, but it’s a type of wine that hasn’t really caught on to the rest of the country, so if you’re wanting to invest in a vineyard, it wouldn’t be my first pick. I can give you the names of a lot of operations I think your money would be better spent on, but that’s entirely up to you.”

  “Wouldn’t there be more competition if I went with a place that used traditional grapes? At least there aren’t a lot of muscadine producers in the first place.”

  Blair shrugged. “That’s a better question for Nate. I just know most people don’t have a palate for muscadine wine.” She glanced over at him with a grin. “But then again, I’m a snob with a vested interest in people not drinking wines we don’t sell so you’ll have to take that into consideration.”

  Cole snorted and leaned back into his seat. “I like you, Blair Sandoval, but you’ve clearly never had a sweet muscadine wine on a hot day while relaxing on a riverboat. I’ve traveled around the world and I’m here to tell you that there’s not much better in life.”

  “Sounds like you miss home more than the wine.”

  A deep “hmm” came from Cole this time. “You may be right about that.” His gaze wandered out to his right, down the hill into the valley of the vineyard, and he seemed to get lost in thought for a moment. “But you know what they say, you can’t go home again.”

  Blair finally stopped the golf cart next to the field of sauvignon blanc vines. She got out and looked over the grapes she’d had a hand in growing and tried to imagine not being a part of this vineyard but simply couldn’t. From the moment her grandfather could feed her a grape, she’d been in love with the vineyard. “This has always been home for me,” she told Cole, plucking off a grape. The grapes were still a little over a month away from harvest, but they were coming along well enough. “We Sandovals bleed wine.”

  “I hope it’s the red kind,” Cole quipped, meeting her at the row of grapevines.

  Blair gave him a bland look. “Maybe.” Then she handed over a grape for him to try. “They’re small but mighty.”

  He took the grape from her and popped it into his mouth, his face immediately puckering.

  “Now that’s what someone might call a textbook illustration of someone eating sour grapes,” Blair laughed. “They’re not ripe yet,” she explained. “But they’re getting there.”

  “You’re an ornery woman,” Cole said, moving closer to her as he inspected the grapevine. For what she didn’t know, but he was very large and his scent was in her nose again, piney and fresh and masculine. She wanted to bury her nose in the soft cotton of his shirt, but also the idea made her want to vomit. As had been her habit since her unfortunate ex, she looked down at Cole’s empty ring finger trying to spot a tan line, but she couldn’t discern one. Though that didn’t exactly make him single.

  Not that she was looking.

  Instead she imagined her future room at the nunnery and put to rest any lascivious thoughts she might be having about Cole.

  Until, that is, he leaned close to whisper in her ear, his warm breath like a feather’s kiss on the shell of her ear.

  “I might as well mention that I like that in a woman too.”

  Blair’s eyes slowly closed and she mentally said about a thousand Hail Mary prayers even though she’d never been much of a church person, because just being near Cole Taggart made that nunnery seem about as far away as the moon.

  CHAPTER TWO

  COLE HADN’T INTENDED on being attracted to his favorite vineyard’s viticulturist, but then, there’d never been any rhyme or reason for who he’d been attracted to in the past. For a lot of years when he was racing overseas, discriminating wasn’t exactly a term that described how he’d chosen a bed partner, so it wasn’t totally out of character for him to be blatantly flirting with a woman he’d just met. What was notable was the fact that for the past two years he hadn’t felt remotely interested in sleeping with anyone. He hadn’t felt much of anything, in fact, in a long time.

  It helped that Blair Sandoval smelled good, like imported vanilla and laundry soap, and it’d made him hard the moment she’d scooted by him out the door of the tasting room. It was actually a relief that he wanted her, and yet at the same time, the ever-present guilt wasn’t far behind, the memory of the crash rising to the forefront of his mind the moment he made any attempt to move on or forget that he’d killed his own brother. An accident, people said, but Cole knew the truth. If he’d only listened to his brother. If they’d retired from racing when he’d wanted to, the crash would have never happened. His brother would still be alive right now. Being able to flirt as shamelessly with a lovely woman as Cole was. It was ironic then, that his wish to reconnect with his family was why he was at the vineyard in the first place and it had quickly turned into where, instead, he betrayed his brother even further by being attracted to the vineyard owner. He was hoping to set up a business that his family could work on together thinking that it might fill the hole Scott’s death had left in all their lives, absolving him of his guilt. Yet here he was, flirting with the woman he needed to do that. It was classic him.

  “It sounds as if you like a lot of things about women,” Blair observed, moving away from him
down the row of grapevines. He couldn’t blame her for creating space, his flirting was unprofessional at best, but he didn’t want to stop. Not when it had been so damned long.

  “That would be an accurate observation,” he joked, running a hand over the shiny green leaves, fascinated with the process of wine making already. He understood what people loved about wine country, had let the rolling farmland quiet his racing thoughts for a moment on their way here. He’d been searching for that kind of peace.

  “Well, just so we can get this out of the way, I’m not interested in men at the moment so you’re welcome to continue flirting with me but you’ll probably be disappointed in the results.”

  “Are you telling me you’re with a woman?” It was possible, but he knew she found him attractive.

  “No,” she said. “Just that I’m off the market and I hope all men die together in an enormous fire so that the entire sex can start over from scratch and maybe get it right this time.”

  He laughed, frankly, a little longer than he should have at the prospect of his own demise. “Bad breakup?”

  That earned him a pointed glare with a well of heartache behind it that she tried to hide, but he recognized the look of someone in pain. “And general observation.”

  Shoving his hands in his pockets, he watched as she rearranged some of the grapevines that were too close together. He was curious about wine but he was finding that he was more curious about her. Her jeans were frayed at the bottom and worn white at the knees and her cropped purple plaid button-down looked soft and well loved. She looked like what he would have imagined a female farmer to look like, capable and tough but warm. Or maybe he was just projecting what he wanted to see. He’d known her for all of a half hour, but he had an increasingly insistent need to touch her, to see if her skin was as soft as it looked. “You going to tell me about him or do I just assume that he’s a dog who cheated on you?”

  A shadow passed over her face and he hated that apparently likely scenario for her. He’d never been exclusive with a woman to be able to cheat on her and that look was exactly the reason why.

  She met his eyes, hers amber in the bright sun, matching the auburn of her hair. “Technically, no, he didn’t cheat on me actually.”

  “Did he steal a secret family wine recipe?” Cole asked, trying to keep things light but also not willing to let the subject go. “Kick a dog?” he added. Then, to further rib her, “You found out he was actually a felon?”

  A dark eyebrow rose. “A felon?”

  Cole shrugged. “Yeah, I imagine that would be a deal breaker for you.”

  Blair just rolled her eyes. Pulling off a withered and brown grape and throwing it on the ground a little too hard if he did say so himself, she met his eyes straight on. “A felon would have been a blessing.” Then she sighed with disgust, eyes sliding away, clearly not willing to give him the real answer. “I would draw the line at kicking a dog, though.” She tore off another dead grape from the vine and threw it out into the field.

  She turned to him then, her sneaker crunching on the sandy pebbles beneath her feet. “But I will say that I can never date again because I’ve proven that I’m epically inept at picking men, which means I’ll probably just die alone in this field someday.”

  Cole opened his mouth to laugh, and also point out that she was too beautiful to be alone forever. Out here in the sun, she looked like a kind of earth goddess with her dark hair pulled up in a ponytail and escaped tendrils blowing in the gentle breeze. He’d never had a fantasy about having sex in the dirt, but if she was willing he wouldn’t say no. However, something about her tone, made him not want to make a joke of it. He wanted to know the real reason for how she’d been so hurt that she’d sworn off men for life. He had an ill-advised urge to tell her to make an allowance for him because he wanted very badly to touch her and it was a real hardship imagining that he’d never have the chance.

  “That seems like a harsh punishment for men everywhere,” Cole finally settled on.

  “Trust me,” she told him, “I’ll never get over the shame of what happened so it’s best for everyone that I opt out of love from here on out.” Blair let out a breath. Then she pointed in the general direction of the grapes to continue her lecture. “These are the sauvignon blanc grapes. For a wine grape varietal they’re fairly easy to grow but need at least six feet of space between the vines, ideally a loamy soil, which is abundant in the Sonoma and Napa Valleys, and unlike a lot of grapevines you don’t want to plant these too deeply into the soil. Also, you don’t want them to get overripe or else what is meant to be a light, dry wine will become too sweet.”

  Cole had been staring at her during her half-hearted instructional session because he definitely had some follow-up questions. “I suspect, Ms. Sandoval, that regardless of what you might have done that you’re a good person.” He stepped closer to her, expecting her to move farther down the vineyard row like she’d done before, but she stayed where she was. “Hell, I’ve done some shit I’m not proud of, but even a tainted soul like mine is redeemable, so I hope you’ll find it in you to forgive yourself one day,” he told her, locking eyes with her, wishing he actually believed he deserved redemption.

  She shrugged his sentiment aside. “We’ll see, but it’ll be quite some time.” Then she blew out an annoyed breath. “I can’t believe I’m even talking about this with a total stranger. Please don’t tell my brother I mentioned it, okay? In his own words, I should only be allowed to make decisions about wine.”

  Cole walked a ways down the dusty dirt path, considering how to proceed and also wondering why he was so interested in a stranger’s love life. “Well, while I just hate the thought of you being alone indefinitely,” he said, “I agree that time does heal all wounds.” He was still waiting, of course, for his to close, but people did often say that. “Doesn’t mean that while you’re waiting you can’t have a little fun.”

  He could hear Blair’s footsteps behind him stop, but he kept going, enjoying a walk in the outdoors. This place, though vastly different from Louisiana in a multitude of ways, starting with the uppity people, reminded him of home and of goofing off outside when he was a kid. But as usual, he couldn’t think of home without thinking of his brother so he forced his thoughts back to the matter at hand.

  “Is that an invitation?” Blair joked, obviously thinking he’d be scandalized by her forwardness.

  Cole turned to face her. “If I had an invitation to issue, I’d probably be less subtle about it, Ms. Sandoval, but in this case, I’d be willing to make an exception.”

  Blair stared at him, her expression blank.

  Cole wasn’t sure what he was doing, but he felt her angst on a soul-deep level and he was drawn to her, period. He still had about a million questions about her breakup but figured he didn’t have a real right to ask them and it certainly wasn’t his business anyway. But it was obvious that whatever it was was eating Blair up inside, which was a state of affairs he was all too familiar with.

  She looked up at him, eyes wide. “I’m a smart person, Mr. Taggart.”

  “Please, sweetheart, call me Cole.” Her eyes narrowed at the unearned endearment. “I know it’s forward to call you sweetheart, Ms. Sandoval, but perhaps under the circumstances you’ll allow me some liberties. I usually don’t make friends this quickly, but we seem to have stumbled into a kinship, you and I.”

  Blair shook her head but didn’t argue the point.

  “And I can tell you’re smart as a whip, just as you say,” he continued. “A genius is what people tend to say in relation to how you make wine, in fact.”

  Blair accepted the compliment with a raised eyebrow. “What I mean is that I consider myself a smart person and I’d be throwing away everything I learned from my previous breakup by turning around and jumping into another relationship. So I won’t be doing that.”

  The finality of the words grated. He’d just
found her, felt the spark of possibility, and she was already closing the door in his face. He knew it wasn’t personal, but it sure felt that way.

  “Men are pigs,” Cole offered in commiseration. He’d been in the mud most of his life, after all. “But you’ll find a good one, one of these days.”

  Blair snorted. “Doubtful.” Then she was trudging back to the golf cart.

  “Not exactly a positive attitude,” Cole laughed, following her. “Where are we off to now?”

  He levered up into the cart again, this time sitting even closer to her on the seat. Instead of her pressing herself so tightly up against the opposite side of the golf cart, however, she stayed where she was, their bodies fully touching from knee to hip. Heat collected on his skin, a prickling reminder of what it felt like to want someone. It was just his luck that after two years the only woman to catch his interest wanted nothing to do with the whole of men.

  The rest of the tour continued with him taking notes every now and then because what she was saying was extremely interesting and educational. However, he did occasionally get caught up in the way the sun glinted red off her hair, the way she’d squint and hold her hand up against the sun as she spoke instead of wearing her pair of sunglasses forgotten in the golf cart, and the way she talked about wine in general. She’d been right before when she’d said she bled wine and he wasn’t too proud to say that he was under her spell. He was still marveling over the fact that she’d moved him at all when the last two years of his life had been a barren wasteland, devoid of happiness or fun.

  By the time they made it back to the tasting room, Cole needed a drink to stop from touching Blair. But, smartly, she flew behind the bar, which impeded him from doing something stupid like that. He resented the barrier; wanted to return to the golf cart where they’d been wedged together and he could see the thin sheen of sweat on her neck. Christ, was he seriously fantasizing about licking sweat from a virtual stranger’s neck?