Chapter 5
Annalise
I tried to warn him.
Even last night, when we’d finished going over our accounts together, I again attempted to bring up today’s pitch to Bianchi Winery. But the smug jerk stopped me before I could explain why I knew he didn’t have a shot in hell at landing the account.
So screw it, I hope he wasted his entire morning on a dog-and-pony show that was totally unnecessary.
I mumbled to myself as I pulled down the half-mile-long dirt road and parked by the giant weeping willow. Coming here always brought a wave of calm over me. Being greeted by rows and rows of neatly planted grapevines, swaying willow trees, and stacked barrels let the serenity seep in through my pores. Getting out of my car, I closed my eyes, took a deep, cleansing breath in, and exhaled some of the stress from the week. Peace.
Or so I thought.
Until I opened my eyes and noticed a car parked off to the right, next to the big, old green tractor. And that car was almost identical to mine.
He’s still here.
Bennett’s appointment had been at ten o’clock this morning. I glanced at the time on my watch, double-checking that I wasn’t hours early. But I wasn’t. It was almost three o’clock in the afternoon. I’d figured he’d be long gone by the time I arrived. What the hell could they have been talking about for five hours?
Knox, the vineyard manager, walked out of the small retail shop carrying a crate of wine just as I finished getting my files out of the car. He’d worked at the winery since before the first grape seeds were sowed.
“Hey, Annie.” He waved.
I slammed the trunk shut and swung my leather art attaché over my shoulder. “Hey, Knox. You need me to open my trunk again so you can stash my weekend bottles?” I teased.
“Pretty sure I could stash every last bottle in your trunk and Mr. Bianchi wouldn’t mind.”
I smiled. He was sort of right about that. “Is Matteo in the office or up at the house? I have a business meeting with him.”
“Last I saw, he was walking the fields with a visitor. But they might be in the cellar by now. I think he was giving him the full tour.”
“Thanks, Knox. Don’t let them work you too hard!”
The door to the office wasn’t locked, but no one was inside. So I set my presentation stuff down on the reception desk and went looking for where everyone was hiding. The retail shop door was open, but no one answered when I called. I was just about to turn and head up to the main house when I heard the echoing of voices as I passed by the door leading from the shop to the wine cellar and tasting room.
“Hello?” I carefully navigated the stone stairwell in my high heels.
Matteo’s voice, speaking in Italian, boomed in the distance. But when I reached the bottom, the only person I found was Bennett. He was sitting at one of the alcove tasting tables, his shirtsleeves rolled up, his tie loosened, and a wine glass taster flight on the table in front of him. Three of the four glasses were empty.
“Drinking on the job?” I arched a brow.
He linked his fingers behind his head and leaned back to revel in his smugness. “What can I say? The owners love me.”
I held back my laughter. “Oh, do they? So you haven’t let them see the real you, then?”
Bennett flashed a smile. A gorgeous one. Jerk.
“You wasted a trip out here, Texas. Tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t listen.”
I sighed. “Where’s Matteo?”
“He just got a call and stepped into the fermentation room.”
“Have you seen Margo?”
“She ran out to the grocery store.”
“What are you still doing here, anyway? Were you late for your presentation?”
“Of course not. Matteo offered to give me a tour so I could see the new vines they planted this year, and then Margo insisted I do a full tasting. I’m like one of the family now.” He leaned toward me and lowered his voice. “Although I’m pretty sure Mrs. Bianchi’s into me. Like I said, you got no shot at winning this one.”
I somehow managed to keep a straight face. “Margo…Mrs. Bianchi… is into you? You do know Matteo’s her husband, right?”
“Didn’t say I was gonna try anything. Just calling it like I see it.”
I shook my head. “You’re unbelievable.”
The sound of a door opening and shutting turned both our heads toward the back of the tasting room. Every sound reverberated twice as loud down here, including Matteo’s steps as he walked toward us. He opened his arms and spoke with his thick Italian accent when he looked up and saw me. “My Annie. You’re here. I didn’t hear you come in.”
Matteo embraced me in a warm hug, then held my face and kissed both of my cheeks. “I was on the phone with my brother. The man, he’s still an idiot, even after all these years. He bought goats.” He pinched together all five fingers in the universal Italian gesture for capeesh! “Goats! The moron, he bought goats to live on his land in the hills. And he’s surprised when they eat half his crops. Such an idiot.” Matteo shook his head. “But never mind that. I introduce you.” He turned to Bennett. “This gentleman is Mr. Fox. He’s from one of the big advertising companies you made us to call.”
“Umm...yeah. We’ve met. I didn’t get a chance to talk to you guys because things have been crazy at the office. But, Bennett and I…we work for the same company now. Foster Burnett, the company he worked for when you made the appointment to meet with him a few months ago, it merged with the company I work for, Wren Media. It’s now one big advertising agency—Foster, Burnett and Wren. So, yes, Bennett and I have met. We work…together.”
“Oh good.” He clapped. “Because your friend, he’s joining us for dinner tonight.”
My eyes jumped to meet Bennett’s gloating ones. “You’re staying for dinner?”
He grinned like a Cheshire cat and winked. “Mrs. Bianchi invited me.”
Matteo had no clue that Bennett’s big, dumb smile was him trying to get a rise out of me since the full-of-himself bastard thought he was invited because the Mrs. was into him.
The notion was hilarious, really. Because I knew Margo Bianchi, and trust me, she hadn’t invited Bennett Fox to stay for dinner because she was into him.
And I knew that not because she adored her husband—which happened to be true—but because Margo Bianchi was a perpetual matchmaker. There was only one reason she would invite a young man to dinner. Because she wanted to set him up with her daughter.
“Oh? Mrs. Bianchi invited you, did she?” I couldn’t wait to wipe that smirk off his face.
Bennett picked up his wine and swirled it around a few times before bringing it to his grinning lips. “She did.”
I exaggerated a smile. “That’s great. I think you’ll really enjoy my mother’s cooking.”
Bennett was mid-sip. I watched his brows draw down in confusion and then rise up in shock—right before he started to choke on his wine.
***
“I can’t believe you invited the enemy to dinner.”
My mother lifted the top off a pot and stirred her sauce. “He’s a very handsome man. And he has a good job.”
“Yes. I know. He has my job, Mom.”
“He’s thirty-one, a good age for a man to start settling down. If you start to make babies in your forties like a lot of young people today, you have a teenager in your fifties when you’re running out of energy to keep up.”
I refilled my wine glass. When it came to mothers, I’d always thought of myself as lucky. After she and my father split up, she’d practically raised me on her own. She worked full time and yet never missed a soccer game or school function. While most of my friends were bitching about their meddling, married mother or absent, divorced mom who was out on the prowl for a new husband, I never complained—until I hit the ripe old age of twenty-five. Apparently, that was when the shadow of an old maid started to follow women around, according to the way my mother acted.
“Bennett is not your future son-in-law, Mom. Trust me on that one. He’s an arrogant, condescending, cartoon-drawing, job-stealing pain in the ass.”
My mom set the ladle down on the greasy spoon and pursed her lips at me. “I think you’re exaggerating, honey.”
I leveled her with a stare. “He thought you invited him to stay for dinner because you were into him.”
Her forehead creased. “Into him?”
“Yes. As in…you were interested in him for yourself. And he knows you’re married.”
She laughed. “Oh, honey. He’s a handsome man. I’m guessing most women are into him, so he’s gotten used to mistaking a woman being friendly with a woman being friendly for a reason.”
It started to feel like I could say anything about Bennett, and Mom would have an excuse for it.
“He’s trying to steal my job.”
“Your companies merged. That’s an unfortunate situation, but it’s not something that he had anything to do with.”
“He abuses kittens,” I deadpanned.
My mother shook her head. “You’re trying to find any excuse you can not to like the man.”
“I don’t have to find any excuse; he hands me the reasons on a silver platter whenever I’m in his presence.”
Mom lowered the flame to simmer and took another bottle out of the wine refrigerator. “Do you think Bennett will like the ’02 Cab?”
I gave up. “Sure. I think he’ll love it.”
***
“So did you grow up here? Living at a winery?”
I’d avoided Bennett before dinner by going outside on the porch to play with Sherlock—my mom and Matteo’s chocolate lab. Unfortunately, he found me.
“No. I wish.” I tossed a tennis ball over the porch railing and into the rows of vines. Sherlock took off running. “My mom and I lived in the Palisades area for most of my life. She didn’t meet Matteo until I was in college. I bought him for her for her fiftieth birthday.”
Bennett leaned against the post, one hand casually tucked into his pants pocket. “Don’t let my mother know that. All I got her was a Keurig that she stashed away in the back of a closet to collect dust.”
I smiled. “Growing up, she always said she wanted to go to Italy. I’d just gotten my first job when she was about to turn fifty, so I saved up for a ten-day tour of Rome and Tuscany. Matteo owned one of the vineyards our tour stopped at. They hit it off, and two months after she came back, he had his vineyard up for sale and decided to move to the US to be closer to her.” I pointed to the grape farm. “He bought this place, and they got married right over there on the one-year anniversary of the day they met.”
“Wow. That’s pretty cool.”
“Yeah. He’s a great guy. My mom deserved to meet him.”
Sherlock came running back with the ball in his mouth, but instead of dropping it at my feet, the traitor took it to Bennett. He reached down and scratched his head.
“What’s your name, boy?”
“His name’s Sherlock.”
Bennett whipped the ball back out to the farm, and off went man’s best friend. “So you could’ve mentioned that Bianchi Winery was your family.”
My jaw dropped. “Are you joking? I tried to. Multiple times. But every time I attempted to tell you, you interrupted me to drone on about how you were going to win the account and how much the owners love you. You were pretty cocky about it. Especially this afternoon, telling me my mother was into you.”
“Yeah. Sorry about saying that. I just wanted to screw with you. Rattle your confidence before your presentation.”
“Nice. Very nice.”
He unleashed his charming smile. “What can I say? All’s fair in love and war.”
“So we’re at war, are we? And here I was thinking the better candidate would get the job based on merit, not because the other one sabotaged them.”
Bennett stood and winked. “I wasn’t talking about war. You love me already.”
I laughed. “God, you’re such a pompous ass.”
***
I stayed on the porch to finish playing catch with Sherlock while Bennett wandered inside the house. I was surprised when he came back out with his suit jacket on, a glass of wine in one hand, and his leather portfolio case in the other.
“Where are you off to?”
He extended the glass of wine to me, but when I reached out to take it, he pulled it back and sipped. “Your mom asked me to bring you this on the way out.”
“Where are you going?”
“Figured I’d head home.”
“Should you be driving? My parents tend to pour wine like it’s water.”
“Nah, I’m good. I only did one set of tastings, and I drank them over a few hours.”
“Oh. Okay. But we haven’t had dinner, yet.”
“I know. And I apologized to your parents. I told them something came up, and I had to run.”
“Did something come up?”
“I don’t want to interject myself into your family time. Your mom mentioned you hadn’t seen each other in a few months.”
“Work’s been crazy ever since Mr. Wren died.”
Bennett held his hands up. “I get it. Trust me, my mother would tell you I don’t call or see her nearly enough.”
“You don’t have to leave.”
“It’s okay. I can admit defeat on the rare occasion that it happens. You won this battle, but you won’t win the war, Texas. I’ll let you present your ideas to them undistracted by me.”
I stood. “My mother is going to be so disappointed. She was probably planning on discussing what kind of underwear you wear over dinner to make sure you’re not killing off sperm with tighty whities for the protection of her future grandchildren.”
Bennett took another sip of wine and offered me the now-half-empty glass. But when I went to take it, he didn’t let go. Instead, he leaned in close while our fingertips touched. “Tell Mom not to worry. My boys are healthy.” He winked at me and let go of the wine. “I prefer commando.”
I chuckled and watched him walk to his car. He loaded his presentation supplies into the trunk and slammed it shut.
“Hey!” I yelled.
He looked up.
“Do you ever sketch yourself? Commando could be a good superhero name.”
Bennett circled to his car door. He opened it and held onto the top as he yelled back. “You’ll be dreaming about it tonight, Texas. And I don’t have to guess what part you’ll exaggerate.”