Me: It’s not even that serious.
Inner me: Have a breakdown anyway.
River Green sat in her 1998 Camry in the Capriotti Winery parking lot peering through her dusty windshield. The place was pretty, real pretty. And upscale.
Way above her pay grade.
But since she didn’t currently have a pay grade, that wasn’t saying much. People were sitting on the patio at two huge white tables, smiling, laughing, talking, and eating from what looked like a huge feast of food.
Her belly rumbled and she rubbed it. “I know,” she whispered. “I’m hungry too.”
So hungry.
She didn’t belong at those tables. Hell, she didn’t belong anywhere, but that was a problem for another day. Today she was here doing recon. Trying to figure out how to go about her life goal.
Which was to get back what was hers.
Because her legs were cramping, she got out of the car and stretched her aching back. Twenty-one years old last week and yet she felt like an old woman. Driven by more than a little desperation, she walked up the path and peeked into the winery. The big, open, barn-like room had a reception area and yes, thank you, sweet baby Jesus, a drinking fountain with small paper cups available.
She made her way to it and drank. And drank. She needed to go back for her water bottle and fill that up too because this water was fresh and cool and helped her jumbled thoughts come together.
But more than that, she needed to get back to the car before anyone saw her. She went outside again, staggering a little bit because moving too fast had spots dancing across her vision.
“Not now,” she murmured and did her best to shake it off. She got to the Camry and opened the driver’s side door, but then put out a hand to lean heavily against it and give herself a minute.
“Hello,” someone said.
River turned her head. A woman, maybe fifty years old. Dark brunette hair streaked with gray, dark eyes, and a welcoming smile. “Can I help you?” she asked River.
Shit. Crap. Damn . . . River shook her head. “No, thank you. I . . .”
The woman came around the car and took in River’s body and smiled. “Ah. How far along are you?”
“Six months,” River said softly and put a hand on her swollen belly.
“Six months is a wonderful time. You can feel the baby move around. Gives a purpose to your suffering,” the woman said with a gentle smile. “Sit, honey. You look dead on your feet.”
And before River knew what was happening, she was sitting on the wooden bench against the split-rail fencing, beyond which seemed like miles and miles of thriving grapevines on rolling hill after rolling hill.
The woman next to her smiled reassuringly and took in River’s opened car, and the suitcase in it.
All her worldly possessions.
“You know what?” the woman said, standing, pulling River up with her. “It’s way too warm out here in the sun for me. I need to get inside. You’ll help me, won’t you?”
“Of course,” River said, but the truth was the woman was helping her, keeping a good grip on River’s arm. Her vision got cobwebby and the next thing she knew, she was sitting in a comfy, cushy chair inside the cool reception area, her feet up on a low coffee table strewn with brochures on the winery and the surrounding areas, sipping water from a real glass with ice cubes.
“Better?” the woman asked worriedly.
River blinked. She’d nearly passed out. Oh, this was bad. Very, very bad. She needed to be able to take care of herself and her baby. “Much better,” she said and mustered a smile past her panic and pounding heart. She started to get up, but the woman stopped her.
“Not yet,” she said quietly. “Wait right here.”
And then she vanished out the set of French double doors at the other end of the building.
River allowed herself a second to lean her head back and close her eyes as she ran a hand over her swollen belly. “We’re okay,” she whispered, as she’d been doing ever since the shocking day she’d learned she was pregnant.
With no time for a pity party, she straightened and started to hoist herself out of the chair, but was stopped short by the sight of the woman coming back into the room carrying a plate of food that smelled nothing short of amazing.
“I thought you might be hungry. I’m Cora, by the way,” the woman said, handing River the plate filled with meat and cheese lasagna, baked bread, and a salad, all of it making her mouth water so that she lost her thoughts again and couldn’t speak. It was a good thing there was a fork on the plate or she’d have dived in with her fingers.
She was halfway through the food before she realized that she was literally hunched over it like a wild, rabid dog, inhaling like she hadn’t eaten in days. But it hadn’t been that long.
Had it?
Cora’s smile was nonjudgmental and easy. “What’s your name, child?”
“River.” She bit her lip. She shouldn’t have said that. “I . . . thank you.” She started to set the plate down on the coffee table but Cora shook her head.
“Finish,” she said.
River had just stuffed in another bite when the next question came.
“Are you here about the temp job?”
River stopped chewing and met Cora’s gaze. Job? “Uh . . . maybe . . . ?”
Cora smiled. “That would be lovely. It’s for the receptionist position, which as you can see is empty. My niece Cecilia was working the desk, but she’s taking some college courses and is feeling overwhelmed.” She pointed to the HELP WANTED sign in the window.
River looked at it and her heart started pounding again.
“Once Cecilia figures out how to handle both classes and the job, she’ll most likely come back,” Cora said. “But that could be months and we need someone now. Do you have any experience?”
“Um . . .” River’s mind raced but she didn’t have to lie to answer this question. “I waitressed at the busiest truck stop in the country, the one on Highway 15 in Barstow.”
“Wow,” Cora said. “So you’re good at serving assholes.”
River blinked at the swear word coming out of sweet Cora’s mouth. “Yes, ma’am. Very good,” she said, tasting the irony.
“Oh, the only ma’am around here is my mom. You can call me by my given name. Any other experience?”
“Well . . . I was going to Barstow’s community college at night to become an LVN, a licensed vocational nurse,” River admitted shyly. Barstow wasn’t the greatest little town in the world but for a while there, it’d been good to her. Until her world had caved in.
“Was?”
River put a hand on her belly. “I finished my first semester a few months ago but had to skip semester two.” For lack of funds. A severe lack. Not to mention she’d been sick and so tired.
And devastated . . .
Cora was looking thoughtful and sympathetic, a powerful combination for River because it made her feel things when she’d been trying so hard not to feel anything at all. She had no idea what she thought she was doing here. She’d only intended to get a look at the place and figure out how to get back what was rightfully hers, but she’d been sucked right in.
“This job would be a piece of cake compared to waitressing and taking classes at the same time,” Cora said. “The responsibilities are answering the phone and making people feel warm and welcome when they come in the front door. If they’re here for a tour, you’ll seat them, make small talk if they’re interested, and keep them happy and comfortable until their tour guide comes for them.”
“That sounds easy enough,” River heard herself say.
Cora smiled. “It’s a fun job. I had it myself when I was your age.”
“And now you’re the receptionist’s boss?”
Cora laughed, a musical sound. “Baby, I’m everyone’s boss. I run the place.”
“Wow,” River whispered in awe. “You must be really smart.”
“Mostly I’m just a quick learner. And I bet you are too. The job isn’t quite full-time hours, but it pays decently.”
River wasn’t sincerely considering this, was she? She wasn’t here for this. Besides, she had bigger problems, and no matter how “decently” the job paid, she knew it still wouldn’t be enough to make it so that she could afford a place to live.
Cora was quiet a moment, her head turned, her gaze pensive as she looked out the window. Possibly looking at River’s car, although River hoped not.
She’d been on her own since age fifteen and it was a point of pride that she hadn’t starved to death in the six years since. But while that much was true, she wasn’t exactly proud of the fact that she was currently homeless.
Which brought her to her current mission, a mission she was forgetting about because Cora kept sweetening the pot.
“We’re not super close to town. To make up for that, we also provide room and board.”
River stilled. “Room and board, meaning . . .”
“We’ve got a series of small cottages for our employees if they so choose, and there’s a community lunch every day. You’d be on your own for the other two meals, but there’s always containers of food in the employee fridge, if you don’t mind leftovers.”
River actually reached down and pinched her thigh to make sure she hadn’t passed out and was dreaming all of this. Decent pay and room and board? To not have to live in her car? It felt like Christmas.
“What do you think, honey?” Cora asked. “Are you interested?”
“Yes,” River heard herself say. “Very.”
“Great!” Cora looked pleased with herself. “When can you start?”
She’d clearly lost her mind. She’d come to case out the place and steal back what was hers, and now she worked here? “Right this very minute,” she said.
Cora stood and took the empty plate in one hand and River’s hand in another and helped her up.
Ridiculously grateful—getting up out of a chair was starting to be as difficult as . . . well, checking to make sure she had her shoes on—she followed when Cora pulled her along.
Her mom had told her to never be a follower, to make her own way along her own path, but River had been fifteen back then. On top of her world. She and her mom had been a team, a good one. She’d never known her dad, but she hadn’t missed his presence. Granted, life hadn’t been easy. They’d lived in a rough neighborhood and her mom had worked a lot, but together they’d been invincible. At the time, the thought of making her own path had seemed exciting, and easy.
It’d turned out to be anything but.
But even if she’d managed to resist Cora, River had a feeling that God himself would follow the woman’s soft, sweet demands.
They ended up in the next building over, which was set up with open-room-style offices. Cora stopped at a desk in front of a woman who had to be her own age. She wasn’t sitting, but instead stood behind her desk glaring at it.
“Mia,” Cora said. “Meet River, our new temporary receptionist.”
“Can’t talk right now,” Mia said. “A spider just landed on my desk. Oh, and in other news, it turns out when I’m startled, I can jump five feet in the air with just the power of my butt cheeks.”
“As long as you didn’t kill it,” Cora said. “Spiders are our friends.”
“Mom, are you kidding me? I murdered the shit out of that spider. Right now I’m just waiting to make sure he didn’t call out the cavalry before I took him down.”
Cora didn’t so much as blink at this. She just shook her head, a small, indulgent smile on her lips. She clearly loved her daughter very much, and suddenly River knew why she was so drawn to Cora.
She reminded River of her own beloved mom. But because that was a slippery slope, she shut it down and smiled at everyone Cora introduced her to, until they came to a big L-shaped desk in the back corner, holding two impressive-looking printers, a big-screen computer, and a bunch of other equipment.
“River,” Cora said, “this is Lanie. She’s our resident graphic artist.”
River froze, but Lanie stood up and reached out a hand for River to shake. “Nice to meet you.”
River still couldn’t move, and then Cora’s smile started to fade, so she galvanized herself into recovery. With a forced smile, she took Lanie’s hand. “Sorry,” she murmured. “Pregnancy brain.”
Lanie nodded but didn’t smile. Not as friendly as Cora, not even close, River realized.
Cora’s cell rang on her hip and she looked at it with a frown. “I’m sorry, I have to take this. Lanie, River has offered to start right now. Can you take her back to the front desk at reception and wait with her until I send someone down with the forms she needs to fill out for employment? River, honey, after you fill out the forms and give them to Lanie, I’ll have someone get your things into your cottage.”
“Oh, no,” River said quickly. “I can do that myself—”
“I’m sure you could, but what kind of a human being would I be if I let a pregnant woman do such a thing?” She smiled. “Besides, I have a misbehaving employee I want to torture. Don’t make things too easy on him, you hear me?”
River had no choice but to nod. Still, there was no way she was going to let that happen. She didn’t want anyone to know her humiliating truth, that not only was she alone and pregnant, but that she’d also screwed things up so much that she was living out of her car.
On the walk to the reception area, Lanie remained reserved but pointed out the staff room and where to put her things.
“So you’re new too?” River asked.
Lanie looked at her. “Yes, how did you know?”
Shit. You’re an idiot. “Uh . . . Cora mentioned it just now.”
“No, she didn’t,” Lanie said and looked like she might’ve said something else, but two little girls came running down the hall and threw themselves at Lanie.
“Lanie!” one of them cried happily. “Look, we’ve got our own lip gloss now!” In unison, they pulled lip glosses from the pockets of their matching jeans. “Just like yours, only they’re clear because Daddy said we can’t wear color until we’re forty or until he’s too old to chase us, whichever comes first.”
Lanie softened and smiled. “Nice. So where are you two really supposed to be right now?”
One of them grinned a toothless, guileless grin.
The other bit her lower lip. “Um . . .”
Lanie turned to a huge whiteboard schedule and ran her finger down the “twins” column. “Looks like you’re supposedly with Grandma.” She pulled her cell phone from a pocket. “Cora, did your phone call have to do with missing product? Say, a pair of three-feet-high missing product? Yep . . . uh-huh. Okay, I’ll tell them . . . Sure thing.” Lanie disconnected and crouched down to face both the little girls. “Your grandma says you have three minutes to get your ‘cute little tushies’ back into her office before she reports you missing to the sheriff, and the word is that the sheriff’s this close to reducing your bedtime for bad behavior.”
This caused twin squeaks of alarm, and then the two girls vanished hand in hand down the hall.
Lanie shook her head, but she was also still smiling a little bit, looking suddenly very human as she led River to the front desk without another word.
“You don’t have to wait with me,” River said when Lanie just stood by, looking at her watch.
“You don’t know this yet,” Lanie said, “but Cora’s the sweetest, kindest tyrant you’ll ever meet. She asked me to wait with you. I’m going to wait with you.”
River nodded.
Lanie gestured to the chair. “You really should sit. Do you want some water or anything?”
“No, thank you,” River said, feeling guilt settle onto her chest just as sure as her baby was tap-dancing on her bladder. Guilt and . . . confusion. Because for months now, Lanie had been the devil incarnate in River’s eyes. But now she was wavering on that belief. Lanie was quiet and reserved and . . . human. And so much more accomplished at life than River could ever hope to be.
“So how did you know I was new?” Lanie asked.
And smart, River added with an inner wince. “You just seemed new.”
Lanie studied her and then thankfully let it go without another word.
And not a minute later, someone came by with the forms and Lanie vanished.
The next three hours were a whirlwind.
River filled out the forms, answered the phone when it rang, and met more Capriottis. At some point, she went to the bathroom and came back to find a pregnancy book on her desk with a little bow wrapped around it. She hugged the book close and silently thanked her anonymous benefactor.
At five on the dot, a guy showed up. Twentysomething, he was dressed in jeans, a T-shirt, boots, and a backward baseball cap. He pulled off his dark sunglasses and gave her a nod, his face unreadable. “Ready?”
Her heart stopped. Had she done something wrong and he was escorting her out? “For . . . ?”
“Cora said to move you into cottage number five.”
When she let out a whoosh of relieved air, he gave her an odd look that she ignored. “Thanks,” she said. “But I’ve got it.”
“Boss lady says otherwise. And as she’s still pissed at me, she also said after I was done doing that, I should ask you what else you needed and do that too.”
“I don’t need anything from you,” River said.
“She said you’d say that.”
Startled, she met his gaze, which was calm and steady, not matching his words at all. Neither did his tone. In fact, he seemed . . . amused?
Which made no sense. “Shouldn’t you be feeling bad about getting in trouble with the boss instead of laughing at me?” she asked.
“I’m laughing because you’re as stubborn as she said you’d be.”
“Maybe I just don’t want to deal with a troublemaker.” Or in other words, anyone of the male persuasion.
He shrugged. “That’s probably a smart plan,” he said.
Unable to help herself, she asked, “What did you do to make Cora mad?”
“Fell off a wild horse and got a concussion.”
She gasped. “And that was your fault?”
“One hundred percent. There’re wild horses grazing the land and we’re supposed to protect them, not touch them. And we’re certainly not supposed to ride them. They can be dangerous.” He gave a wry smile and tapped a finger to his temple.
“I see,” she said, though she didn’t see at all. “I appreciate that she offered your assistance, but really I’m fine.”
“She was pretty sure you’d say that too,” he said and turned to look out the window. “The rusted blue Camry, right?” Without waiting for a response, he moved to the door.
“Wait!” she cried and struggled to stand up. It took her a second and once she was up, his eyes widened at the sight of her belly and he held up a hand.
“Oh Christ,” he said, his calm definitely shaken now. “Sit back down!”
“I’m pregnant, not helpless.” But damn, she was dizzy from getting up too fast.
He came around and got ahold of her. “Whoa,” he said. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Low blood sugar? Do you need food?”
Yes and yes, not that she was going to say so. “I said I was fine,” she snapped and pulled free. “My diet’s fine. My baby’s fine. And as it’s my stuff out there, I’m going with you.”
He looked her over, scrubbing a hand over his scruffy jaw, probably trying to determine just how serious she was.
She was as serious as a heart attack.
“Fine,” he finally said and she gave him a point in his favor for accurately reading her level of determination. “You can point out the stuff you want moved. But you’re not to touch anything, you understand me?”
“The way you didn’t touch the wild horses?”
He slid her a look and gave a tiny hint of a smile. “Kitten’s got claws,” he said, sounding pleased.
“I do, and for your information, I’m not going to not touch my own stuff.”
He nodded as if he’d expected that answer and took off his baseball cap with one hand, shoving his other through his military-short dark hair so that it stood up on end. The guy had clearly been working hard, probably all day, and was gleaming with sweat. “Cora’s gonna kill me,” he muttered and jammed his hat back on his head and strode out the door.
She assumed she was to follow, so she did. At her car, he stopped and looked in.
“Is this all of it?” he asked.
When she didn’t answer right away, he turned toward her in question. Whatever he saw in her face softened the hard lines of his and he came toward her.
She backed up a step.
He stopped on a dime and went hands up. “You’re looking a little flushed is all,” he said quietly. “I just want you to back up a few more feet and sit on that bench, okay? You can boss me around from there just as well if that’s your plan.”
She sank with gratitude to the bench. “I’m not bossy.”
He laughed a little, which confused her.
“You’re doing all this for me,” she said, baffled. “And I don’t even know your name.”
“Holden.” Without asking her name in return, he opened the car door and grabbed the suitcase she’d been living out of. She had her purse on her, which left just a small backpack with a few essentials. He grabbed that as well and then went to pop the trunk.
“There’s nothing else,” she said.
He nodded. “I’ll take this stuff to your cottage and then you can give me your address and I’ll go get whatever else—”
“No, there’s nothing else,” she repeated softly. “As in . . . nothing else.”
He paused, and she told herself if he looked at her with so much as even a single ounce of pity, she’d have to smack him with her purse, which was heavy as shit.
But he simply nodded. “Pretty and she packs light,” he said. “I like it.”
She had no idea how to respond to that, but the butterflies in her belly did, taking flight. Holden showed her to her cabin, pointing out some landmarks on the way, such as the actual winery, the not-wild horses the family kept, the wide-open fields that to River were just about the most beautiful scenery she’d ever laid eyes on.
At her door, Holden pulled a key from his pocket, unlocked the place, and then handed the key to her. Then he shouldered his way in, strode to the small loveseat against the far wall, and set her things down. He looked around. “Never been in this one. It’s nice, yeah?”
She took in the very small place with a kitchenette and a full-sized bed with bedding that looked soft and inviting and felt a weight lift off her chest that she hadn’t even realized was there. “It’s the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen.”
The minute the words left her mouth, she felt embarrassed, but he simply nodded his agreement.
“I know exactly what you mean,” he said, and then paused at the door.
She braced herself for him to do something stupid like every man she’d ever met, but all he said was, “If you need anything else, I’m three cottages down on the right. Cottage number two.”
She ignored the flutter in her belly at that, telling herself it was just the baby. “Thanks,” she said, and then with a gruff nod, he was gone.
That night, River lay in her comfy bed in her adorable cottage and shook her head. Guilt was her bedmate, but even she had to add, it was a hell of a lot better than being cold and hungry.
The baby kicked and she rubbed a hand over her belly. “I know,” she murmured. “I can’t believe it either. But there will be a price for this. There always is.”