Tyler
I NEEDED TO get the jobs done.
Prying myself out of bed wasn’t easy, but there were some things I needed to accomplish before heading back to the office tomorrow.
There was also that fact that once Wilhelmina returned home, Paris and I would be hopping back on the Corky and London train. And who the fuck knew what kind of dynamite she would throw at us.
Locating the hidden storage room and preparing for the auction were also good Sunday jobs. The latter was going to require a lot of effort, so getting started was a good idea. Thank fuck, Paris had agreed to help me research the vintages at the CJ office this coming week.
I flicked on the lights and looked around the subterranean cellar with its 2,500 square feet, housing over a 2,000 bottles of vintage wines.
Her eyes widened like saucers. “Holy God, this place is amazing,” she mused, running her fingers over the glass bottles that lined the racks.
The tan stucco private tasting room was 22 feet long, had a vaulted ceiling, a wood-burning limestone fireplace, and an antique copper sink that functioned as a place to chill white wines as well. And in the middle of it all was a giant hand-made wooden table that sat sixteen.
“This place is like a giant party room,” she commented, having moved over to the chillers to inspect it.
The oak barrels were on the other side of the room and I made my way over to them, tapping on one. “I’m pretty sure it once was.”
Paris blinked her long lashes. “Do tell.”
On the wall opposite the barrels hung a black and white picture of a woman dangling upside down from a silky rope attached to the ceiling. This very ceiling. The dancer had her foot wrapped tightly in the rope and was carefully pouring wine into the glasses of those sitting beneath her at the table.
“Wow. That looks so very scandalous,” she smirked.
“I used to joke with Wilhelmina that I knew exactly how she got her job at the winery before marrying my grandfather, and it was her dance moves.”
Paris shook her head. “That poor woman.”
“Poor, my ass,” I said. “Nothing about that old battle ax is poor.”
Her giggle was music to my ears, and I took a moment to gaze at her happy face.
We were doing this together. I wasn’t going at it alone. Although it was different for me, I didn’t mind it. I might have even liked not going at something alone.
Before I was even aware of what I was doing, I hurried forward. I heard her intake of breath when I wrapped my arms around her. Taking her face in my hands, I pressed my lips to hers.
“What was that for?” she asked when she pulled back, gasping for air.
I shrugged. “Does there have to be a reason?”
“I guess not.” She grinned.
“Come, on, let’s get started.”
We started peeking behind the racks that had been installed so many years ago. Paris took the bottom. I took the top. It was on our third trip around the room that Paris spun on her heels, and all that red hair swishing around her as she did. “Look! I think I found it.” Intrigue rippled across her gorgeous face.
It wrenched through me. Tripping me up. Making me want to beg forgiveness for all of the sins I’d ever committed and then do it again and again.
I wanted to scoop her up and take her right there, but my curiosity had me peering down to where her finger was pointing.
“Son of a bitch,” I muttered when I saw it.
In the racks was a gap, a space as if a bottle couldn’t fit snug upon the rung, so it was left empty. I used my phone to illuminate the area and saw an old brass doorknob right where the bottle should have been but couldn’t fit.
“You’re right. That has to be it.”
Disbelief pinched her brows as she looked up and down the rack. “That’s a lot of bottles to move first before we can get to it.”
Peering up, I surveyed how many bottles there were and then dragged my hands down my face. “I’d say at least two hundred.”
She bit her lip. “And then you have to move the rack.”
I raised my arms and flexed my biceps. “If I can move mountains, I can move this little thing.”
Hysterical giggles filled the open space. “Mountains, really?”
I gave her a shrug. “What can I say, I’m a man of many talents.”
When she rolled her eyes at me, I patted her ass. “Hey now, no haters. How about you get us a glass of wine and watch me work.”
Her eyebrows practically kissed her hairline. “Are you sure we should open one? Aren’t they really expensive?”
Shaking my head and laughing, I pointed to the chiller. “Your pick, Love. Who knows, behind that door could be a new beginning. A time to celebrate the demise of Vince Gable.”
Sashaying across the room, I watched her shake her ass on purpose. “Little minx,” I growled.
She pulled out a chilled bottle of rosé and hunted in the cabinet at the bar for an opener.
Carefully unloading the bottles, I set them on the table where Paris and I could check their credentials later to see if any of them were suitable to take to the office for further research.
I admired the way she skillfully tore the foil and then gracefully popped the cork. I had to wonder if she wasn’t celebrating having made it through two weeks without killing me or possibly the fact that she’d been able to draw me out of my dark mood.
I supposed either was acceptable.
Chewing at her bottom lip, she poured the two glasses, and it took all I had not to cross the room and take that lip between my own teeth.
I didn’t.
Instead, I kept working until she started back my way with that sexy little body she’d wrapped so perfectly in jeans and a tight sweater.
She was like a gift I wanted to unwrap all the time, and when she handed me a glass and clinked hers against mine, the words just came out.
“I don’t want to lose you.”
It wasn’t the declaration I should be making, and it definitely wasn’t the right time or the right place or even the right context to say anything.
Then again, I never did follow the rules.