Thirty
Leah wasn’t a big proponent of day drinking, but after that meeting, she was willing to bend the rules. She sat at the bar in the tasting room, alongside three couples. A cork popped, and the tasting room manager poured a flight of reds.
“This is the first red we make every year,” he said. “This is your Monday through Thursday red, your training wheels red.”
“I can taste the pepper in this one.”
“Goes well with barbecue,” said the tasting room manager. “And this is our Malbec: note its deep purple color. It has a great mouthfeel, great finish.”
He was good at his job; all of the winery and vineyard staff were. While her mother was clearly relieved about the buyers backing out of the deal, Leah knew it was just delaying the inevitable. Leonard would not change his mind about selling.
Still, it was only July. What if they had the best summer of all time—a summer to make Leonard believe in the ability to turn things around? They might still be losing money, but if things at least started to head in the right direction, it could give him hope. The question was, what could she do quickly, in the short term, to increase revenue?
“Well, that was fun,” Asher said, sliding onto the stool next to her.
“What a nightmare,” Leah said.
“You ran off pretty fast.” Asher signaled for a glass of wine.
“I mean, what was there left to say?” Leah said.
The manager made his way to their end of the bar, already opening a bottle of Asher’s favorite Cabernet. He set out two glasses.
“Don’t you have work to do?” she said. “It’s not even lunchtime.”
“Sure. Nothing like moving deck chairs around on the Titanic.”
“Considering Mom’s ancestry, that’s in poor taste,” she said. “Asher, come on. We can’t just give up.”
“Do you have any better ideas?”
“I’m not the one who’s been working here my entire life. What should we do?”
“Nothing. You can just accept, like I have, that this is fucked.”
“Does Bridget know the sale fell through?”
He shook his head. “I don’t want to worry her.”
“You mean, you don’t want to scare her off.”
“No, that’s not what I mean. And speaking of Bridget, she said you and Mom have some sort of book club?”
“Book club?”
“Yeah. Around the pool the other night?”
“Oh—that wasn’t a book club. We were just talking about a book.”
“Yeah . . . a book that you all read. That’s called a book club. Can you invite Bridget to join in? I want her to feel like part of the family.”
“We all have dinner together every night. Isn’t that more a family-bonding activity than a book club?” Leah said. As soon as the sentence was out of her mouth, the words “bonding activity” reverberated in her mind. Bonding activity. Was there any bigger bonding activity for groups of women than book clubs? Hollander Estates had always done a lot of business with bachelorette parties. Why not book clubs, too? And what better setting for a book club than a vineyard, as her mother had proven all those years earlier?
She knew she was on to something.
“I hope you’ll at least consider inviting Bridget.” Asher finished his wine and set the glass down hard. “You of all people should know how it feels to be excluded.”
“I’m not too happy about that stunt you pulled today,” Leonard said, slipping into his side of the bed. Their room was cool, a breeze blowing through the open window. The curtain billowed, and Vivian let it catch her eye.
“I assume you’re referring to bringing Leah to the meeting?” she said, taking off her reading glasses.
“We have enough going on without you muddying the waters.”
“Muddying the . . . Leonard, I’m just about losing my patience,” she said, turning to him. “Leah is here to be supportive. Maybe you could let her try to help.”
Leonard sighed, reaching for her hand. “I wish it were that simple. But losing that offer . . . it’s a bad sign. I’m worried, Vivian.”
In all of their ups and downs, Leonard had never uttered those words to her. Leonard prided himself in being a fixer, in having the answers. She felt a shiver of fear.
“Have you considered reaching out to another winemaker? Maybe partner with someone else around here?”
Leonard pulled his hand away. “You can’t be serious.”
It had been years, so many years, since either of them had so much as acknowledged the disastrous partnership with the baron. And she was the only one who knew the abrupt end of it had been her fault.
In the weeks and months following their encounter in the stable, the baron continued to contact her. First it was phone calls to the winery office; he’d ask for Leonard, and if Leonard wasn’t available, he’d ask for her.
“I understand your hesitation at your own home,” he said. “But I’ll meet you anywhere in the world. Fly you anywhere in the world.”
She told him no, begged him to never speak of it again. Then the letters began arriving, sometimes two a week. Vivian existed in a state of panic that Leonard would somehow get to the mail before she did. She intercepted the letters, finding creative ways to dispose of them or hide them so they weren’t discovered in the trash even by one of the household staff.
One day, the letters stopped. And the baron pulled out of his partnership with Hollander Estates.