Baby, It's You (12 page)

Kari didn’t like this. Not one little bit.

“Hey, I’m offering to help you,” Bobbie said. “It’d be pretty ungrateful if you didn’t take me up on it.”

Kari still didn’t like it, but she was in a bind. Finally she handed her the plates.

“Now, get out there,” Bobbie said. “Or you can kiss your tip good-bye.”

Kari left the kitchen, swinging by to grab a high chair, only to go to table six and be told they’d never asked for one.

Then she heard the crash.

She set the high chair down and hurried back to the kitchen. Bobbie stood over two broken plates on the floor, their shards mingling with lumps of chicken fried steak and gravy. She put her hands to her face. “Oh, my! I’m sorry, Kari. I can’t believe I was so clumsy. They slipped right out of my hands.”

Kari looked down in horror.
No, no, no!
This meant the order had to be put in again, and it was going to be ages before those people got their food. And her tip would go right out the window.

As she stood there staring at the carnage, Bobbie said, “I have an idea. Why don’t you ask your friend Carlos to fix you two new chicken fried steaks? Oh, wait. Silly me. He doesn’t
hablo inglés
.”

As she flounced out of the kitchen, Kari wanted to cry. Just start boohooing at the top of her lungs. But then she pictured herself crawling back to her father and asking for her money back. He’d give it to her. She knew he would. The question was, what would she have to do to make that happen?

And Marc. No matter how frustrated she was with him right then, his words of encouragement still rang inside her head.
Trust me. You’re tougher than you think you are.

And that meant she had to keep going.

She put in an order for two more chicken fried steaks, and Carlos said he’d move them to the front of the queue. Then she went back out to the dining room to deal with demanding customers and her own aching feet.

That afternoon, Marc walked the sloping landscape of the vineyard, where row after row of grapes hung heavily on their vines. The green of their ragged leaves was edging into gold, signaling the last few weeks of ripening. This morning he’d felt a breath of cool air in spite of the heat, like a gentle tap on his shoulder, a whisper in his ear:
Autumn is coming. Then harvest. Pay attention. Read the signs. Be ready.
He could almost feel life bursting from the grape clusters as they ripened on the vine, tiny globes of potential energy that would become a kinetic explosion at harvest.

He stopped beside Ramon, who was examining one of the vines and the clusters of grapes it held. His face was deeply tanned and fissured, a product of long summers working in the Texas sun. His hands were growing gnarled, with enlarged joints that were the first indication of the arthritis he tried so hard to hide. It wouldn’t be long before pruning vines and picking grapes would be out of the question for him, but Marc knew he’d crawl out to the vines before he finally admitted he couldn’t do it any longer.

“Looking good,” Ramon said. “But I did see half a dozen wasps this morning.”

Marc’s heart skipped with apprehension. “Any nests?”

“One.”

This wasn’t good. Wasps were generally almost nonexistent through most of the growing season, but when the sugar content increased in the last days of ripening, the pests could descend on a vineyard and destroy the fruit.

“Set the traps and keep watch for damaged fruit. If you see it, get it out of the field. And be on the lookout for more nests. And pray we don’t get another hard rain in the next few weeks.”

“I think we’re in the clear from this last one,” Ramon said. “There’s still plenty of time for the grapes to settle and the sugar to stabilize.”

Soon that magical moment would come when the acidity decreased, the sugar content rose, and a perfect equilibrium was reached. Then it was time for harvest. Determining that moment began with lab tests, but it ended with much more objective things. Taste, weather conditions, plus something that couldn’t be quantified—the intuition of an experienced vintner.

Marc’s grandfather had begun this vineyard in 1948, and his father had grown it to the size and quality it was today. The outbreak of Pierce’s disease in 1996 had damned near wiped them out, but they’d come back, planting new vines and rejuvenating the ones they’d been able to salvage.

Marc remembered his father taking him out into the vineyard when he was a boy, showing him the vines, pointing out mold or pests and telling him what to do about them. As the grapes ripened, he demonstrated how they should look and feel and taste. Then came harvest, which was some of the hardest, dirtiest work a man could possibly do. But the harvest party made it all worth it, when they opened a bottle from a prior year’s vintage and his father toasted their success. Those times were written across Marc’s memory in indelible ink, memories that would stay with him for the rest of his life.

His father had tried to instill those same feelings for the family business in Daniel, but he was always immersed in computers and video games and anything else that didn’t involve the day-to-day operations. Working in the vineyard was Daniel’s definition of hell on earth.

“It looks as if we’ll be harvesting a little sooner than last year,” Marc said. “They’re moving fast.”

“When will Daniel be here?”

“He said sometime next week, but with Daniel you can never be too sure.”

Ramon just nodded.

“I know how you feel about him running the place.”

Ramon held up his palm. “None of my business.”

“No, it
is
your business. You’ve been part of this vineyard for the past twenty years. You know your opinion is important to me.”

“Daniel…” Ramon shook his head. “I’m just not sure about him. That’s all.”

“He knows what it takes. He grew up at this vineyard.”

“You know it’s nothing personal. I couldn’t love him more if he was my own kid. But he’s just not cut out for this. Not like you are.”

It didn’t matter whether Daniel was cut out for it or not. Three years. That was their deal. He could certainly keep the place going that long, particularly if Ramon was there with his steadying hand. But Daniel was also impulsive. Prone to coming up with ideas he was dying to implement whether they made sense or not. More distractible than a kitten who’d spied a string. Focused on cars and women and the next big deal. But they had a bargain, and Marc intended to hold him to it.

“I have to get out of here for a while,” Marc said. “Just for a few years. I’ll be back.”

“So you’re keeping the vineyard after that?”

For a long time, Marc didn’t respond. Couldn’t respond. He didn’t know what the next three years would bring. What would he see out there in the world that was more enticing than running a vineyard for the rest of his life? He, Nina, and Daniel would all have a say in the decision, but when it got right down to it, the vineyard was Marc’s to keep.

Or his to sell.

“I’m not sure what I’ll be doing with it,” he said. “But it’ll be a few years before we make a decision.”

“A lot can happen in a few years.”

Marc knew just how true that was. A poorly timed harvest. A too-cold summer. Birds and bugs and rabbits and mold. Any one of those things could turn a potential banner year into a subpar vintage that would screw up the reputation Marc had tried so hard to maintain.

“What happens happens,” Marc said.

“I wonder what your dad might say about that,” Ramon said.

Marc turned away, hating the sound of those words.

Ramon sighed. “I’m sorry. That was out of line.”

“No. It’s okay. It’s not as if I haven’t done a little thinking about that myself.” He looked at Ramon. “You’ll stay, won’t you?”

“I’ve been here a long time. Seen this place through the good times and the bad. I can’t imagine being anywhere else.” He paused. “I can’t imagine
you
being anywhere else.”

Sometimes Marc couldn’t, either. But he knew that was only because he’d never lived anywhere else. The moment he got the chance to see what was out there for him, Rainbow Valley wouldn’t seem so important anymore.

It was the perfect time to leave. Curtis had been gone almost a year now. Nina was getting over the shock of his death, and she had plenty of money from the settlement the company had provided after the accident to live comfortably even if she didn’t work. Angela intended to become a veterinarian, and since there was room in Rainbow Valley for only one vet and that post was occupied, she’d probably never live there again. And Daniel had enough money to last him for the rest of his life, so taking three years out to run the vineyard wasn’t interfering with his livelihood.

But until then…

Marc thought about Kari, her stunning green eyes, her beautiful breasts, her gorgeous naked body lying on that sofa. It had been as if dormant cells inside him had suddenly come to life, making him want her with an intensity that bordered on insanity. Being with her was like getting a head start on the life he’d envisioned all these years, a chance to get a little crazy, have a little fun. What could possibly be wrong with that?

Maybe she was right. Maybe he had overreacted. Manufacturers didn’t cut it that close on the quality of their products versus expiration dates. He needed to ease up. Relax. Take precautions, of course, but let logic and reason rule. In spite of everything, he needed to stop worrying about it. He was a logical man, and it just wasn’t logical to get uptight about those kinds of odds.

He wanted her again, no matter how out-of-bounds it seemed for the man he’d been all these years. But after the way he’d acted, what were the chances that she’d want him?

W
hen the waitresses at Rosie’s got to the end of their shift that afternoon, Bobbie did what she always did. She asked the rest of them how their day had gone, then proceeded to tell them how much she’d made in tips. Most of the time she blew everybody else out of the water. But if somebody happened to make more than she did, there was always an excuse. She’d had six tables with nothing but women, and women were terrible tippers. The air conditioner was acting up, and the customers in her section complained about being hot. The cooks couldn’t get a steak right to save their lives. But when she outperformed the rest of them, it was because she was next in line for induction to the Waitress Hall of Fame.

For Kari, that day had gone pretty much like the past ones had. She’d made so little in the way of tips that if things didn’t change, she was never going to be able to support herself. She was just about ready to take her meager earnings and call it quits for the day when Nina came through the door.

“I’m meeting a friend,” she said to Kari. “Why don’t you keep me company until she gets here?”

Kari sat down at a table across from Nina, relishing the chance to rest for the first time that day.

“So how’s the job?” Nina asked.

“It’s okay. I mean, it’s a little hard because I’ve never waited tables before. But I’ll get the hang of it.”

Nina leaned in and spoke softly. “So how are you getting along with Bobbie?”

Uh-oh.
In spite of what Marc had said about her, it made Kari nervous to say what she really thought. That could be dangerous in a small town like this. “Oh. Just fine.”

“Well, that must mean hell finally froze over,” Nina said quietly. “Bobbie Arnette doesn’t get along with anybody. You wouldn’t be telling me a fib now, would you?”

Kari sighed. “Well, sometimes she is a little hard to deal with.”

“There you go. Now,
that’s
the Bobbie I know.”

“I don’t think she likes me.”

“Bobbie doesn’t like anybody.”

“But I didn’t do anything to her. All I did was show up.”

“Oh, no,” Nina said. “You did way more than that.”

Kari was horrified. “What?”

“You had the nerve to be gorgeous. Bobbie doesn’t like anyone prettier than she is.”

“She’s pretty.”

“Honey, she looks like a mud fence compared to you.”

“So what do I do about it?”

“Gain fifty pounds, chop off all that gorgeous red hair, and stop wearing deodorant.”

“Is that all?”

“No. Throw in a breast reduction, and you two can be best buddies.”

Kari sighed. She knew the job would be a challenge, but she hadn’t expected any of the other waitresses to be.

“How are the tips?” Nina asked.

“Not great.”

“Hmm. Are you having fun with it?”

Kari was aghast. “Fun?”

“Waiting tables is hard work, but you can’t let anyone see that. This is a tourist town. A lot of people come here on vacation, and they want to relax. If you look like you’re always out of breath, that makes the whole situation tense. People don’t like that.”

No tension? That was like asking a person being chased by a bear to pretend they were out for a Sunday stroll.

“Just try to have a good time,” Nina said. “People having fun always look like they know what they’re doing.”

Kari did like to find the fun in anything she did, but pasting on a big smile when she had to be on her feet for hours each day with half a dozen people wanting something from her all at once while she was sweating like mad and wearing ugly shoes…well, that was a real challenge.

“So how are things going at the vineyard?” Nina asked. “Is the cottage working out for you?”

“It’s great.”
And if Marc came back, it would be even better.

“I wasn’t surprised to hear that Marc let you stay there.”

“Yeah? I was.”

Nina laughed. “That’s because you don’t know Marc. Sometimes I want to shoot him dead for being so bossy. But he always does the right thing in the end. When the going gets tough, he’s the guy you want in your corner. And don’t you dare tell him I said that, or he’ll become so insufferable the rest of us will
all
pick up a gun.”

Kari told Nina about Marc showing up at her door with a boxful of things to help her feel better.

“That doesn’t surprise me, either,” Nina said. “Remember, this is the man who acted as if it was such an imposition for you to stay there.”

“How long has he been divorced?” Kari asked.

Nina looked surprised. “Divorced?”

“Uh…yeah. I assumed—”

“Marc was never married.”

“What?”

“Angela’s mother was his high school girlfriend. She got pregnant, then ran off after Angela was born. Marc would have married her, but she didn’t want anything to do with a baby or a husband.”

“You mean he raised Angela alone? And he was only in
high school
?”

“Yeah. And Daniel and I were just kids ourselves when Angela was born. I was fifteen, and Daniel was thirteen. Our father was dead, and our mother was in bad health. She’s gone now, too. Marc was already calling the shots at the vineyard by that time, even with going to school.”

“Then he had a baby on top of everything?”

“Yeah. But if there’s anybody who can handle the hard stuff, it’s Marc.”

Kari was stunned. She’d assumed he’d been divorced somewhat recently, but he’d never been married at all? His high school girlfriend had gotten pregnant and then left him with a newborn baby? Then it struck her. Maybe that was why he took his condoms so seriously. Suddenly what had happened between them a few nights ago was making a lot more sense.

Just then a woman came into the café wearing jeans and a T-shirt, a tote bag slung over her shoulder. She was tall and thin with dark, silky hair pulled into a ponytail. When she walked up to their table, Kari realized she was the friend Nina was meeting.

She pulled out a chair and sat down. “Sorry I’m late,” she said breathlessly. “Had a family who was adopting a cat. Had to finish that up.”

“Kari, this is Shannon North,” Nina said. “She’s the director of the Rainbow Valley Animal Shelter.”

Kari shook her hand. “That’s a pretty cool job. I bet it keeps you busy.”

“You have no idea.”

“Kari’s new to Rainbow Valley,” Nina said. “She started working for Rosie, but she’s a little tight on money so she’s staying in the cottage at the vineyard.” Then she turned to Kari. “Shannon’s meeting me to work on her wedding plans.”

“Wedding?” Kari said. “You’re getting married?”

“Yeah,” Shannon said with a smile. “At the vineyard next month.”

“So where’s Luke?” Nina said. “I thought he was coming, too.”

Shannon frowned. “Funny thing. He said he had to meet the contractor who’s building a barn for the rodeo school at exactly the same time we were meeting to talk about the wedding.”

“Wish I’d known,” Nina said. “We could have met at another—
oh
.”

“If we met at two in the morning, suddenly that would be the time he was meeting the contractor. What is it with men and wedding planning? He just keeps smiling and saying, ‘Whatever you want.’”

Greg had done something similar with their wedding. Only with him, it had been
Whatever your father will pay for.

“So how are plans going for the rodeo school?” Nina asked.

“Great. Marc was out last week to help Luke repair some of the fence around the property, so now he can start looking for livestock.” Shannon smiled. “It’s his dream, and now it’s coming true. I’ve never seen him so happy.”

In spite of her words about Luke and his aversion to wedding planning, Kari could tell just how much Shannon loved him. She was practically glowing with it, and Kari would bet her last dollar that Luke felt the same.
That’s it
, she thought.
That’s how it’s supposed to be.
All she could remember about the days before her own wedding was Hilda screeching, her father writing checks, and her own conviction about getting married slowly slipping away.

“Marc has given Luke a lot of business advice, too.” Shannon sighed. “We’re sure going to miss him when he’s gone.”

Kari came to attention. “Gone?”

“After harvest is over, Marc is leaving Rainbow Valley,” Nina said.

Kari was stunned. “Why?”

“Well, if he weren’t so young I’d call it a midlife crisis. But since he’s only thirty-five…” She exhaled. “Hell, I don’t know. He’s got it in his head that he just wants to be by himself for a while. So he’s turning the vineyard over to our brother and heading out.”

“For how long?”

“Three years. Then we’re all coming together again to decide what to do with the vineyard. If Marc wants to come back, we’ll keep it. If he decides to live somewhere else, we’ll sell it and split the proceeds. To be fair, after taking care of other people all this time, he’s earned the right to do just about anything he wants to. I just wish leaving wasn’t one of those things.”

Kari couldn’t believe it. Here she was trying to integrate herself into this town at the same time Marc was looking ahead to leaving it? A terrible sinking sensation came over her, a sense that something she wanted desperately was destined to slip right out of her grasp.

As if she’d ever had it in the first place.

“So…how are things going between you two?” Nina asked.

Kari’s heart jolted. “What do you mean?”

Nina shrugged offhandedly. “I just hoped you were getting to know each other.”

“Well, he did come by a few nights ago with that stuff, but…” She wondered what else to say. It didn’t seem right to tell the
whole
story.

“Okay,” Nina said. “Here’s the truth. I want my brother to stay in Rainbow Valley. I was hoping you’d give him a reason to.”

“You actually think he’d stay on account of
me
?”

“I don’t know,” Nina said. “If you were seeing each other…”

“We’re not.”

“Would you like to be?”

Yes! But he doesn’t want me!

Or maybe he really did, and it was just the condom issue. He was just thinking too hard about all of it. The trouble was that she could speculate all day long, but she had no idea what was really going on inside his head.

Nina waved her hand. “No. Forget I said that. It’s crazy. You barely know each other. And it’s none of my business, anyway.” Then she turned to Shannon and stage-whispered, “What do you think? Is there a chance?”

Shannon smiled. “Well, last I checked, Marc’s not blind. And Kari isn’t, either.”

Okay. Enough was enough. Kari decided it was time to talk to Marc. The conversation might go nowhere, but they were going to have one whether he liked it or not.

Later that evening, Marc grabbed a glass of wine and went out to the deck. Brandy followed him there and lay at his feet, letting out a doggy sigh before closing her eyes for a nap.

He hadn’t been able to get Kari out of his mind. He’d seen paradise. Lived it for a few blessed minutes. Now he wanted to go back there. He wanted to make up for all the time he’d lost in the past eighteen years. He wanted to crawl into bed with Kari and make love to her for hours on end, leaving only long enough to consume the necessary food and water to stay alive. He wanted to make rabbits cry with envy. He wanted to have so much sex that Ripley himself wouldn’t believe it. But what had he done?

He’d run away from the very thing he was dying to have.

Brandy suddenly leaped up, wagging her tail. Marc looked down the path and saw Kari walking toward the house, wearing a pair of shorts and a tight little T-shirt. Having a beautiful woman on his property was unsettling. Having a beautiful woman on his property he’d seen naked was downright unnerving. He had no idea what she wanted, but she probably hadn’t shown up to heap forgiveness on him for what he’d done a few nights ago.

She climbed the steps to the deck and sat in the chair next to him. “Nice night, isn’t it?”

It was. But he didn’t think that was what she had on her mind. He certainly didn’t have it on his.

“Yeah,” he said. “Nice. Wine?”

“No, thanks.”

Silence.

“At least the heat seems to have broken,” Kari said. “It wasn’t even ninety degrees today.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Is there any rain in the forecast? Surely after the storm a couple of nights ago—”

“I don’t think you’re here about the weather.”

“No. I’m not.” She paused. “I talked to Nina today.”

“Oh.”

“She told me a few things.”

“Such as?”

“She said Angela’s mother was your high school girlfriend. And that she left right after Angela was born. But maybe you’d rather she hadn’t told me that.”

Marc shrugged. “It’s no secret. The whole town knows it.”

“If you’d told me, I might have understood the other night just a little bit more.”

Marc looked away, feeling guilty. But it was a hard thing for him to talk about. Always had been. To this day it still brought back memories of that moment he realized Nicole was gone, leaving him with a newborn baby and no clue how to take care of one. Those had been the most difficult days of his life, ones he didn’t like to think about no matter how much he loved his daughter.

For a long time they sat in silence, the chirp of crickets grating against the stillness of the night. The evening breeze kicked up a few fallen leaves on the deck until they rustled softly.

“Shannon was with Nina today,” Kari said. “They were planning her wedding. It’s cool that you guys do weddings here.”

“Uh-huh.”

“She said you’re leaving Rainbow Valley.”

So she’d found that out, too. “That’s no secret, either.”

“Where are you going?”

“Don’t know yet.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. I’m just getting on my bike and hitting the road.”

“Bike?”

“Motorcycle.”

Her face lit up. “Motorcycle? You have a
motorcycle
?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, my God! I
love
motorcycles! Can I see it?”

He couldn’t believe the rapturous expression on her face. It was as if she was a five-year-old kid talking about a paint pony with a silver-trimmed saddle. This was a new experience for him. Angela didn’t like the engine noise. Nina told him a motorcycle was a death trap whether he wore a helmet or not. Daniel’s fondness for motor vehicles extended only to those with four tires and a 350-horsepower engine. But this little wisp of a woman actually
liked
motorcycles?