Intoxicating (3 page)

Guilt gnawed at the back of his brain and he felt a sudden urge to be on the side of David instead of Goliath.

“Well?” She was a pushy one.

“Surprising,” Wyatt said, but he was not speaking of the wine.

“What else?”

“Mind-bending.”

“Impertinent,” she said.

“The wine?”

“You.”

“But I intrigue you.”

“Not you,” she said. “Your tongue.”

“Now who's being impertinent?”

Her cheeks reddened with effrontery. “I didn't mean it like that.”

Finally.
He'd rattled her.

She fumbled his gaze, turned to put on a lab jacket.
Professor
Vineyard Commando. He readied his grin, dialed it to stun.

Kiara turned back, held up a palm, a firm stop sign between them. “Look, clearly that I'm-so-handsome-that-it-hurts thing usually works well for you, but if you want this job, knock it off.”

He tipped the glass to his lips let the liquid slip over his tongue.

Pow!

There it was again. That same sweet kick of pure pleasure that had stormed his senses back in the tasting room.

Wyatt glanced from his glass to the bottle she'd poured from. Yep. The DeSalme label. He lowered his lashes, studied Kiara for a long, hard moment. What was she trying to pull? This wasn't DeSalme's muscat. Something was up and he wasn't walking into her trap. He was going to make her call him out.

“Well?”

“I thought you wanted a comparison,” he hedged.

She pursed her lips, but said nothing. She did have
an exceptionally gorgeous mouth. Full and lush. Like plump ripe grapes. “I do.”

“I'll need a palate cleanser before I try the other wine.”

She opened one of the table drawers, reached in and pulled out a packet of plain unsalted crackers. With one eyebrow arched upward in a skeptical expression, she passed him the crackers.

He took a bite. The soft crunch was the only sound in the room except for the ticking of the wall clock. The bland cracker soaked up the fruity taste of wine.

Kiara presented him the second glass of wine decanted from the Decadent Midnight bottle.

He swirled the liquid in the glass, inhaled.

“Bouquet?” she asked.

How was he going to play this? Straight up? Or coy? “Secretive,” he said, going for coy and pulling out the double entendres.

Her eyes widened. “What else?”

His stare locked in on hers again. “Deceptively simple.”

She squirmed. Surely she had to know she was busted. “And?”

“You really want to do this?” he asked, leaning across the table.

She tightened her jaw. The pulse at the hollow of her throat fluttered. He stared at the provocative stirring.

Her hand moved to cover the telltale spot. “Do what, Mr. Jordan?”

“Tango.”

She drew in an audible breath. “I have no idea what you're talking about.”

“Just tell me one thing. Why are you playing with me?”

A flash of emotion crossed her face and in that split second she looked achingly vulnerable, and that made him feel soft in the general vicinity of his heart. “You know?”

“That you switched the bottles? Of course I know. What I can't figure out is why.” Except he did know why. She knew he was a DeSalme and she wanted to make him admit it. Well, he wasn't going to admit anything. She was going to have to accuse him.

Suddenly, startlingly, she grinned. A grin that made him feel like her hero.

Why was she grinning? It was a bit disorienting after all that hostility.

“Well, what do you know,” she murmured, more to herself than to him. “A guy who speaks the truth.”

Wyatt exhaled and it was only then he realized he'd been holding his breath, waiting for her to accuse him of being a DeSalme.

While he was relieved she hadn't unmasked him as DeSalme's mole, part of him felt disappointed. Not with her. But with himself for remaining silent.

“The truth?” he asked.

“You're a supertaster.”

“A what?”

“You have the inherent ability to identify all the different notes in a wine. That's why I was testing you. A lot of people can talk a good game, but when you present them with the more expensive label, they invariably perceive it as the superior wine, no matter what's in the bottle. But you didn't fall for it.”

“Seriously? Most people can't tell the difference?”

She told him about the experiment she'd performed as a research assistant in graduate school, something
about competing cola brands, MRIs and the power of advertising. He understood that. He'd spent some time in the marketing department at DeSalme before deciding it wasn't for him.

“You didn't let the pricey DeSalme label fool you,” she said. “I saw it on your face when you were drinking Decadent Midnight with Grandmamma's lava cake. It's a treasured talent, but I had to be sure you weren't just bluffing.”

No kidding? Yes, he'd always had a knack for picking out the right wine with the right meal—sometimes friends would call him up while they were on dates and ask his advice on what wine to order—but he attributed the skill to his family's profession.

“What was the expression on my face?”

“And your comments on the note card,” she went on. “You described the wine like you were reviewing Beethoven live at Carnegie Hall.”

“What was the look on my face?” he persisted.

“It doesn't matter.”

“If it doesn't matter, why don't you just tell me?”

“You have a hard time letting things go, don't you?”

“Not at all. I'm famous for letting things go. Girlfriends. Bad habits. Housekeepers. I have a hell of a time keeping housekeepers.”

“You can afford a housekeeper?”

Most thirty-something guys working as interns couldn't afford housekeepers. He had to be careful.
Quick, stun her with your wit.
“No, that's why I can't keep them.”

“Point taken.”

Okay. He'd sidestepped that one. “So what was the face?”

Kiara sighed. “You lied about being good at letting things go.”

“So sue me,” he said. “I lied. What face?”

“Orgasmic,” she said bluntly. “You had an orgasmic expression on your face. Happy now?”

Orgasmic? Had she actually said that? Damn. His cheeks burned. Thank God he had a heavy five-o'clock shadow or she would see that she'd caused him to blush. When was the last time he'd blushed? When had he
ever
blushed? Wyatt didn't have a bashful bone in his body. He did not blush. And yet, here he was, blushing.

“And that told you what?”

“You're very sensual.”

“Well, all you had to do was ask. I could have told you that.” His mother called it self-indulgent, but what was so wrong with sleeping on satin sheets? And what did she know? After she left the guy she'd left his father for, she hooked up with some Norwegian crab fisherman named Lars Bakke off the coast of Bear Butt, Alaska, or some such place, and started carving figurines out of animal bone.

“Do you know how long I've been searching for someone with your innate talent?”

“A long time?” he guessed.

“Years.”

“Looks like today is your lucky day,” he drawled.

Her smile disappeared and her lips pressed into a stern line. She glared. Funny, she looked adorable when she glared. And she glared a lot, so that meant she was pretty damned cute.

“Sorry,” he apologized.

“If I accept you as an intern, you're going to be work
ing here in the lab with me, Mr. Jordan. The rest of the interns will be out in the vineyards.”

Well, now, that was a happy turn of events. He couldn't have planned this any better. She was inviting him right into the heart of her winery, into the nerve center, the inner sanctum. Privy to Bella Notte's best-kept secrets. He could do some serious damage here.

Maybe.

“Wyatt,” he said.

“What?”

“Call me Wyatt.”

“I'm a hard task master, Mr. Jordan. Winemaking is my passion, my life, my reason for being on this earth. I take it very seriously. I'm excited to have found someone with your wine-tasting talents, but if you can't do as I ask, when I ask you to do it, without any questions, then you're out on your keister. Got it?”

“Keister?” He tried not to laugh. Failed. “Sounds like something a vaudevillian would say.”

She sank her hands on her hips. “It's a word. Look it up.”

He resisted the urge to salute and say, “Aye, aye, Captain.” Instead he toned down his smile. “You're the boss.”

“You seem old for an intern.”

“What can I say?” Wyatt spread his arms. “I'm a late bloomer. Misspent youth and all that.”

“Trust-fund baby, huh?”

He startled. He thought he disguised himself pretty well, but she'd seen right through him. She had his number.

“Nah,” he lied, surprised to find how uncomfortable lying to her made him feel. “Just a slacker.”

Her frown deepened. “May I assume you've put those slacker tendencies behind you?”

To demonstrate his commitment, Wyatt started rolling up his sleeve. “I'm ready to work.”

“You're a jokester.”

“You're not.”

“Mr. Jordan, you will do everything I ask of you, no questions asked.”

“Yes.”

“It was a statement,” she said. “Not a question.”

“Gotcha.” Fiery. He liked that about her. In fact, he liked everything about her and it occurred to him that could be a serious problem.

“What did you study in college?” she asked.

“A little bit of this, a little bit of that.”

“You're a dilettante.”

“I prefer the term
renaissance man.
” He winked, but that didn't work any better for him than his grin.

“Of course you do.”

“Were you aware that you can be a tad dismissive?” he asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Oh, I get that you're too absorbed in winemaking for polite conversation, but you have a tendency to dismiss people out of hand if they don't immediately fall in line with your plan or live up to your expectations.”

Dude, what are you doing? You're supposed to be winning her over, not pissing her off. You're here to spy on her, not call her on her less than positive traits.

Wyatt knew he should shut up, but he just kept rattling. “It's inconsiderate.”

“You don't know anything about me.”

“I know what I see.”

She shifted, but seemed to give his comment some thought. “You're right. I have a tendency to get absorbed in my work and ignore everything else.”

“Some might even say rude.”

“Is that a criticism?”

“We've all got our flaws.” He shrugged.

“Some of us more than others.”

Did she mean herself or him?

Finally, she pulled out the chair beside him and sat down. “Why wine?” she quizzed. “What attracts you?”

He was about to say something glib, like, “Why not?” Or “What better way to spend the day than drinking wine?” But he got the distinct impression such a tongue-in-cheek response was not what she was looking for from a potential intern, and he needed to correct the bad impression he'd made. “I believe that to master something so complex and engrossing would be a life well spent.”

She folded her arms across her chest, eyed him speculatively as if gauging his response on her internal bullshit meter. Kiara Romano was a tough nut to crack.

“Besides,” he said, unable to resist his natural inclination to tease. “There's nothing more romantic than the art of making wine.”

She held up her palm. She used the gesture liberally. “Let me stop you right there.”

“What?”

“Winemaking is
not
an art. That's a dreamy, illogical, magical supposition and it has no place in
my
laboratory. Winemaking is a science that can be measured and controlled. It's quantitative and qualitative. It's the human perception of wine that's faulty.”

“Okay.” Clearly, he'd punched one of her hot buttons.

“That silly legend you've heard floating around Idyll is pure poppycock and it's only useful as a marketing tool for people who like to believe in romantic nonsense.”

“Poppycock.” He pantomimed writing it on a notepad. “Gotcha.”

“I'm a scientist. My focus is science. If my cousin Maurice can increase our customer base by capitalizing on a fable, well, more power to him. Me, I prefer to concentrate on using proven scientific techniques to produce the best wine possible.”

He held up an index finger and thumb, measuring off an inch. “You don't think that there is at least a little bit of magic in the—”

“No,” she said sharply. “And if you want to work for me, you won't bring that up again.”

All rightee then. Message received. Not a romantic bone in her body.
“No more romantic poppycock.”

“You're making fun of me.”

“I have to. You're just too serious and I get the feeling you have most of the people around here buffaloed.”

“I have to be tough.” She notched up her chin.

“Only on the outside. I can tell that on the inside you melt like a Popsicle in the sun.”

“Seriously? Women go for stuff like this?”

“Oh, yeah.”

She snorted and rolled her eyes but he could tell that underneath she wanted to smile, just somewhere along the way she'd come up with the notion that allowing herself to relax and enjoy herself meant she was weak or something.

“Now,” she said. “You can return to the group. Mau
rice will give you a tour of the winery and then show you to your accommodations. Get settled in and then be back in here tomorrow morning at seven o'clock on the dot and be prepared to work hard.”