So Far Into You (13 page)

‘And what about you, Seth?' Max said, putting his glass on the table. ‘I have to admit you're not what I expected.'

‘How's that?' Seth said.

‘When I told people I was thinking about selling out to you, they told me I had rocks in my head. They said you were hard as they come.'

Seth shrugged. ‘Not sure what I should say to that, except maybe I'm getting soft in my old age.'

‘You've got a few years left yet, mate.' Max sucked down the rest of his glass and refilled it. Then he shifted his weight to the side and dug into the pocket of his pants, pulling out a sheet of typewritten paper. ‘Here's the grower list I promised you. All up to date.'

Seth reached for the pages but Max resisted, and their eyes met. ‘You will look after them, won't you? There are people on this list who are like family to me.'

‘I'll do the best I can by them, Max. That's a promise. As long as no one on there is unreasonable about anything, we should be right.'

Max released the pages. Seth tucked them in the inside pocket of his jacket without looking. He didn't need to look. There was only one name on the list he cared about. One name he knew.

Remy Roberts, Red Gum Valley Road, via Oakbank.

Four months ago when he'd first started discussions with Max Montgomery's business broker, after word came through the industry grapevine that Max was ready to sell, he'd seen the name Remy Roberts on this same list. ‘Remy' was unusual enough that he had to ask the question.

Max told him Remy had been in the Adelaide Hills for five years and had come from over West. ‘Great grapegrower—there's never any problems with her fruit. She's pretty easy on the eye too,' Max had said. ‘You wait till you see how all the blokes at work find stuff needs doing at the winery whenever Remy comes around.'

Roberts, he'd discovered, was her mother's maiden name.

So he'd found her. Accidentally, after all these years.

Seth took a sip of his drink. He didn't drink before noon as a rule, but hell, it was five o'clock somewhere and if Max was in a mood to celebrate, so was he. It was that kind of day.

‘You look pleased with yourself,' Max said.

‘I could say the same.'

‘Yeah. I guess so. It'll take a while to sink in.'

‘It'll help when the money hits your account,' Seth said.

‘Only if the wife hasn't spent it yet.' Max laughed.

Seth laughed with him, but privately his mind skipped to Remy.

He'd thought about her less over the years, of course. Life moved on and he'd been busy building an empire. But it didn't take much to remind him. He stayed away in the wildflower season because he didn't want the memories of the picnic they'd shared at Ellen Brook. He hadn't been to Vintage Festival in four years, either. Left it to Ailsa or Rina to present his father's trophy.

Did Remy know he'd bought Montgomery Wines?

He would love to be a fly on the wall when she found out.

She wasn't there when he got back from France. He'd told her he'd help her deal with her debts. He'd begged her to trust him, and she'd gone without a word. Worse, she'd gone with a hundred grand of Lasrey money in her pocket.

He didn't even know if those debts were real: a story to put him off his guard. Make him feel sorry for her. Make him want to help her.

He'd been such a fool.

Remy Hanley/Roberts—whoever she was—she'd never needed help. She knew exactly what she was doing, and she'd used him to get her there.

‘What's up?' Max asked. ‘You've gone quiet.'

Seth sat back in his chair, swirled the liquid in his glass. ‘You got me thinking about first impressions, Max. That's all.'

Through the glass windows of the restaurant, Seth saw Rina near the serving counter. Lewis Carney beside her.

‘I'll ask them to join us, shall I?' Max said, gesturing to the restaurant.

‘Sure,' Seth agreed, then as Max made to get up he said, ‘you stay here, mate. I'll go.'

Max sat, muttering about his blisters. Seth strode along the balcony, feeling the resilience of the boards under his feet. The sun was shining, it was a beautiful day.

All in all, an auspicious start to Lasrey Estate's new venture into South Australian wine.

Chapter 10

For a week after Zac told her about the Montgomery buyout (that Seth insisted in interviews was actually a
merger
), Seth was all over the newspapers and TV. The media blitz tailed off as journalists ran out of angles to cover and now their interest in Seth had turned social.

You'd think Adelaide had never seen a handsome rich bachelor before, Remy grumped, snapping the Wednesday paper shut.

So far, she'd seen Seth photographed with the daughter of an Adelaide real estate stalwart at the National Wine Centre; in a corporate box at the Australia Day cricket match with someone called Paula; and at a basketball game with the team sponsor's niece and her friend.

It seemed the women and the events were interchangeable. Not that she cared. She didn't. But just let the bean-counters from Lasrey Estate try to tell her how tough times were, or that everyone in the wine industry had to tighten their belts. Every grower who sold grapes to Montgomery Wines knew those fruit negotiations were brewing. It was highly unlikely Seth would be as generous as Max.

She took her coffee out into the early afternoon heat, grabbing her hat from its hook on the wall and secateurs and gloves from where she'd left them on the outdoor table.

Breeze trotted in front, paws puffing up the sawdust paths, tail bashing a lacework of fronds and flowers that tumbled from the beds. Each whack of her tail released scents of lavender or the salvias fresh pineapple, or the sharp tang of rosemary. All of it helped cover the smell of the sheep manure she'd scraped from the Williams' shearing shed and dumped on the garden beds. It would decompose all winter and give the plants that perfect boost leading into spring.

Spring.
Her mother's wedding. Lexie would be back from her round Australia trip with Bernie by October, and the two planned to tie the knot.

As Remy walked, she snipped, deadheaded, drank coffee, and tried not to think about how much she still had to get done to make everything perfect for the wedding. Paving. Fixing the outdoor barbecue. Fixing the brickwork where the old red quoins had cracked. She didn't want to think about what it would cost; and not about Seth Lasrey or kisses, or bushwalks, or dolmades. Not thinking about that at all. She didn't want to think about Seth Lasrey either, or bushwalks, or … any of that.

Breeze huffed back and forth chasing a scent or a sound. Every tiny scuttle in the undergrowth made the dog freeze, then she'd pounce on stiff front paws to where whatever made the sound had either hunkered down for dear life, or vanished.

Each time Breeze was thwarted Remy laughed because her dog looked so damn
puzzled.
It felt good to laugh. She'd been living in a time warp since news of the Montgomery buyout broke, caught between past and present until she felt like an elastic band.

Ailsa. Seth.

The day she grabbed the money and ran.

She'd lost count of the times in the last five years she wished she'd never taken Ailsa's money, and double-wished she'd paid back the old harridan when she'd had the chance.

The secateurs snagged on a rose and Remy yanked the blades from the thorns, leaving a gouge in the stem, ripping her glove.

Pulling both gloves off in frustration, Remy whistled for Breeze. This half-arsed gardening wasn't helping anyone and when half-arsed gardening didn't do the trick, there was only one thing for it. Whole-arsed gardening.

Entering the stable, Remy left her coffee cup on the garden bench and hefted her best pair of shears from their place on the wall.

First victim was the thug of a wisteria that ruled the sunny side of the stable.

With the handles near chest-height, she thought about Ailsa Lasrey and her sparkly rings and her neat little zeros, extended her arms and started hacking at the thick shoots tangled over her head, making tentacles of wisteria whip to the ground.

Dust sloughed off the leaves and she coughed. Sweat dripped in a vee between her breasts, darkening her purple tank top. She kept cutting, shearing the canes until her arms ached and her heart raced and there was no room in her brain for worrying about the future or regretting the past.

A thick clump of green loosened from the stable gutter and fell at the same time as Remy dropped her arms to ease the muscle burn. Legs apart, shear tips low, she stood amid the carnage breathing hard.

***

Two days later official notice from Lasrey Estate came in the handful of mail Zac delivered. It was one of two letters. The other was from the bank. She ignored the latter. Bank statements never held good news.

Remy tore open the other heavy cream envelope and scanned the page.

Dear Ms Roberts

I write to confirm recent news regarding the Lasrey Estate merger
(Remy nearly choked on the word)
with Montgomery Wines.

For those of you who aren't familiar with our company, Lasrey is the largest winery by value of wine produced in Western Australia and we're committed to growing our business both within Australia, and abroad.

You should feel confident that we value your contribution toward making Montgomery Wines a favourite with wine lovers everywhere. Lasrey has always believed great wines begin in the vineyard, and with the assistance and expertise of existing and new grape suppliers, we are sure this relationship will continue.

It is my pleasure to invite you to a grower meeting at Montgomery Wines on Monday, February 2 at 8.30 am. We look forward to providing you more information about our harvest procedures at that point, and answering any questions you might have.

It was Seth's signature at the bottom of the page but the letter wasn't personally signed. Instead, his scanned electronic scrawl was positioned in a perfectly sized gap between the lines
With Sincere Regards
and
Seth Lasrey, CEO.

Hell and Tommy.
That was it. After two weeks of nailbiting and soul-searching, four measly paragraphs were all she got.

Remy stuffed the letter back into its envelope.

So what did she expect? A smiley face near his signature? A note on scented paper: ‘Hi, Remy, Seth here. Let's do lunch.'

She'd been making this buyout personal and yet Seth's letter was all business. Was it possible he hadn't connected the dots? Could he truly not know who Ms R Roberts was? Or if he knew, maybe he didn't care. It was all so long ago, everything that happened in Margaret River: mountains in her life, molehills in his.

He would have tried to contact her otherwise, wouldn't he? At some stage over the years he would have tried to find her?

He hadn't. Neither had Blake, and for Remy's part she'd kept her side of Ailsa's bargain.

For the first month, not calling Seth or Blake had been the hardest thing. She'd pick up the phone then slam it in the cradle before the dial tone could go through. Then when she banked the second of Ailsa's cheques, the whole thing seemed so final.

In the second month, she dreamed she'd wake and find Seth outside the Adelaide Hostel where she was staying. That he'd ignored whatever his mother said and found her, and she could explain everything.

After the third month it got too painful to hope.

Not long after that, she'd opened her copy of
Grapegrower & Winemaker
magazine to find a small item in the
Grapevine
section announcing Seth's engagement to Helene Bouchard.

Chapter 11

The drive into Montgomery Wines wound around the side of a camel-hump shaped hill. In winter, the hill was green. This time of year like everywhere else, it was sun-baked brown. Cars had to leave the safety of the bitumen to drive the two kilometres into the winery and Remy always had the feeling that the Mercedes and BMW drivers braving the gravel path enjoyed the thought they were officially off-road. Gleaming, expensive cars wore the shimmer of dust like a suit of honour. The owners probably didn't get them washed for a week.

On the Monday of the growers' meeting, it was too early to have to slow for tourists and she was too preoccupied to pay attention to the view. Parking under some river gums, she left her car without bothering to lock it. No one would steal the car. No one would steal any of its contents either, unless they had a hankering for old Fleetwood Mac CDs, a pair of well-worn Blundstone boots or the big box of vegetable seedlings tucked in the passenger footrest.

Remy had dressed to blend in. Her hair was in a sloppy bun at her neck, cap pulled low over her forehead, big sunglasses. Her usual denim shorts had been replaced by faded denim jeans. Add flat shoes instead of boots and an over-sized blue long-sleeved shirt and she had a look Zac would have called
incognito.

She wished she felt incognito. Unfortunately, she felt more like a high-kicking chorus line of neon fairies sat on the brim of her cap, chanting her name.
Remy. Remy. Remy.

A sign at the bottom of the stairs directed growers up stone steps to the balcony. From there the timber decking led into the back of Montgomery's restaurant. Remy had been there plenty of times with Max and Sue, celebrating their big wine show wins, celebrating the Christmas party Max threw every year.

It wasn't like that now. The atmosphere was subdued. Normally, get a bunch of blokes together they'd be talking football, ribbing each other over teams, talking about what they'd got up to the last weekend, or what might be planned for the weekend ahead.

Quite a few growers had brought wives or partners, which made sense, Remy thought, because these were business decisions that affected the livelihoods of entire Hills families. The wives would want to hear from Seth Lasrey too. Get it straight from the horse's mouth.