Work of Art (39 page)

When we arrived at Brandon’s winery a few minutes later I realized how different it looked since the last time I’d been there in the dark. The house was actually way back on the property, and you had to drive past the tasting room, the building where they made the wine and the actually vineyards before you could even see it. I’d mindlessly driven past it all a few weeks earlier when I’d been going to meet Brandon’s plumber. Now I looked around and really took in the breathtaking beauty of the place.

Ryan got out of the car, and I followed him around to the front. Almost instinctively, his hand drifted toward mine, but as soon as our skin connected, he pulled back as if he realized he should do that. Then he wouldn’t look at me as we walked up the wooden steps to the porch of the tasting room that had four rocking chairs sitting on it, and I had to stifle a laugh.

“What?” Ryan asked, playfully smirking when he turned to
look at me.

I shook my head. “Brandon has rocking chairs. It’s weird.”

He chuckled. “I know, right. He’s definitely not the rocking chair type. Unless he’s using them for sex.”

I knew Ryan had made that comment as a joke since we both knew what a man-whore Brandon was, but my body didn’t know that. I felt heat rush between my thighs at his statement, and instantly my brain imagined trapping him in one of those chairs and rocking him slowly back and forth toward ecstasy.

I realized that Ryan was expecting me to respond, so I jokingly said, “Yeah, I know, right. That Brandon is such a slut.” But it came out sounding awkward.

When we entered the tasting room, I was surprised to see Brandon behind the counter pouring wine for three girls in their early twenties.

“Speak of the slut himself,” Ryan whispered in my ear, his warm breath caressing my skin and making it tingle.

“What the fuck are you two doing here?” Brandon’s voice suddenly boomed when he looked up and saw us.

“We’re here to get sloshed on your wine, bro,” Ryan told him, as Brandon came out from behind the counter and hugged him.

Then he moved over to me. As he wrapped his arms around me, he whispered in my ear, “Are you giving him a chance?”

“We’re just friends,” I whispered back.

“Yeah, we’ll see how long that’ll last,” Brandon said before he released me.

Yeah, I know.

Thankfully Ryan had stepped up to the counter, so he was out of earshot. “What do you recommend?”

“The pinot is really good,” one of the girls said to Ryan, and I noticed she’d sidled up next to him and had placed her hand on his forearm.

My hackles suddenly rose, and the feelings of jealously that poured over me caught me by surprise.

“Is it?” he asked, gently pulling his arm away from her hand, and I wanted to smile. He turned to me. “Did you hear that, Harper? The pinot is really good.”

Then he put his arm around me and pulled me flush against his side. It wasn’t a gesture I’d been expecting, but a part of me really wanted to stick my tongue out at the girl who was now awkwardly standing next to him.

“Here, try it yourselves,” Brandon said, placing two glasses in front of us as Ryan let his arm drop from my shoulders.

Ryan picked up his glass, sniffed it, and then he took a sip. I was glad he didn’t do the
douchy swirling and examining and tasting display that I knew he was accustomed to doing. I’d seen him do it at his rehearsal dinner when the waiter had presented that night’s selection of wine, and it was so pretentious.

“That’s good,” he said,
then he turned to me. “What do you think?”

I’d been watching him taste and swallow, so I hadn’t even touched my glass. “Oh, um,” I said, hurriedly picking up my glass and taking a big gulp. I swallowed so quickly I could barely taste anything. Damn, he had me really flustered.

I held up a thumb to let him know I liked it.

Ryan chuckled. “Did you even taste it?”

“Yeah, sure. It was great,” I said quickly after I’d swallowed the mouthful.

He turned back to Brandon. “Alright, we’ll take a bottle of that.”

Brandon pulled a bottle from underneath the counter and set it behind him.

“When did you start working in your own tasting room?” I asked him as he started to open a bottle of what looked like a red blend.

His gaze shifted to the three girls at the end of the counter. The blond had migrated back to her friends once she realized Ryan wasn’t going to entertain her advances.

“Since I realized I could meet really hot chicks,” he said, and I rolled my eyes. “I’m kidding! I like it. It’s cool to connect with the customers, and I’m learning about the wines I own and sell, so that’s a bonus. Besides, I needed something to do. I’ve worked so much for the past eleven years that I don’t know how to not work.”

“Maybe you need a girlfriend to keep you busy,” I suggested, and he waved his hand in dismissal.

“If I had a girlfriend, I couldn’t sleep with multiple women in a week. I was hoping I’d
have a wingman after Ry called off his wedding, but I don’t think–”

Brandon stopped talking suddenly, and I looked up to see Ryan making slashing motions against his throat with his hand.

“Since Ry what?” I prompted.

“Since
Ry decided he wanted to try some more wine,” Ryan said, reaching for the glass in front of him and swigging back a gulp. “Try it.”

He was practically choking as he gestured to the glass in front of me.

I bit back my giggle and picked up the glass in front of me, giving him the benefit of trying to do right by my request and just be friends. He was really working hard at it, and he deserved credit for his efforts.

“We’ll take two of these, Brandon,” I told him. “And give us another bottle of that pinot, okay?” Then I turned to Ryan. “I’m hungry. Let’s go eat lunch.”

Brandon handed me the two bottles of the red blend I’d asked for, and I walked outside to the car, leaving Ryan to pay for them and the two bottles of pinot.

I was standing by the car when Ryan came up behind me. He placed the two bottles he’d
carried out in the backseat, his arms reaching around me on either side and essentially trapping me for a few seconds.

“I’m trying,” he said, his lips right by my ear.

I spun around and faced him.

“What do you mean?”

He closed his eyes for a few seconds as he pulled his arms back and let them hung by his sides.

“I’m trying really hard to be your friend.”

“Do you not want to be?”

He shook his head. “You know what I want, but I’m just letting you know that I’m trying to respect what
you
want.”

“I know, and
you’re doing a good job of it.”

He was almost doing too good a job of it since he was making me question how long I could be his friend before I’d want more.
I placed my hand against his cheek and leaned up and kissed him on the opposite cheek, letting my lips linger there for a few seconds. As I started to pull back, he grabbed my wrist.

“You can’t do things like that,” he said, when my gaze met his burning one.

I nodded, knowing I’d flustered him, and I really hadn’t meant to. I just wanted to be close to him, just for a few seconds.

“
I’m trying really hard to keep my distance, and if you want me to keep that distance, you can’t do things like that, okay?”

I bit my lip, seeing that we were at a crossroads. Then I nodded, chickening out, be
cause I knew once I let him in that was it.

“Okay,” he said, but it came out breathy.

Then, before I could stop him, he leaned down and crushed his lips to mine, pushing me back against the car with the force of his weight. He stayed there for a few beats, but he didn’t deepen the kiss. Finally he pulled back and looked at me with remorse filling his eyes.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he said, raking his hands back through his hair as he stepped away from me. “I had to get that out of my system. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.”

I watched him, my body angled awkwardly against the car where he’d left me. I reached up to wipe beneath my mouth and stood up straight.

“It’s okay,” I said,
as I felt the pain he felt radiate through the desperation in his kiss.

He loved me, and he was miserable because I was keeping him at arm’s length.
He wasn’t rebounding. He wasn’t just lonely, and he wasn’t just interested in sleeping with me. I could see in his eyes that he truly loved me, and it was torture to stay away. The thought made my heart start to pound in my chest.

All this time
a part of me thought his feelings had been part obligation or part desperation to make up for what happened between us years earlier, but I could now see that he really had strong feelings for me that went deeper than they’d ever gone in high school. He’d jokingly told me I would fall for him, and I knew then why I’d held back. I’d been afraid that he would hurt me again because he couldn’t possibly feel what he was telling me he felt. But he did.

He loved me, and I could see it so clearly.

Before I could say anything, Ryan hopped into the driver’s seat and started the engine, so I walked around to the other side and got in, buckling my seatbelt as he tore out of the gravel parking lot.

“
Where are we going? I thought we were having lunch?” I questioned when I noticed he was leaving Brandon’s property instead of venturing deeper.

He shook his head. “
Let’s just go back to the city.”

Okay.

Wait. No! That wasn’t okay.

“Why? You
invited me to lunch,” I said, as he picked up speed and we flew down the road away from what would have been a really nice date. “I’m hungry, and that wine was good. I want to have lunch with you, Ryan.”

He sighed
as he downshifted to pass a car on the two lane road and then pushed the car even faster. Then he shook his head, his blond hair blowing in the wind as he sped.

“
Kelly warned me about being too aggressive and letting you come to me in time, and I didn’t listen,” he said loudly over the sound of the wind. “I’m sorry, Harper.”

I looked at him in confusion, and he realized his cover story from that morning was blown.

“Kelly wasn’t really sick, was she?” I questioned, realizing I should have known.

It was all too convenient that he’d shown up when he did and my plans with my friend were suddenly cancelled.

He shook his head. “No, she was doing me a favor.”

“I see.”

I wasn’t mad, but I was kind of irritated that Kelly had meddled in my love life. I could only imagine what she’d told him. My friends thought was I so fragile, but I really wasn’t. I did need to do things in my own time, sure, but it wasn’t because I was breakable and couldn’t handle them. I just didn’t like to play fast and loose with relationships with men.

The agitation was visible on Ryan’s face as he drove us out of Sonoma as fast as he could.
Once we’d merged onto the highway, and I knew he wouldn’t be shifting any time soon, I turned to face him, my hand reaching for his. He didn’t look at me as I took it.

“Ryan,” I said, as I ran my thumb back and forth over his skin.

He looked over at me for a second. “Yeah?” he said, sounding dejected.

“Do you really
love me, really?”

He nodded a few short nods. “Yeah, I do.”

My body tingled as he confirmed what I already knew, and a swirl of emotions flooded me. I held tight to his hand, and he let me, as we continued to barrel toward the city. I was surprised we hadn’t gotten pulled over. He was going at least a hundred miles an hour.

“Ryan, I’
m scared,” I said after a few minutes, raising my voice so he could hear me over the wind.

I was putting it out there, how I felt, what I was afraid of, but I think we both knew what that meant. I was caving.

“What are you scared of?” he asked, keeping his emotions in check, but his eyes were so alight with hope as he stole a glance at me.

I swallowed. “I’m scared of getting hurt, of getting left behind, of falling in too deep that I can’t get out if I have to.”

“Why would you have to get out?” he asked, the concern evident in his tone as he squeezed my hand. The pressure was comforting.

I shrugged. “If you stopped loving me or if you got tired of me or I don’t know. I haven’t l
et anyone in since you. What if I do it and get hurt again?”

“Harper, no,” he said, and I could suddenly see how he felt about me so clearly in the way he looked at me. “You can’t think like that. This isn’t me asking you out to see how it goes to see if maybe I like you. It’s me telling you that I want to be with you and o
nly you – forever. That’s all this is.”

I laughed
, but there wasn’t a lot of humor behind it. “That’s all?!”

It seemed like a hell of a lot to me, but it also sounded sort of perfect.