Zoe Brennan, First Crush

Chapter One

CHAPTER ONE

It’s eight a.m. on a brisk March morning, and there’s a man in my mouth.

An annoying one.

“Open wide for me, baby. You can take it.”

“ Teddy. ” I growl around the mouthful of metal and cotton he’s loaded into my face, then gag as something pointy hits my tonsils.

“Come on now, Zoe!” Teddy’s futuristic dentist spectacles flash as he roots around inside my face like it’s the junk drawer, and he’s hunting for the last triple A battery. “I know you lesbians don’t have a lot of practice, but surely you can open wider than that . Think boa constrictors. Unhinged jaws.”

There are downsides to being best friends with your inappropriate gay dentist.

This is one of them.

After Teddy retrieves the last of his clanking oral probes from my mouth, he picks up my chart and frowns, vigorously drawing several large circles on various teeth in the diagram.

I arch an eyebrow. I can see where this is going a mile away.

“Bad news,” Teddy says gravely. “Some of these cavities are so deep, they’re forming a tunnel network. Have you ever heard of fistulas?” He swats his hand at me, like never you mind , and gets up and opens the door. “George? Prepare the shots! We’re going to need them all !”

Teddy’s hygienist materializes in the doorway like a ghoul, eyes delighted, gripping a large metal tray cluttered with needles.

I remove the wad of wet cotton from my mouth and smile politely. “That won’t be necessary, George. Thank you.”

Teddy’s theatrical frown turns genuine. “You’re no fun, Zoe Brennan. You know that? All well-adjusted and calm .”

I get the feeling I’m supposed to be insulted.

George’s face falls as he realizes the shots aren’t needed after all. I watch him shuffle back to his station from the corner of my eye. “You ever worry about George?”

“He brings a certain unhealthy enthusiasm for the job, yes,” Teddy says simply, his back turned to prepare the next round of tortures.

“So what’s this ‘ red-hot emergency business meeting ’ I had to drop everything and come in for?” That’s usually Teddy’s code for fresh gossip, but every now and then, he legitimately wants to talk business. As the go-to lender for my family’s vineyard, Teddy considers himself my “silent partner,” which is hilarious because nothing about Teddy is silent.

Teddy swings back around with a set of whitening trays and a suspiciously innocent face. “You mean other than your red teeth, you unrepentant vampire?” He butts the upper tray against my mouth, and I reluctantly open wide enough for him to shove it in. Is this what blow jobs are like?

“You’re lucky I got a shipment of the good bleach in.” He tsk s and jams the lower tray in next.

“Pitfalls ah running a winn-yer,” I say as dignified as I can around the two trays. “’inking wine ih my yob.”

“That’s funny, I could’ve sworn making wine was your job.”

“Same ’hing. Now ’pill it.” I give him my best don’t fuck around look, but I’m still wearing those giant black safety glasses and drooling, so it’s less effective than usual.

“Mayor Esposito’s aide was in yesterday—Elisa?” he says with feigned nonchalance. “You know the girl. Class one malocclusion? Well, she mentioned that the Bon Vivant has chosen to host their annual wine festival in Blue Ridge this year.”

Even Teddy’s reflexes can’t stop the trays from shooting out of my mouth. “ Everyday Bon Vivant ?!”

“Ms. Brennan, this is expensive bleach. You want me to charge your ass double?”

“ TEDDY! Tell me everything!” I rip the black safety glasses off.

The grin spreading beneath his dental specs is positively evil. “Not so calm now, are you?”

I blink against the chair’s overhead spotlight, head spinning. Everyday Bon Vivant is the word on exemplary—but accessible—wine. I’ve gone to their traveling annual festival a few times, whenever our vineyard can afford to send me, and it’s always an amazing time. It draws thousands of visitors from around the world for three blissful days of eating, drinking, and fun events, and when it’s over, the area picked to host is officially on the map. As a small wine-producing region, Blue Ridge can’t compete with Napa and Sonoma; wine connoisseurs don’t even know we exist. But if it hosts Everyday Bon Vivant , it would change everything—for our wine scene, our town, and especially for the lucky vineyard chosen to host the opening showcase.

“When?”

“This fall, after harvest at the tail end of tourist season. They’ll start scouting locations right away.”

I sit back, mouth hanging open long enough for Teddy to jam the trays back in.

“It’s time to put on that clever thinking cap of yours, baby.” Teddy dabs at the drool on my chin affectionately with the paper towel clipped to my chest. “This is Bluebell Vineyards’ big opportunity to level up.”

He’s not wrong. Most people don’t know this, but running a small vineyard isn’t the most profitable venture. The pandemic hit our region’s tourism hard, followed by two drenching, grape-killing rainy seasons back-to-back. Teddy’s loans, local music nights, family picnics, business 101 classes—I’ve had to pull every trick out of my hat to keep the lights on and the grapes growing. Some days it feels like a miracle we’re open at all, and the stress keeps a perpetual grip around my throat.

Bluebell Vineyards was my mom’s dream—she and my dad built it from the ground up. But Mom died when I was twelve, and I vowed to continue her legacy by pouring my love and energy into the business the way she and my father always had. Watching sales decline these last few years fills me with a panicked desperation that keeps me up at night. Dad’s been so down lately, too. Our money situation stresses him out, though I try to protect him from the worst of it.

But if Bluebell gets the Everyday Bon Vivant showcase? Dad might even be able to retire one day. We’ve always assumed he’d be out there pruning to the very end, but this could change everything.

“Did Elisa mention any vineyards the mayor’s considering endorsing?”

Teddy grimaces, and I already know the answer.

“Into the Woods. Who else?” he says.

Our neighboring vineyard run by my best-friend-turned-enemy Rachel Woods.

Of course .

It’s a shame, really. Rachel’s parents Molly and Ezra Woods are my dad’s closest friends, her older brother Chance is an all-around nice guy, and her big sister Charlaine? An absolute goddess and star of all my teenage fantasies.

Rachel, however, is a stone-cold bitch.

Rachel, Charlaine, Chance, and I all grew up together, our houses on neighboring properties nestled between rows of young vines and tucked away in the lush, rolling woods of Gilmer County. I was at the Woods’s house every day for years, until things with Rachel went to hell in a handbasket. Now here we are, twelve years after high school graduation, all still working in the wine business. Charlaine went to California to study viticulture and never came back, while Rachel and Chance stayed on at their family’s vineyard. Thanks to Chance’s winemaking skills and Rachel’s insufferable knack for making money, Into the Woods is our biggest competition and the snobbiest vineyard in town. They spell classic “ classique ” for no good reason and generally make me want to throw things.

“Rachel better stay out of my way. That showcase is mine .” The decree slurps out around the trays.

Teddy’s smile returns with fiendish glee. “I love it when you’re business evil, Zoe Brennan!”

My mind’s off to the races already. It’s the beginning of the spring season, and vineyard operations will grow busier until the first grapes appear. Then work transitions to pure chaos, which reigns through harvest. If Everyday Bon Vivant is scouting soon, I’ve got to put together a plan for winning the showcase now .

The bleaching timer goes off, and I yank the trays out and set them on the counter, ignoring Teddy’s disgusted demands that I rinse. My hand’s already turning the doorknob to leave when he calls out, “Wait, dammit! There’s one more thing!”

I sigh impatiently. I’ve got a date with Microsoft 365, two shots of espresso, and my entrepreneurial cunning. “Make it quick, Teddy.”

“Harlow Benoit is in town—Diego and I saw her when we were out for dinner.” Teddy levies his finger in my direction. With his dental specs still on, he looks like a very stern gem dealer. “Do not text her, Zoe! Remember your New Year’s resolution!”

Harlow. Her name alone brings a flush of heat to my neck. Harlow Benoit, wine buyer for the prestigious Bouche à Bouche restaurant group, rolls into Blue Ridge a few times a year to sample new wines and negotiate supply deals. She’s a human tornado disguised as a five-foot-two pansexual party girl who always manages to destroy my calm and upend my carefully curated feelings. She’s fun, extraordinarily sexy, and pushes my limits until I let go, willingly, of all the things I’m trying to control at any given minute. I absolutely crave the release I feel in her arms.

The problem is she always leaves. She’s an employed vagabond, based in New York City for a few months a year, then on the road for the rest of it. I get two or three days of sexual bliss, then she’s gone, and I’m left desperately trying to remind myself that I don’t want a real relationship. Why bother wanting what I can’t have? The queer community in Blue Ridge is thriving thanks to all the gay transplants—it was even named the friendliest LGBTQ city in Georgia a few years ago—but the lesbians who move here are already coupled up, and the few who aren’t hooked up with me, then settled down with each other.

Which is fine . None of them were right for me, anyway. And Harlow isn’t, either. I know this, I do … but then she shows up, and the desire to be touched overwhelms me. I break all my resolutions for one more round of sex followed by the brief whiplash of loneliness being with her always kicks up. But not this time. Teddy’s sick of the emotional hangovers I have after she leaves, and I am, too. This past New Year’s after a particularly incredible Christmas rendezvous when she kissed a snowflake off my nose— ugh , it was so romantic—I vowed I’d stop for good. It’s easier to be alone than to have these periodic moments of intimacy, showing me what life with another person could be like.

“Relax, Teddy. I won’t.” I smile, confident that the words are true this time. Who has time for amazing meaningless sex when the biggest business opportunity of all time just landed in your lap?

Even Harlow Benoit can’t compete with that.

After a quick pilgrimage to Office Depot to stock up on my favorite thinking supplies—a new binder, graph paper, and approximately two hundred colorful gel pens—I turn the vineyard’s old truck onto the long, winding road that curls its way through our forest. Like a sea of green parting, the forest dips back to reveal our rolling valley striped with vines. Into the Woods’s extensive property is first, streaming past my window in all its pastoral bounty, and I deny the urge to flip it off. I hate what Rachel’s done to her family’s vineyard since taking over operations. Hate . It was Rachel’s decision to renovate the old farmhouse into a “modern Tuscan” theme, even though a real, live Tuscan family operates the vineyard next door. We manage to restrain ourselves from curling ironwork and decorative plates with roosters on them. Why can’t she? Every time I see their Tuscan palazzo by way of T.J. Maxx, my Italian heritage cringes.

The worst part is that Into the Woods is thriving under Rachel’s tacky, unoriginal hands. They host five weddings for every one we do, their lush vineyards are triple the size of ours and put out some of the best grapes in the region, and their parking lot’s full every weekend. They have money to expand their land, hire more workers, and make more wine, giving them more money . Meanwhile, Bluebell Vineyards can’t afford to grow, buy new equipment, hire new people, or make more wine, and despite my best efforts, we can’t seem to budge out of the same profit/loss cycle every year. As our vintner, farmer, and primary fieldworker rolled into one, Dad will never get to retire, unlike his best friends Molly and Ezra Woods. Chance, Rachel’s brother, took over for their father Ezra as lead vintner a few years ago, and from my palate’s perspective, the transition’s been seamless. Into the Woods consistently makes the same good (if boring) wines every year. Respectable reds and whites that respectable wine aficionados enjoy drinking. I particularly love their crisp Chardonnays, not that I’d ever admit it publicly. Who could ever take over for Dad?

Not me. I can wither a succulent just by looking at it.

That’s why we have to get the showcase. It’s the one thing that could break us out of our boxed-in position and let us finally grow. Then maybe we could breathe a little, take a goddamn day off here and there. Into the Woods doesn’t need the showcase like we do, yet that won’t stop Rachel’s manicured nails grabbing for it.

I just have to grab it first.

As I pass the hand-carved sign for Into the Woods, a white Lexus SUV appears from the opposite direction, blinding me. My jaw snaps shut.

Rachel Woods, Director of Operations for Into the Woods, former best friend, and current pain in my ass, slows down until her aggressively polished vehicle reflects the chipped paint of mine. God, she’s obsessed with her car. Behind the wheel, she’s in an expensive sports-bra-shirt thing I’m convinced runners wear as an excuse to be half-naked in public. I don’t mind normally, but this is Rachel, and thus, everything she does is inherently the worst.

We lock eyes as our vehicles inch past each other, like two sharks lurking over a contested feeding ground. Her long brown hair is pulled into a high ponytail so tight, it lifts the corners of her eyes, making her look even more feline and cruel than usual. Her fingers visibly tighten around her steering wheel as she mouths exaggeratedly, Helloooo, bitch , and caps it with a frosty smile.

Rachel doesn’t know about Everyday Bon Vivant yet! If she did, her savage competitive streak would be on full display, and I wouldn’t have received such a pleasant greeting. I raise two fingers to my brow in salute, then smile all the way home.

“Hey, Dad?” I slam the truck’s door shut with my hip, arms full of sweet, sweet office supplies. “I’ve got ne-ews !”

I dump my stuff in the office and enter the winery, where the magic happens. The sharp scent of fermenting wine permeates the air, rushing me like an excited puppy as soon as I step in, followed by the smooth sigh of oak from the barrels racked along the back wall. Our winery is smaller than what you’d find at most vineyards, but I’ve always loved it in here. The wooden rafters crisscross above my head like steepled fingers, and the steady hum of the air conditioners keep it a brisk sixty degrees year-round. I squeeze down a narrow aisle of massive plastic bins filled with aging reds to reach our cold room in the back, where I find Dad standing in front of a bin of Vidal Blanc, foot tapping, holding a clipboard.

“ Ahhh! Questo vino mi sta sui coglioni! ” He makes a rude gesture at the bin that raises my eyebrows.

“Um, Dad? Something wrong?” I don’t speak much Italian, but I know enough to clock that he just yelled at the wine for standing on his balls. Cosimo Rossi Giuratraboccetti came to America for college, met Julie Brennan of Blue Ridge shortly thereafter, had a little bambina they decided was too tiny for such a big name, then never left again. Most of the Italian Dad speaks now is reserved for when he’s deep in his cups and feeling sentimental, or angry at inanimate objects that defy him, so my grasp on our mother tongue is spotty at best. But if you want someone to moon over you, then curse you out? Prego! I’m your donna .

He whips around, startled, and smiles hastily at me, pulling his clipboard to his chest. “Zoe Nicoletta! No, no, it’s just this wine”—he pauses to give it a dirty look—“is still not ready for bottling. I’d hoped to do it before … well, before now.” His face droops into its normal pensive state.

I follow him out of the cold room and over to his worktable where he plops into his chair, muttering about Brix and acid and just a simple farmer as I swoop in to give his bearded cheek a kiss.

“Well, I hope our whites stop squishing your balls soon, but Dad, I’ve got amazing news.” I brush a lock of his once smoky black, now generously silver hair out of his eyes. “You won’t believe —” I stop suddenly. His worktable, normally neat as a pin, is covered with scattered papers, and his clipboard sports a checklist a mile long, with over half its to-do items crossed off. “What’s all this?”

Dad’s large, dark eyes meet mine. “I have some news, too, Zoe Nicoletta.”

I frown. Dad’s been even more distant than usual lately, staying late at the winery, avoiding me in the tasting room. He hasn’t cooked us dinner in over a week. I chalked it up to Mom’s impending birthday, which always brings him low, but this feels like something else. Something more.

I pull up a stool to sit beside him.

“What is it, Dad?”

He takes off his small round glasses that look unfairly chic on him and slips them into his shirt pocket. “Paolo called. It’s Nonna, Zoe Nicoletta. She’s sick.” His voice cracks on the word sick , and my hand flies to my mouth. I don’t have many memories of my Nonna, but the ones I do are good. When I was little, we’d visit her in Montepulciano, a small town in Tuscany where most of my Italian family lives, once every few years. My grandfather died before I was born, so as far back as I can remember, it’s only been my beautiful Nonna. She never remarried. She once told me there are a million kinds of love, but you only need a few to get by. I hold that close on my lonelier days.

“Oh, Dad. How sick is she?”

“She’s had a stroke, a serious one. She doesn’t want to be at the hospital, so the family is taking turns caring for her at home.” Dad takes both my hands in his. “I have to go to her, Zoe Nicoletta.”

My mouth parts, the news landing in my stomach like a hot, heavy brick. The notes, the checklist, the preparations—it makes sense now. It’s a bad time of year for us to leave the vineyard, but then again, it’s always a bad time. That’s why we haven’t visited Italy since Mom died. With Dad running the vineyard by himself until I graduated college and came back to take over operations, it’s been a near round-the-clock endeavor to keep the vineyard open. Even with both of us, it’s beyond full-time. We could swing one, maybe two weeks, away, but anything more and the financial hit would be brutal.

Dad sits there watching me realize how difficult this is going to be and squeezes my hands.

And then I hear what he’s really saying. He needs to go.

Not we .

My heart contracts painfully at the idea of never seeing Nonna again, but I haven’t seen my grandmother since my own mother’s funeral. It feels wrong to place my grief on the same level as Dad’s right now. This is his mother. I swallow and nod numbly. “Of—of course, you should go. I can take care of things here while you’re gone.”

He purses his lips in a smile so soft, it’s almost a grimace. “I know you can, my sweet Zoe Nicoletta. You won’t be on your own, though. I’ve already arranged for someone to take my place while I’m gone.”

“A replacement? Is that necessary?” My forehead knits together. Josiah, our vineyard hand, will gripe about it, but he can handle the farming work for a few weeks. “How long will you be gone?”

“As long as she needs me, Zoe Nicoletta.”

“Dad.” I stare into his woeful eyes, my heartbeat picking up in rhythm against my will. “What are you saying?”

“Paolo and the others cannot handle this on their own. They have lives in other towns, small children. Nonna deserves to die in peace, in the house she loves where she’s spent her life. I can give her that.”

“So you’re—what … going to buy a one-way ticket?”

“I already have,” Dad says softly.

“For when?” My voice cracks, the feelings rising like floodwaters within me.

“Saturday.”

“That’s two days from now!” I stand up so fast, the stool crashes behind me, and Dad jumps a little. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, it’s just …” I run my hands down my face. “This is all so fast. When were you going to tell me?”

He sighs and rubs the ridge of forehead above his eyebrows. “I wanted to wait until I had the replacement lined up so you wouldn’t worry, Zoe Nicoletta. It’s taken me longer than I thought, but I found someone who can handle the growing and the winemaking while I’m away. Someone extremely qualified.” He smiles wistfully. “More than I am.”

I blink at him, my thoughts and feelings clashing into each other like tectonic plates. How am I going to train some novice wannabe winemaker on top of everything else I already do? I sell wine, I can’t make it. And no matter what Dad says, this replacement can’t be anyone other than a total reject. I know this because we can’t afford to pay anyone with real skill to take over Dad’s responsibilities. Dad and I don’t even pull down salaries—we just take what we need to live, and the rest goes back into the vineyard.

How the hell am I going to get the showcase now?

“Zoe, I’m so sorry, but Nonna needs this. I do, too.” He stands and reaches for me. I let him pull me into his arms and press my hot cheek into his warm, soft chest, like he did when I was small. His forever smell—freshly baked bread and the sharp, sweet tang of crushed grapes—fills my nose, but instead of bringing me comfort, guilt roils inside. Here I am, panicking about business and timing and when Dad will return, as if that’s not counting down the remaining days of Nonna’s life. But this vineyard has always been more than a business to me. It’s Mom. It’s our family.

It’s all I have.

“Okay, Dad.” A single tear rolls down my cheek, and I pull away. “I’ve got a lot of work to do before my shift starts in the tasting room. We’ll talk more later, okay?”

“Okay.” Dad regards me with that soft, sad look, and I shuffle back to my office.

No three-ring binder can rescue this day now.

Cool winds whip around my ankles as I trudge up the hill to my little cottage at the back of the vineyard. It was a torturously slow day in the tasting room. I tried halfheartedly to brainstorm pitches for the showcase, but it’s hard to be creative when your only grandparent is deathly ill, and the core of your business is leaving the country indefinitely. Dad promised to bring his replacement by to meet with me tomorrow, but I was too numb to ask any of the questions beating at the back door of my brain. Like who is this person? And even more importantly—how are we going to pay them? I heard Angry Bear Vineyards just fired a senior farmhand for stealing from the till—Robbie? Bobby? I guess I’ll find out tomorrow when Dad brings him round because who else could it be? The Blue Ridge wine scene is tiny . If someone qualified was looking for work, I’d know. This is an absolute disaster.

I shoulder open my door and drop my bags of fresh, forgotten office supplies on the small table. I brought them home in the hopes that inspiration for the festival would hit but looking at the colorful page tabs still encased in their packaging is only making me feel worse. There are no ideas to organize. No brilliance to divide. Fuck. I know I’m wasting the precious head start Teddy gave me, but how can I plan when I don’t know how I’m going to keep our doors open? If Dad is gone more than a few weeks, Bobby McThief will be responsible for bottling next year’s whites in addition to nurturing our vines from leaf to bud to grape. If Dad’s gone for a few months, this schmuck will have to blend our reds, too. And if Dad’s gone until harvest …

I can’t even think about that. It’s practically a death sentence for this season’s output, and whatever happens this year affects next year, which affects the following year, and the year after that. One bad year can wipe an unprepared vineyard out.

And a vineyard without a vintner? It doesn’t get more unprepared than that.

I collapse onto my loveseat, letting the backs of my knees hang over the armrest, feet dangling lifelessly over the edge. When life’s thrown me curveballs, I’ve always had our vineyard to pour myself into. That’s the family way, after all. Dad turned his grief into work, and now I do, too. But when the vineyard’s in trouble, where do I put this grief?

My phone buzzes from my pocket, making me flinch. I half expect it to be Rachel crowing she’s found out about the festival, but it’s …

Oh, shit.

FOR THE LOVE OF WINE, ZOE, HAVE SOME GODDAMN SELF-RESPECT

Guess who’s in town …

Teddy got into my phone and changed my contact names again. I sigh out a small laugh that sounds anything but happy. After a second, I unlock my phone.

Zoe

Hey, Harlow.

And then, after a pause:

Zoe