Chapter 19
Bianca
I ’m obsessed with orange wine.
Also with Jansen Beck. But I’m trying not to think of him. I can’t afford to be obsessed with anything besides wine right now.
I can do this. I can have sexy shenanigans with a hot hockey player, and then leave when it’s time. I did that with Tomás.
I can do it again.
Back to the wine. I need to talk to Rosa about it. She’s meeting me here in the pressing house in a few minutes and I’m prepared for the discussion.
She walks in and drops into one of the ancient chairs. “What’s up?”
“I want to talk to you about what we’re going to do with the viognier.”
“Sure.”
“I want to make orange wine.”
She frowns. “What?”
“You have to have heard of it. It’s getting more popular.”
“I don’t know anyone who’s making orange wines. What is it? Do we mix white wine with orange juice? Or…?”
“No, no.”
“Because our brand isn’t fruity wines like peach Moscato or those strawberry flavored wines. Ugh.”
“It’s not that. Some wineries in Argentina were making them. One thing about Argentina is that they’re not governed by Denominations of Origin.”
She nods. “Like Champagne.”
“Yeah. So we had more freedom to try new things. And I found some qvevris in our cave.”
She gives me a blank look. Okay, Rosa knows a lot about wine, obviously, but this is a bit obscure.
“They’re terra cotta vessels that wine is fermented in. I think they’ve been there a long time. Probably they were there when we were kids but they’re in the ground so we didn’t realize. I want to clean them up and put some Viognier grapes in there to ferment.”
“That sounds…weird. Terra cotta?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t know, Bee…”
I clamp my bottom lip between my teeth briefly. “I want them to ferment a year. Then age another year.”
She frowns. “I thought we were going to make wines that we can drink sooner.”
“I know. That’s why I’m talking to you about this. I won’t use all the viognier grapes. But it will be a longer process.”
She makes an annoyed sound. “Bee. We need to start making money as soon as we can.”
“I know! Believe me, I know. I’m just…I found those qvevris and it seems like a sign. And I’ve been doing a ton of research and I think we’d be getting in early on a growing trend.”
“We’re not a family who jumps on trends.”
“This is our winery. Our vineyard. We don’t have to stick to Lamberti traditions. We can make it what we want.”
I can’t tell her how much I want this. How much I need to do this, to make my own history in this family. “In fact, I think we should change our name.”
Her eyes fly open. “What? Change the name? From Caparelli?”
“Yes. It hasn’t really been Caparelli for years anyway; with Geno running it, all the wines have been Belmonte wines.”
“But…it’s always been Caparelli.”
“Think about it, okay? It’s an idea. We can talk to Allegra about it, too.”
“If she ever shows up,” Rosa mutters.
“I know.” I sigh. “So back to the orange wine. It’s another way for us to differentiate ourselves from Belmonte. To make our own name.” To show what I can do.
“The whites are ready to drink sooner,” she says slowly. “Do you have to use white grapes?’
“Yes. That’s what orange wine is. It’s making wine using white grapes as though they are red. With the skins and seeds in contact with the juice. I tracked down a few bottles—one from Australia, a couple from Italy. Would you try them and see what you think?”
She tilts her head. “You’re really set on this.”
“Yeah.” I eye her expectantly.
She gives me a long, appraising look.
“What?” I run a hand through my hair.
“I’ll try them,” she says. “But I’m still not sure.”
“Fair. But we do have to make a decision. The viognier grapes are coming in soon.”
She nods. “Okay.”
She leaves and I sit back in my chair.
She doubts me.
Never mind Uncle Geno, Rosa doesn’t even trust me.
My mouth twists and I sigh.
This is why I stayed in Argentina. This is why I need to go back. They believe in me there. They give me opportunities and the freedom to show what I can do.
Coming back has messed up my head. I was doing great in Argentina. Now I have all these hopes and dreams and desires and I shouldn’t, because my family is never going to let me do the things I want to.
And now I’m getting involved with Jansen, another risk. God, if I hadn’t promised, if it wasn’t the middle of harvest, I’d leave right now and run back to my mentor Milenko and Castillo Lorenzo where I’m appreciated and respected.
But I can’t do that.
So. I’m here. But I can’t care. I have to just do my job. Just make wine. And I have to make sure that this romp with Jansen is just a romp…short, sweet, and casual.
Our picnic the following Sunday is not short. It starts sweet but quickly gets dirty. And it doesn’t feel very casual.
After helping with the harvests, we’re at a point where we can’t pick any more grapes right now, so Jansen and I are escaping for a little relaxation time. Jansen packed a late lunch/early dinner in a cooler bag and I brought a couple bottles of wine. I lead him and Moose down to the creek the town is named after, a small but burbling stream of water. Moose is in heaven with all the new sniffs.
There’s a place we used to hang out and play when I was a kid, and I hope it’s as nice as I remember. After a short hike through the woods, we arrive at the wooden foot bridge, which thankfully appears well-maintained. We cross it and I pause to lean on the railing and peer down at the water bubbling over boulders.
“Cute,” Jansen says, standing so close our shoulders touch.
“Isn’t it?”
On the other side of the creek there’s a grassy, shady area dappled with sunlight, and we spread out our blanket and stretch out on the ground. It’s peaceful and quiet and I inhale a big breath of the fresh air scented by trees—a mix of pine needles, citrus, and herbs.
Jansen ties Moose’s long leash to a nearby sapling. Moose does a few circles on the blanket, then curls up near our feet.
Both of us lying on our backs looking up at the oak branches, Jansen lets out a sigh. “This is nice.”
“It is. I’m glad it’s still here.”
He lets out another sigh, which tells me he’s been holding a lot of stress. Well, that makes two of us. This is a nice break.
“What color is the sound of silence?” I ask.
I feel his amusement. “Hmm. I’d say blue.”
“Why?”
“I have no idea. Because of the sky? It’s big and silent.”
“That’s good. I’d say green.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s green here. But…it’s not completely silent. The wind rustles the leaves. There are birds. So maybe your answer is right.”
“I don’t think there’s actually a right or wrong answer to that.”
I smile. “Fair point.”
He takes my hand and curls his fingers around mine. His hand is strength and warmth and assurance. He’s been there every step of the way, doing whatever I ask of him and more, taking it all in, reassuring me that we can do this. And by we, I mean all of us—my sister, Jake, him, me. His belief in me is unhesitating. His trust in my winemaker skills means so much to me. He’s honest and hard-working and he does what he says he’ll do. I admire that so much and it makes me want to hold onto him. My fingers tighten involuntarily on his.
I’ve also seen a different side of him. He’s not such a grumpy bear. He has a sense of humor, and he’s showing it more and more. I feel like he’s happier than he was when I first met him, despite working his ass off. For some reason that creates a happy bubble in my chest, too. I like it when he’s happy. I like it when he’s laughing. I also like it when he’s kissing me, and touching me…
Because not only do I admire him and like him, I’m hot for him.
Dammit, we’re lying here in the woods having a picnic and I’ve talked myself into a buzz of arousal.
I roll toward him and he shifts too, so we’re lying on our sides facing each other.
He brushes his fingertips over my face, studying me with soft, warm eyes. “You’re so beautiful.”
My lips lift. “Thank you,” I whisper. “I think you are, too.”
“Beautiful?” One corner of his mouth quirks.
“Yes. I love your throat.”
He chokes out a chuckle. “My throat ?”
“Yes.” I trail a finger over it. “It’s perfect. Your whole neck is. Strong. I like to imagine kissing you there. Sucking on your skin.”
His eyes darken. “Ah.”
“I also like your forearms. Also strong. The way the veins stand out.” I lift his arm away from me to study it. “So hot. Well, you’re hot everywhere.”
His smile is a full-on smile and as always, it does things to my girl parts.
“I think you’re hot, too.”
We’re staring into each other’s eyes, smiling goofily, and the breeze shifts the leaves into a moving pattern of sunlight and shadow on us. His eyelids drift lower and he leans over to kiss me.
His mouth on mine is…everything. I want him so much. The softness of his lips, the slide of his tongue, the low growl he makes in his throat…God. I kiss him back, trying to devour his kisses like I’m starving.
“I want to kiss you forever,” I mumble. “I love kissing you.”
“Christ.” He rolls over me, pinning me to the blanket, gazing down at me with lust-blown eyes. His body is solid and strong on mine, and I’m soft and yielding, thrilling in the hardness of his erection against me. “More.”
He kisses me again, and again, and then kissing’s not enough. I’m aching deep in my core and my hips lift against his. I want everything from him. His hand molds my breast through my T-shirt, grips my waist, slides over my hip. He nips at my bottom lip then sucks it and a moan leaks from my lips.
His hands move slowly on me, our mouths cling and lift, and I hold onto his big shoulders and cradle him between my thighs. The breeze sweeps away the sounds we make, the soft gurgle of the creek a gentle soundtrack to our making out.
He slips a hand under the hem of my shorts, finding the tender skin of my hip and groin. He pushes his thick cock into my softness. He’s wearing similar shorts and I’m not sure he has underwear on. I glide my hands down his back and under the elastic waistband and find his bare ass. “Commando,” I whisper.
His lips curve against mine. “Is that a problem?”
“God no.”
“I thought we might go skinny dipping in the creek.”
Smiling, I push at his shorts.
“We’re doing this here?” His mouth is on the side of my neck and I shiver.
“There’s no one around.”
“I feel obligated to point out that that could change at any moment, but honestly, if I can’t fuck you right now I’m gonna cry.”
I smile too and he goes up onto his knees to shove his shorts down, freeing his beautiful cock. I’m admiring it when he reaches for my shorts and whisks them down my legs along with my panties. He pushes up my T-shirt but doesn’t take it off, just exposes my mesh and lace bralette. He brushes fingertips over my nipples, visible through the sheer fabric. “So pretty.”
“So handsome.” I curl my fingers around his shaft. “You’re beautiful here, too. Please. I want to kiss you here.” I rub my thumb over the head. “Taste you.”
His groan rumbles in his chest and he moves, straddling my torso, and holy angels singing, he’s right there in front of my mouth and I’m dying for him. Holding him, I slide my tongue over wet, silky skin, swirl it around the defined rim, then close my lips over him.
“Fuuuuck.”
He towers above me, feeding me his cock, rocking his hips in restrained pulses so he slides slowly deeper. And deeper. I suck and lick and taste him, his skin thin and delicate over hard rock. I make ecstatic noises in my throat, reveling in the feel of him in my mouth, so solid and virile, my lips stretched around his girth. I seek his balls with my fingers, cupping them, and he makes another animal noise that has my pussy clenching hard.
Then he pulls away.
Panting, I gaze up at him.
He glares back at me, not in anger, but self-control, his chest rising and falling. “So close,” he grits out. “Wanna be inside you.”
“Yes.”
He gropes around for his shorts and pulls out a condom and I grin with delight as he rips it open and rolls it on his straining cock.
Eyes fastened on mine, he moves back between my legs. Inside me. Slowly. Thickly. I can’t breathe and all I can see is him against a background of blurred green and gold, the perfect V shape of his torso, the opposite V shape of his meaty thighs spread wide between my legs, his firm stomach. His eyes—green and gold and brown like the trees, pulling me into their depths until I’m lost in another world, a fog, a dream.
“Jansen.”
He takes my hands and threads our fingers together, and we move in a rhythm we create together ours, new and yet familiar.
“I can’t stop thinking about you,” he rasps. “I can’t stop wanting you.”
“I know.” The drag of his cock over sensitive nerve endings sparks and catches fire, a hot coil of flame building. “I know.”
Everything inside me expands, too fast, too hot, and I can’t go slow because I’m desperate, dying. I whine and lift my hips and he smiles tightly, letting go of one hand so he can find my clit with his thumb. I gasp and lose my mind, staring up at the sky then my eyes falling closed as he drives into me, harder, grunting and gulping in his own rapture. Pleasure rips through me and I shudder and quake and he drops over me, elbows on the ground, his face in my neck, pushing into me in urgent thrusts. He groans, and I clench around him as he comes, milking him, holding onto him with everything I have. And I never want to let go.
I’m exquisitely aware that I want him with me, next to me, always. I’m fascinated with him. I’m infatuated with him. I want to live inside him and keep him.
We doze off in each other’s arms, a second blanket tossed over us in case someone comes by, but we’re alone in the woods. The sun warms us and I’m so cozy and sleepy I might never move, drifting on a haze of sexual satisfaction and happiness, with Moose curled up at our feet.
We both wake up at the same time, stirring, slowly surfacing. We smile at each other.
“This is a first for me,” he says.
“What is?”
“Sex in the woods.”
“City boy,” I scoff, sliding my fingers through the hair at his temple.
“I’m not opposed to it. It just never happened.”
“Well, I’ll be honest. I’ve never had sex here before either.”
His eyes crinkle up. “Good.”
I want him again, with an urgency that’s out of place with the fact that I’m still here in his arms. When he moves to pull his shorts back on, I want to grab him and hold on. But I let him go. I find my own shorts, straighten my bra and my top, and run my hands through my hair.
Jansen reaches over and pulls a piece of grass from my hair with a smile. “Hungry?”
“Famished.”
We open the cooler bag, which interests Moose, and spend the next while slowly eating a tomato salad, an assortment of charcuterie, cheeses and crackers, and fresh fruit. I pour us glasses of the wine I brought and we sip the zinfandel sitting with our knees touching, the breeze nudging my hair.
“Do you think?—”
He makes a choking sound.
I give him a chiding look. “Wait! Hear me out.”
He rolls his lips in on a smile and nods, feeding Moose a little piece of salami.
“Do you think our future selves are watching us right now through memories?”
His mouth relaxes. He sips his wine and looks over my shoulder. Then he nods. “Yeah,” he says slowly. “I think so. And this…this is a good memory. My future self will love this memory.”
My heart throbs. “Yeah. For me too. We should have memories that make us happy, right?”
“That’s all we ever really have, in the end.”
Yeah. He’s right. His words move me and give me a glimpse into his character. And I like it.
“Not all memories are good, though,” he adds. “Shit happens.”
I grin. “True. I’d definitely rather forget that I destroyed Mrs. Gerstenmayer’s shed.”
His lips quirk but his eyes are shadowy.
“I know there are worse memories than that,” I say quietly. “My dad dying. My mom leaving. I was only thirteen. One time Zoe Mayberry told me my mom left because she didn’t love me.”
“Fuck.”
“It was true, though.” I lift a shoulder. “How could she have left us like that if she loved us? I’ve come to terms with it now, but it was hard.”
“Of course it was hard. I can’t say I understand that, a parent abandoning her kids.”
“Nobody did. Nonna tried to tell us that Mama wasn’t herself because of the heartbreak of losing Daddy, but she left with a man and she’s still with him and she hasn’t come back, so I guess she is herself. That’s who she is.”
“It’s not a reflection on you.”
“It’s hard not to feel that way. That you’re lacking somehow. How else could a mother do that?”
He doesn’t reply, his gaze going blurred again. “I’m sorry your mom left. You lost both parents and you were young.”
“Thank you.”
Jansen pulls out the wine bottle and tops up our glasses.
“What’s something you can’t do that you wish you could?” I ask.
He holds out a morsel of cheese to Moose and thinks. “Speak another language.”
“Oh, me too! I wish I could speak Italian. I know a few words from Nonna, but we always spoke English.”
“I took French in school for a few years. But I wasn’t good at it. Now I regret not trying harder.”
“There are apps you can use to learn a language. We could both join and do challenges together.”
“We could.”
“You don’t sound enthused.”
“How about after harvest is done?”
“Okay.” Except I’ll be gone. But we could still do language challenges long distance.
Wow. That’s sad.
A sudden feeling of being swamped, of drowning, not being able to breath rises in my chest. I gulp my wine. “I’m obsessed with orange wine.”
He blinks at the rapid change of subject. “Orange wine?”
I tell him of my discovery in the wine cellar and my research into orange wines.
“What makes them orange?” he asks
“We leave the skin and seeds in contact with the juice.”
“Like red wine, but with white grapes.”
“Exactly.” I beam at my favorite student. “It’s all about the skin contact.”
“I like skin contact.”
He says it so seriously I almost don’t get it. Then I see the gleam in his eyes and I crack up. “Well, to be honest, I do too. But I’m talking about grapes.”
“Right.” His lips twitch.
“Rosa agreed to taste some, but she’s not enthusiastic about the idea.” I make a face. “She wants wines that are ready more quickly so we can start making money.”
“That’s practical.”
“I guess. I feel like she doesn’t trust my winemaking abilities, though.”
He inclines his head. “Really? I’m sure she knows what a great winemaker you are.”
I snort. “I don’t know if anyone here in Napa knows that. Especially Uncle Geno.”
“And that matters to you.”
“I don’t care what they think.”
The corners of his mouth deepen. “Sure.”
My mouth pinches. “Okay, okay, it’s a tiny little chip on my shoulder.”
He smiles.
“I think it’s practical to try this new wine, because I think it’s growing in popularity. It’s something new and different and people will be intrigued. Especially if it’s good.”
“Of course it will be good. Bianca Martinelli is making it.”
His belief in me pulls at my heart and warmth spreads through my chest. “Thank you.”