Chapter 21
Rosa
I ’m filing papers in the office when Jake comes through the back door, yelling something about taking a shower.
Earlier, Deputy Romero’s truck rumbled by the house, headed toward the vineyard. Half an hour later, it made the opposite journey.
I was tempted to walk up there to see what transpired, but I restrained myself. I didn’t want to give Emi and Javier the impression the situation is more serious than it really is.
The problem is I’m not quite sure just how serious this situation actually is.
Jake and I both know who’s behind this. It’s time to stop hiding from the truth and figure out how to fight.
I close the filing cabinet with a sigh and maybe a little more force than necessary. I’m angry. Livid. But not at my husband.
This inheritance—this quixotic, overwhelming, brilliant project—should have been a chance for me to show my competence. To prove to everyone that I’m capable of putting in the work and making Caparelli viable again.
But if I can’t protect Caparelli from sabotage, especially from my own damn family, how capable am I really?
I shut down my laptop and close the lid, knowing I won’t get any more work done tonight. At least not until we have a plan.
I head into the kitchen and grab a bottle of Chardonnay out of the fridge. I hold it in one hand, two glasses and a bottle opener in the other, as I wander into the front room we rarely use.
When we were kids, Jake and I would sometimes hang out in here, escaping from the summer heat on the wide wooden floors. We’d play board games and cards, maybe watch a cartoon or two on the old beat-up black-and-white TV that used to sit in the corner.
It’s gone now, and the floors are even more scarred and dusty than they were back then, but Nonna’s old couch is still comfy and it’s still one of the cooler rooms in the house.
I can hear the shower turn on in the distance, water rushing through the pipes to the upstairs bathroom. I try to ignore the image of Jake standing under the spray, water pouring in rivulets over the sculpted muscles of his chest. And after the other night, I know exactly what that body looks like. The fantasy is based on reality.
I swallow, hard, and pour a little wine.
I take a sip of Chardonnay and swirl the golden liquid in my glass. It’s one of my favorites, from Take Flight before Jake’s family had to sell. I only have a few bottles left, and I’ve been trying to stretch it out, keep a little for a future treat. But today feels like a day to crack one open.
Before too long, it’ll be gone. Just like Take Flight itself.
The water shuts off, and I sit on the couch, scrolling through my phone until Jake appears a few minutes later. He drops down onto the opposite end of the couch, giving me a distracted smile. He’s wearing joggers and a well-worn T-shirt with the neck stretched out, and I have to dig my fingers into my thigh to keep from reaching for him.
I keep replaying the other night in my mind, the way it felt like he was worshiping my body with every move.
And then he left and stayed out the next night, and the one after that, like he was avoiding temptation.
Or maybe he was just avoiding the inevitable awkward conversation. It was fun, you’re a great girl, but…
But. He’s leaving soon. In the long run, it’s better if it was just a one-night thing.
Maybe if I keep telling myself that, I’ll eventually believe it.
I hand him the bottle, and he pours himself a glass, leaning back with a satisfied sigh. I put my phone down and turn to him. “What did Officer Friendly have to say on his return visit?”
Jake snorts, taking a long swallow of Chardonnay. “Very little,” he says eventually and pulls a business card out of his pocket. “He wants me to contact him if we think of anything we can share with him.”
“Gee, how thoughtful.” I roll my eyes.
“But in the end he decided there wasn’t enough evidence to shut us down or report us to the invasive species board.”
“Thank God for small favors,” I mutter, and he nods.
Jake picks up the bottle off the floor and turns it in his hand, a fond smile playing at the edges of his mouth. “I loved this year,” he murmurs, and my heart squeezes.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to—” I say, but he shakes his head.
“No, it’s fine. Better than fine. A good memory.” He tilts the bottle and studies the wine, gleaming gold in the early evening sunlight streaming in through the plate-glass window. “Take Flight had a good run. A long one.”
I nod; there’s not much I can add.
We sit quietly for a moment. Finally, I take a deep breath and turn to Jake. “So, I’m ready to fight back. Are you?”
He heaves a sigh. “Finally.”
“We’re obviously being sabotaged.” I wave my hand. “The complaints, the impossibility of finding workers, someone messing with our equipment, everything.”
“The hard part is finding proof.” He twirls his glass by the stem, then puts it down on the coffee table and props his elbows on his knees. He stares out into the distance. “Without that, who’s going to believe us?”
I nod. “Okay, then. Let’s go over what we do know.”
“Sure. Tell me what you’ve noticed.”
I hold up a finger. “First. As soon as I take over Caparelli and Uncle Geno pulls his crew, I can’t manage to hire anybody. It’s like there’s a ‘do not work for’ warning out in the laborer community. I have to go with the only candidate available, who ends up bailing in under two weeks.”
“Yeah.”
I add a second finger. “Then, you come along and discover he hadn’t been watering the vines while he was here and shut off the irrigation system completely before he left. If you weren’t around, that could have been a disaster.”
“Also true.”
“And then…” My voice trails off. “Then you come on board. What happened under your watch?”
“I can’t hire anyone, either.” He’s quiet, still looking away. “And then I was warned not to work with you.”
My heart stops. “What?” My voice sounds weak, pained, even to my own ears.
He slants a look at me. “Apparently word in town is that you don’t have any money to pay people.”
“Shit.” I dig my hands into my hair and lean forward. “You’re kidding me.”
“Unfortunately, no.” He lifts a hand, then drops it to his lap. “I’ve done what I can to convince people of the opposite, but it’s a pretty solid rumor.”
“It’s not true,” I say when I can gather my wits around me. “We don’t have a lot of cash lying around, but I pay my bills.”
“I know,” he says. The conviction in his voice helps me calm down.
I shake it off and move on to the next issue. “Then, Mr. Law and Order shows up with a complaint about Caparelli’s paperwork, of all things. Like I don’t do everything by the book.”
Jake laughs softly. “Your lists have lists,” he adds.
I narrow my eyes at him, but he’s not wrong.
“And then the traps.” My breath hitches. “Someone actually came onto our property and stole equipment.”
I almost can’t bear to think about it.
And then I realize what I just said. Our property. I’d backtrack and say something about it being mine and my sisters’, but enough time has passed since I said it that I’d just make it all the more awkward.
Not only that, but the last few weeks working together, it really has started to feel like our property. Mine and Jake’s, together.
It’s a mirage, not a marriage, but it’s one I can’t help but wish was real. I wish both were real.
I hurry to move the conversation along. “And again, Deputy Romero shows up with a complaint.”
He looks out the window, pondering, then throws back the rest of his wine, leaving the glass empty.
I watch as his Adam’s apple bobs and fight back the wave of want that surges through me.
“That seems more than a little convenient,” he says, and I take a moment to figure out what the hell he’s talking about. I was distracted, okay?
“Actually, it seems designed to be the most in convenient thing possible,” I grumble.
Jake tips his head to the side, acknowledging my point. “So we’ve got rumors in town, anonymous complaints to authorities, and theft.”
“Of the missing insect traps,” I add. “And who knows what’s coming next?”
Because once you lay it out there like that, it seems pretty apparent that this isn’t over.
I know who’s behind it. But I don’t want to voice it. I barely want to think it because it’s too awful to consider.
But based on the look on Jake’s face, he knows, too.
So much for family, I think bitterly. Because there’s no one else in the realm of possibility who stands to gain so much from the sabotage of Caparelli.
If I can’t make a go of it, Uncle Geno’s absolutely waiting in the wings to take over. He’s made it abundantly clear that his goal is to take Caparelli back. And what better way to ensure Caparelli is back under Belmonte control than to have poor, naive Rosa fail at running it on her own?
Things happen, you know. Sometimes the odds are against you.
And right now, Geno is stacking the deck.
“There’s no hard proof,” Jake turns sideways on the couch, gently taking my hands. “But we’ll get through this. I promise you.”
I let the words wash over me, like we is a thing that’s going to continue after harvest. If only.
His hands are warm and solid, gripping mine. I take a deep breath and let it out. “So where do we go from here? It’s not like we have time to become amateur detectives.”
“I think the best thing we can do is to stay alert. Watch for anything out of the ordinary. Stay on top of it so that we’re not caught off guard by the next thing.” He grins then. “And you can keep being your list-making, rule-following best self.”
“Fuck you,” I mutter, shoving him to the side, and he laughs, tipping his head back. I kind of want to lick the long, tanned length of his neck.
“Come on.” He plants a hand on my knee and levers himself off the low-slung couch, then holds his hand out to me, palm up. “Let’s go find something to eat and forget about this bullshit for the rest of the night.”
“Sounds perfect.”
As I follow him into the kitchen, trading insults and laughing, I realize that it really is.
It’s perfect.
And when he takes my hand at the end of our meal and leads me upstairs to my bedroom, that’s perfect, too.