Chapter Four. Duncan
TWO WEEKS LATER
Duncan’s day began as it often did—sprinting away from a donkey determined to take a bite out of his ass.
It happened at least once a week. Ears laid back, nostrils flared, the donkey broke off from the little flock of sheep she watched over and came at him like she had a taste for his blood. That morning, she was nearly on his heels by the time he kicked into high gear, rushing southeast through the luminescent morning fog that gave the property its name. Cloud Tide.
Duncan was a big guy, built for strength and endurance rather than speed. Even on a good day he had a hard time keeping ahead of the damned animal’s hooves. Today, though—he wore a pair of shiny oxford dress shoes instead of his usual work boots. He had to windmill his arms to keep from slipping on the dew-slick grass.
From behind, someone honked a tractor horn to taunt him as he ran—a perky, high-pitched beep-beeeeep!
His whole family thought the donkey thing was funny as hell.
Without looking, he aimed a middle finger in the direction of the horn and hauled ass south toward the bank barn. He was pretty sure the donkey’s aim was to incite terror rather than actually trample him, and he also knew she wouldn’t get too far from her flock before she gave up the chase.
The lawn dipped and flattened, and the big stone bank barn materialized in the mist. The donkey veered off with a disrespectful parting hee-haw and cantered back up the hill toward the vineyards. Duncan slowed to a jog and stacked his hands on his head to catch his breath.
Harry stood in the open frame of the barn where two ten-foot doors would eventually hang. He wore a grass-stained UCLA T-shirt and a pair of cargo shorts so old and weathered they might disintegrate directly off his ass if he sat down too fast. He looked as natural in those clothes as he did in a white coat with a stethoscope around his neck.
“Ah, Ducky,” Harry said. He poured black coffee into the gravel from a mug that read HOT BEAN WATER in vintage script. “I’ll never get tired of watching her chase you.”
Still winded, Duncan shot a glance over his shoulder. “Who’d have thought a donkey named after a fucking vegetable would be malevolence incarnate?” He undid the cuffs of his button-down to roll the sleeves up to his elbows.
“Asparagus is a sweetheart. She’s just doing her part to ensure your cardiovascular health.”
Up the hill, the donkey twitched an ear and blithely began nibbling clover.
Duncan grunted. “Should have named her Asshole.”
“Hmm. Little too on the nose, don’t you think?”
“Well. I’m not exactly known for subtlety, am I?” Duncan said.
“Good point.” Harry used the empty mug to gesture at Duncan’s clothes. “What’s with the business casual?”
“What, these old rags?” He smoothed a hand down the front of his pale peach button-down.
“The only times I’ve ever seen you in anything other than jeans and T-shirts have been weddings and funerals,” Harry said.
“I’ve got a thing in Linden today.” Duncan crossed his arms and immediately uncrossed them when the seams at his shoulders and biceps strained.
His brother’s brows twitched in curiosity, but thankfully, he didn’t press.
“Now what the hell is going on?” Duncan said. “When you text me before seven in the morning, I know it’s not going to be good.”
“Well, I was taking coffee to my future bride.” Harry set the empty mug on a stack of lumber. “When I found her, she gave me a kiss, patted me on the ass, and told me to get the hell out of her vineyard if I wasn’t going to prune, pick, or plant something.”
Duncan laughed. Rowan McKinnon could be prickly about people lingering in her vines if they weren’t putting in the sweat equity. She had a bad habit of abandoning coffee mugs half-full, perched on the flat-topped trellis posts. At least once a month, Harry made a trip to the thrift store in Linden to stock up on old mugs. The family had an ongoing bet about how many they’d find in the vineyard later in the fall when the vines lost their leaves.
“Anyway,” Harry continued, “I had some time, so I came down here to see how things were looking. It’s—ah, I think it’s best for you to just see.”
The barn was a monolithic two-story structure that seemed to have sprung directly from the earth itself. With foundational walls of gray Pennsylvania fieldstone, it seemed as indigenous to the land as the forest of hemlock and red cedar that bordered it from behind.
When Duncan was a kid, Ma and Dad had taken him and Harry and Arden on a day trip to the historic Fallingwater house—Frank Lloyd Wright’s most famous architectural achievement. It was perched at the top of a waterfall, tucked into surrounding forest and stone as if it had erupted there fully formed. In effortless, impeccable harmony with nature. For nearly two hours they’d stayed, touring the grounds and the interior, and even though ten-year-old Duncan had never heard phrases like spatial quality or biomimicry or organic architecture, that day at Fallingwater, he’d experienced what those words meant.
It felt a lot like what he’d recognize later as falling in love.
Since that day, he couldn’t look at a building without noticing the way it met the land beneath it.
The upper story of the bank barn was level with the ground in front of him, with the basement level nestled partway into the sloping embankment that flattened to empty pasture. His family’s winery was half-finished in that basement level. Since it was tucked into the hillside, humidity and temperature would passively stay perfect for aging wine year-round.
Projecting off the front of the barn was a bay that would be the future tasting room for the winery. About as big as a two-car garage, the front face of it was two aluminum-and-glass doors that opened and closed on a sliding ceiling track. “Rustic-industrial chic,” Ma called it. Duncan had paneled it with reclaimed wood stained a deep espresso brown that contrasted beautifully with the pale gray stone around it.
He followed Harry to where the tasting room opened into the main interior space of the barn. The sweet mustiness of old wood and sawdust mingled with the damp mineral odor of fresh concrete. From both gable ends, gauzy light poured in through floor-to-ceiling casement windows, the glass so new it still had the protective film stuck to it. Bolts of sunshine slashed through the open cupolas on the roof, intersecting with the exposed planks and trusses overhead. It felt like standing in the belly of an enormous upside-down boat.
Harry quickly held out his arm to stop Duncan from crossing the threshold into the tasting room. Then he pointed at the ground.
It took Duncan’s brain several seconds to process what he saw.
Last night, he and his crew had left the freshly poured black concrete floor as smooth as a mirror. Now, the surface was imprinted with dozens—no, hundreds—of tiny animal footprints, and the concrete had long since begun to cure.
“Jesus Jennifer Coolidge Christ,”Duncan muttered under his breath.
Harry tilted his head sideways like he was appraising a painting. “I think it’s artistic.”
“Fuh-huck—”Duncan bowed his head and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Raccoon, you think? Possum?”
Duncan groaned at the ceiling. “I don’t have time for this. What—why—”
Harry pointed to the wall behind the bar. “I think whatever it was wanted your pastrami.”
Perched on a two-by-four stud in the open wall sat the remainder of his lunch from yesterday afternoon, a half-eaten hoagie from Hogger’s deli. He’d put the damned thing there intending to come right back to it after a call with the electrical subcontractor he’d hired to bring the winery level up to code. Until that moment, Duncan hadn’t remembered eating at all. It had been at least a year since he’d finished an entire lunch on a weekday.
He turned away, swiped a hand over his beard, and muttered to himself. “—trip hazard—barstools won’t sit flush—impossible to keep clean—”
That concrete had a ten-day cure time before furniture and appliances could be put down, and he still needed to finish the ceiling and drywall before he brought anything else in. He had about two weeks until the sink and refrigeration units were due to arrive, and he couldn’t seal the hardwoods on the main floor of the barn until he moved out all the tables and chairs and barstools from where they were being temporarily stored.
He paced, still talking more to himself than to Harry.
“—crew coming Monday to install the ceiling fans in the barn, and I’ve got some electrical to finish in the back kitchen. Still need to move the rest of my crap out of the loft so Dad and Nate can move the office—could probably delay that. And—ah—” Duncan cut off and swore under his breath.
Harry frowned. “And what?”
Andthe leaking roof and lead paint in the cabin.
And the ruts in the drive into the vineyard, before another storm dumped enough rain to turn it into a fucking Slip ’N Slide again. The dry-rotted gasket on that ancient refrigerator in the greenhouse. The old pool house’s plumbing issues were a recurring nightmare, and the roof on the old gambrel barn in the east pasture had finally collapsed after a bad storm in April. A hundred other little things.
It felt like a giant, expensive puzzle spilled out onto an eleven-acre table, and he was the only person who knew where all the pieces went.
Harry and Rowan wanted to have their wedding reception here next month. Ma wanted a fully functional event space along with the completed winery by late September—but Duncan’s personal timeline was tighter. If everything went according to plan, he had about two months to figure out how to tell them he’d need to scale his workload back by at least half. And more important—that he couldn’t run Brady Brothers anymore.
Duncan felt time bear down like the barn itself was collapsing around him.
“There’s no way around it.” He blew out a frustrated breath. “We’re going to have to hammer out the whole goddamned slab and start over. There’s no time—”
“Duncan.” Harry put himself between his brother and the doorway. “What have you been doing in Linden? I’ve been watching you age before my eyes over the last six months.”
Duncan strode around him and out of the barn. “I’ve just got a lot of plates in the fire.”
Harry followed close behind. “You mix idioms when you’re stressed.”
Duncan grunted and kept walking.
It wasn’t the first time Harry’d tried to talk to him about Linden. Everyone else in the family was so accustomed to his perpetual hustle that they never remarked on how often he was gone, or how tired he looked. The hours he spent in Linden could be explained away as vineyard or Brady Brothers business—site visits, client meetings, trips to the hardware store. Networking with local artisans, farm equipment auctions. Without exaggerating, he could give any of a hundred different reasons for spending a few hours a day in Linden, and his family would buy it.
The truth would actually be less believable.
It had been almost two years now, and nobody knew he’d gone back to school at Linden Community College. Duncan meant to keep it that way. If nobody knew he’d gone back, nobody would have to know if he fucked up and failed out again.
After classes, he’d head back to the valley by midafternoon, balancing Brady Brothers tasks with projects around the vineyard and the last of the guest room renovations in the main house. In the evenings, his retrofit work at his cabin would begin. Radiant heat in the floors, double-paned windows, low-flow everything. A new slate roof would go on the first week of June, and next would be solar panels.
Duncan worked each day until the sun was gone, or until his fatigue made it hazardous to handle power tools or sharp things or electricity. Whichever came first. Some nights, when his hands were too sore to function, he’d take a break from the cabin reno, make a cup of shitty coffee, and get ahead on reading or school projects until he fell asleep at the table.
Handling all the things became a passive process for him. A simple matter of maintaining momentum, sticking to routine. But all that careful equilibrium didn’t account for regular close proximity to his ultimate distraction.
Temperance skimmed the outer edge of the Chambourcin vineyard on her morning run, airy as a dandelion seed in her short, short white shorts and yellow sneakers. Without bothering to cover her mouth, she yawned as she ran, and Duncan could almost hear the sweet little huh sound she always made at the trailing end of it. The sway of her body turned her ponytail into a white-hot flickering flame.
Even from that distance, she made his bones ache.
He tightened a fist in the front of his hair until his eyes watered.
The high-pitched beep-beeeep of the Gator horn sounded again from the direction of the Chardonnay vineyard. Rowan sat behind the wheel in an old khaki hat over twin ginger braids. From the back of the little utility vehicle, a dune flag jutted nine feet into the air on a flexible pole, bouncing and whipping in the air as it went. Duncan had originally attached the flag to the Gator so he’d be able to find it when Rowan inevitably left it parked in one of the vineyards overnight, and someone had made a game out of anonymously changing it. Today’s flag simply read I brAKE FOR POSSUMS in block letters.
Rowan slowed the Gator to a crawl alongside Temperance as she ran. Sunshine lit her up like an ember, and the muscles in her thighs shuddered with every footfall.
Duncan’s mouth went dry. His bones felt unhinged from their joints. He started back up the hill, and Harry followed.
Around dusk last night, he’d spotted her jogging northward toward the greenhouse as he finished up with his crew at the barn. And now here she was, barely eight hours later, running again. He’d always been impressed and a little intimidated by her discipline, but he also knew what simmered just beneath her cool exterior. Temperance Madigan was a shaken bottle of champagne with a loose cork. She ran because she had to.
“Duncan?” Harry said.
Hell. He felt like a juggler who’d swapped one of his rubber balls for a hand grenade.
“I think you need a day off,” Harry said.
“I’m like Cinderella, man. I can’t go to the ball unless I get all my chores done.”
“Anything I can help with? I kind of miss the days of you bossing me around this place, making me do your bullshit grunt work.”
“Ah, Doc.” Duncan dug deep for levity. “I’m sure all the calluses on your pretty hands have been moisturized away by now.”
“Fuck off.” Harry laughed, smoothing a hand over his belly. “God, I was so ripped last summer. Pretty sure I have you to thank for Rowan finally falling for me.”
Duncan laughed, too. “She didn’t fall for your abs, Harry.”
“Really, though—I’ll be on baby watch for four different patients soon, but if you need a hand over the next week, let me know.”
“Hell. We should go into business together. Call it ‘Parts and Labor.’”
Close to the house now, Temperance laughed at something Rowan shouted to her from the Gator. They were too far away to hear, but Duncan knew that laugh like a favorite song. Intense but quiet, punctuated at the end with a husky little hmm in the back of her throat. Her eyes would sparkle long afterward, like the laughter had left behind some kind of joyful residue.
“I’d love to see you two spending more time together,” Harry said.
Duncan pulled up so short the soles of his shoes skidded on the grass. “I’m sorry, what?”
“You and Temperance. There’s always been static between you two. I think you should try to be friends.”
Friends.
With Temperance Madigan.
Duncan set his teeth against the frayed cuticle of his thumbnail and ripped sideways. Blood welled hot against his bottom lip.
Harry had been high-minded and big-hearted ever since he was a kid. To him, it was a logical request. Temperance had, in all the ways that mattered, been a member of the Brady family since the first summer she spent with Maren and Nate when she was in high school. Maren and Nate’s kids were her niece and nephews, just like they were Duncan’s. Harry’d been one of her closest friends since they were teenagers, and now her best friend since college was going to marry Harry. Temperance Madigan was woven through the fabric of the Brady family from multiple directions, impossible to extricate without leaving a hole.
But there was more to it than Harry knew. Friendship hadn’t ever been on the table for Duncan and Temperance. Back when they first met, she was barely fourteen and he’d been a few months from fifteen. They couldn’t be friends because they’d had nothing in common.
At seventeen, friendship wasn’t an option because they couldn’t keep their hands off each other whenever they were alone together.
At eighteen, they couldn’t be friends because they’d fallen into devastating, soul-walloping first love with each other.
Now, they couldn’t be friends because they hated who they became when they were together.
What if they tried true platonic friendship now, and Temperance decided it suited her just fine, but he sank even deeper into his feelings? Hell. He’d been treading water for fourteen years. Infusing his lifelong craving for her with the warmth and intimacy of true friendship would pull him permanently, unconditionally under.
“Maybe just try?” Harry studied him with a thoughtful downward draw of his brows. “This weird vibe between you two can’t go on forever. Listen. If not for me, then for Rowan. For peace, for the wedding.”
Duncan had a giant soft spot for Rowan, and Harry knew it. He exhaled a quiet laugh. “You fucker.”
Harry grinned. “I’ll take that as a yes.”