21. SIENNA
SIENNA
I called Celia at seven this morning because today is a two-person job.
The irrigation system needs to go in all at once.
The lines connect at a central manifold and the pressure distribution only works if the whole network goes in together.
You can't start and pause and come back to it.
I need someone who can read a technical blueprint without needing to be walked through it and who understands how a branched system behaves under load.
Celia has worked with me on four projects.
She has good hands, better instincts, and in all that time I've never had to tell her the same thing twice.
She arrives ten minutes early. I hand her the secondary blueprint.
"All the lines today," I say. "Rose bushes go in after, once the system's ok to go."
She turns the paper, looks at it intently. "We'll get it done."
No questions. No pushback on the timeline. She picks up her tools and starts. I've worked with enough people who need managing at every step to know what Celia is worth.
I get down on my knees and start on the first trench.
The Vale's grounds are quiet this early.
Morning light comes in flat and gold across the hotel's east face, long shadows from the olive trees reaching across the grass.
The soil here is dark and workable. It holds a tool cleanly and gives you a consistent depth without resistance.
I've been on this site long enough to know its patterns.
Where water pools after rain, where the roots compete underground, where the afternoon sun dries the topsoil before anything shallow can establish.
I focus on the trench. Depth, angle, spacing.
I hold that focus for about four minutes.
Then the repetitiveness of the task lets my thoughts wonder. To Adrian.
Something real happened at the beach house. I don’t know what label to stick on it, but it was there either way. Something opened between us that night. Something amazing and undeniable.
But, when morning came, the door closed. Gently, carefully and defined. He wasn't unkind about it. He was honest. He told me exactly what he is looking for, what he can offer. I heard him, and I understood every word. It still hurt. A lot.
The distance between how alive I'd felt the night before and the particular hollow of the next morning. Like something real was handed to me and then, not taken back exactly, but boxed. Here is this thing. It exists. But only this much.
I move to the next stake. Force my thoughts to focus on the task. I need to deliver a flawless project to MH Group. This can be the start of great things for Veridian. I can’t screw this up. No when the M of the group is just waiting for my downfall.
And just like that my traitor thoughts go to William. And to Charlie's kitchen. He kissed me like he needed it to keep alive. And I kissed him back. And I would make that choice again, which knowing all the factors involved is pure insanity.
I need to control my desire for William. There are secrets that are not mine to tell between us.
I check the trench depth. Adjust the angle. Keep moving. I look up to the sky and smile. Blue with small tattered clouds. Today is going to be a glorious day
If it’s anything like the other days I was here, soon someone from the staff will bring a basket with water, juice, fruit and small sandwiches.
The first time it was delivered I asked why and the reply I got left me speechless, “Mr. Hill instructed us to make sure that you always have water and something to eat.” I blushed, thanked her and ever since that day I have been fantasizing that maybe some day it will be Carter that delivers the basket personally.
"Sienna." Celia is crouching over the third line junction. "Connector here needs the longer coupling. Spacing's wider than the blueprint."
I look where she's pointing. She's right. I reach into the open tool case to my left and hand her the coupling.
"Good catch," I say.
For a few minutes I think about connector spacing, pressure tolerance and nothing else. It's the clearest my head has been all morning.
Then I hear a male voice behind me saying, “So, Veridian is one of those feminist companies that only hires women?”
I stand up. Turn around.
Marcus Hale from Sycamore Design is standing there, arms crossed over his barrel chest, looking smug.
He looks pointedly at Celia. Then at me. Like he is daring me to refute him.
I step forward to put myself between them.
"Nah, Veridian is a company that hires competent people." I say. "Regardless of gender."
I turn back to the rose bed. He came looking for friction. I'm not giving it to him.
He takes a step forward. Then another. His boot comes down directly on the rose bed, right on the plants, stems snapping under his heel.
"Hey, what the fuck are you doing?" I demand. "Get out!"
He comes near me. So close I can smell his coffee breath.
"I've been doing some research on you," he says. "Spoiled rich junkie." he spits out the words.
I go still inside. Force my face to remain relaxed and emotionless. I have heard some version of this before. It doesn’t affect me. It doesn’t!
From the corner of my eye I can see Celia moving toward me. I shake my head once. I can handle this. She stops but stays close.
"Congratulations," I say to Marcus. "You know how to use Google. Now get off my site."
"This is our site!" he shouts in my face. He moves even closer towards me. And with a malicious smile he adds.
"Yeah, you bet your ass I’m good with google." he says. "Enough to find out you got arrested Friday night."
And that makes me pause. I have been so absorbed in what happened after being arrested that I haven’t even considered the full consequences of it.
He watches my face and he seems pleased to finally have a reaction. " What do you think the MH Group is going to think about having their brand associated with you?"
His expression shifts into something satisfied. “You have until the end of the day to quit this job or I will share what I know with Carter Hill”.
I feel all consuming rage vibrate through me. Enough. This stops now.
"Why wait until the end of the day?" I don’t know how I manage to keep a steady voice when all my body feels like it's vibrating in anger. "I'll personally tell him now."
I turn and stomp my way to the hotel, leaving Marcus and his threats behind.
The lobby is cold and it smells like fresh stone and the white gardenias in the tall arrangement near the front desk.
My boots leave soil prints across the floor from the entrance. I'm aware of what I look like, with dirty jeans and flushed face, but I keep walking anyway.
Carter is near the check-in desk. Talking with a hotel manager over a clipboard, both of them midway through something. His back is half-turned to me.
I cross the lobby. Stop beside him and without any preamble, "I need to talk to you," I say. "Now."
When he looks at my face he must see the urgency, because without hesitation he tells the hotel manager. "We'll finish this later.” He then turns and makes a gesture for me to follow him down a corridor. He opens a door and holds it. I go through.
We are in a small office. The door clicks shut.
I don't give myself time to think better about what I came here to do.
"I was arrested Friday night." My pulse is in my throat but I manage to speak through it. "Trespassing. It’s a long story, but basically I was converting an abandoned parking lot into a vegetable garden."
Carter hasn't moved from the door. His eyes are on me. Steady, dark, unreadable.
" I’m telling you this because I understand if you don’t want the MH Group associated with this mess.
I mean, you are weeks away from opening this hotel.
I can see how much care and effort you have put into it.
Associating your brand… It would be a nightmare…
" I stop. Start again. "I totally understand if—"
He moves towards me in a deliberate way.
When he is near it makes me even more nervous, for reasons that have nothing to do with what brought me here in the first place. My voice picks up speed.
"I know this is a bad time to —"
He reaches me.
Both hands close around my upper arms.
My voice stops. Immediate. Like a switch.
I look into his eyes. He has this intense determined look in them that sends shivers down my body.
"Sienna," he says. "Shut up."
And then he kisses me.