Chapter 23
Chapter twenty-three
I TAKE FULL RESPONSIBILITY
The three of us exchange a look that Leah communicates on our behalf. “I think we’re fine here. Thank you, though.”
Ollie’s long legs make the steps between levels look like they are normal-sized ones, as he comes down to stand next to where we lie on the couch.
“Cam is moving Judith over to the guest house on the back of the property, and Delaney said she is going to her room for the rest of the night, so it would just be the four of us.”
Both Val and Leah consider his updated offer, but I keep my eyes down on my lap. I plan to second whatever Leah chooses, since I can’t cover for her and her pregnancy anymore by avoiding the wine, but I selfishly hope that she chooses an option that at least involves food.
Ollie reads our hesitation and tries a different approach. “We can continue where we left off or do the rest of the tasting informally. Whatever you guys decide, I am happy to accommodate.”
“I like the informal idea,” Leah says to Val and me. “My social battery is getting pretty low after everything that’s happened today, so I don’t think I have it in me to sit through a full tasting.”
“Same here,” Val agrees.
With Judith gone, I see no downside to this plan.
Val and Ollie are both easygoing, so I doubt they would care, or even notice, what Leah was drinking or not drinking.
Even if they did notice something, they wouldn’t be so rude as to call her out on it.
Besides, Leah is the one who proposed continuing informally, so there is no reason for me to worry about covering for her more than she is worried about it herself.
“I am pretty hungry,” I admit, when they turn to me for my response.
“Excellent,” Ollie says. “Come with me. I’ll get everything set up.”
The kitchen has a completely different vibe without Judith and Delaney in the mix as we stand around the island and dig into the food that Ollie prepared. We settle into an easy rhythm of conversation about our past travels and bucket list trips.
When Ollie offers to serve us the rest of the wine and lemonade, Leah suggests we just finish the ones that we already have open, and then promptly pours what remains of the lemonade into her own glass, so that I have no choice but to have the Sauvignon Blanc.
As expected, Val and Ollie don’t take any notice or care about what anyone else is drinking, and Leah’s secret is kept safe.
When our conversation turns to focus on Ollie and his sommelier training, I apologize on behalf of the group for how our tasting ended up.
“Don’t be sorry,” he says. “What happened tonight is nothing in comparison to some of the things I’ve seen in my career.”
“Like what?” Val asks as she pops a perfectly medium-rare piece of meat from the steak-and-frites board into her mouth.
“Like the time that I accidentally overserved the groom at a joint bachelor, bachelorette party that resulted in the wedding being called off.”
Our collective jaws drop, and then we beg Ollie to tell us the rest of the story, which he happily obliges.
“When I first started, I was too worried about remembering all the details about each wine to really pay attention to the guests, so I didn’t realize that the guys from the bachelor party had pregamed before they got to the tasting.
By the time I noticed, they were pretty sloshed, especially the groom, and our policy is to stop serving guests if they appear intoxicated. ”
We nod as he continues, and I take advantage of both Val and Leah’s attention being laser-focused on Ollie’s story to swipe the last goat cheese crostini, even though I’ve eaten more than my share of them.
“Well, as you can imagine, the groom didn’t like that,” he continues. “He got in my face and demanded I keep serving him and his friends. He backed me into a corner, and I ended up just handing over the wine I had just opened, and he drank it straight from the bottle.”
I gasp, both at the way the story is unfolding and the image of him backing down from a fight.
As he stands here today, Ollie is almost as tall as Cameron and equally muscular, if not more.
The thought of him being too afraid to stand up for himself is as hard to imagine as the idea of someone being brave enough to challenge him.
“This was at the beginning of my career, so I was young and pretty scrawny back then,” he says, when he notices that I am not the only one surprised that he was overpowered by an unruly groom.
“When the groom and his friends finished the wine, he threw it against the cellar wall and shattered it, then went for the spittoon in the middle of the table—”
“What’s a spittoon?” Val interrupts, eyes wide.
“It’s the bucket for all the guests to pour their unfinished wine into after each tasting round. When he drank from it, we had done at least five rounds, so I can’t even imagine how awful it tasted.”
Leah shakes her head back and forth, disgusted. “Forget the taste, imagine the germs! All of the backwash from multiple people swirling around together in there . . .”
Cameron walks in just as we are doubled over in laughter at Leah’s dry heave that punctuated her last sentence. “What did I miss?” he asks, smiling politely at the others before his eyes land on me.
“I was just telling them the story about that awful joint bachelor, bachelorette party, because they were trying to apologize for how tonight was going.”
Cameron leans on the doorway into the kitchen. “Ah, yes. That one was a doozie.”
“That’s how Cam and I met, actually,” Ollie says, but rushes to clarify, “He wasn’t at the tasting. No, I met him at the Muay Thai gym that I joined shortly after.”
Cameron smiles fondly at the memory. “Ollie came in demanding to fight someone right away, even though newbies always start on the bag.”
“Yeah. And you were the only other guy over six feet in there that day, so Kru Pan pointed me in your direction, and you dropped me in about three seconds flat with a knee to the gut.”
Cameron shrugs as if he had no choice.
“I trained in Muay Thai too,” Val joins in. “But now I am a Wushu student. I started it to help my Ahsoka cosplay look more realistic but ended up falling in love with the art of it.”
The way Ollie looks at Val after she finishes her statement makes me think he just fell in love with her.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t understand half of the words that she just said,” Leah says in the silence that follows.
Ollie chuckles in awe, eyes sparkling as he keeps them trained on Val. “I think she just said that she is a Star Wars fan and knows how to scrap, which might just make her the woman of my dreams.”
Val meets his lovestruck gaze and promptly rolls her eyes at him, which just makes his smile even wider.
Leah scoffs. “On that note, I think I’m going to head upstairs to my room. I need to read my notes about the book so that I can be ready for all the activities tomorrow morning.”
“Yeah, about that . . .” Cameron says, pulling our attention back to him. “Delaney just let me know that she will be leaving first thing tomorrow, too, so we need to talk about what the rest of the retreat will look like.”
We look at each other in shock for a few stunned seconds, then Leah crosses her arms over her chest. “Can we continue without her? The last hour with these three has been the best part of the retreat by far,” she says, gesturing to us with a tilt of her head.
“You are all welcome to stay for the rest of the weekend, but she is refusing to give me any of the book discussion details or reservation confirmations for the events that she pre-booked. We would be starting from scratch,” Cameron says.
“Although the weather has been so bad that the star party at the UNC Charlotte conservatory and the bookstore tour would have probably been canceled, anyway.”
“I can’t believe that she would leave us high and dry like this,” Val says, and Ollie takes a step towards her as if he can somehow physically protect her from any further hurt feelings. She shoots him a warning glare, and he about melts into a puddle at her feet.
“Well, I take full responsibility for my part in all of this,” Cameron starts.
“But you didn’t do anything wrong,” I say, jumping to his defense.
I know that Delaney has been irritated with him all day for stepping in where she claims he doesn’t belong, but I shudder to think how things may have turned out if he hadn’t intervened during her and Judith’s initial fight over the cookies.
“Clearly I did,” Cameron sighs. “Although none of it was intentional.”
“Of course not,” I say, but close my mouth because I am starting to sound like a fangirl.
He smiles weakly at my show of solidarity. “She actually thought that you and I had some secret prior working relationship, Drew. She’s convinced that you’re here undercover to scope out what she’s built, so that you can copy it when you take over as the new host.”
My jaw drops to the floor. “Are you serious?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” he says. “She’s pretty distraught over it too.”
Val and Ollie exchange a look of confusion, and Leah narrows her eyes as she looks back and forth between Cameron and me.
“It’s not true, just to be clear,” I say.
“Then why would she leave the retreat over it?” Val asks curiously.
“Your guess is as good as mine,” Cameron says, but the way his gaze flicks briefly to mine tells me there is definitely more he is not saying. Leah catches the look between us, and her eyebrows raise a fraction.
“I met Cameron today, just like the rest of you,” I say, mostly to Leah, then add, “Well, besides Ollie, since he said they knew each other before. But you know what I mean . . .”
Leah remains unconvinced, and I return her suspicious look with my own puzzled one.
“Like Drew said, the accusations are false,” Cameron confirms. “I wanted to clear that up in case any of you talk to her between now and when she leaves in the morning. I also wanted to let you know your options. You three are welcome to stay and finish the weekend, if you’d like.
I’m confident that we can find a way to make the rest of your time here enjoyable.
Or you can also leave early, if you’d prefer.
Everyone will be getting a full refund, regardless of their decision.
I just need to know as soon as possible what route everyone chooses so that I can start making arrangements. ”