Chapter 12
“Yoo-hoo? Natalie? Is the house on fire?” a chirpy voice said from the doorway.
Confused, Natalie turned in the direction the voice had come from and saw Maddy. “Oh, hi,” she replied. “Sorry, did I miss you saying something?”
Her recently acquired aunt smiled wryly and stepped into the room. “You could say that,” she said, pointing at a cup of tea on the counter in front of where Natalie was seated.
“Huh?”
“Wow,” Maddy said. “You really are out of it. I came in and asked you how your day was; you grunted. I asked if you wanted tea, and you grunted. I made you tea and talked about my day with Jack, and you—wait for it—grunted. I even tried ringing you as a joke, but your phone is dead.”
Covering her face with her hands, Natalie slumped in her seat. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t catch on.”
“What in the world is going on?” Maddy asked, taking a seat and pushing the cup of tea toward her before reaching for Natalie’s phone and plugging it into the charging cable in the middle of the table.
Natalie’s face was still covered as she shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“Sugar?”
“Sure…”
“Ahem?”
“Sorry, yes, please,” Natalie corrected. “It’s just this whole day—this whole month—has been completely ridiculous. Did I tell you about Izzy and Lou staging an intervention because of how dull I am now?”
In silent respace, Maddy stirred a spoonful of sugar into the cup.
Natalie got the gist. “Fine, not dull, but I’m a homebody now. I’m kind of stuck in my routine. Hey, wait. I did tell you this.”
“Yes, you did,” Maddy replied. “But the fact that you forgot speaks volumes.”
“I remembered,” Natalie said defensively. “Eventually.”
“My opinion of that intervention remains the same—if they’d told me about it, I would’ve gone, too,” Maddy said.
“I know we haven’t known each other very long, but you have been a different woman in the last few months.
Combine that with the fact that your mom, grandmother, and friends also think you’ve been down, and it tells me that my instincts are right about it.
And you can’t say it was all bad—you said their stunt was the only reason you made a move on Neil. ”
“It was,” Natalie said. “But now that I think about it, it wasn’t a move—I just put some nicer than usual makeup on and batted my eyelashes a few times.”
“Well, some guys don’t need much encouragement,” Maddy said quickly. “And you haven’t even told me how the date went.”
After taking a long sip of tea—which was far too sweet and milky for how she would normally take it—she said, “Well, it started terribly. I couldn’t find anything to wear that I didn’t hate.
Then, when I finally ran out of things to try on in my closet, I went up to the storage room where I saw this jerk who had been on the tour I gave to the university people just waltzing around the vines. ”
“Waltzing, really?” Maddy commented. “On his own, or did he have a dance partner?”
“What? Oh, stop that,” Natalie said. “So, I ran down there—completely forgetting that I was basically in a silk pajama top, and it was freezing outside. I confronted Ian about the fact that he was trespassing, and instead of having the good sense to pretend to be sorry about it, he got all huffy and insulting.”
“Really?” Maddy said, nodding slowly. “And this was on your date with Neil?”
“Before,” she said. “This made it worse because Neil showed up by the time I got back to the house with Ian, so I had to grab whatever I could find and run. Which was a red cardigan on the coat rack in the hall—do you have any idea whose it belongs to?”
“A cardigan? Not one of mine?”
“I don’t think so,” Natalie said. “It was a bit tight on me.”
Maddy hummed, checking her phone. “Maybe. Regardless, you still haven’t told me about your night out with this young man.”
“What? Yes, I have?”
Her aunt blinked at her slowly as she typed a message without looking at the screen. “Not about Neil, you haven’t.”
“Oh, right, I was getting there,” Natalie replied. “It was nice; he took me to a restaurant that was way too fancy, serving mostly Italian seafood dishes. It was a bit weird but very nice. Too fancy; there was a valet, for heaven’s sake.”
“That is fancy,” she said. “Very good choice from Neil.”
“I mean…”
“What? You don’t like fancy food? Or was it show-offy?”
Natalie shook her head. “No, it wasn’t in a showboating way; it was more like I wish he had given me a heads-up. He saw my reaction to the valet and immediately told me that I looked fine.”
“Which you would have,” Maddy said. “And if he had told you, I assume you would have been more stressed and worried than you were when you assumed it was just a run-of-the-mill restaurant.”
Well, that complicated it. Yes, she would’ve been more stressed about it, but she didn’t like not being told—either because he didn’t think to or because he had thought to and decided keeping it from her would be better.
“I don’t know, maybe,” she said finally. “It was a lot of fun—even though I was still furious at Ian.”
“And was he a gentleman?” Maddy asked with a mischievous glint in her eye.
“Aunt Madelaine!” Natalie exclaimed in faux horror.
The pair laughed, and Natalie sipped her tea.
Oddly, they had found a strange balance regarding Maddy’s place in the Fitzgerald family.
She was—literally—Natalie’s aunt by blood, but from the moment they met, she had somehow acted like an aunt.
A cool aunt, but they had been more like friends than she had ever imagined being possible with a woman twice her age.
“He was a perfect gentleman,” she said finally. “He did kiss my cheek and ask if I’d like to go out again this weekend…”
“You didn’t tell me that,” Maddy said, playfully smacking her on the shoulder.
“Hey, ouch. Woah…” Her phone picked up enough charge to turn on, and a barrage of missed calls and messages came through.
Three missed calls, five texts, a direct message on her main social account, and a voicemail—all from Candice.
“Everything all right?”
“I hope so,” she replied as she hit the button to return a missed call. “It’s Candice.”
That got Maddy’s attention; the teenager had been an asset in everything they had achieved last year.
From being the only one who could successfully run the social media and tech side of it all, she had proven indispensable when marketing the charity event.
So much so that they had put her on retainer to keep her on for the winery; just because Candice was still in high school didn’t mean she was any less strategic and useful in business.
“Hello?” Natalie exclaimed as the line picked up.
“Oh my God, please tell me it’s there.”
“What’s where?” Natalie asked. “You’re freaking me out—are you all right?”
“I will be,” Candice said. “As long as you have my red cardigan, and there is nothing wrong with it.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“Your cardigan?” she repeated. “The one with the gold buttons?”
“Yes! For real, you are my favorite person ever,” the teenager rambled. “I will love you forever and ever! Where was it?”
“On the coat rack in the front hall. How did you know I’d borrowed it?”
“Borrowed it? You wore it?” Candice sounded almost disgusted.
“Uh, tone?” Natalie replied.
“Sorry, sorry. It’s just, um…it’s a little more expensive than I usually wear, and you do kind of wear a lot of your clothes out into the fields and…”
Natalie sighed. “I wore it to a five-star restaurant where I did not spill any wine, drop any food, or get rained on. All right?”
“Yes! Thank you; you’re the best.”
“Sure,” she said. “So, shall I get Maddy to drop it off with your mom?”
“No!” Candice exclaimed so loudly that Natalie instinctively moved the phone away from her ear.
“I mean, no, it’s fine. She doesn’t need to bother my mom. Bringing it to the shop is fine. She’s heading back soon, right?”
Recovering from the auditory assault, Natalie brought the phone to her ear. “Yes, she is. I don’t think you answered my question about how you knew to ring me.”
“Oh,” Candice said. “I had asked Ms. C about it earlier; I thought maybe I’d left it at the shop. Leaving it at your house didn’t even occur to me; I forgot I wore it out there for the product shoot we did last week.”
There was still an edge to the teenager’s voice that Natalie couldn’t quite put her finger on. “You’re sure you don’t want Maddy to give it to your mom?”
“No. It’s fine.”
So, she didn’t want her mom to see the cardigan, huh?
“Sure, whatever you need, sweetie,” she said. “I’ll send it back with Maddy; you’ll swing by the store this afternoon?”
After a dozen more thank yous and you’re the bests, Natalie could finally put the phone down.
“Doesn’t want her mom to know she lost her cardigan?” Maddy asked, an eyebrow raised.
“I think she doesn’t want her mom to know the cardigan exists,” Natalie replied.
“Oh, why?” Maddy asked, leaning in like this was the juiciest gossip she had heard all month.
“Not sure, but she seemed genuinely afraid of you dropping it off at her house—almost as terrified as she was at the idea that I’d worn it,” Natalie replied. “It doesn’t have the tags in it, so it’s not that she bought it on a credit card and she’s going to return it…”
Maddy hummed. “Interesting.”
“Indeed…”
The pair caught each other’s gaze, ruminating on the puzzle.
“Quietly investigate?” Maddy suggested.
“Agreed, just to make sure she’s not getting into trouble.”
“Who’s in trouble?” Sarah interrupted.
“No one, Gran.”
“Not if we can help it,” Maddy added with a wink.
Natalie rolled her eyes as Maddy left; she couldn’t leave it alone, could she?
“Now, let’s chat where I can sit down.”