Page 10 of Let It Breathe
Ignoring the way his biceps flexed under the thin T-shirt, Reese turned back to her guests. They all sat staring at Clay.
“Pardon my reach, ladies,” Clay said.
All three fluttered their lashes at him. The woman with her palms on the bar turned toward him, leaning down in a blatant effort to give Clay a glimpse down the front of her shirt. Clay looked at Reese and gave an almost imperceptible shrug.
The woman in the pink cashmere licked her lips. “Are you a viticulturist, too?” she asked, shooting a pointed look at Clay.
Clay didn’t loosen his grip on the bar. “No, ma’am, just a carpenter.”
“Oh, join us for a drink, then!” piped the woman with the expensive handbag. “We could use a little male companionship.”
“Please?” pleaded Pink Cashmere, leaning sideways on the bar and causing it to sway as she patted the empty stool beside her. “Just one drink. It’s a girls’ getaway, but we’ll make an exception for you.”
Clay smiled, his expression nearly as tight as his grip on the bar. “Thanks, but I’m doing great right here. You ladies enjoy.”
Reese waited for one of them to wrestle him to the floor and pour wine down his throat, but they backed off and turned their attention back to her.
“This is our 2024 Reserve Pinot Gris,” Reese announced as she tipped it into the stemware. “As you can see from the tasting notes in front of you, it was a gold-medal winner at the Northwest Food and Wine Festival last year. We age this in steel for six months before we filter and bottle it right here on site.”
“Only six months?”
“That’s common for a lot of white wines like Pinot Gris,” Reese explained. “Others—like our Chardonnay, which we’ll be tasting next—are aged in oak, so they take a little longer. And many of our red wines spend years in the barrel.”
There was much chatting and sipping, with the women commenting on notes of pear and apple. Reese shot a glance at Clay, who was still holding the end of the plywood steady. He smiled and Reese gave a small nod of thanks before reaching for the Chardonnay.
She cycled through the white wines and moved on to reds, pointing out a bronze-medal Pinot Noir and explaining that most of their wines were estate grown.
“What does that mean?” one of the women asked. “Estate grown?”
“It means we grow all the grapes right here in our vineyards. Except for the dessert wine we’re sampling at the end—that’s a blend of some grapes from Southern Oregon.”
She bent to retrieve a small brass bucket from under the wine rack, conscious of Clay’s eyes on her as she plunked it down on the bar.
“This is a rather long tasting list, so it’s perfectly okay to expel the wine. I’m sure you ladies know, but it’s not mandatory that you swallow wine to taste it. Go ahead and spit if you like.”
She shot a quick look at Clay, though if he’d seen the opening for a dirty joke about swallowing versus spitting, he hadn’t taken it. The old Clay would have at least smirked, but this one just stood there stone-faced, hands gripping the edge of the bar. Reese uncorked a Maréchal Foch and started pouring, wondering what the hell was taking Larissa so long.
The ladies chattered among themselves, one of them taking only a small sip of each wine before passing it off to the woman in the pink cashmere, who obligingly polished it off.
Reese continued to move through the list, her lips forming the words while her mind drifted a thousand miles away—well, more like three feet away at the other end of the bar. She kept stealing glances at his shoulders, those beautiful, chiseled arms, the way his narrow waist tapered into worn jeans that fit snugly over his?—
“That’s it for the tasting list,” Reese said as they sipped the last drops of specialty Vin Glacé dessert wine. “Did you have any questions or want to sample anything not on the list?”
“I’d like to buy a case of this one,” announced the woman with the expensive handbag, jabbing a finger at the Reserve Pinot Noir. She fished for a wallet with her free hand and peeled out a credit card.
“Excellent choice,” Reese said, accepting the card as the woman leaned across the bar, making it sway again. “Let me just run this, and then I’ll help you carry it out to your car.”
“I can get it,” Clay said. Every female eye shifted toward him. “Which box is it?”
“Oh,” Reese said. “It’s right over there in that stack against the wall, but you don’t have to?—”
“I insist,” he said, waiting until the women pried themselves away from the bar before loosening his grip on it. Reese watched as he ambled over to the cases and hoisted one like it was filled with cotton balls.
“Ladies,” he said. “Would you mind pointing the way to the car?”
“Oh, it’s the gray Lexus right out here,” chirped the woman as Reese handed her credit card back. “Let me get the door for you.”
Clay smiled and followed after them. “If you’re not okay to drive, I’d be happy to give you a lift wherever you’re headed.”
