Page 19 of Blush
“A meeting,” he said, opening the refrigerator. “What are all these flowers doing in here?”
“I told you before,” Peternelle said. “I put the hydrangeas in overnight to stay crisp and then by noon, voila, they open.”
Asher asked her to “whip me up a quick omelet” and slid onto the stool beside Leah.
“Missed you at dinner last night,” she said. “Did you two go out?”
He nodded. “We took the boat to Sag Harbor to celebrate,” he said.
“Celebrate what?” Leah said.
“Mom didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?” Her mother had been strangely quiet the past day.
“I proposed to Bridget. We’re engaged. I can’t believe Mom didn’t mention it.”
Leah smiled, trying not to look as surprised as she felt. She never thought she’d see her playboy brother settle down. She loved Asher, but she didn’t understand how he could be so infantile. He only dated much younger women, he lived in the house they grew up in, and he certainly did little to earn his position at Hollander. Maybe that was his response to their father’s overbearing personality. It was a form of retreat.
“Ash, congratulations. So... she’s the one.”
He nodded, grinning. “It seems that way.”
It was strange that her mother hadn’t mentioned it. She wasn’t happy with this turn of events, of that Leah was certain. But still. What was going on with her?
“Do you have a wedding date?”
“We’re working on it,” he said. His phone buzzed with a text. She looked over his shoulder and saw that it was from her father.
“Busy day in the winemaking world?” she asked lightly.
“Ah, yeah. You could say that.”
“Anything new?”
He slid his phone into his pants pocket. “Nothing worth talking about.”
In other words, none of her business. Leah sipped her coffee, trying to quell the prickly feeling rising inside of her. Some things never changed. Case in point: to this day, the only female employees at Hollander Estates were Peternelle and the housekeepers.
“I gotta run,” Asher said, even as Peternelle set a perfectly cooked omelet in front of him.
Leah slid the plate toward herself.
“Thanks, Peternelle,” she said. “This looks delicious.”
Sadie pulled open the heavy library curtains, sun streaking through the room. She could see dust motes in the air, and she felt a lusty romanticism toward her surroundings that filled her with curiosity about her grandmother’s journal.
She shouldn’t. And yet...
Sadie pushed her chair back. The journal was from thirty-five years ago—it wasn’t like Sadie was reading something out of her bedroom, something current. Her grandmother had probably forgotten it even existed.
She again climbed the narrow spiral stairs and headed right for the shelves of photo albums. This time, she pulled out just enough to give her access to the hidden compartment and she placed them neatly next to her in a pile. Her hands perspired as she pressed the pencil point into the lock. It took a few seconds to give, and she had a moment of panic that it had been a fluke that it had worked last time. Only then did she realize how badly she wanted to continue reading her grandmother’s words.
December 12, 1984
It was Delphine’s idea to start the book club. She is the only one who understands how frustrated I feel sometimes... so underutilized here in the vineyard I helped build. She said when women gather, there is power.
We’re meeting once a month—there’s eight of us, including Bess Winnel, even though she says she barely has time to think, let alone breathe, now that her twins are toddling around. I, on the other hand, have more time than I care to think about.
