Page 58 of Blush
She couldn’t believe he recalled the offhand comment.
“Did I? Well then, I must have also mentioned we don’t have horses,” she said, touching the scarf around her neck.
Leonard, who was uncharacteristically insecure while hosting the baron, jumped on their guest’s show of enthusiasm.
“Well, we might someday,” he said, just as Peternelle appeared to tell Leonard the tasting room manager needed him. “Vivian, why don’t you two go take a look at the grounds and then meet me back at the winery.”
The baron was silent for their walk to the rear of the house. He was taller, broader, more kinetically present than she had remembered. She suspected it was the change in scenery, the relatively humble Long Island estate rather than the sweeping backdrop of Bordeaux. Theystrolled with half a foot between them, and yet she felt like they were touching.
“It’s a shame Natasha couldn’t make the trip,” she said, desperate to normalize her breathing. Willing herself to forget the way she’d imagined his hands on her body.
“Natasha and I are no longer together,” he said. He stopped walking, looking at her in a way that felt searing, like he could see through her clothes. And then it rushed back, the old attraction, as fierce and unwelcome as it had been four years earlier.
“Oh.” She swallowed hard. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
Why did she have such a reaction to this man? She didn’t know him and probably wouldn’t like him if she did. Whatever pull she felt toward him was clearly just chemical, a trick of the body. And yet she was thirty-seven years old and had never experienced anything like it.
Inside the stable, he politely admired the stone masonry and woodwork. Still, she knew he had to be underwhelmed by the modesty of it all. They had spent very little of their renovation budget on building the stables, and now she wished they had been able to be more ambitious. But the simple, barnlike structure did have a lovely brick interior with stalls of southern yellow pine.
“We really built this on a whim,” she said, turning to face him. “I can’t imagine when I’ll have time for horses again. And my daughter shows no interest—”
He touched her elbow and, in a movement that took her by surprise even as it seemed to happen in slow motion, kissed her. She felt enveloped by that faint tobacco scent she’d first experienced in France, and the warmth of his mouth sent waves of pleasure through her entire body. Her response kissing him back—immediate, ardent, instinctive—encouraged him to pull her close, to press his body against hers in a way that gave a thrilling suggestion of what lay beyond the kiss. She wanted him more than she’d ever wanted anything physically in her life. Everything else was forgotten: The vineyard. Delphine. Leonard. The kids. Even, in a sense, her very self. There was only, in that moment,need. His touch thrilled her and scared her in its absolute authority over her senses. He untied her scarf, his fingers brushing her neck as the whisper of silk fell to the ground. Then he kissed her collarbone and unbuttoned her dress, his hands on her body as no one but Leonard had ever touched her.
It had been so long since she had been anything other than a dutiful wife, a grape farmer, a mother. And maybe she’d never been what she was under the soft pressure of the baron’s lips—just a woman in the heat of a moment that would burn bright, then disappear, like the flash of a camera. What was so wrong in that? She could almost convince herself that there wasn’t anything wrong with it. She wanted so badly to allow herself this. But then they were down on the ground, their naked bodies entwined but not yet one. She looked up at the vaulted ceiling of the stable Leonard had built for her, despite the impracticality of having horses at the vineyard. The thought was like a splash of cold water. Her husband loved her. She loved him.
Vivian pulled away from the baron.
“I’m sorry. I can’t,” she said.
“Can’t? Weare,” he said.
She stood up, pulling her dress in front of herself.
“You and my husband are business partners.”
“Maybe not,” the baron said. “He just fired my niece.”
“What? You just said you understood—that you would have done the same thing.”
“My mind could change. Besides, this whole venture had been to please Natasha. Clearly, that’s no longer a priority. So now I have to wonder: What’s in it for me?”
He couldn’t be serious. “Is that a threat?”
The baron’s steely gaze was all the answer she needed. She dressed quickly and fled the stable. She hoped that would be the end of it. But it wasn’t.
Now, sitting in the crisis meeting, she felt a crushing sense of culpability.
“So what can we do?” Vivian said, her mouth dry.
“It’s all hands on deck,” said Leonard. “And that includes Sadie. I want that granddaughter of mine to help out around here. There’s too much work to be done to have her drifting around with her nose in a book all summer.” He turned to Leah. “You were in the field at her age.”
Yes, Vivian thought.And a year later, you cast her out.
But Leonard was not entirely to blame. She couldn’t help but wonder if they would be in a different situation today if that afternoon in the stables hadn’t happened.
She’d never know.
Thirty
