The Other Boy (4 page)

In the sun-flooded kitchen, she sat down at the round wooden table and tried to stretch her eyes all the way open. Mom set an enormous spinach and cheese omelet down in front of her. Without even looking up, Maddy started devouring it, along with two pieces of sourdough toast.

“We’ve been having such fun eating local,” her mother chattered as she bustled around the kitchen, putting away the omelet ingredients. “Those eggs are from our neighbors down the road. I found the goat cheese at a little grocery in town that sells all Napa-grown food.

And the spinach is from our garden!”

“Great,” Maddy mumbled with her mouth full. It was hard for her to muster up enthusiasm for the origins of eggs and spinach before seven o’clock in the morning.

Debbie poured herself a glass of orange juice and sat down across the table.

“It’s so relaxing out here,” she went on. “The air gives me so much energy! Take a deep breath. Don’t you just love it?”

“Um, yeah.” Maddy was concentrating on heaping three teaspoons of sugar into her coffee. She needed the caffeine—immediately. Her head was pounding and her eyes refused to stay open without serious effort.

Mom jumped up as a truck engine rumbled outside in the front. “That must be Dad and Fred. They went down to talk about the harvest schedule with John Sands—our neighbor on the other side,” she explained.

“We might trade work to help each other out. Come on out when you’re done, okay, honey?” Her voice trailed off as the screen door slammed behind her.

Maddy gulped her coffee in three swallows and immediately felt more awake. She lowered her sunglasses and clattered down the back steps. Under the pure blue Napa sky, the air was cool but held the promise of heat. The sun was shooting its lemon-yellow rays around the mountains and over the lush, green vineyard. In one corner of the yard, flowering quince glowed orange in the morning light. As she walked around to the front of the house, Maddy barely even noticed what a shack the place was.

“Hi, honey!” Dad called as he and Fred climbed down from the cab of an ancient red pickup truck. “Come on over!” He handed his wife a bag of groceries, which she hoisted onto her hip and carted back around the house, giving Maddy a peck on her forehead as she passed.

“Morning, Fred! Morning, David!” Debbie called over her shoulder.

Maddy’s head shot up.
David?
She peered over her dad’s shoulder and finally noticed a guy with curly, sun-bleached brown hair sitting in the truck bed, his arms looped easily around his knees.

“Morning, Mrs. Sinclaire!” The mystery boy rose and vaulted over the edge of the truck, landing lightly on the ground. He stood about six feet tall, and his old, slim gray T-shirt hung easily from his broad shoulders and showed off the muscles of his chest and arms. Even from where she was standing, Maddy could see that his forearms were strong and corded, and he had the kind of tan that only comes from working outdoors.

“Maddy, I want you to meet David,” her father said.

“This is Fred’s son. You two will be working together this summer.”

What?

Somewhere in the background, her dad was still talking. “Sorry, hon, I forgot to mention yesterday that David is staying up here at the vineyard for the summer too. Fred and I thought it would be great for you to work together.”

David’s big, dark eyes were trained on her. For a moment, she stared right back. She felt her face get hot and her heart speed up. Wow, he was
really
cute. The moment stretched out until he blinked his long black eyelashes quickly, like he was trying to wake up from something, and stuck out his hand.

“Hey, nice to meet you.” His smile was wide and open and his teeth flashed white against the tan of his face.

Maddy’s mind raced. Why exactly had she decided to skip that shower this morning? Wait, stop. Who cared if he was gorgeous?
You’re not available, Madeline!
She summoned up an appropriately bored smile and shook David’s hand. His hand felt warm and firm against hers.

She drew in her breath at his touch. What was going on?

Stop!
She took her hand away and awkwardly brushed some hair back from her forehead. Maybe she’d had too much coffee. As Maddy considered switching to decaf, David casually stuck his hands in the pockets of his battered jeans and leaned against the side of the truck.

He smiled at her again. “So, you all got in yesterday, right?”

“Um, yeah.” For some reason, she couldn’t think of anything else to say.

David waited for a second and tried again. “Cool.

What do you think of the place so far?”

“Obviously, it’s great.” The sarcasm was unintentional; she was going for smooth.
Damn.
She felt like she was in school, standing at attention in front of him like she was about to recite the Pledge of Allegiance or something.

She looked around for a place to sit, but there wasn’t one, so she just crossed her arms awkwardly.

David seemed a little thrown. “Ah, yeah. The house is amazing. Have you seen the grapevines yet?”

She snorted a little, involuntarily. “Well, they’re hard to miss.” Arrrgg.
Mean
when she’d meant
friendly
. She was trying to be polite, but, honestly, this whole situation was just aggravating. The sun was too hot, her breakfast felt like a boulder in her stomach, and worst of all, she had
no
idea what “amazing project” her parents had cooked up for her and this guy. No matter how nice he was, he couldn’t teleport her back to the city, and that was really the only thing she wanted.

David opened his mouth but then shut it abruptly and fixed Maddy with a quizzical stare, as if he was realizing something. “Yeah, I guess it’s too bad if you’re anti-grapevine. You’re trapped by about three hundred miles of ’em,” he said, rolling his eyes playfully and shooting her a rueful grin.

“Okay, kids!” Bob walked up, beaming. His bald head was sunburned, and he was already sweating in the strong mountain sun. He slapped his hands together.

“Now, I have a really special project for the two of you.”

Oh boy,
Maddy thought.
Here it comes
. “What, Dad?”

“Well, I think I should just show you—it’s going to be great when it’s all done. Come on, let’s take the truck.”

He climbed into the driver’s seat of the red pickup.

“Um, Dad,” Maddy asked, “where did you get this truck?” The windows were missing their glass, and the stuffing in the seats was bulging out everywhere. The inside of the cab was sprinkled liberally with dog hair and bits of straw.

“Got it at an auction when we came up here at Christmas. Remember, I told you about it?” Maddy did vaguely remember him going on about a great deal he had gotten up in Napa. “Climb in!”

David hoisted himself back into the truck bed.

Maddy hesitated for a minute. She had never ridden in the back of a truck before. David was watching her from his perch on a straw bale.

“Want a hand?” he asked. He stood up and leaned over the edge, extending his arm toward her.

“No, thanks,” she said, trying to sound airy. She perched her sunglasses on top of her head and climbed awkwardly onto the tailgate, trying to avoid flashing her hot pink bikini underwear. Her feet were sliding around—sneakers probably would have been a better choice. She was almost in the truck, when one flip-flop caught on something and slid off into the dirt. Maddy looked down in dismay. “Crap!” she said. She was caught in a very unflattering position—straddling the tailgate, one leg in the truck bed, one outside, with her rear sticking out, and clutching the edge with both hands.

She swung a leg back over so she could hop down, but before she could, there was a soft thud behind her. In one motion, David reached down, tossed her the flip-flop, and effortlessly swung back into the truck.

“Thanks,” she said, surprised.

“No problem.” He winked at her. Maddy started a little. Damn, he was sexy. She settled herself on a bale of straw, and the truck engine started with a roar. She jumped at the noise before she could stop herself. David glanced over at her. She lightly tossed her hair and looked away. He leaned forward and raised his voice over the engine noise.

“Your dad seems unaware that there’s this new invention called a muffler … ,” he said, gesturing to the front of the cab. Maddy laughed in spite of herself, the wind blowing against her face and her hair flapping out behind her like a long golden banner.

The truck bumped over the rocky soil down a dirt track that wound between the rows and rows of vines.

The grapes hung thick in their clusters beneath their canopies of green leaves. Despite the neat, curving rows, the place had a slightly wild air. Crows perched here and there, eyeing the grapes. A red-tailed hawk circled overhead, momentarily hanging in the air before folding its wings and silently hurtling toward the earth.

The truck stopped in front of a little stream. Maddy looked around at the rocky bank twisting along the field in a silvery streak until it disappeared out of sight between two hills. This must be the edge of the property.

A broad meadow spread out on the other side of the stream, with tangled high grasses and scattered boulders competing for space with masses of blue and yellow wildflowers. The mountains lay brooding beyond, over-looking the landscape like sentinels.

Dad killed the engine, and David rose quickly and hopped out of the truck. Maddy followed cautiously, eyeing the distance from the bed to the ground, trying to calculate whether she could make it without losing any more of her clothing. She looked up, realizing that David was watching her again.

“Don’t worry,” he teased. “I won’t look if you jump.”

Maddy scowled at him. The guy was reading her mind—

it was uncanny. Irritating and uncanny. He came back up to the edge of the truck. “Hey, I was just kidding.” He held his arms out. “Come on, I’ll help you.”

Maddy looked down into his sparkling, deep brown eyes from her perch in the truck, and awkwardly bent down, gathering the skirt of her dress between her knees.

She grasped the edge of the tailgate with one hand and closed her fingers around David’s with the other. She leaped down clumsily, almost falling. Quickly, he grabbed her around the waist. For a split second, his arms encircled her, hugging her against his broad chest.

Maddy felt the warmth of his skin through his T-shirt and caught a whiff of fresh, piney soap and a vague scent like cedar chips. A tiny sigh escaped her. Flustered, she struggled upright. He quickly dropped his arms.

“Okay?” he asked, blushing a little.

“Yeah, fine,” Maddy mumbled. She concentrated on brushing dust off her dress so she wouldn’t have to look at him. Her knees felt a little wobbly, but she didn’t know why. It wasn’t like it was a big deal that he helped her down. She’d just tripped a little. This whole place had her off balance.

“Come on, you two!” Bob waved from the stoop of a small red wooden building perched on the stream bank.

Dry yellow grasses lay in luxuriant swathes against the stone foundation, and the front entrance was draped in a profusion of wisteria. Maddy’s dad pushed the oak door open, revealing an empty room beyond. Maddy and David stepped inside.

The space was square, with bare plaster walls and a plank floor. There was no ceiling, only the underside of the roof and rafters soaring twenty feet overhead.

Swallows swooped in and out of an open window set high into the wall. Sunlight filtered through the wavy old glass of the windows and painted shadow patterns on the floor. A faint film of dust covered everything.

“The last owners used this for storage,” Bob explained.

“But it was originally a barn for goats, back when this was a farm as well as a vineyard. You can see how solidly it’s built.”

“Yeah, it really is,” David said approvingly, knocking on the wall. Maddy gazed longingly out the window, wishing that she could see San Francisco from here. She whipped her head around and saw that both Dad and David were staring at her.

“Mmmhmm!” she managed, pretending to admire the cobwebby walls. “So, what’s the plan, Dad?”
Might
as well get it over with.

“Well! Glad you asked!” Her father grinned like a little boy. “You can see that the structure is in good shape. All it needs is a quick scrubdown and then …

Fred and I want you two to transform it into our new wine-tasting room!” He paused for their reaction. David lifted his eyebrows slightly.

“Ah … great, Bob,” he offered.

Maddy’s father barreled ahead. “We want you two to take complete charge of this project, planning what you want in the room, ordering glasses, tables, chairs, wall art, rugs—after it’s cleaned up, of course.”

Maddy couldn’t help herself. “So, this is where the vineyard visitors come to get trashed, right?” She widened her eyes innocently.

“Very funny, Madeline.” Her dad looked annoyed.

“The tasting room is where the visitors
taste
our wines—

explore their nuances, discuss their various qualities.

They can go into town if they want to drink themselves silly. This is supposed to be a refined, relaxing room where people can focus on tasting good wine, enjoying conversation, and …” He strode over to the opposite side of the shed, where huge sliding doors stretched the entire length of one wall. Puffing a little, he pushed one back. Sunlight immediately flooded the room as he pushed open the other door. “Feasting on the view!” he finished triumphantly.

Maddy gazed out on the stunning view of the mountain. There was slightly awed silence as everyone took it in. Then David piped up. “Amazing. This is going to be great. Right, Maddy?”

All she could do was stare at him in dismay. What had happened to her summer? Tanning? Partying?

Sleeping late? What was she doing here, in a former goat barn in the middle of the country?

Her father, however, seemed oblivious to the intense pain he was causing his only child. “Well, Fred and I are going to lay irrigation hose in the far quadrant today.

I’ve got some cleaning supplies—buckets, rags, and a couple of mops. There’s water outside.” He pointed out the window, where Maddy could see an old-fashioned metal spigot standing in the middle of a bare patch of ground. “Take some time to look around. And then get started.”