The Vineyard (12 page)

Natalie scowled. “He did no such thing. I advertised, I interviewed, I hired.”

Carl touched her cheek and said a soft, “We're aware of that. They aren't.”

She was that easily diffused. Letting out a breath, she said, “Yes. The problem in a nutshell.” Her eyes found Olivia's. “There was never cause to make it clear. My husband needed the stature more than I did, so I let him have it. Unfortunately, that's backfiring on me now. They all saw Alexander as father of the vineyard. They loved him. They felt loyalty to him. That loyalty goes on. Like my children, they're offended that I'm remarrying so soon.”

Carl added a quiet but potent, “And so low.”

“Well, they are
ignorant,”
Natalie declared.

“Ignorant or not, they're leaving us in the lurch.”

Olivia asked, “How many have left?”

“Paolo's leaving brings it to four,” Natalie said.

“Four, out of how many in all?”

“Thirteen. The vineyard operation has Simon, his assistant, a general field hand, and Paolo. We have two full-time people at the winery—the wine maker and his assistant. There are four in the office—an accountant, a marketing director, a sales administrator, and a receptionist. And three here at the house—a maid, a cook, and a groundskeeper. The field hand went first. He'd been nursing a grudge against Carl since Carl brought in a woman to a position above him.”

“The grudge worsened when Simon took over as manager and the field hand stayed a field hand, instead of moving up,” Carl said.

Natalie resumed the count. “Soon after that, we lost the accountant. Now Marie and Paolo.” She raised wary eyes to Carl. “Do we expect more?”

“Joaquin is grumbling.” Again spoken with style, in this case a gently lyrical Wa-
keen
.

“Joaquin,” Olivia echoed, marveling at the beauty of the names.

Natalie's smile held surprise. “You did that
well
. The name is Portuguese. Our staff has always been heavily Portuguese, what with their numbers being so large, so close by, just over the Massachusetts line. Joaquin is the groundskeeper, but he's truly a Jack of all trades. His wife is our cook.” She grew fierce. “Carl,
keep
him. If he goes, Madalena goes. I can't do without my cook, not right before the wedding.” Suddenly defiant, she drew herself up and returned to Olivia. “But it's their loss. With or without them, Asquonset is solid. We have Carl to thank for that.”

Carl's cheeks grew ruddy. “Come on, Nat.”

“Carl and Simon,” she amended, no less vehement for splitting the credit. “The vines are stronger every year. Production is up. The grapes are more balanced. Our wines are steadily gaining recognition.” She sent Carl another wary look. “Is Simon right? Is there a problem with the Pinot Noir?”

“There may be.”

“Then he isn't just running away?”

“Oh, he is,” Carl granted with a small smile. “But he may have a valid excuse.”

Olivia was wondering what the big man was running from when Natalie faced her with a flourish. “There you have it. Our staff is depleted, the vineyard is wet, and my children are sure to make more trouble before the summer's out. You, my dear, are not only my memoirist, you're my personal buffer. Are you up for it, Olivia Jones?”

W
AS
O
LIVIA UP FOR IT
? Was she ever. She wanted nothing more than to return to Natalie's first distinct memory, anxious to get the memoir fully launched. But Natalie had to see about hiring a new maid, not to mention giving a pep talk to Madalena and Joaquin.

So Olivia spent the rest of the afternoon unpacking. She emptied Tess's bags and then her own, filling closets and drawers with what they had brought, but their new clothes were nowhere near as exciting as the shirts Natalie had pulled from a carton before sending her off. Half were T-shirts, half were polo shirts, half in Olivia's
size, half in Tess's. Some were burgundy with ivory print, some the reverse. All had the vineyard's logo and name.

Slipping one on with her shorts, Olivia looked in the mirror. She rolled the sleeves and adjusted the blousing at the waist. Leaning closer, she finger-combed her short hair and was about to pinch color into her cheeks when she realized that it was already there. She stared at herself a minute longer. Short hair and all, she didn't look bad.

Wearing the T-shirt with pride, she went off in search of Tess.

Seven
 

S
USANNE WAS UP AT DAWN
, which was early indeed in June. She was baking brioche for breakfast, or so she reasoned at four-thirty, as she slipped into a robe and crept out of the bedroom, leaving her husband in a deep, jet-lagged sleep.

He had returned the night before from five days of nonstop meetings on the West Coast. In the hope that they would have dinner together, Susanne had bought the fixings for his favorite veal dish. Then the plane was two hours late taking off, and it was after ten before he walked in the door. He did try to eat, but she would have been blind not to see that he was doing it only to please her. Taking pity on him, she sent him into the den, where he sat with his favorite symphony on the stereo, for a few hours of decompression.

Susanne had sat with him until her eyes started to close. She didn't know what time he'd come to bed, only that he was there when she had woken for the first time, at two.

In the kitchen now, she heated milk, butter, and sugar, added yeast, eggs, and flour, kneaded the dough, and set it aside. She split a fresh pineapple, sliced its fruit, and returned it to the shell in an artful arrangement that included cantaloupe, kiwi, and banana. She
whipped up Mark's favorite sour-cream coffee cake, tossing in blueberries and raisins for good measure.

She punched the brioche dough down. While it rose again, she cooked fresh asparagus, washed arugula, and beat eggs for a frittata. She arranged plates, silverware, mugs, linen napkins, and flowers on linen place mats at the kitchen's granite island. She rearranged the flowers once, then again.

She formed the brioche dough into individual portions and fit each into its own mold. She ground fresh coffee. Changing her mind about the linen place mats, she exchanged them with woven ones and added raffia ties to the napkins. She scrubbed her work counter, washed and dried everything in the sink, and then scrubbed that, too. She removed the coffee cake from the oven and put in the brioche.

She brought in the morning paper, read as much of it as she wanted in the fifteen minutes that it took to drink a cup of coffee. She wiped out the refrigerator until the brioche was done, brushed her hair and teeth, washed and moisturized her face, then sat at the granite island and waited for Mark to wake up.

By the time he joined her, it was after nine. She had been up for five hours and felt it. He, on the other hand, looked refreshed, sleep-mussed but handsome. Neither thinning gray hair nor ten extra pounds around his middle could change that. It struck her, amidst all else on her mind, how much she had missed him and how glad she was to have him home.

He gave her a long hug that said the feeling was mutual. “Mmmm. I don't know which smells better, you or whatever that is you're baking.”

“It's either Dior or brioche,” she said against his raspy jaw. “Take your pick.”

“I'll take Dior and a cup of coffee for now.” Loosening his arms, he drew back only enough to search her face. “You were up early.”

“I tried not to wake you.”

“You didn't, but I'm smelling more than perfume and brioche. From the looks of this kitchen, you've done a day's work already. I'm afraid I won't be able to eat half of what you've cooked. Couldn't sleep?”

She gave a diffident shrug.

“Bad dreams?” he asked.

“If only they were dreams.”

“Uh-oh. Still Natalie? I thought you were going to talk with her again.”

“She won't take my calls.”

He arched a brow but remained wisely silent.

“Okay,” Susanne confessed, “so I said things I shouldn't have that first time, but what did she expect, popping this marriage on me that way?”

“You told me that she'd been mentioning Carl a lot before that.”

“Mentioning Carl. Not mentioning love or romance, and certainly not mentioning marriage. Marriage was totally out of the blue. I'm her daughter. I was hurt.”

“Did you tell her that?”

Susanne sighed. “Not the way I should have, but when I call now, someone else always answers the phone. She's hired a new assistant who is disgustingly bouncy.”

“A corporate assistant?”

“A personal one,” she said and added a drawled, “Apparently, her social life is that busy.”

Mark gave a soft meow.

Susanne dropped the drawl, though she wasn't apologizing. “Marie is leaving, and she says she isn't the only one. So part of me is pleased that I'm not alone in being upset by this marriage. The other part feels that the Asquonset I know is … is slipping away.”

“You've always claimed not to care,” he reminded her gently.

“I don't. I just feel bad for Dad.”

“More than he can feel himself. He's dead, Susanne.”

“Yes. He is. It's like Natalie was just waiting for that.”

“I don't think so. She was a loyal wife.”

“Maybe she wasn't. I never thought she'd remarry. Maybe I don't know about the other, either.”

“You do know,” Mark chided.

Yes, Susanne supposed that she did. But that didn't forgive what Natalie was doing now. “She bided her time until her husband died and not a minute longer.” She felt a moment's satisfaction when Mark didn't deny it.

But immediately he said, “Why don't you take a drive up?”

Her satisfaction faded. “To Asquonset? I can't. I have things to do here.”

“What things?” he asked, holding her gaze.

She didn't answer. None of what she had to do was important—they both knew that. She was at a crossroads in her life and didn't know what path to take, but going home—going back—was at the very bottom of the list.

“Mother doesn't want me there,” she reasoned. “We'll only fight.”

“Maybe you'll talk.”

“Mother talk? Mother
talk?”

“Well, you two have to communicate
somehow
before the wedding.”

“Why? I'm not going.”

His hands unlocked and slipped away. Moving around her, he helped himself to coffee. Cupping the mug, he leaned back against the counter. “I think that would be a mistake.”

“Greg isn't going.”

“A double mistake, then. She's your mother. Boycotting her wedding will cause a permanent rift.”

“The wedding is the thing causing the rift.”

He didn't answer, just stood there nursing his coffee. Finally he asked, “How old is Natalie?”

“Seventy-six.”

“How old do you think she'll live to be?”

The question startled Susanne. “
I
can't answer that.”

“Does longevity run in her family? Heart disease? Cancer?”

“Why are you asking this?”

“Because Natalie is approaching that age where she may be wondering how much time she has left. She may be thinking that she can't afford to do things that people in their thirties, forties, or even fifties consider ‘proper.'”

“You
condone
this marriage?”

“No, but I can't condemn it, either. She's coming from a different place from you and me.”

Susanne folded her arms. “She's in good health. She'll live another twenty years. At
least.”

“Spoken by the daughter who wants that to be so, but what's the point for you, if you cut yourself off from her?”

“She's the one doing the cutting. She's making a choice.”

“Seems to me you're the one making the choice.
She
wants her children and grandchildren in her life. That's what the invitation was about.”

“But … an
invitation,
Mark?”

He let out a long breath. Setting his mug on the counter, he approached her and stroked her arms. “She tried to tell you, but couldn't quite get it out. Sweetheart, that's her way. It always has been. She's more formal about things than you are, just as you're more formal about things than
our
daughter is. Maybe it's generational. Maybe it isn't. Either you can condemn her and live with the consequences of that, or you can swallow your pride and drive on up there. You do have the time, Susanne …”

G
REG WAS UP
nearly as early as Susanne, watching daylight steal over Woodley Park from the small balcony off his bedroom. One after another, his neighbors' rooftops were touched by pale gold. The paleness would deepen in no time. Washington was in for another hot day. He could feel the humidity even now. It was thick, slowing everything down.