Blush - Jamie Brenner Page 0,58

the casual book club into a project.

There had been years when she’d forgotten how to have something of her own—something that wasn’t about pleasing someone else. And then Delphine reminded her.

Delphine had been grateful that Vivian believed in her enough to give her an important job within Hollander. She said it changed her entire outlook and that she wished she could return the favor.

“I have everything I need,” Vivian had said.

“You need to have more fun,” Delphine had said. “It’s work and kids, work and kids. Where I grew up, women know how to play.” Her own mother, she said, spent weeks and weeks every year island-hopping. Delphine knew that Vivian didn’t want to actually get away from her family or the vineyard. But she needed to do something.

“What do you do just for yourself?” she’d asked her.

“I like taking the kids to the beach. I love harvest, when it’s so busy everyone is included in the work. Making apple cider in the fall . . .”

“Vivian, something aside from all that.”

“I like to shop. And I like to read.” She especially liked to read books about women who did a lot of shopping.

And so the book club was born.

Ultimately, it had all been short-lived. She didn’t have the heart to continue the book club after Leonard fired Delphine. And the journal languished, locked away where she didn’t have to think about it and no one would discover it. Or so she believed.

“Mom, are you still with us?” Leah said. She and Sadie looked at her expectantly.

“Sorry. I was just thinking,” Vivian said.

“I asked who your favorite character is,” Leah said. “Mine is Lucky. Since I’m also a woman whose father never saw her as an equal—who was marginalized from the family business.”

“Is that true?” Sadie said, snapping to attention.

“Yes.”

“Oh, Leah,” Vivian said. It hurt to hear her daughter express the sentiment. Even if it was the truth.

“What happened? You wanted to work here?” Sadie said.

“I think this is a conversation for another time,” Vivian said, shooting Leah a look. The last thing she wanted was the conversation to devolve into a prolonged attack on Leonard. Even if he deserved it. She still felt protective of him. And, perhaps, she felt her own sense of culpability in letting Leah be pushed aside.

“Well, I didn’t identify with anyone in this book,” said Sadie. “And honestly, I find it shocking that this book was a New York Times bestseller.”

Vivian sipped her wine. “Why wouldn’t this book be a bestseller? It has it all: passion, a business empire, love. This is what storytelling should be. Personally, I liked Clementine Duke. She had fabulous parties.”

Clementine Duke, a high-society dame who had a penchant for lovers of a different class, summoned Gino Santangelo to her mansion. Vivian couldn’t help but think about the summons to a mansion that had completely altered the course of her own life.

For weeks after their trip to Château de Villard, she’d thought about the baron. Ironically, once she wanted to be around him, he all but disappeared. The remainder of the weekend was segregated, with Leonard and the baron walking the fields and discussing their new business venture while Vivian and Natasha lounged around the estate, drinking wine and talking about the royal wedding. They both had been obsessively following every bit of news about Princess Diana (whom they both still called “Lady Di”) and both agreed her wedding gown was a bit busy. Vivian felt they might very well become friends. By the time the chauffeured Mercedes whisked them back to the airport, she could almost pretend the surge of nearly violent desire for the baron had never happened.

But back on Long Island, tucked away in her own bed, alone with the thoughts roaming free in the secret corners of her mind, her feelings for the baron were more vivid than they had been in the moment. In her fantasy, the weekend unfolded differently: the horseback riding had not seen them innocently cantering through the fields of Bordeaux, but instead ended with him ravishing her in the stables. Every time she imagined the scenario, she became so worked up she was in a sweat. She lost sleep at night and during the day was plagued by an unease and guilt for betraying her husband even in her imagination. For the first time in a long time, she was the one to initiate sex, and through intimacy with Leonard she was ultimately able to excise his new business partner from