property sale. There’s a lot more competition these days, and sales have slowed down to the point where we’re spending more than we’re earning. I’d like to update the website and start doing some social media, and search for new outlets for our sales.”
“Well…” She scrunched up her face. “You know how I feel about technology.”
“I understand. But this is just reality, Aunt Fernanda. Ninety percent of people in the U.S. use the internet to some extent these days. This is how people find out about new things. We’ve got to take advantage of what it has to offer.”
She scowls and purses her lips. “I don’t like it.”
“I’ll be taking care of it. You’ll never have to deal with it.”
“But what happens when you go back to Seattle?” she frets.
That’s been the plan all along, but when she says it, my stomach clenches. I do want to go back to Seattle, don’t I? I have friends there, sort of. Work friends. I haven’t heard from any of them since I came back to Greenvale, but whatever.
“Let’s worry about that when the time comes, shall we? I mean, I can run the website and do the social media from Seattle, if necessary, but Sara could also help out. She’s good at social media. Once we’ve got more money coming in, we could pay her for it.”
“I’ll consider it,” she grumps.
Then she proceeds to spend twenty minutes interrogating me about the vineyard. She’s trying to be nice about it, but she looks more and more worried, and nothing I say can reassure her. Finally, she pauses to take a breath.
“I forgot!” I say quickly. “I have another present for you. Would you like me to read to you?” I pull the Bibbia Riveduta, an Italian translated version of the bible, from my purse.
We spend a pleasant hour with me reading aloud and her correcting my terrible pronunciation.
When I get up to go, she puts her hand on my arm. “Would you mind leaving that dirt with me?” she says shyly.
“Of course, Aunt Fernanda.” I pull out the packet and set it gently down on her nightstand.
Chapter Twelve
DONOVAN
I get another lousy night’s sleep on Saturday. I’m going to have start using that roll-up mattress in the loft. I can’t lie next to Sienna, aching with desire for her, and get any rest at all. I fall asleep around three a.m. and wake up a few hours later to the smell of coffee.
I take a quick shower and try to enjoy a session with my right hand. Sienna’s face swims in front of me and I remain unsatisfied.
I pull on boxer shorts and pad into the kitchen. Sienna’s made coffee using a mini propane double stove burner. On the other burner, she’s frying bacon and eggs. Aceto crouches on the counter, watching me with a slit-eyed glower of suspicion.
“Cesare brought over breakfast for us,” she says. “My aunt made home-made muffins.” She gestures at a bag sitting on the butcher block counter.
“Ribaldi muffins? No thank you.” I grab one of the apples that I bought at the grocery store yesterday. A lot of the other stuff I bought was powdered-protein-type materials, which need a blender to prepare, because I’m a dumbass and I forgot we have neither blender nor working outlets. Tomorrow I’m going to go on a shopping spree. I’ve already contacted an appliance store to deliver a refrigerator, stove and microwave mid-week.
Sienna hands me a cup of coffee.
“Dark and bitter, like a Witlocke’s heart,” she says cheerfully. I don’t dignify that with an answer, but after a few sips, I start to feel a little less savage.
“Whatever. Electricity’s coming tomorrow, right? And then we can get internet,” I say. “Beautiful, beautiful internet.” Aceto, padding across the kitchen counter, gives me a look of scorn. “What?” I say to him. “I’ll let you watch cat videos when I’m not working.”
His only reply is a scornful tail-flick, then he pads off silently, tail held high, showing me his butt-hole. And I don’t think that’s an accident. I think it’s a statement.
I sit warily on one of the folding chairs, which creaks under my weight. The sound of a car driving up pulls me up straight.
“Carrie and Tonya? Again?” I bark. “On a freaking Sunday, after I told them to call first. They fucking did not.”
“No, they did not, so cool your jets. It’s everybody’s favorite wedding-wrecker, Jonathon.”
The door opens slowly, and he slinks in like a choirboy caught with nudie mags tucked in among