At Wits' End - Kenzie Reed Page 0,39

out a low rumble that might possibly be a growl of agreement.

Sienna hurries out just as her mother comes in the front door. “Hey, Linda.” I think it’s beyond weird that she calls her mother by her name instead of “Mom”. “What’s up? Did you need something?”

“No, I just came to say hi. What are you doing today? I thought we could spend some time together.”

Sienna manages a tentative smile, and I want to grab her and haul her aside and tell her not to trust Linda. She’ll just get hurt. It’s not my business, though.

“Today I’m going to help bottle the pinot,” she says. In May, they bottle the wine that’s been maturing in oak barrels, to get ready for the next vintage.

“Don’t you have people to do that for you?”

Sienna shrugs. “We’re a bit understaffed right now.”

“I’ll help you, then.” Linda has worked at the vineyard over the years, between husbands. Sometimes she’s even worked side by side with Sienna. Never for more than a couple of weeks at a time, though.

I hear the hesitation in Sienna’s voice. “You really don’t have to.”

“But I want to. It’ll be fun. Then we can grab some lunch in town.”

“Pamela’s coming here this afternoon, but we could do it tomorrow.”

Her mother smiles and winks at her. “I’ll take whatever time with my girl I can get.”

Since when?

But Sienna’s tentative smile grows a little stronger.

“I’m going over to my parents’ house,” I say. I get dressed and leave before I say something I’ll regret.

I park in front of the vineyard. Our operation looks completely different from her aunt’s. We use irrigation, commercial fertilizer, and mechanized harvesters. We’re twenty times the size of the Ribaldi vineyard, and each block is planted twice as densely, but then, Fernanda Ribaldi never wanted to be what we are – a large commercial operation with a goal of producing affordable, consistent wines.

My family always felt that she looked down her nose at them, like her hand-harvested, high-priced organic wine was better than theirs. I’m sure she did. And they looked down on her little rinky-dink operation and tried to tell themselves that she was just a hobbyist – even though, year after year, her tiny vineyard won the first place awards at wine festivals, and ranked in the high 90s, whereas theirs ranked in the low 90s.

My parents are both in the production room, waiting for me. Workers bustle around the space-age 2,150-liter silver tanks, which are used to age the white wines. The red wines are aged in a separate room, in enormous oak barrels.

My company has replaced their crusher-destemmer and their bottling machines. Later this summer, we’ll be providing them with new harvesters. The installation crew is going to be here for the next few days, training them to use the new equipment.

I join them at a table at the far end of the room, away from the hustle and bustle. My mother, clad in khaki slacks and a lime-green sweater, comes over and kisses me on the cheek, and my father gives me an abrupt nod. I set my file folders, full of brochures and instructions, down on the table.

This is equipment that I designed as a side project, with their vineyard in mind, years ago. My father had turned me down up until recently. When he finally, reluctantly came to me for help, I quickly had our company put it into production. These are all prototypes, and it’s not our usual line of work, so I paid for it out of my own pocket. After the deal with Constantine goes through, I might approach Graham about looking to expand into the vineyard and beverage equipment market.

“How are you?” my mother asks anxiously. “Is it an absolute nightmare over there? You can always sneak over here at night to sleep.”

“No, he can’t. If Carrie catches wind of it, she’ll broadcast it all over town,” my father says heatedly.

“Mom, it’s fine.” I shake my head in wry amusement. “You think she has a torture chamber over there or something?”

“I’d put nothing past them. I still can’t believe that you had to be the one to marry her,” my mother says sourly.

“Well, in fairness, her family probably can’t believe that she had to be the one to marry me.”

“Oh, come on,” she scoffs. “She married up. You married down.”

I give her a warning look. “You might want to show a little appreciation. Sienna quit her job, gave up her apartment, completely upended her life, and agreed