Blush - Jamie Brenner Page 0,96

as much that day she ran into him at the seafood restaurant. Still, they’d found their way to each other. That first night in the vineyard he’d seemed as starved for her as she’d felt for him. What changed? Was it because the new buyer was walking around, getting in everyone’s face? That was no excuse.

She now understood why Holden had broken up with her. He’d been completely justified: she held a part of herself back. She had put her work first, her time alone first. She didn’t let him pull her out of her comfort zone in any way. But with Mateo, she couldn’t hold back if she tried. She didn’t even recognize the person she was becoming. And still, he had found a reason to end it.

“Fine,” she said, wiping the rain from her mouth as she spoke. “I don’t want to be involved with you, either. You think I have time to waste on this grape farm? I’m a writer. I’ve been published in The New Yorker!”

He shook his head, his expression not unkind. Wistful, even.

“Go back to school, Sadie. There’s nothing for you here.”

* * *

Leah sat on her bed, her window cracked just enough to let some fresh air in and keep the rain out. She pulled one of the wine logs onto her lap and flipped through it. Pages and pages of her father’s tight, precise handwriting. It was so familiar to her. Oh, how she’d always looked up to him. It was too painful to read. Setting the log aside, she picked up the copy of Mistral’s Daughter she’d taken from the library.

She glanced at her phone, silent next to her. Steven hadn’t answered her call and text from before dinner. Sometimes it felt like he was punishing her for being out here. Did she have to beg him to talk?

Across the hall, Sadie’s bedroom door slammed shut. She must be back from her “walk.” Maybe after the visit with her new boyfriend she’d be more open to a conversation. Leah smiled, thinking of her girlhood crush on Mateo’s father. Amazing how life could come full circle.

She remembered coming home from college one summer to find Javier walking around with a dark-haired beauty by his side. When Leah learned the woman was his fiancée, she was jealous. It wasn’t the fact that he was taken, but more that she felt so far from love in her own life. College dating had been a frustrating merry-go-round of casual hookups and short-lived relationships. Looking back on it, she wished her twenty-year-old self could have known that Steven Bailey was just around the corner.

With a pang, she looked again at her phone. She decided she’d say a quick goodnight to Sadie and then try calling Steven one more time.

As soon as she opened her bedroom door, she heard the sobs coming from Sadie’s room. She rushed over and knocked with urgency.

“Sadie? Open up.”

“I’m fine,” her daughter called out.

“You’re not fine.”

Sadie must have known that of course Leah wouldn’t leave, that she might as well let her in. Sure enough, she cracked the door, and Leah saw that her hair was soaking wet and her eyes were swollen. Moving into the room, she closed the door behind her and steered Sadie to the edge of the bed, where she put her arm around her shoulders. Her clothes were wet, too.

“What’s wrong?”

“Earlier, when you asked me where I went the night of the book club? I think you know.”

“I don’t know anything. I just suspected maybe it was to see Mateo. I don’t mean to pry, but I can’t help but wonder. Is that what’s wrong? Did something happen with him?”

Sadie nodded, sniffling into a crumpled tissue.

“We hooked up,” she said. “And I really like him. I thought he felt the same way, but now he’s mad about the sale, about what’s happening to Javier. He doesn’t want to see me anymore.”

Leah hugged her, murmuring that she was sorry even as a part of her was relieved to see Sadie so emotionally invested in someone. She never seemed to take any of her relationships to heart. Leah and Steven had heard about the boy she was seeing at school for months, but then she showed up at the winery announcing it was over and hadn’t seemed to miss a step. Better for her to experience strong feelings, both good and bad, than to do nothing but write all the time.

“I know you’re hurting now,” Leah said. “But you’ll