Can't Hurry Love (20 page)

It could have been fifteen minutes, it could have been an hour, before a prickling sensation ghosted over his skin. His head turned, and there she was, her hair waving around her face, her color high. She wore a button-down shirt he thought might be his, along with jeans and those dime-store flip-flops he should have chopped into rubber confetti.

He slid off his barstool and made his way toward the stage, his gaze remaining steady on her wary face. For the first time since that morning when she’d announced her sale of the land, he felt in control. Yeah. He felt better for the first time in ten effing
years
because he was doing something instead of standing by while his world fell to shit around him.

The emcee thrust a wireless microphone in his hand as he stepped onto the platform. Then the man gestured toward a binder, thick with plastic-sleeved pages of songs. A loud voice called out, “Go, Liam!”

It pierced his boozy haze. He blinked, his focus zooming outward. What the hell? There were a hundred people in the place, all looking at him. The emcee was pointing at the binder again. “What song?” the man asked.

Jesus Christ. A . . . song? Putting his hand to his suddenly clearing head, he clunked his skull with the microphone. He jerked it down. Had he really committed himself to some melodic confession? How much had he had to drink?

Liam put the mike down, backed away . . .

And saw Giuliana mirroring his move, her feet in retreat, heading for the exit.

“Wait!” he yelled, grabbing the microphone again. The emcee brandished the song binder once more, but he pushed it away. A song was for cowards—or people who could actually sing.

But speaking truth in front of an audience . . . Jesus, he was going to feel like an ass. He was going to have to let go of his dignity and lay himself bare in front of his brother, some biker types, and a bunch of people who found it entertaining to spend their evenings squalling out rock anthems and show tunes.

In one corner was a woman in a rhinestone halter top who looked like the hygienist at his dentist’s office. In another, a big man in a black ball cap stood with his arms folded over his chest, his avid gaze taking in the scene. Liam couldn’t swear to it, but it looked like his fourth-grade teacher had just bellied up to the bar.

The thought of an audience made him a little ill.

But remember? He was taking a chance.
Doing something
.

So instead of paying attention to the roomful of distractions, he spoke to the only one who mattered. “Giuliana.” His mouth was dry. Apparently his hundred bucks afforded him a beverage, too, because the emcee pressed on him a cold glass of water.

His hand trembled as he brought it to his mouth. He would have liked to think it was a result of the booze, but now he felt sober as a judge . . . and his wife was looking at him with the gaze of a very skeptical juror.

“Giuliana . . .” He closed his eyes, unspooling the reel of his memory. This morning, the last year, the golden summer in Tuscany, the kisses, the childhood games. For as long as he could remember, she’d been his co-conspirator, his co-leader, his cohort. No wonder that for the last decade he’d been walking around like a man with a missing limb.

Opening his eyes, he looked into hers. “You were created for me,” he said. “I called what we have together a curse, but I was wrong. So stupidly wrong. You were created for me just as I was created for you. I think we’re a promise one hundred years in the making.”

She was breathing fast, her chest rising and falling with each quick breath. He leapt off the stage and walked toward her, winding his way through the crowd. Her eyes widened as he approached. A foot from her, he halted.

“Don’t go, Jules. Don’t leave me again.”

And then she did just that, spinning on the rubber soles of her thongs and rushing for the door.

Astonishment froze him for a moment and then he dropped the microphone. He’d really expected this to work. After another moment he took off after her, pushing past anyone who got between him and the door. Outside, he whirled around, trying to locate her in the parking lot.

Headlights flashed on and he raced toward them, only to find her tight-lipped behind the wheel of her newly repaired car, her expression impossible to read in the greenish glow of the dashboard. He banged on her window.

She rolled down the glass and then she was hissing at him like a cat, her voice furious. “So this is what a head injury looks like!”

“Huh?”

“Penn said you’d hit your head. That you had a possible concussion.”

He rubbed the back of his hair. “Kohl sucker punched me.”

“Good. Because that means I’m not the only sucker around here.”

“That’s Penn’s doing.” But he could tell she wasn’t the least bit moved by logic or what he’d said in the bar in front of the whole fucking world. It infuriated him, but he kept his voice cool. “I just made a fool of myself for you.”

Her eyes rolled. She dismissed his risk with a wave of her hand. “You arrogant ass. It was just your way of assuming control again. For some reason you don’t like the idea of losing even your little piece of Tanti Baci, so you resorted to emotional blackmail and tried manipulating me in front of our family, our town.”

Liam froze, feeling sick again. Emotional blackmail. It was a Calvin Bennett trait, one of those faults he’d always feared might be handed down from father to son.

“Jules, no. I’m sorry. But I—” He couldn’t tell her that he loved her, though. She would only see that as more manipulation. Sick again, now with frustration, he rubbed his hands over his face.

“Good-bye, Liam. I’ll be spending the night at the farmhouse.”

And like that she was gone, leaving him to stare at her red taillights as she shot out of the parking lot. They reminded him of those red rosebushes at the end of the rows of grapes in the Bennett vineyards. How had the old man lived with that reminder of love lost?

Once Giuliana left Edenville, he was going to remove them one by one with his very own hands, just as she’d ripped out his heart.

After leaving the bar, Giuliana drove around the dark streets of Edenville as if they were a maze and she was seeking the way out. But she wasn’t lost—except, in a sense, to herself. The fact was, after a day of so much emotional turmoil, all feeling had fled. Suddenly, she was numb.

Where was the passionate, impetuous Giuliana Baci who hadn’t thought twice about eloping with the love of her life when she was eighteen? Where was the woman who’d translated the loss of her baby and her anger at the young man who’d betrayed her into a living, breathing grudge that had sustained her for a decade?

Her passion, her grief, her temper, they were mere shells now. As vacant as her heart.

It was much later that she found herself at the farmhouse. She tiptoed up the steps, figuring she’d wrap herself in a quilt and sleep on the couch. It would be a relief to escape the emptiness inside her.

A light in the kitchen blazed. She considered leaving it burning, but she’d left the porch fixture on in case Penn and Jack were still out. With the rest of the house quiet and dark behind her, she pushed open the swinging door.

Stevie sat at the table, a carton of ice cream in front of her. She held a spoon and wore a pretty, lacy peach robe and a guilty expression. It almost immediately eased. “Thank God, it’s you.”

Giuliana discovered she could still experience relief, despite the dullness of the rest of her feelings. Her sister was feeling better if she was digging into rocky road. And if her sister was nudging the chair beside her with her foot, extending a silent invitation for her to sit, then she wasn’t completely despised.

On her way across the scarred linoleum, she grabbed her own spoon. Then she slipped onto the wooden seat, cocking her head to study her sister, who looked both feminine and fertile. Her skin glowed. Apparently the day’s rest had done her good. “I take it Jack wouldn’t approve of late-night snacking?” Giuliana asked.

“Not so much what I eat, but that I ventured down the stairs by myself to do it. He’s threatening to carry me everywhere.” She grinned, looking again like the softball-playing tomboy who’d always sported scraped knees and splinters. “Though it’s kind of nice being treated like a princess, I admit.”

“You
are
a princess.”

Stevie’s grin widened. “Still amazes the hell out of me.”

Giuliana dipped her spoon in the chocolate ice cream. “You were the one who loved your fairy tales.”

“Yeah. We always thought of Allie as the big romantic, but it turns out I’m the real daydream believer.”

“Any doubts that our little sister had about happy endings have been put to rest by Penn.”

Stevie nodded, then the curve of her mouth flattened, and she reached for Giuliana’s free hand, clasping it with her slender fingers. “She told me. She told me about your baby. I’m so sorry.”

Had she admitted that to Alessandra only this morning? “It was Liam’s, too,” she murmured, remembering that anguish she’d seen in Jack when he thought about losing the child he’d made with Stevie. She returned her sister’s grip. “But that was a long time ago and your doctor said you’re fine. Your pregnancy isn’t in any danger.”

“No.” She placed her hand over her belly. There was just the slightest of curves. With her height, Stevie was going to be one of those enviable women who looked the same from the back for nine months and only showed a cute bump from the front. “But, Jules . . . no matter what happened . . . it’s Jack who makes me feel safe.”

Giuliana slipped her hand from her sister’s. “That’s nice.” Her glance wandered away, and caught on the leather-bound book also on the table. She reached for it, then snatched her hand away. “You have Anne’s diary?”

“Don’t think I don’t know you slipped it back into Allie’s tote bag the other day.” Stevie dropped her spoon in the ice cream carton, then snagged the book and drew it close to her. With a gentle finger, she flipped it open and started turning pages with a delicate movement. The handwriting was heavily slanted and faded in some places. They’d raced through it on the first reading, sometimes being forced to give up on the meaning of a passage, the ink was so washed-out. They’d been so eager, if not exactly hopeful, to find a clue to the treasure.

And if they’d now discovered it . . . “Selling the wedding bells won’t change things,” she warned her sister.

Stevie looked up.

Giuliana appreciated her dead insides now. If her decision about the land was upsetting her sister, Giuliana found she couldn’t feel it. And she had the advantage of logic on her side! “No matter how much we could get for the topper, if that’s indeed what it is, we’d eventually run through that money, too, to keep the winery going.”

“We could still turn it all around,” Stevie said, her voice mild. “Did Allie tell you? We’ve sold out the Vow-Over Weekend.”

Giuliana shook her head. “Why would you want to prolong this? We’ve lost so much already . . .” She focused on Stevie’s finger, leafing through the book page by page. “We lost Mom and Papa.” She’d lost her baby and Liam and she might lose her sisters if she didn’t convince them that her approach was best.

She grabbed her sister’s moving hand and held tight. “We can cut those losses if we get out from under Tanti Baci now. It will make it easier to walk away.”

“You ran away before, Jules. How did that work out for you?”

Her sister’s comment couldn’t pierce the anesthetized casing around Giuliana’s heart. It only frustrated her and she sat back in her chair, Stevie’s hand sliding from hers.

The younger woman tapped the old diary. “Anne faced a similar problem to you, when you think about it,” she said. “Her family was against her choice, making her decision that much more difficult.”

She glanced up at Stevie. “Yeah. And she ignored their wishes to turn her back on Liam.”

Her sister’s mouth quirked. “We don’t have to repeat the past quite so literally, do we? The point I’m trying to make is that if you love something—or someone—you don’t just give up on it. Remember what Anne wrote? The lesson that ended all her indecision and heartache? She had to learn to live without fear.”

Giuliana sighed. Living wasn’t a problem. But with her dead heart and her weary soul, she figured she’d lost her capacity to love . . . and she didn’t really regret it.

19

They closed the winery to tours and tastings on Thursday before the Vow-Over Weekend so they could prepare for the event. Still, Tanti Baci was swarming with people: those setting up the large tents they’d rented, others delivering chairs and tables, the caterer and her assistant doing a walk-through to determine the final placement of the planned food and beverage stations. The
Wedding Fever
TV production crew had been in and out.

Giuliana had her own long list of tasks to accomplish, as did her sisters, their husbands, and even Liam. They moved around each other like watch parts, ignoring the underlying tension.

Allie, with Stevie and the men behind her, had cornered Giuliana first thing in the morning, right after the impromptu meeting they’d held in the small conference room to hash out some last-minute details. “You’ll do your part this weekend, right?”

“What?” she’d said. “Of course I will.”

“Just checking.” Her little sister’s dark eyes were flinty. “I wasn’t sure, since you’re selling the place and on your way out of town again . . .”

“I’ll put in one hundred percent,” Giuliana declared. She’d felt herself bristling at the questioning, but then she’d forced herself to let her insult go. Her family was upset by her decision, she got that. The only way she could hope to salvage a relationship with them was to do everything she could during Vow-Over and believe that there’d be some resultant, healing goodwill.

“You’ll see,” she’d promised them all. “Whatever needs doing, I’ll be doing it.”

With that, they’d called a tacit truce that she hoped would last until the last guest on Sunday left the property. And it didn’t seem there’d be time to do battle anyway. Workers needed direction, vendors had questions, the phones were ringing off the hook.

The high point of her morning: she opened a supply closet and found Kohl and Grace in a clinch. The couple had sprung apart, but the younger woman had turned a pretty shade of pink while Kohl just looked pleased with himself. “I misplaced my tool belt,” Kohl said. “Grace knew right where I’d left it.” She didn’t point out that it was at the couple’s feet, as if it had just been unfastened.

The low point came when she faced off with Liam in the winery caves. She was pushing a dolly loaded with cases of the wedding
blanc de blancs
on their way to Anne and Alonzo’s cottage. They would be serving the wedding wine there to couples and their guests following the renewal of their vows.

He was frowning down at his cell phone as he strode forward and she had to stop or mow him down with the dolly. Since it wasn’t easy to maneuver, he nearly walked right into it. At the last second, his feet halted and he looked up.

It was the first time they’d been alone together since their confrontation in the parking lot at the bar. She’d felt dead inside then, and now wasn’t different. Though she was aware of her thumping heart, her emotions were still flatlining. She realized, suddenly, that the detachment she’d always cursed in Liam was hers.

It was a mode of self-protection, of course. A withdrawal from pain. The aloofness wasn’t arrogance at all.

“Sorry,” she said.

He shoved his phone in the pocket of his jeans. With them, he wore a ratty T-shirt that had a rip in the sleeve. It was a very un-Liam-like look. After the bar night, he’d likely had a hangover, but a few days of recuperation didn’t appear to have done much good. “Sorry for what?” he asked, his voice tired.

It wasn’t the time to share insights. She was tired, too. “I’m in your way.” It was the first thing that came into her head and she gestured to the dolly.

His half smile was wry. “Yeah. I’m kinda used to that, though.”

“Only for a little while longer.”

“I remember.” He nodded. “We’ve almost finished up with your four weeks to freedom.”

She’d said those words. Talk about arrogance. Though she didn’t feel much besides a dull twinge, she could admit now that escape from the past and from the ties of Tanti Baci wasn’t an option. No matter where she went, she’d carry them with her.

She pushed the handcart forward, and Liam stepped to the side to allow her to pass. As she made her way toward the doors, she could feel his gaze on her back.

“Your things are still at my house,” he called. “If you drop by anytime before seven o’clock tonight, you’ll have the place to yourself.”

If she was careful, she wouldn’t even have to face him alone again.

“Perfect,” she called back. “I’ll leave my key behind.”

The next hours flew by as she continued knocking items off her to-do list. Of course, others were added to the bottom, and she was interrupted often to give an opinion, hold the end of a tape measure, or plug in an extension cord. After a quick lunch break, it continued in the same vein. When she realized how thirsty she was, she loaded a wheelbarrow with ice and drinks, and rolled it around, offering beverages to all and sundry.

Passing the wedding cottage, she heard murmuring voices. With a quartet of cold water bottles in her hands, she mounted the steps and peeked inside. The florist and her assistants were tying flower holders and ribbons to the ends of each of the boxed benches. On the weekend, they’d fill them with blooms.

“Water anyone?” Giuliana called out to the women. “Or anything else you need, since I’m free at the moment.” It took a second for her to absorb their suddenly alarmed expressions. It took just another before a loud sound started emanating from a far corner. A third passed before she identified the noise.

A baby was crying.

Delle Michaels, the fifty-something florist, grimaced and put down her tools. “She’s awake.” With quick strides, she made her way to a infant carrier and pulled a wiggling bundle in pink free. The child quieted. “My four-month-old granddaughter,” she explained to Giuliana. “I love her to pieces, but when she’s awake, she’s a snuggler, which is not conducive to work that requires wire and pliers.”

“Maybe if we put her closer to us,” one of her assistants suggested. “If she sees us moving around she’ll be content in the carrier.”

“Maybe,” Delle said, and put the baby down.

The crying started again.

“We won’t get everything done on time,” a second assistant cautioned, “unless we’re all working.”

With a sigh, Delle retrieved the baby and kissed her on her chubby cheeks when the child instantly stopped the waterworks. “I know, I know.” She sent an apologetic glance at Giuliana. “My son and daughter-in-law had an emergency babysitting need.”

“Sure,” Giuliana said, backing toward the door. “I understand.”

“Terrific!” Delle smiled in relief. “So you won’t mind holding her for an hour, will you, Giuliana? Or until she falls asleep, whichever comes first.”

“
Me?
” Giuliana took another step in retreat. “I mean, I, uh . . .”

“You said you were free,” Delle reminded her, bustling forward. “And you like babies, right?”

“Well, uh . . .” And before she could come up with another excuse, Delle placed the pink bundle in her arms.

She tucked a thin flannel blanket around the baby. “See? She’s quiet again already. Her name is Molly.” Delle patted Giuliana’s arm. “Take her for a walk. If she doesn’t see Grammy, she’s probably even less likely to fuss.”

Giuliana swallowed. “I . . .” Then her own words came back to her.
Whatever needs doing, I’ll be doing it.
“We’ll be just fine, Delle.”

She’d go find one of her sisters and pass the infant off. “You understand,” she said to the baby as she descended the cottage’s porch steps, her gaze already roaming for a familiar face. “It’s nothing personal.”

The baby wiggled in her arms, and Giuliana hitched her closer. “Nothing personal,” she repeated, glancing down at the round cheeks, the baby mouth with its pronounced upper lip, the big blue eyes.

Molly’s eyes.

Giuliana stared down at her. “It’s no Fabulosa Magnifica or Myauntiescool Andspoilsme,” she murmured.

The child responded with a squirm and wrinkles developed on her tiny forehead. She appeared annoyed.

“But it’s not a bad name,” Giuliana hastened to say. “Molly has a very nice ring to it.”

The lines smoothed out, as if she was appeased by the compliment. So Giuliana kept talking as she walked, and Molly’s eyes fastened onto her face as if the conversation was riveting. What was riveting, Giuliana thought, was the feel of the infant against her. Though she was light, Molly was surprisingly . . . solid. And warm. She didn’t remember a baby being so warm.

Giuliana wasn’t sure she’d ever actually held one in her arms. Like every other teenage girl, she’d babysat on many occasions, but her charges had been toddler-sized. The kind you ran after or rolled a ball to, not the kind you held close to your chest. Heart to heart.

Instead of heading to the administrative offices, where she’d most likely discover a sister, Giuliana found herself turning into the vineyard. “Have you seen grapes growing before, Molly?” she asked, turning in a slow circle in the red dirt. Silt coated the bottom of her thongs and crept onto the bare parts of her feet.

Good Baci dirt.

“Aren’t the grapes pretty?” She tilted her arms so that the baby could see a pale green cluster.

Healthy Baci grapes.

“We’ll make wine with them next fall.”

Traditional Tanti Baci wine.

“When you grow up, Molly, maybe at your wedding you’ll serve the
blanc de blancs
that’s from the grapes grown at this very vineyard.”

If the Bristol brothers decided to continue making it.

If they didn’t decide to scrap one hundred years of Baci history. Once the land was sold to them, they could yank out the vines and plant plums or pears or any number of things, just like growers had done during Prohibition. Or they could let her family’s land go fallow. Unused. Lifeless.

What Giuliana had been feeling inside.

The baby made a little noise, and Giuliana looked into those serious blue eyes. Her gaze was strangely wise, she thought, and then the rosebud mouth moved. Curved.

Giuliana froze, the smile piercing her breast with a smooth stroke. It found her heart, and the bittersweet pain jolted it awake.

“Oh, Molly,” she whispered. “Oh, no.”

The baby wiggled against her and Giuliana shifted her closer, cuddling that warm, pliable weight against her. Her skin smelled of soap, her downy hair was soft against Giuliana’s lips. Molly didn’t seem the least bit bothered by the rain of Giuliana’s tears on the crown of her head.

She was feeling again.
Oh, God.
Feeling everything.

From her connection to the land at her feet to the ache of love in her chest.

Just as Molly was no inanimate doll, neither was Giuliana—though perhaps she’d been living like that for the last year. Going through the motions of being a Baci and a sister without taking a real breath as either one. She’d railed at Liam’s closed-off emotions, but she’d been no better, using that as an excuse to keep away from him and everyone else in Edenville for the last ten years.

He’d hidden his emotions away.

She’d hidden from everyone who might cause her to have any beyond the most superficial.

She said she didn’t believe in second chances, when it was really that she didn’t want to risk trying again. Losing her mother and then losing the baby and then losing Liam had left her so bereft.

“Oh, Molly,” she whispered. She tried brushing away the flow of tears with the back of her hand, but they continued to fall. “Allie was right. If we don’t look for what we’ve lost, then we lose everything.”

She spun again in the dirt, more slowly this time, to absorb the beauty of her surroundings. Stark blue sky, fertile earth, lush vines.

Growing grapes.

It was all so beautiful it made her eyes sting all over again.

“Let me tell you how it works, Molly,” she said, rubbing her wet cheek against the baby’s head. “When you harvest the grapes, you have to deal with the bees. I always get a sting or two when we’re picking. But that’s part of the process. You have to take the pain here and there if you want to hold that sweet, warm fruit in the palm of your hand.”

She took another breath of the baby’s delicate scent and then held her away to look into her serene gaze. “I’d forgotten that.”

A breeze caught her hair. It stirred the leaves on the vines and felt like a chilled breath against her skin. Prickles stung the back of her neck and instinct took over, causing her arms to draw Molly close again and her shoulders to round, creating a haven of her body for the child.

“Jules!”

Liam. Relief coursed through her and she turned toward his voice. He stood at the end of the row, staring at her. She saw herself as he would: dusty feet, tear-wet cheeks, baby. Her heart lurched in her chest, remembering what he’d said to her in the bar.

Don’t go, Jules. Don’t leave me again.

She saw this clearly, too, now: she’d been the one to run. He’d left Tuscany before she did, but he’d been at home all this time.

He paced toward her, his gaze never moving off her and Molly. “What’s wrong? You’re crying.”