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  “Well, to be perfectly honest, if I had known my parents cared about me at all, I probably wouldn’t have been out in the woods getting drunk back when I was sixteen. If my father had shown me even a tiny bit of affection when my mother died. If, when she knew she was dying, my mother had at least had a deathbed confession of love, maybe I wouldn’t have found Jared quite so appealing. But Violet must know how much Cain loves her.”

  “I can see why you would think that,” Lane said. “But the thing is, he’s not very verbal about it. He does a lot for her, and I can see what that means. I can see that it means that he loves her, and so can you. But I’m not sure that a sixteen-year-old girl who was abandoned by her mother is going to interpret it in the same way.”

  “I guess not,” Alison said, feeling strangely defensive of Cain. Though she supposed at this point it wasn’t that strange if she felt defensive of the man who had made her body feel better than it had in years. Maybe better than it had ever felt.

  Grassroots Winery was right next to a river, the sound of the rushing water audible through the thick grove of trees that separated it from the sleek, manicured lawns and paths around the buildings.

  Alison knew there was a dining area down by the water, but it didn’t get a lot of use outside of summer since it was a good ten degrees cooler there thanks to the rushing rapids and dense tree cover.

  Pale light filtered in through the pines, casting a golden glow over the grass, dappling the parking lot. It smelled different here, miles from the ocean. Like wood, moss and pine. Heavy and rich like the forest itself.

  The tasting room was fashioned from a beautifully reconstructed old barn, the beams glowing a deep amber color in the sunlight, the grounds around well manicured and lushly green.

  The vineyard stretched gloriously behind the tasting room, tables and a gazebo situated in perfect placement for catching the vast mountain view behind the winery in wedding pictures.

  It wasn’t Lindy who greeted them though, but a petite blonde who looked to be in her early twenties. She had a pale, drawn look to her, in spite of the fact that she affected a broad smile when Alison and Lane approached.

  “Hi,” she said, “welcome to Grassroots. Lindy told me that you would be here, and that I was supposed to direct you to the tasting room. I’m Clara.”

  Alison thought the other girl seemed vaguely familiar, like someone she might have known back when she was a child.

  “Have we met before?” Alison asked.

  “Probably,” Clara said, forcing another smile. Alison couldn’t help but notice that her smiles disappeared completely between them, her mouth edging into a firm, grim line. There was something about the solemn expression that gave her déjà vu.

  “I doubt you and I went to school together, but do you have older siblings?”

  This time Clara didn’t attempt a smile. “A brother.”

  “Okay. What’s his name?”

  “His name was Jason,” she said, her voice flat. “He’s dead.”

  Alison felt immediate regret. If there was one thing she knew all about, it was the insensitive questions of strangers, or, sometimes even more oppressive, the silence of them. “I’m sorry,” she said simply.

  “Me too. Lindy hired me to fill a temporary vacancy here at the tasting room, and that worked for me. Staying busy is best for me right at the moment. Anyway, you aren’t here to hear about my tragedies. If you want to bring the baked goods inside, I can have some of the other staff members take care of putting it all away.”

  “I’ll be doing the wedding cake tomorrow,” Alison said. “I’ll deliver it just before everything starts, and I’ll be here to help serve.”

  “Perfect,” Clara said. “Do you want my help carrying in trays?”

  “You probably shouldn’t leave your post. We’ve got it.”

  Alison and Lane headed back to the truck to collect the trays of pies and cookies, and when they had a decent amount of distance between themselves and Clara, she groaned. “Nothing like asking the wrong question.”

  “You didn’t know,” Lane said. “It’s not like you did it on purpose. Not like when that old bitch in the diner asked you how Jared was when she knew full well that you had left him because he was an abusive ass. And that Sheriff Garrett had basically run him out of town on a rail after he made a scene at the Fourth of July barbecue.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Alison stepped up onto the bumper of the truck, then leaned down and picked up a tray filled with pies. “I had almost forgotten about that.”

  Except of course she hadn’t. It had been the thing that had finally made her go. Not more beating in private. That full, public humiliation. Not just in the parking lot of the diner after work, but at a place where she had been trying to...she’d been trying.

  Sadie Garrett had invited her to bring pies for the first annual barbecue on Garrett Ranch, and for the first time in years she’d felt a spark of something.

  And her husband had come in swinging his fists, and he’d ruined it. Like he’d ruined everything in her life during the course of their marriage.

  Sadie had helped her find just enough with that offer of baking pies, that she’d been able to see a different future.

  And she’d taken it.

  Unlike when she’d been nineteen, she hadn’t let a painful event propel her right into another one. Into another person who would just use her without giving anything back.

  She had decided to stand on her own two feet. And she’d been doing it ever since.

  Lane grimaced. “Sorry to bring it up.”

  “No. It really is okay. I guess that’s the thing. Sometimes, it’s not the worst to remember bad things. Sometimes it’s actually good. I’m in a really good place right now, Lane. And a few years ago I didn’t think that was possible. A few years ago I didn’t see anything stretching ahead of me but...” Her throat tightened unexpectedly, emotion gripping her. “Well, anyway. I’m in a good place now. And everything that happened in the past... It can’t hurt me now. He can’t hurt me now.”

  She was feeling particularly renewed after reclaiming that long-forgotten part of herself last night. Quite happily renewed, even.

  “That’s good. Very good that he’s not holding you back anymore.” Lane let silence lapse between them for about half a second, then her whole tone changed. “So does that mean that you can call Cain now and tell him that you want his body?”

  Alison nearly stumbled, quickly reclaiming her grip on the pie tray. “What?”

  “You want him. You have wanted him since you first saw him. I wasn’t there, and I could still tell when you recounted it. So what’s holding you back?”

  “The little matter of the fact that his daughter is my employee,” she said, lying like a lying liar, “and that everything in his life is so complicated.” She cleared her throat. “Plus, who even knows if he wants me?”

  “He’s a man. He is a man who has been alone for a very long time.”

  “Wow. That’s friendship for you. None of this, of course he wants you, Alison, because you’re so beautiful, and witty, and charming, and of course he won’t mind the fact that you’re barely a B cup out of your Wonderbra, Alison. Because you’re a special glitter princess who has no equal.”

  “Is that really a Wonderbra?” Lane asked, directing her gaze to Alison’s breasts.

  “I don’t know. It’s an off-brand. But it is padded. My point is, I’m not looking for an entanglement.” She took one hand off the tray and gestured broadly. “And...and...”

  “And you slept with him already, didn’t you?” Lane asked, her eyes suddenly far too keen and intelligent for Alison’s taste.

  Alison turned her focus determinedly to the landscape. “I can honestly tell you I have not slept in that man’s presence.”

  “Right. But have you seen his pen
is?”

  Warmth and color flooded Alison’s face. “Maybe.”

  “Ha! I knew it! Were you ever going to tell me?” Lane’s tone was borderline shrill.

  “Yes,” Alison said. “I was going to tell you.”

  “Even if I hadn’t guessed?” she pressed.

  “Yes. I’m pretty sure.”

  “Pretty sure?”

  “It just happened last night. It’s not like I’ve been keeping it some big massive secret for weeks.”

  “How did I miss that?” Lane looked at her, her expression filled with scrutiny. “You’re glowing. You have sex glow.”

  “I do not have sex glow,” she grumped. “That isn’t a real thing.”

  “Yes,” Lane said, “it is. Trust me. I know. Because I was feeling really upset about the fact that Rebecca and Cassie were radiating it a few months ago when I felt bleak and lifeless and definitely without a glow.”

  “Well, now we’re all glowing.” She lifted her hand in a gesture of triumph, then the tray wobbled slightly and she grabbed it again quickly. “I glow, you glow.”

  Lane’s expression brightened and she quickened her pace down the path toward the tasting room. “Wow. Finn’s brother. You’re sleeping with Finn’s brother.”

  “Don’t say that like it’s significant. It isn’t. I like Cain a lot, but this thing that’s happening between us... It’s only physical.”

  “Why? Why would you limit yourself like that?”

  “I don’t consider it a limitation. From my point of view.” She paused for a moment while they walked into the tasting room. There were tall tables made from barrels situated throughout the room, with roughhewn stools positioned around them. Twinkling lights hung on crossbeams overhead—a special decoration for the wedding, she had a feeling—and there was a large rustic chandelier that also seemed to be made from parts of old barrels.

  Alison made absolutely sure the room was empty before she continued to talk. “From my point of view relationships have never been about freedom. My life, the way that it is now? It’s the best it’s ever been. And now I have the very best part of a man on top of it. His body. And all the freedom and autonomy that I want. My life can continue to be all about me while I have great sex. That, my friend, is what they call having your cake and coming too.”

  “I don’t think that that’s... I don’t actually think that’s the saying,” Lane said, setting her tray down on the far counter. Alison did the same.

  “Whatever,” Alison said, “it’s what I say.”

  They walked back out of the tasting room and toward the truck, a strong breeze from the ocean sending her curls straight into her face. She smoothed them back while Lane continued to lecture.

  “I would just hate for you to discount relationships because of something bad that happened to you. And I’m aware that this is a different conversation than the one the two of us had a few months ago. Where we were both kind of supporting each other’s desire to stay single. But...”

  “I know,” Alison said. “You’ve crossed over. You’ve reached the other side. You pierced the veil. And now you see the light, and you have love, and you’re living your happily-ever-after. I’m not trying to minimize what you went through, Lane. I understand that having the baby and being abandoned by your boyfriend and shunned by your family was really difficult. And I completely get why it took you a long time to decide that you wanted to move forward with your life. But this is different for me. I actually thought I found my happy ending once. I thought I had my Prince Charming. I didn’t marry Jared knowing he was going to use me for a punching bag. I just wanted love. I wanted what everybody else wants. And I thought I had it.”

  She folded her arms over her midsection, trying to keep the unexpected twinge of pain that had popped up from spreading. As if she could keep it localized by gripping her own ribs. “But that’s not even the worst part. It’s what I became over the course of that marriage. It’s all the pieces of myself that I lost, that I gave to him, that I’ve only just now started to get back. I don’t want to lose those. Not again. It isn’t just that I didn’t like the man I was with. I didn’t like the woman I became. I like who I am now. I’m not going to risk that.”

  Lane frowned, her dark eyebrows locked together. “Right. I guess I can’t argue with that.”

  “No,” Alison said, “you can’t.” They walked on in silence for a moment, no sound but the gravel crunching beneath their feet.

  “He’s good in bed though, right?” Lane asked finally.

  Alison huffed a reluctant laugh. “I mean, in theory. I had him on a bistro table.”

  “You what?”

  A smug smile tugged at the corner of Alison’s lips. She was never the one with a story. She was never the femme fatale. The fact that she was right now both amusing and wholly satisfying.

  “In the bakery,” she continued, suddenly feeling downright chipper.

  “You’re going to have to tell me which table. So that I can avoid it. Or don’t, I guess. But then every table is a potential sex table. It’s Schrödinger’s sex table.”

  “The one in the far corner, in the very back. There. Now you know. You don’t have to wonder. You won’t be plagued with speculating.”

  “Thank you.”

  She hesitated for a second. She’d told Cain to keep all of this to himself, and not to go telling his brothers. But Lane was...linked to the Donnelly family and there was no getting around it. “I don’t suppose the odds are great that you aren’t going to tell Finn?”

  “I tell Finn everything. I always have. I mean, even before we were together, he was my best friend. I don’t really do the secret thing from him. I mean, except for the giant secret that I kept from him for years about my past. But that’s not how I do things anymore. I share now.”

  “Cain doesn’t want his daughter to know. And I don’t either. It would make things really weird. Can you even imagine knowing that your dad is having sex with someone, let alone somebody that you have to interact with? Also, he has a whole thing about it seeming like a bad example.”

  “He doesn’t want to have to get into the whole do as I say and not as I do on a bistro table conversation?”

  “Not especially.”

  “You can trust Finn. I mean, you can trust him not to spread it around, I don’t know if you can trust him not to say something to Cain and in general be an ass, because he kind of excels at that.”

  “That’s fine. I mean, Cain was going to tell them that he was sleeping with somebody, because he figured he would need his ass covered sometimes.”

  “Wow. You guys have this all planned out, don’t you?” Lane sounded a bit too amused by that. Especially when there was nothing funny about it. “Yeah. We do,” Alison said.

  “So did Finn and I,” Lane said, her tone now dripping with smugness. “Good luck with that.”

  “Don’t say that. You don’t know me. I think I can handle this.”

  “Honey. I do know you. And, for as long as I’ve been your friend, you haven’t had a relationship at all. So, I’m just saying, things might not go as smoothly as you think they will.”

  “I don’t see why not. We’re very compatible in every way. Both of us really liked what happened between us, and neither of us wants a relationship. Plus, it isn’t like you and Finn. Cain’s not my friend. He never has been. I saw him, and I wanted him. And now I’m having him. I’ve had a shortage of that kind of thing in my life. I’m taking it by the horns, so to speak.”

  A sly smile curved Lane’s lips. “Grabbing hold of it with both hands.”

  “Stop it,” Alison scolded.

  “What? I’m just saying.”

  “Well, just say your way into the tasting room. We’ve got stuff to do. I can’t sit around and trade double entendres with you.” She cleared her throat,
shooting her friend a very prim expression. “But it definitely takes both hands if you want to grab onto it.”

  Lane let out a crack of laughter. “Okay. I can let it go now. Because that satisfied me so very deeply.”

  “Good. I’m glad that you’re satisfied.”

  And for the moment, Alison felt like she might be too—a rare and wonderful occurrence. She was just going to enjoy it. Because up until now she had had spare few moments of enjoyment, and she felt like she deserved this.

  Heck, from where she was standing, feeling like she deserved much of anything was a pretty big achievement in itself.

  She paused in front of the tasting room, looking at the scenery around her, then down at the tray of goodies in her hands. All of these steps she was taking. All the richness, the layers and textures she was adding to this existence that she had carved out for herself in such a desperate, bloody-knuckled way in the beginning. It was all starting to look beautiful.

  And she was happy.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “ALISON IS COMING over tonight.”

  Cain looked up from his dinner and stared at his daughter, who had just come flouncing into the kitchen before hoisting herself up onto the island next to where he was eating. “Okay.”

  He was impressed that he had managed to keep his tone neutral, considering every male hormone inside him had stood up at full attention at the mention of Alison’s name. He wondered why she hadn’t texted him to let him know. But then, he had to wonder if it was because she was trying to keep her interaction with Violet separate from her interaction with him. Or at least trying to keep their personal connection separate. She was supposed to use her connection to Violet to give him some insight.

  “What are you working on tonight?” he asked, trying his best to seem unaffected by the mention of Alison, and interested in what was happening.