Moonlight and Roses

Jaye resisted the urge to fiddle with the end of her braid. “Actually, I didn’t go with my dad that time. I stayed behind to look after things at the vineyard.”

“That explains it then,” Zack said. “I never forget a face.”

“I never forget a wine. Your chardonnay was exceptional that year.” It was a relief to return to the subject of grapes. She always felt on firm footing when the discussion centered on business.

“Yes, Holland’s was,” he said. Again, he seemed to distance himself from taking any credit. “I think Medallion’s has the potential to be even better.”

“Really?” she asked, too intrigued to act blasé.

“I wouldn’t have bought this vineyard if I felt otherwise,” he replied.

The reminder of the winery’s change in ownership tempered her enthusiasm. “I see.”

“I was disappointed I didn’t get a chance to meet you when I toured Medallion before making my initial offer,” Zack said.

“I was out of the country at the time.”

He nodded. “A buying trip. France, I believe your mother told me.”

“Margaret is my stepmother.” She snapped out the correction. “I was not informed of your visit until well after my return. In fact, I wasn’t informed that the vineyard had changed hands until after the deal was done.”

He blinked in surprise. “I…I didn’t realize.”

Jaye saw no point in beating around the bush. “Medallion should have been mine.”

“But your father didn’t leave it to you.”

His equally blunt statement had her bristling. “Dad thought he could micromanage a peace treaty between his second wife and me from the grave. He was wrong.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t want your pity,” she replied.

“Actually, that was an expression of sympathy,” he said, making her feel small.

Jaye paced to the window in an effort to regroup. Her anger, justified as it was, was of no use here. So she moderated her tone and said evenly, “I want the vineyard, Mr. Holland. I’m prepared to offer you what you paid plus a little something extra for your trouble.”

“Why don’t you call me Zack? And it looks like we have a problem.” He joined her at the window. “I want Medallion, too. I’m not interested in selling.”

His reply was nothing less than Jaye had expected. After all, she had made the same offer to Margaret without success. Yet the disappointment of hearing him say the words nearly leveled her.

“Is that going to be an issue for you?” he asked.

She swallowed her outrage along with a good helping of pride. “I don’t have much choice but to accept that you’ll be the one calling the shots from now on.”

To her surprise, he laughed out loud. “Gee, that sounds convincing.”

“I said I would accept it. I didn’t say anything about liking it.”

“Ah. Thanks for the clarification.”

While Zack appeared amused, Jaye was dead serious when she said, “I’m very good at my job. I…I would appreciate it if you would allow me to stay on.”

He nodded. “I’d like that. You know the local people, not to mention the regional quirks of the Great Lakes growing season, far better than I do at this point. I’d like you to manage things.”

“But I’m the head vintner. Tom Worley manages Medallion’s operation.”

“Not anymore. He’ll be reassigned or offered a compensation package. Think you can handle it?”

She bristled at his tone. “There’s not a job at Medallion I haven’t done at one time or another. My father thought it was important to know the business inside and out. He didn’t believe you could be an effective leader without understanding the jobs of the people you were leading.”

“Is that a subtle barb?” he asked.

“Of course not.” Before she could censor the thought, she added, “I wasn’t trying to be subtle.”

She expected him to be annoyed, perhaps angry. Instead he laughed.

“Do you think I’ve never worked a harvest or shoveled grapes into a crusher?”

“Have you?” Jaye asked.

“Yes. But I don’t think I have to work every job to understand its demands or to appreciate the people I pay to perform it.”

“Fair enough. So, if I’m no longer head vintner, who’ll be in charge of winemaking?” she asked.

Zack only smiled.

“You?” Her tone was incredulous, so much so it bordered on insulting.

“No need to look so shocked. I have some prior experience,” he informed her.

Jaye wasn’t impressed by his claim. All she could see was that she would have her hands full in the coming months, likely pulling double duty while he dabbled. She cleared her throat. “I believe in being honest.”

“That’s good to know,” he said slowly.

“I’ll stay on, managing and assisting with the winemaking when necessary—”

“You’re already assuming I’ll need your help?”

“I said I believe in being honest.”

“Yes, but what about tactful?” he asked wryly.

“I’ll work on it.”

“Fair enough,” he replied.

“As I said, I’ll stay on, but I won’t be doing it for you or even for the paycheck.”

His eyes narrowed. “Go on.”

“I’ve got an investment here that goes well beyond money. Your name might be on the deed now, but make no mistake, Mr. Holland—”

“Zack,” he said, for the first time sounding truly annoyed. “My name is Zack.”

“Fine. Zack. I want Medallion. And I plan to keep making you fair offers for its sale until you finally accept one. I don’t give up easily.”

“So I’ve noticed.” Then his expression turned oddly grim. “Do you love it that much?”

“Love it?” Jaye shook her head, not surprised in the least that someone who could walk away from his family’s land would fail to understand the attachment she had to hers. “This vineyard is everything to me.”

“Everything? It’s just a place. It’s not…people.”

“No. It’s more reliable than people.” She hadn’t meant to say that. Thankfully, he didn’t understand her meaning.

“It’s dirt and vines. It’s real estate, an investment,” he countered, blue eyes glittering like ice.

“Is that all it is to you?”

Zack didn’t say anything, although for a moment she thought she saw something contradictory flicker in his expression. Then it was gone.

“Well, that’s not all it is to me.” She glanced back out the window. Her voice was low, her tone reverent when she added, “My dad and I built Medallion from nothing. It’s…it’s my life.”

CHAPTER TWO

ZACK spent the following week getting acquainted with the winery’s day-to-day operations and the people who performed them. As he’d told Jaye on the first day, other than the manager and the vintner, he didn’t have any immediate plans to let people go, change their duties or make new hires, but neither did he intend to maintain the status quo. He saw potential at Medallion for greater profit, just as he saw potential for a superior product. He planned to achieve both.

Zack had something to prove.

He was sitting at his desk late Friday going through invoices when the telephone rang. It was his mother.

“I thought I’d call since you haven’t.” Judith Holland’s tone held teasing censure as well as a little hurt. He regretted that. It wasn’t his intention to wound her.

“Sorry. It’s been a busy couple weeks. The harvest is beginning,” he said.

“Here, too.” It was her subtle way of saying she didn’t buy his excuse.

“How is it looking?” he couldn’t help asking. Hearing her voice had made him a little homesick for California and the vineyard he’d left behind. Winemaking was in his blood. It had been in the Holland blood for three generations.

“Good,” she said. “Ross says it will be a better yield than last year, especially for the Sangioveses.”

“That must please Dad.” The Italian varietal was one of his father’s personal favorites.

“It does. Phillip thinks we should expand that section of the vineyard and increase our production, given the rise in popularity of the wine.”

“Of course he does.” Zack’s mood soured. He’d suggested the very same thing to his father two years ago without success, but only because Phillip had been against it at the time.

Phillip was Zack’s cousin but the two men were more like brothers. They had been raised together after a car accident had left a four-year-old Phillip orphaned. Zack had been two at the time. Over the years the pair had butted heads often, enjoying what his mother termed sibling rivalry. It had run deeper than that. Now as adults, Holland Farms and their opposing visions for it posed the biggest source of friction.

No matter what innovations or changes Zack proposed, to make the staid winery stand out in a changing and ever more competitive marketplace, his cousin effectively vetoed them. It wasn’t that Phillip had any more say or power than Zack did. No, what he had was more damning. He had Zack’s father’s ear. He’d always had his father’s ear.

“How is old Phil these days?” Zack drawled. “Still sitting to the right hand of the father?”

“Zackary.” Judith’s tone sounded more weary than scolding.

“Sorry.” And he was. He hadn’t meant to put his mother in the middle.

She seemed satisfied with the apology. “Your cousin is well.”

“And Mira?”

“She’s well, too.” The words came out slowly.

“They’re still together then?” he asked.

Zack’s fiancée’s affections had soured quickly when he began talking about selling off his share of Holland Farms and shopping for his own vineyard. Soon after ending things with Zack, she’d turned up on Phillip’s arm at his family’s annual charity ball. It had been a hell of blow to his ego to learn that she’d considered the vineyard to be Zack’s most appealing attribute.

“Yes.” Judith cleared her throat before continuing. “In fact, she and Phillip recently became engaged.”

It wasn’t heartache he felt. He’d moved beyond that. What was left was bitterness. “Proof that one Holland is as good as the next as long as he comes with a stake in the land,” he sneered.

“Zackary, please. It’s been nearly a year. Don’t be like that.”

“Like what, Mother? Honest?” He snorted. “Apparently I’m the only one so afflicted in our family. Everyone else just tiptoes around the fact that my cousin has always taken what belongs to me.”

She didn’t dispute that. Instead, she said, “They love one another.”

“They love Holland and the lifestyle it affords them,” Zack countered.

“You used to love Holland, too.”

“Yes. I loved it enough to want to see it evolve.” He let out a sigh. “It’s not worth getting into again. Not over the phone and not with you, Mom.” She’d always been in his corner. “I know you supported my ideas.”

“I did and I still do. I know you’ll do well.” There was a hitch in her voice when she said, “I just wish Michigan weren’t so far away.”

“It’s just a plane ride,” he said lightly.

“Yes, just a plane ride,” she repeated. Then, “Are you upset about Mira?”

“Not the way you think.”

“Good. Mira is a nice young woman, but she wasn’t right for you, Zack. You never would have been happy married to her,” Judith said.

“That much we can agree on. So, when are they planning to make it official?”

“In the spring.” She hesitated a moment before asking, “You’ll come home for the wedding, won’t you?”

“What and ruin my black sheep image?” His laughter held no humor. “Sorry, Mom. I think I’ll send my regrets.”

“There will always be a place for you here.” Judith’s voice was low, broken.

“I know that’s how you feel, Mom, and I appreciate it. Really, I do.” Left unsaid was that his father and cousin had long made him feel like an outsider. Mira’s defection had been the final straw. There would be no going back, at least not until he’d achieved some of the ambitious goals he’d set for himself.

“Are you happy?” his mother asked quietly.

“I’m getting there.” The reply wasn’t only for her benefit. Zack meant it.

“That’s good. I want you to be happy even more than I want you here. I love you.”

“I love you, too, Mom.”

After hanging up, he decided to call it a day. The sun had set already, and he was tired and not likely to get much more done—especially now. He felt too unsettled, too restless to sit behind his desk and sift through papers. His stomach rumbled noisily and he realized he was also hungry.

When he stepped out of his office, he noticed that Jaye was still in hers. Through the open door, he could see her hunched at her desk, reading a report. Her hair was in its usual utilitarian braid and she wore a flannel shirt that looked to be at least a couple of sizes too large. A bottle of spring water sat open next to her elbow, and she was munching on a granola bar.

He stopped at her door. “Please tell me that’s not your dinner,” he said.

Jaye glanced up at the sound of his voice and blinked as if trying to focus. In the past week Zack had learned one thing about her: she was no slacker. The woman put in long hours and gave everything she worked on her undivided attention.

“Sorry? What did you say?” she asked.

He motioned toward the bar of rolled oats and raisins she held in one hand. “I was just wondering if that was your dinner.”

“Oh?” She shook her head. “A late lunch, actually.”

“It’s going on seven.”

She glanced in the direction of the window, as if just realizing it was dark outside. “A really late lunch, then,” she said.

He leaned against the doorjamb. “I can see how you manage to stay so slim. Got something against real food?”

“This is real food, but to answer your question, no. I just didn’t have time to stop for a meal today.”

He nodded and straightened, intending to be on his way. But he found himself saying, “I was thinking about grabbing a bite to eat before I head back to my hotel. Would you like to join me?”

Jaye eyed him the way a scientist might study an acutely contagious test subject and said nothing.

“You know, you’re hell on a man’s ego,” Zack drawled, snorting out a laugh afterward.

“Sorry. I just…I just don’t think that we should—”

“What?” He cocked one eyebrow in challenge. “Be friendly? I’m not asking you out, Jaye.” Thinking of Mira and all of the pain and disillusionment she’d caused, he added with great feeling, “Believe me, I’m not interested.”

“And you have the nerve to say I’m hell on the ego,” she replied dryly.

He closed his eyes, rubbed them and sighed. “Sorry. That came out wrong.”

“Bad day?”

Zack shook his head. “Just a long one. A long week, for that matter.” Now the weekend yawned before him. More than likely he would spend it in his office. Better there than alone in a hotel room with nothing to do. “Well, I’ll leave you to your late lunch. See you Monday.”

He was turning to go when Jaye said, “Friday is pizza night.”

He angled back. “Pardon?”

“It’s Geneva’s night off. She’s my housekeeper. She plays bridge with her friends on Fridays, so I make pizza.”

“From scratch?” He was having a hard time picturing Jaye puttering around in a kitchen. She didn’t appear to be the domestic sort, given her affinity for men’s shirts and steel-toed work boots.

She shrugged. “It’s not like it’s rocket science. Besides, I buy the dough already made from a pizzeria in Sutton’s Bay. Saves me time.”

“I see.” He motioned with one hand. “So, are you extending an invitation to me or are you just sharing information?”

His ego took another beating when she took her time answering. “I’m extending an invitation, one coworker to another.”

He decided not to point out that technically he was her boss. “Gee, glad we have that straight.”

Jaye tossed the uneaten portion of her granola bar into the trash. “Give me five minutes to finish up here.”

“Okay. I’ll meet you downstairs.”

Jaye didn’t know what had possessed her to invite Zack to dinner, and at her house no less. She didn’t want him in her home, invading more of her space. But there was no use wasting time regretting it now. The deed was done, and unless she planned to uninvite him, which she didn’t, she was going to be spending the next couple of hours in his company.

The idea wasn’t completely without appeal. She told herself that was because they had winemaking in common, which meant at the very least the conversation would be easy and interesting. Besides, what was that saying? Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Zack wasn’t her enemy exactly, but under the circumstances, neither was he her friend.

Downstairs, the tasting room had closed a couple of hours earlier and all of the employees had long since gone home. Stemmed glasses had been washed and put up, the hardwood surface of the large circular bar had been wiped down, and any opened bottles of wine properly stored. The security lights glowed softly, giving the large space with its vaulted ceiling and exposed oak beams a more intimate feel.

“Zack?” she called out.

“Over here.” He stepped from behind a display of bottles that had been stacked on their sides to keep the corks moist.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“My mom told me never to show up at someone’s home empty-handed, so I’m looking for a little something to go with our dinner.” He flashed an engaging grin that, along with the reference to his mother, made him appear far younger than the midthirties she knew him to be.

Jaye pointed to the next shelf over. “How about the house red?”

“It’s good.” He scratched his chin. “But I was thinking of something a little more…elegant.”

“To go with pizza?”

Zack shrugged. “Is there a rule against that?”

“I guess not.”

“Good. Besides, I feel like celebrating.”

“Let me guess. Ownership of the vineyard?” Her tone was tight.

To her surprise he shook his head. “I was thinking more along the lines of freedom.”

His lips twisted on the last word, as if it had left a foul taste in his mouth. Jaye didn’t press him, even though the cryptic answer certainly made her curious. Freedom from what? Or the more intriguing question: Freedom from whom?

It was none of her business, though. So she asked instead, “If it’s a celebration you have in mind, then how about our 2004 pinot noir?”

“Ah. Now you’re talking.”

He grinned again. This time there was nothing remotely boyish about the way he looked. He was all man, fully grown and way too easy on the eyes. Jaye swallowed. Friend? Enemy? For a moment her traitorous libido seemed interested in drafting an entirely different classification. She chalked it up to long work days and a virtually nonexistent social life, especially when it came to members of the opposite sex.

“I’ll wait for you outside,” she told him, and hastily retreated, happy to stand alone in the frigid moonlight while her pulse returned to normal.

Jaye was leaning against his car when Zack finished locking up the building’s main doors. Unless she had appointments that took her away from the vineyard during the day, he’d noted that she walked the short distance from the house to work.

“Car’s unlocked,” he called. “I should have thought to give you the keys so you could start it up and get the heater going.”

The air held an extra bite tonight, but she didn’t look cold. In fact, her jacket remained unzipped.

“That’s okay. I was just enjoying the peace.”

“It’s like this at night back home, too,” he commented as he drew closer.

“Like what?”

He motioned with the bottle of wine to encompass the dark countryside beyond the lighted parking lot. “Isolated and quiet. It’s easy to forget the rest of the world exists beyond the vineyard once the visitors go home for the day and the sun sets.”

“My dad used to claim I did that even when it was light outside.”

“A bit of a homebody?” Zack asked as he joined her on the passenger side of the car.

“I date.” She sounded slightly defensive.

“I don’t believe I said otherwise, Jaye.” He opened her door. The basic courtesy that was so common on the dates she claimed to go on had her brows lifting. Still, she said nothing as she folded those long legs of hers inside his Mercedes. He wasn’t sure how, but she managed to look graceful even wearing oversize cotton, abused denim and a pair of muddy boots. He took a moment to thank providence for the rubber floor mats he’d installed just the week before.

“It’s just that I work a lot of hours,” she was saying.

“Same here.”

“It’s hard to get out.”

“At times.” Mira, of course, had enjoyed spending time with him at Holland. He frowned.

“Not everyone understands the kind of commitment a vineyard requires.”

“No. Not everyone does,” he agreed. “Of course, there’s a fine line between commitment and obsession.” He moved to close the door, but she put a hand out to stop him.

“Which are you, Zack? Committed or obsessed?”

“I’m…driven,” he replied, deciding there was a difference. This time she let him close the door, but the conversation wasn’t over.

When he settled in behind the wheel, she said, “So, you straddle the line between the two.”

Straddle? “I…no.”

“Come on. Isn’t that what driven is? Half obsession, half commitment?”

He wasn’t sure how she’d managed to put him on the defensive, but he felt the need to explain himself. “I want to make a superior product. I want to prove—” He broke off abruptly. He wanted to prove to his father, to Phillip, come to that, to Mira, that his ideas had merit, that he had worth.

“What do you want to prove?”

“Nothing.”

“You know what I want? I want another Judgment in Paris this time with Michigan wines, specifically Medallion wines, taking top honors,” she said, referring to the 1976 blind tasting of California wines by French judges in which they won in every category against French wines.

“You aim high.”

“Anything wrong with that?” she asked.

“Not a thing.”

Zack started the engine. They arrived at her home barely a minute later. Thanks to moonlight and clever landscape lighting, he was able to admire the architecture inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright, with its wealth of rectangular windows and geometric motifs.

“I’ve got to tell you, this is a great house.” Zack switched off the ignition and pocketed the keys.

“Dad liked it.”

“But not you?” he asked.

“It’s…big.”

Something about the way she said it made him think the word was synonymous for lonely.

“It has seven bedrooms,” she was saying. “My housekeeper is livid. My house only had three.”

“I’m not following you.”

“I owned a house on the water, a three-bedroom bungalow with an incredible view of the bay. I sold it and moved in here after…after I inherited the place. I don’t really need all of this space.” She blew out a breath. “But it’s mine now.”

“I like the way it takes advantage of its setting.” The lower level and a three-car garage protruded from the side of a gently sloped hill. Rocky, terraced flowerbeds lit with small hanging lanterns angled sharply up to a wide, L-shaped porch that was braced with intermittently spaced square columns. “I bet these gardens are something in the summer.”

“My dad’s doing. He had a real green thumb, whether it was with grapes or herbs or black-eyed Susans.”

That made twice she’d mentioned Frank. This time, Zack heard the sorrow in her voice. He envied the closeness they’d obviously enjoyed, even if he didn’t envy her grief. Before he could think of something suitable to say, though, she was opening her door and getting out of the car.

He followed her up the steps to the porch.

“This is a Craftsman, right?” He’d always been a fan of that style of architecture with its solid look and angular lines.

“Yes. My dad had it built the year we moved here from the Detroit area.”

“It’s a very masculine design,” he said.

“I manage to like it, anyway,” she remarked dryly.

“It suits you.”