Summer at Orchard House: An utterly compelling and heart-warming summer romance (Blue Hills Book 1)

by Ellyn Oaksmith

  Carmen shook her head. “So many people’s feet have been in there.”

  Stella tucked her chin into her neck. “I wish I could unsee that.”

  Carmen laughed. “Right?”

  “At least they’re having fun.” Stella began putting wine in the cases they’d stored under the tables. They’d sold close to a hundred bottles. Not bad, Carmen thought. Except, was it good? How much profit was it? She had so much to learn.

  Evan strolled over from a wine garden, sporting a baseball hat and aviator sunglasses. “Ladies,” he doffed his cap in greeting. “Everything going okay?”

  Carmen felt her entire body flush. “Yep.” If she said one more word, she wasn’t sure what would come out. He caused such a strong reaction; it was better just to keep her mouth shut. Pretend that he was any other person.

  “It’s been epic. Really great. Thanks for organizing the festival” said Stella, elbowing Carmen. “Right, Carmen?”

  “Yes.” Carmen stood woodenly, wishing she had a glass of wine in her hand. Or something to do.

  “What Carmen means is… Do you know who set up the booth and fixed the crack in the barrel?” Stella strained her head confidentially toward Evan. “Was it perhaps you?”

  Evan shifted a little, seemingly uncomfortable. “No. Carmen has been very clear that she doesn’t want anything to do with me. That would be breaking the rules, right Carmen? And one thing I’ve learned is that Carmen doesn’t like people who break the rules.”

  Three deep breaths, Carmen told herself. That’s all it took. She wouldn’t take the bait, although her delivery was stiff and formal. “Thank you for fixing the barrel, Evan. We really appreciate it.”

  Evan tilted his head. “You’re welcome.”

  An awkward silence followed as a farmer drifted past talking about the smoke. Stella conjured words to break the tension. “That barrel would make a wicked hot tub.”

  Evan laughed. “Do you need help loading it?”

  Carmen’s response was lightning quick. “Nope. Thanks.”

  Evan took off his cap, gazing at the sky. “Look, it’s not a problem. I’ve got five guys here to help and honestly…” He took off his sunglasses to look at Carmen. “We’re neighbors, right?”

  Carmen gritted her teeth. “That’s rich, coming from you.”

  Evan rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I’m not the one who unleashed sixteen goats during a wedding.”

  “What’s worse? That, or attacking innocent people with drones or soaking their clothes with misters?”

  “Well, isn’t this nice?” Stella said. “World War III at a wine festival.”

  Carmen lifted her chin. “Which is perfect, because it started at a winery.”

  Evan flung his hand at her. “It’s called progress! It’s what people do if they want to be a success. Even the seasons change, Carmen. Blue Hills will evolve. You can’t make me the bad guy.”

  Carmen couldn’t believe that a few days ago they’d been night swimming, blissfully gazing at the moon. That seemed impossible now.

  And yet.

  Was this passion?

  Was this one of those heated relationships that thrived on conflict? Stella’s time with Paolo sounded like one blissful moment after another. Delicious food, fascinating talks, walking down the street holding hands. Stella said they constantly laughed over the silliest things.

  Stella stepped in front of Carmen before punches were thrown. “Look, Evan, you’ve done a fantastic job. Thank you. We’re going to clean this out and have someone come get it tomorrow, okay?”

  Evan seemed to have calmed down. “Thank you. Your display was great. Big success.” He didn’t seem to mean it. “I’ve, uh, well… See you later.”

  He walked off quickly.

  Stella shook her head. “That was awkward. Thanks for that.”

  Carmen thumped her chest. “Me?”

  “Yes, you. It’s like you’re a bomb and he lit the fuse.”

  “Oh, come on!”

  “That wasn’t you?”

  “That was me and Evan Hollister.” Carmen opened the door to the tub, eying the purple muck clinging to the bottom. She handed her friend a bucket, preparing to wade in with a shovel.

  “Then stay away,” said Stella, disappointed. “I thought it would have been fun to double date. But after that? Thank you, no.”

  Carmen slid the first shovelful of grape gunk into the bucket, wiping her hair off her face with the back of her hand. “Trust me, I’d love to keep my distance from Evan Hollister.”

  When Carmen got back to her car there were six voice messages on her phone, which she’d accidentally left hooked up to the charger. They were from Lola, growing increasingly worried.

  “Hi, it’s me. We just had a ranger stop by who said we should put water on the roof and water the vines.”

  “Hey, me again. Call me.”

  “Hey Carmen, please call me. We’re working like crazy to get everything wet.”

  “Hey Carmen, there’s smoke blowing in here thick and fast. Does Papi have asthma? I don’t know if we should evacuate or not. Call me.”

  Carmen dialed Lola’s number, but there wasn’t enough strength in the signal.

  Stella had barely climbed into the truck when Carmen put it in drive, rattling out of the fairground dirt parking lot, leaving a wake of dust.

  “Hey, slow down,” Stella said, trying to fasten her seat belt with difficult on the bumpy unpaved road.

  Carmen looked over at her, then up at the sky. They’d come around the corner of the hill with a view up lake. Towards the northwest, a layer of smoke clung to the lake by Wapato Point. “That looks like it’s near the winery.” Stella had her phone out. “Would you look at the Forestry Service site?”

  Stella shook her head in frustration. “No reception.”

  Stella turned on the radio, searching through the AM stations to see if she could get an update. When she finally found one, Carmen wished she’d never heard it.

  If the wind didn’t change, all of Chelan would burn.

  Twenty-Two

  Evacuate

  It was like driving onto a movie set. A disaster movie. Smoke loomed over Chelan at the head of the lake. Visibility had dropped to half a mile. Tiny white flakes settled onto cars and pavements, speckling the grass as if it was snowing. As they drove down Lake Street towards the heart of town, Carmen and Stella were traveling upstream. Cars loaded with families, barking dogs and luggage were pouring out of town. The owner of the Black Dog boutique was taping a sign to her window as they passed: CLOSED FOR EVACUATION. SEE YOU SOON.

  Carmen gulped, staring at Stella with wide eyes. “Are you sure you want to go to the winery with me? Maybe you want to go check on your cat and pack up.”

  Stella nodded. “It’s fine. Mrs. Hartner texted me. She’s taking Misha to her sister’s in Twisp, so I don’t have to worry about him.”

  “Poor kitty.”

  “He’ll be fine. He loves Mrs. Hartner, and I don’t want him running off with all this smoke.”

  Carmen nodded. “Okay.” After a moment she added, “Thanks, Stell. I’m really glad you’re here.”

  “It’s going to be fine. Seriously. Just a little smoke.”

  It was strange to see the sidewalks empty. The business doors closed and locked. Stranger still to drive down Lake Street and only see a quarter mile of lake, dim and sluggish in the eerie half-light. They drove slowly before taking a left onto the old bridge across the canal. Families crowded the parking lots of the lakefront hotels, packing their cars.

  Stella leaned her head on the window, gazing outside. “This is like last time.”

  Carmen shook her head. She’d been in Seattle during the bad fires two summers ago. It had been a close call. The wind had changed, sparing the town. “Let’s hope not.”

  “Yeah. Let’s.” Her somber tone made Carmen glance over. Stella’s face was clouded with worry.

  At Pat and Mike’s Store there was a slight back-up where the road
turned up the hill to leave Chelan. Carmen and Stella sat in the right turn lane, watching the line of cars drive up the hill, fleeing town. Cars pulling onto the road from their lakeside cabins were causing the delay, along with people filling up with gas at Pat and Mike’s. The closer they got to the thick smoke, the more frantic people appeared. At the gas station, a man stood red-faced and yelling at a woman with a baby in her arms. The baby was crying as the woman pointed to a car that was blocked by another car.

  Stella turned to watch them as Carmen drove past. “Wow. That was intense.”

  “So much for emergencies bringing out the best in people. Makes me wonder what’s happening at the winery.”

  Stella patted her arm. “Everything’s going to be okay. You know that, right?”

  Carmen nodded, offering her friend a tight smile that was more of a grimace. “I’m sorry things were a bit awkward with Evan.”

  Stella waved a hand. “No worries. Maybe I needed to see it to get over that whole hot millionaire thing.”

  “He’s complicated.”

  Stella shook her head. “I think actually, he’s quite simple. He wants to be successful.”

  Carmen gave her friend a sideways glance. “Whose side are you on, anyway?”

  “Yours, obvs. I just mean maybe down the line when he’s figured out his deal, you guys can date.”

  “Yeah, because it’s going swimmingly well as friends.”

  Stella looked out the window at a boatful of teens pulling a water skier, oblivious of the smoke. Or maybe they just didn’t care. “Let me ask you something.”

  “Sure.” Carmen glanced at the lone boat in the water.

  “If Evan wasn’t trying to buy your vineyard, would you go out with him?” Stella studied her friend’s face, but it was unreadable.

  Carmen drummed her fingers on the wheel, thinking for a moment. “Hard to say. Competition is all we know.”

  “With each other.”

  Carmen gave a little smile. “Right.”

  “You’re both very competitive?”

  Carmen nodded. “Yeeees.”

  “So, let’s say that you just met him in town and say, I introduced you. Wouldn’t you find him the least bit attractive?”

  Carmen shook her head. “If you take the competitive nature out of Evan Hollister, there is no Evan Hollister.”

  Stella’s eyes went theatrically wide. “Oh. Hmmm. Let’s see. Who does that remind me of?”

  Carmen rolled her eyes. “Nice, Stella. Real nice. You could have just out and said it.”

  “Wouldn’t be half as fun.” Stella twisted a bracelet on her wrist. “Besides, I didn’t say it. You did.”

  Cars rolling down the driveway blocked their entrance to the winery. One right after the other. The driveway was only wide enough to accommodate one car, so Carmen pulled to the side of the road, watching the recovered guest harvesters drive off. Some of them saw her and waved, others were talking to each other, seemingly stressed, as they headed back to their homes.

  “At least they’re well enough to drive,” Stella commented.

  “It’s too bad it had to end like this.” Carmen watched the cars leave one by one. A couple of women from Mami’s prayer group followed the guest harvesters, driving through the dust kicked up by the stream of cars. “We were going to do dinner down here. By the lake.”

  Stella nodded, looking to her left at the water. “That would have been cool. You know, maybe you can do it again but without having people do the actual harvesting. A food and wine series. Have people come here and learn about how wine is made. You could totally do a blog about it.”

  “In all my spare time.” Carmen tapped her lip, thinking. “I did like hosting. I’d much rather do a thing where we take people out in the field, clip a few grapes, show them how we read the brix level.”

  “Maybe have Paolo talk to them in his super sexy accent.”

  Carmen laughed. “That too. Yeah. It could be fun. But first, we need to solve the business. There goes Tia Joaquina. In the minivan.” The chubby lady waved. Carmen blew a kiss.

  Finally, there was a break in the traffic.

  Carmen turned up the driveway.

  “We made it!” Carmen said, eager to seeing her family and make a plan for the encroaching fires.

  When Carmen walked into the kitchen, the assembled ladies hugged her. “Carmencita,” one of them said. “We picked a lot of grapes.”

  “It was like the good old days!” Jovita said.

  “The best thing is we don’t have to do it mañana!” laughed Consuela. She patted Carmen. “Don’t worry bonita, it was fun. If grapes could talk, we wouldn’t have a friend left in town.”

  Which led to bunch of chattering in Spanglish.

  One by one the ladies proffered hugs, explaining they had to get home. Although they were lavish with their goodbyes, there was an air of urgency. A casual onlooker might think they lingered, but Carmen knew these ladies usually took an hour to say goodbye. There was always one more child to discuss, one more nephew who had gotten into a fancy college or was getting married.

  “Are you going to evacuate?” Carmen asked.

  Frieda put her hands on her hips. “When the fire hits the town, that’s when I leave. Not a moment before.” She waved her hands around. “The whole time I was picking, I prayed to St. Jude for the wind to change.”

  Jovita put her hands together in prayer. “Oh sí, with all that praying you didn’t gossip at all.”

  Frieda laughed, waving her hand good-naturedly. “Me, gossip? Aye Jovita, yo soy una santa!” She drew an imaginary halo atop her thick black hair.

  “Isn’t Saint Jude patron saint of lost causes?” Stella asked, tasting the sauce simmering on the stove.

  The older lady wagged her finger. “Stella, you would know if you weren’t chattering like a monkey during Sunday school. Saint Jude is for lost and desperate causes.”

  “Asking the wind to change direction is a pretty desperate request,” said another old lady.

  “Exactly!” said Frieda.

  Carmen got another round of kisses as the ladies departed in a group, showing her the fridge full of food. She walked them outside, where the daylight was being swallowed by an early dusk, thanks to the smoke.

  Carmen shivered despite the heat. Something about the eerie light, the bird swooping in frantic, worried loops above. It was all very unsettling. “Ladies, I don’t know what we would have done without you.”

  Jovita hugged her, pulling back to admire the girl’s beauty, to pinch her cheeks. “Darling, you are our daughters. Juan would have done the same thing for us in our hour of need.” Jovita hiked the same cavernous purse she’d carried since Carmen had noticed such things.

  “Where is Papi?” Carmen asked Honora, as the older lady waved from the door.

  “No sé.”

  Lola came into the kitchen with a load of laundry. “Probably sleeping. He picked for eight hours.”

  “Well, thank you so much.” Carmen said to Honora. “We’ll have you all out to dinner after this nonsense dies down.”

  “Don’t you worry!” said the older lady. “The wind is going to change!”

  Except, it didn’t.

  Twenty-Three

  Papi

  Carmen decided to stay up late and keep an eye on the sky. She made coffee, cupping it in her hands, sitting on the patio on the west side of Orchard House, looking up the lake. Over her shoulder, she was aware of Evan doing the same thing, although if he wanted the best view of the approaching fire, he’d be on the other side of his house. From time to time she got the sense that he’d shifted, but she didn’t keep track. Her mind was on other things. For once, the complicated windstorm of emotions Evan brought out in her didn’t appear.

  The approaching fire changed everything.

  Once, when she was a child, they’d evacuated the vineyard. Mami had been very firm: she would drive the kids to Wenatchee and stay with her sister, shouting at her husband that a bunch of g
rapes wasn’t worth his life.

  “It’s everything and you know it!” Juan had calmly replied in Spanish.

  His wife had called him a stubborn pig and continued loading their van. He’d told her that they’d be back before sunrise. His wife had stayed two days with her sister just to spite him.

  When they’d come back, their father had had breakfast waiting. When Juan had asked his wife in a teasing tone if they’d had a nice little vacation, she’d smiled. “You’re lucky the wind changed.”

  He’d kissed her and said, “You’re lucky. Where else would you find such a handsome man?”

  She’d rolled her eyes. “Girls, listen to him. So full of himself.”

  Their father had turned, displaying his profile. “Such a nose. Such a forehead, full of deep thoughts.”

  “Full of beans!” Mami had laughed.

  They’d all started giggling. Carmen remembered feeling safe, sitting around the kitchen island, knowing her parents would always watch out for them. Would keep them safe.

  Now it was her turn. The wind showed no sign of changing. The lake glittered dangerously in the dark. In one day, it had changed from an inviting blue oasis into a vast betrayal. All that water so close, and yet, except for the infrequent planes and helicopters flying low to collect it, useless. The water dumped on fires left damp spots around which the fire traveled, relentless.

  Carmen finished a second cup of coffee outside on the front patio, facing the direction of the fire. She stood, realizing she was sore and hungry. She went inside to get some dinner.

  After dinner, she decided to get some rest. After checking the Forest Service website to make sure that evacuation wasn’t mandatory and that the fire was still fifty miles away, she set an alarm for four o’clock. You couldn’t spend a childhood in Chelan and not know that wildfires traveled faster than cars. Fifty miles wasn’t much of a barrier. Tomorrow she’d set the sprinklers around the house to dampen the roof and talk to Lola and Papi about evacuation. Changing her mind, she set the alarm for three and went to sleep.