“You’re not making any sense. Why is this store such a big deal to you?”
“A big deal?” Lila echoed, suddenly furious and not caring who could hear. “No, you’re right, it’s not a big deal that Annie and I have planning this for months. Make that years since we were talking about running a café together. And all the work getting Marion on board, putting together the business plan, working it out with Joyce—”
“Is it possible I didn’t know all that?”
Lila didn’t like being cut off one bit. “But you!” She was yelling now and throwing in some grand hand gestures for good measure. “You swoop in at the last minute—”
“It wasn’t me, it was my father.”
“That’s so convenient to blame him.”
“It was him,” Jake insisted.
“So you had no idea it was happening?” Lila pressed.
“Listen,” Jake ran a hand through his hair, distraught. “I mentioned it to my father, that you were leasing the store. But I didn’t do it so he could swoop in and buy it.” As he said it he imitated her whooshing hand gesture, cranking Lila’s temper up an extra notch. “I knew he’d been thinking about leasing it, but I thought he’d decided not to.”
“So you did tell him we were about to lease the store!” Lila yelled, pinning it all on Professor Plum in the library with the candlestick. Throwing up her hands, she mentally dared him to make fun of her hand gesture once again. Upset to feel hot tears pricking her eyes, she couldn’t help adding, “It was my dream! And now it’s gone!”
With a firm hand on her elbow, Phillip arrived on the scene. “What’s going on here?” he asked, sounding much like the school principal happening upon a schoolyard tussle.
“It’s nothing!” Realizing she sounded like a guilty, defiant child, Lila threw up her hands again in exasperation. “I need some air.”
Marching out of the tent, she mustered all of her faculties to keep a straight and true line, chin up, dignity intact.
Greeted with a sharp gust of wind as she burst forth from the French doors, Lila realized that the late October night had taken a sharp turn toward freezing. She suddenly felt nearly naked in her backless dress, yet knew heading back in to retrieve her sweater and jacket was an impossibility. She’d already created enough of a scene; over two dozen guests had neglected their chit chat in favor of following the action. Plus, when women stormed out in movie scenes they never slunk back to retrieve an outer layer. She also had an urgent need to scream or cry or punch something, all of which more suited the parking lot than the midst of an upscale charity benefit.
Behind her, she heard the doors open and footsteps follow. “Lila,” Jake called out, catching up to say, “This is ridiculous.” Cupping his warm hand around her half-bare shoulder, he added, “You must be freezing.”
“Now what’s going on?” Phillip barked as he hustled toward them. With alarm, Lila noted he wasn’t alone. A small but growing throng of people followed, clearly having decided in favor of watching the dinner theater. Among the crowd Lila spotted a black beret.
“Please,” Jake entreated. “You’re overreacting. Listen to me.”
“Now see here!” Phillip stepped between them and even went so far as to place his hand on Jake’s shoulder. “This is my girlfriend.”
“Oh, now you use the word!” Lila spun on him, incensed. “I’m not your girlfriend! I never was, remember? And why don’t you just go by Phil? Why does it have to be Philip?”
Jake looked directly at Phillip who now appeared to awkwardly hold a fistful of Jake’s sweater. “Back off,” he growled. The crowd now assembled in a semi-circle around them. Lila half-expected them to start chanting “Fight! Fight” in spite of their fine attire.
“I’ll do as I please,” Philip retorted, releasing the sweater with a petulant push.
Stepping forward, Jake gave him a hard shove direct in his chest, sending Phillip stumbling back.
“That’s it!” Lila yelled, throwing her hands up in the air in what was quickly becoming a redundant gesture. “I’ve had it!”
A car spun up next to Lila. The tires squealed to a stop. The passenger door swung open. Behind the wheel, Sven beckoned.
Lila hopped in. Olga dashed in back. With a rev of the engine and a peal of rubber, they sped off into the night leaving a plume of dust and smoke in their wake.
“Woo Hoo!” Godfrey hollered behind the wheel as he careened down the winding road away from Endicott Vineyards.
“Oh my God!” Lila yelled, pumped through with adrenaline.
Punching on the stereo, Godfrey cranked up the volume on some German techno. Lila knew without needing to be told that he’d made a mix to help him and Zoe get into character.
“You rescued me!” Lila yelled.
“That was awesome!” Zoe shouted from the back seat.
Godfrey nearly bounced up and down behind the wheel. “My favorite part was ‘It was my dream! And now it’s gone!’”
From the backseat, Zoe yelled, “Mine was ‘Why does it have to be Phillip?’”
“You guys rule!” Lila shouted, head swimming, confused, upset, angry, embarrassed, but most of all thrilled at the great escape.
A techno remix of 99 Luftballons pounded through the car and they all yelled along with the words, windows down as they hurtled home through the darkness.
CHAPTER 12: I Gotta Have Faith
The week that followed rolled by much more quietly. No fisticuffs in parking lots, no disguises, no moments in which Lila declared in front of a large, well-dressed audience, “You stole my dream!” And she liked it that way. But it did make everything that had happened feel that much more surreal. Phillip had re-entered her life with an aggressively attentive push, but he exited in his previous fashion: without a word. No follow-up call, no text. She didn’t know if it was pride or anger or sudden disinterest, but, frankly, she was glad.
She did wonder if Phillip had ever learned the identity of the man with whom he’d tussled. There was absolutely no way he’d known it was Jake Endicott of Endicott Vineyards, Lila was convinced. Had he known, he probably would have shoved Lila out of the way instead, the better to clear the way toward his sales pitch.
Still feeling the need to wrap things up, a couple of days after the auction she’d sent Phillip a text message, “No thanks on your offer. Good luck.” Brief, to the point. She didn’t want to expend any more energy on him than necessary. And she meant it; she hoped he did well. Or, more accurately, she didn’t care if he did or he didn’t. What she knew was she didn’t want any part of it.
She also hadn’t heard a word from Jake. She’d considered sending a text to Jake. Or calling. Maybe even stopping by. It had all been so dramatic, more like a soap opera than real life with two men literally fighting over her. In the moment, everything he’d said had infuriated her. Every protest had corroborated her sense of his guilt. But in the days that followed, certain moments had interrupted her steady condemnation. His plea that she listen to him, for example. Seemed like a reasonable thing to ask someone and she really hadn’t.
And then there was the truly bothersome fact that, more than anything else, it had been good to see him. She liked the sound of his voice and his long, dark eyelashes and the feel of his hand on her shoulder. How might things be now if she’d turned to him in the parking lot, placed a hand against that strong chest and said “Kiss me, you fool!”?
That Sunday, Lila folded clothes from her laundry basket and listened as her Gram, on speakerphone, described that morning’s beach romp with the rescue dogs of the moment, Rudy and Minnie. “Then the sand pipers all started panicking in a big clump, zigzagging up and down the sand. And Millie found some seaweed about five times her size that she insisted on carrying around in her chompers.” Lila pictured the chaos, thinking if a beach were able to express emotion it would surely shudder at the sight of Gram and her ever-rotating pack of untrained wild rescue dogs.
She glanced out the window and noticed the rain was
still coming down. No getting around the fact that it was November now, with fog and rain and chill.
“We’re supposed to get three inches of snow tomorrow. And it’s going to keep raining for you through Wednesday.” Gram easily switched between her favorite topics: dogs, weather, soon to be followed by the health and babies update.
“You missed your calling as a reporter, Gram.”
“I don’t know how you do it with all those earthquakes and mudslides and fires.”
“I wear a Hazmat suit most days.”
“It is beautiful out there, though.” Gram continued straight on, as usual, through Lila’s teasing. “And I am so glad your nice young man friend had the opportunity to apologize last week. I’m sure this has been quite difficult for him.”
“Do you mean…” Lila tried to recall their conversation, wondering what part of the infamous auction night’s events with which guy had struck Gram as an apology.
“It can’t be easy with an overbearing father like that.” Jake, Lila realized. “My Henry was always so easygoing, but that isn’t the way with a lot of them.”
“I’m not sure he was apologizing.” Lila remembered anger, frustration. A sharp coldness in Jake’s eyes as he spotted her with Phillip. The deep growl in his voice in the parking lot.
“It doesn’t sound to me as if things have been working out as he’d hoped. But what fun, riding off with your friends! Just like a movie!”
“It was,” Lila agreed, sitting down on her bed. Tucking up her feet, clad in big, wool socks, she leaned back against the wall and remembered flying through the darkness making their getaway. She could still feel the night air on her cheeks.
“I’m glad you’re having some fun, Lila. And the backless dress sounds divine. You said Zoe lent it to you?”
“I know, isn’t that funny?” Lila knew Gram was trying to piece together the image of a sexy little stretchy black number with Yoga Zoe. “She told me women don’t have to make sense.”
“Isn’t that the truth.” Gram’s laughter came through the phone clear and warm. Lila smiled herself, cozy in her apartment with the rain coming down. “But tell me. Have you considered Phillip’s offer to go work for him? Even for a minute?”
“Nope,” Lila answered honestly. “All I could keep thinking was if this guy calls me Lillian one more time I’m going to clock him.”
“You do have a lovely name, dear. So refined. Your mother has always wanted the best for you, you know.”
“Thank you, Gram.” Lila stemmed the tide of what she could sense was Gram’s revisiting of the Your Mother Loves You She Just Shows It Differently speech. “I just mean he sounded like such a salesman, trying to sweet talk me into going to work for him. And he was so insulting about my life here, like I could just pick up and leave no problem.”
“And you don’t feel you can?”
“No! There’s my job at the bookstore. Business is starting to pick up now that it’s the holiday season. Zoe’s teaching a new level two yoga class Tuesday nights and I want to go check it out. And now that it’s winter I’m making soups again. If I didn’t bring food in for Godfrey I swear he’d disappear.”
“So you didn’t consider Phillip’s offer? Even though you didn’t get the store?”
“Even though.”
As Gram moved on into recounting Neighbor News, Lila relaxed into the familiar rhythms of her storytelling and reflected on what she’d just said: she didn’t want to leave Redwood Cove. True, much had gone crashingly wrong as of late, what with the loss of the store, her closest friendship and a budding romance all in one fell swoop. And, true, she felt scooped-out and decimated over it all.
But Redwood Cove still felt like home. It was something of a revelation. She’s spent over five years in San Francisco and then left it in a heartbeat without a moment of regret. The thought of doing the same now, with less than a year under her belt, seemed an anathema. She truly hadn’t considered Phillip’s offer. And it hadn’t just been his pompousness, or his overt salesmanship. She didn’t want anything associated with it, the old life, the hectic pace, the city, advertising. Certainly not Phillip, himself.
“Heard from Annie yet?”
“Hmm? No.” Snapped from her reverie, Lila made her way into the kitchen to put on some tea. “I’m thinking I might give her a call.”
“Do, Lila. Whatever was said, it’s not important. She’s your closest friend. Bring her some banana bread and move on.”
“Yup, you’re right.” Lila agreed, wondering if she had some black bananas in the freezer. Peering in, she found a bag of frozen strawberries and some toaster waffles but the banana bread would have to wait. “Maybe some soup?” she considered, opening the pantry to see if she had any more of that barley/rice/spelt mix she picked up the last time she’d hit the gourmet market. Bingo; about half a cup, just enough.
“Perfect,” Gram agreed. “Don’t delay. Life’s too short.”
Sending each other their love, they ended their call, both tending to their kitchens on opposite coasts. Looking at the clock, Lila wondered if she even had time to stop by Annie’s tonight. If she got right down to business with the mirepoix—just using the French term for carrots, celery and onions always seemed to give soups an extra kick—she might be able to get things simmering by 6:30, which meant she could hop in her car around eight and arrive just after Charlotte had gone to bed. Seemed like a good plan, especially if Annie had a bit more yelling she needed to get out of her system. No need to expose the young.
Barely had she put a kettle on the stove for some tea and begun peeling and chopping when she was startled by a knock at the door. Lila wiped her hands on a kitchen towel and headed over to the entryway. Opening her door, she saw Annie standing in the hallway holding a plate of cookies covered in red, orange and yellow sprinkles.
“They’re turkeys,” Annie explained, holding the plate up for Lila’s inspection. “Charlotte and I made them this afternoon. She wanted to come with me to give them to her Auntie but I told her she could see you tomorrow. Just in case you needed to do some yelling at me tonight.”
Annie’s puffy coat felt about a foot thick as Lila reached her arm around for a hug.
Catching sight of a glisten in Lila’s eye—so pleased was she at seeing her long-lost friend—Annie cautioned, “Now don’t you cry, because then I will and you know I hate that.”
Lila shoed her inside, taking the cookies and wondering how long it would have taken her to guess that the misshapen lumps were turkeys if she hadn’t been told. “Letting Charlotte take charge?” she asked, holding up the plate.
“Pretty hard not to these days. She’s two with a vengeance. Plus she has a lot of her mother in her. Stubborn. Opinionated.”
“I was just putting together some chicken barley vegetable soup.” Lila gestured at her counter top. “I was going to bring it over to your place later tonight.”
“Yeah?” Annie smiled.
“It’s been a long couple of weeks.”
“Two and a half weeks,” Annie corrected. “Pete’s been after me to suck it up and apologize.”
“Gram’s been after me.” The bright red tea kettle began its whistle. Lila removed it from the burner while Annie took down two mugs.
“Are we feeling green?” Annie asked, examining a couple of varieties of green teas.
Selecting one with jasmine—an overall immune booster, Zoe had told her—Lila started “I’ve been wanting—”
“Wait,” Annie interrupted. “I want to go first.” Standing at Lila’s kitchen counter, she said, “I’m sorry—”
“I’m sorry—” Lila interjected.
“I went way too far that day we found out.”
“No, I should have just called you.”
“I was so mad. I mean,” Annie paused, running a hand through her ponytail and exhaling. “Pete stayed away from me for about a week. I wanted to burn Endicott Vineyards to the ground.”
“Arson’s never a good plan.”
“And then I heard that Jake said it was his father who bought the place.”
“You did?”
“From Zoe who heard it from you.” Right, Lila realized, of course Zoe would have been relaying the information. “And Martin made the mistake of stopping by, trying to pitch me again on that place on Walker. I bit his head off and he told me to take it up with Big Bob.”
“Jake said the same thing at the auction.” Lila recounted what he’d said—and her outrage at it. “So it really was my fault. I mentioned it to Jake. And then what happened happened.”
“We don’t know exactly what happened. Maybe you acted like an idiot, maybe you didn’t. But even if you did,” Annie put her tea down on the counter and put a hand on each of Lila’s shoulders. “You’re my idiot friend.”
Lila smiled. “You know, that would be a good name for a band. ‘My idiot friend.’” They used to play the game in college, stopping each other when they came across a phrase with the ironic wit favored by indie, slacker bands. My Idiot Friend would surely be heavy on the depressing, mumbly lyrics. “But, honestly, I am sick over all of this.”
“I am without direction and purpose.” Annie tried some deadpan humor but it came out simply sounding honest.
“I feel decimated, too.”
Annie shrugged. “At least I hadn’t given notice at the chocolate shop yet.” She took a sip of her tea. “So, you’re not leaving Redwood Cove? Even though I accused you of ruthless betrayal?”
“Why would you think I was moving?”
“I heard Phillip offered you a job.”
“I’m not taking it. Who would feed Godfrey?”
“All right, so we’ve got that covered.” Annie’s eyes caught a gleam as she nibbled her cookie. She sat down at Lila’s kitchen table. “Now I need to hear all about this auction. From you. It’s been killing me. Sounds like such a scene.”
“Did Zoe tell you about it?”
“And about four other people.” At Lila’s raised eyebrows, Annie reminded her, “This is a small town, kiddo. We don’t get these kinds of scenes that often. At least not involving one of us. A local. My favorite was Vanessa. She came into my store all, ‘Is that girl around? The one with the mousy curls? Your helper.’” Annie’s lips pursed, back arched, she did a fair impression of Vanessa—or sitting on a pin cushion and sucking a lemon.
Christmas in Wine Country Page 25
