Back To Us (Shore Secrets 3)

by Christi Barth

  “No. Rich doesn’t believe in marriage.”

  Lovely. Sounded like a real keeper. There was only one other thing that would make Ward dig in his heels. “Are you, uh, having a baby with him?”

  Lori doubled over, laughing. “God, no. Bite your tongue, Piper. How could you even ask me that?”

  “I probably shouldn’t have. I’m treating you like the girl I used to adore. Poking at your personal business crossed a line. I’m sorry. I feel like I know you, but I guess I don’t.”

  “It’s nice that you still care. Care enough even to poke at me. Nobody’s done that in a really long time.”

  “Of course I care. So come on, let me help. What’s the problem with your brother?”

  Color flooded Lori’s cheeks. “He owes me money.”

  “Oh.” It took about two seconds for curiosity to get the best of her. How could Ward owe Lori money when he hadn’t seen her, or even known how to get in touch with her, for over a decade? “For what?”

  “Look, Dad was wrong to cut me out of his will. Ward got everything.”

  Hardly. The way Ward described his inheritance—on a good day—was to call it a shit sandwich with a side of flaming crap. “That everything you’re talking about wasn’t a pile of gold, Lori. It was a pile of bills and a gigantic burden. Trust me when I say you’re lucky you avoided having any of it dumped on you.”

  “He made it a success, though, didn’t he? Maybe I could’ve done that, too. I should’ve at least had the chance to come out the other side with a pile of cash.”

  Piper had been raised to never talk about money. Or to talk about people behind their backs. This uncomfortable conversation was pushing all of her well-mannered boundaries. Of course, her mom would probably be more shocked that she was having said conversation on the side of the road with her bra tucked into her purse. And Lori needed to be set straight.

  “Ward’s come out the other side, true. But he’s hanging on by his fingertips. The pile of cash you’re envisioning is probably smaller than the pile of jacks we used to bounce for on the porch.”

  “Right now. Things change.” She tilted her head. Squinted. Nodded slowly like they were exchanging spy passwords. “You know what I’m talking about.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t.”

  “Look, I’m not asking for a share of Ward’s booze business or anything. I don’t want him to have to sell the farmhouse or close down the distillery. I’ll settle for a fair profit from the wind farm sale.”

  Piper’s stomach did a roundoff, then a handspring between choking her throat tight and knotting in her belly. Because Lori could not possibly be telling the truth. There was no way Ward would sell his land to a wind farm. “The, uh, what?” she asked cautiously.

  “Don’t pretend you haven’t heard all the rumors. If they’re talking about it over on the other Finger Lakes, then I know for sure that everyone here on Seneca Lake already knows about it. A wind farm wants to buy Ward’s extra acreage. Put up a couple of windmills.”

  Sure, she’d heard the rumors. But hadn’t for a moment thought that they’d involve prime Cantrell acreage. “On the edge of the lake?”

  “Duh. Best place to catch the wind. That’s why we always flew our kites out there.”

  Where to begin? Piper glanced at her watch. She really didn’t have time to insert herself into a family squabble. On the other hand, being in love with Ward, trying to build a future with him, meant dealing with Lori’s ridiculous statement sooner or later. Better to nip the whole thing in the bud right now.

  Piper drew her around the hood of the car for safety. Now that it looked like they’d be hanging out on the edge of the road for a while. “First of all, you’re wrong to ask your brother for any money that he’s slaved to earn. You don’t get handed things in life. Or if you do, you don’t feel good about it, I promise.”

  “Says the woman who’s going to inherit an entire winery.”

  Lori had to be over twenty-one by now. Old enough to know that life was never that simple. Piper was exhausted, late, caught off guard in a dozen different ways and therefore just cranky enough to let her temper fly.

  “Aren’t you full of assumptions today? I get a paycheck from Morrissey Vineyards, and I earn it by working usually fifty-hour weeks. There are no handouts. Even if I do inherit the winery someday, it doesn’t run itself. I’ll need to keep working, even harder, so that it stays successful. That’s what Ward does every day with his business, too. Unless you put the work in, you don’t deserve a cent of his money.”

  “He’s not working on the wind farm land. All he’s doing is signing over three stinking acres to a big company. He can take another five seconds and sign over a check to me.”

  Three acres? Her three acres for the port line? Piper’s head was spinning. If it was true, it certainly explained why Ward had kept it a secret from her. But there was absolutely no way that it could be true. Lori must’ve heard some silly rumor, like the one that made the rounds at the sing-along Sound of Music, and fallen for it hook, line and sinker.

  In the calmest tone she could muster, Piper continued. “Second of all, you’re just flat-out mistaken. Ward would never sell to a wind farm. In fact, the only extra acreage he has I plan to lease from him.”

  “Mmm-hmm. Got that in writing?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Because I’ve talked to the men who hold the contract for the wind farm. Then I talked to Ward about it. He didn’t deny it.”

  Piper closed her eyes for a second. When she reopened them, the lake still gleamed with its ubiquitously overwhelming presence just on the other side of the road. The damn birds were still chirping. Everything looked and sounded the same. Except that her world was now, irrevocably, turned upside down.

  “Lori, I’m sorry we argued. I really do want you to come by and have lunch with me soon. And I truly want you to think about what you’ve done to deserve a cent of Ward’s money, no matter how he comes by it. Now I’m afraid I have to run.”

  It wasn’t a figure of speech. Bitterness, shock and sheer fury fueled her sprint back down the road to the farmhouse. It didn’t matter that the winery was short-staffed and this was their busiest day of the week. It didn’t matter that Ward had to go open his own tasting room. It didn’t even matter that she could still smell Ward on her skin. There was going to be a fight. A big fight. One in which she’d let her redheaded temper fly free. Because just when she’d let her guard down and decided to trust Ward fully, he’d betrayed her. Again. And this time she wasn’t walking away until she told him to his face what an unforgivable mistake he’d made.

  * * *

  Piper threw open the bathroom door so hard that the knob banged against the wall. Maybe it had gouged the wall. She kind of hoped that it had. She wanted Ward to have a physical reminder of the gouge he’d taken out of her heart. Steam billowed toward her. She didn’t wait for it to clear. He had to be in there. So she let it rip. At the top of her lungs.

  “Did you enjoy screwing me last night? Since you were already screwing me business-wise, and screwing me over as a member of the town as well, why not screw me for real, too? Was that the twisted logic that you used?”

  “Piper?” Ward hastily knotted a towel at his waist and grabbed her hands. “What’s going on? Why are you screaming at me?”

  “Because the choice is between yelling or crying, and I’m not ready to break down and cry yet.” It’d happen, though. Definitely at the top of her to-do list for the day.

  “I’m not a fan of either of those options. How about I take what’s behind door number three?”

  Piper twisted out of his grasp. “Don’t joke. Don’t tease. We’re about to have the most serious conversation of our lives.”

  His eyebrows shot up to his scalp. “Should I put on pants?”

  On any other day,
his tanned chest covered in water droplets would have overloaded her mental circuits. Tongue-tied her...or after last night’s sexcapades, driven her to use her tongue to catch every last drop. Sure, he’d always be an exquisite male specimen. But Ward’s body would no longer move her. Or distract her. Because she knew it housed a lying, cheating black heart.

  “I don’t have time for you to get dressed. I’m going to say what I came here to say and then never come back.”

  “Piper, what’s with all the dramatics? You left here ten minutes ago. What could possibly have happened to set you off like this?”

  “I talked to your sister.” Silence hung between them heavier than a full cask of Cabernet. “No quick comeback? No wondering what she could possibly have said to get me this worked up?”

  “She told you about the wind farm offer,” he said flatly.

  “She did indeed tell me about the wind farm deal. I’m hazy on the specifics, but I’ll bet you can clear it up for me. Those three acres you’re selling them...those are the same three acres you promised to me, aren’t they?”

  “Yes and no.”

  Piper walked away from him. She had to, otherwise she might, for the first time in her life, be tempted to slap him. Which would undoubtedly hurt her hand more than it would hurt his granite cheekbones. She looked through the French doors out at a day that seemed to mock her with its sunshiny perfection. “Do. Not. Lie. You owe me that much. Give me your complete honesty for the next five minutes.”

  “I’m not lying. Yes, this guy, Hickock, approached me with an offer. For the same three acres I promised you. But he never said he represented a wind farm.”

  “Really? What did he say they planned to do with it? Build a giant replica of Stonehenge to amuse tourists? Or the world’s largest grape?”

  “He said it was a secret.”

  Piper whirled around. “Come on. You’re smarter than that.”

  He fisted his hands on his hips. “Why the hell should it matter to me what they want to do with it? All that matters is the cash in hand.”

  Guess that applied to her, too. Never, in a million years, would Piper have guessed that Ward would prioritize greed over friendship. “You need money that badly? Were my parents right? Were you stringing me along just for my money?”

  “That’s insulting.”

  So what? Did Ward actually think he had any moral high ground to stand on in this conversation? “I get to take every potshot I damn well please right now.”

  “If anything, this wind farm deal should prove that I wasn’t chasing you for your money. Hickock’s the one who’d give me the windfall.”

  “So you do admit you were going to take it?”

  “No.” Ward crossed to her in two long steps. “The land was yours. The land is yours. Yes, I heard him out. But I didn’t agree to anything.”

  “You didn’t kick him out on his ass, either. You didn’t say, oh, I’ve promised that land to one of my best friends already, so good day, sir.”

  Ward jabbed his hand through his wet hair, spiking it straight up. “Damn it, I didn’t go looking for another buyer. Hickock came to me, out of the blue, the day after our first date. He said he’d give me a month to think about it. Everything about us was still a coin flip. Just to hedge my bets, yeah, I took the month. But I didn’t plan to take his money.”

  She’d asked for the truth, but it hit her with the burning punch to the gut of a double shot of tequila. “You’ve kept this secret from me for twenty-one days? You’ve kept it a secret from Ella and Casey, too? Since when do the four of us keep secrets from each other, let alone something of this magnitude?”

  “This was different,” he mumbled.

  “How?”

  Eyes flashing like the lake outside the window, Ward snapped, “Damn it, I didn’t want you to know I failed.”

  She needed a map for this conversation. One of those 3-D maps that had pop-up buildings you could actually step between to get your bearings. “Failed at what?”

  “I want to expand the distillery. Hire more people, expand distribution. But all of Dad’s debts messed with my credit. I can’t get a loan. His middling failure is keeping me from being anything more than a middling success.”

  “That’s not failing. For God’s sake, you built this distillery from scratch. When that article about you in WWLL comes out, you won’t need a loan. Investors will throw money at you. And who cares if you do fail? Everybody does, countless times in a lifetime. What counts is how you pick yourself up afterwards.”

  “Easy for you to say.” Ward shook his head, lips twisted into a grimace. “You’ve never failed at something, Piper. That’s one of your best qualities. You don’t believe in failure. You just keep plugging away at what you want and make it happen through sheer force of will.”

  “Oh, I’ve failed. I failed at keeping you. I wanted it more than anything, but I failed.” In fact, it looked like she’d failed at that twice now. Doing it a second time did not make it any easier. It hurt even more. Like running a serrated knife across an already bleeding wound.

  “Our breakup was my fault, not yours,” Ward insisted. “And speaking of that time in our lives, remember when I fucked up so royally before? When I tried to pick myself up and start fresh, the town wouldn’t let me. They wouldn’t forgive, and they definitely wouldn’t forget.”

  “You mean the town who carried you on their shoulders and screamed themselves hoarse for you last night? Sure, everyone was pissed at first, but you brought them around. With honest, hard work. And now you’re willing to lose that hard-won respect by selling to a wind farm?”

  His mouth twisted downward. “I never said I’d sell.”

  “Your sister seems pretty convinced.”

  “Lori’s trying to hold me up for half the profit from the wind farm. Otherwise, she’s threatened to take me to court to contest Dad’s will. If she wins, they could make me sell the business to pay her. Sell the farmhouse. Because I’ll be bled dry with lawyers’ fees by then.”

  The prodigious nature of the threat surprised her. “Lori would really do that to you?”

  Ward jerked one bare shoulder. “I don’t know. Sounds like the whole thing is the brainchild of her boyfriend, not her. I want to try and talk to Lori again, make her see reason. I even offered her a job at the distillery. But Hickock’s offering a lot of money. More than I could pay her to pour samples at Lakeside, that’s for sure.”

  Piper canted to look out at the lake again. The pristine run of trees that ran from the road down to the shore. The unsullied, matching vista on the opposite side of the lake. “Probably because he’s run up against a brick wall on every other square inch of lakeshore. Nobody wants a windmill on Seneca Lake. It’d be an eyesore. It would disappoint tourists. And tourists are the lifeblood of this town.”

  “That’s a separate argument.” Ward paced the length of the room. “The point is that Lori knows how much Hickock’s willing to give me. It’s way more than you can, or should pay me for that acreage. Now I can’t afford to turn down his offer, or I’ll lose everything to her.”

  It was a weighty problem, Piper could grant him that. But sharing weighty problems with the person you ostensibly loved was known to lighten the load. At least, according to every women’s magazine for sale in the grocery store. If Ward wouldn’t—or couldn’t—share everything with her, they’d never last. She’d give him one more chance to explain.

  “Why didn’t you come to me?” she demanded in a small, tight voice.

  A frustrated groan ripped from his throat as Ward turned to face her. “How could I? I’m supposed to be convincing you to take a chance on me. Not sit around while I sell your land out from under you. All I’ve been doing since Lori came home was try to figure out a loophole. Some way not to lose my shirt. Some way not to lose you. That’s all I’ve done.”

>   Aha. He’d given her an explanation, all right. One in which he didn’t trust her enough to separate a choice being thrust upon him from their feelings for each other. Ward didn’t care what anyone in town thought of him. But it was clear now that he didn’t care what Piper thought, either. How many times was it possible for a heart to break? Because it felt like hers had splintered at least four times already this morning.

  “That’s not quite all, Ward. Here’s what you did do. You lied to me. You can split hairs and call it a lie of omission. But the moment this Hickock made his presentation to you, you should’ve told me. Because that’s what couples who are seriously dating do. You told me from the start to treat these thirty days as though we were one hundred percent, full-bore dating. Instead, you hid this huge part of your life from me.”

  He slammed his palm against the stone border of the fireplace. “Because I didn’t plan to take the damn money.”

  “Plans change, don’t they?” Hers sure had. All the plans to live happily ever after with Ward that had managed to infiltrate her subconscious over the last twenty-one days. Gone. Erased. “You also set yourself up to betray the town.”

  “Piper, I don’t care about that.”

  Because she’d loved him for so long, Piper still wanted him to succeed. So she took a moment to point out the obvious. “Don’t be so dismissive. You care about tourist revenues in your pocket every bit as much as I do. A windmill would affect you, like it or not. And becoming a pariah wouldn’t do much good for your business, either.”

  “The town doesn’t get a say in my business, or in my life.”

  “Fine, then. Take the whole damn town out of it. Just worry about your closest neighbor, whose sweeping scenic vistas would also be affected. Who might not be able to book weddings in the vineyard after that eyesore is installed. Did you think how it would affect Morrissey Vineyards?”

  The long silence was as good an answer to her questions as anything he might have said. Finally, he held out his arms, palms toward her, almost pleading. “I told you, I wasn’t going to sell to Hickock.”