A Delicate Finish

by Jeanette Baker

  Mitch leaned over his daughter’s shoulder as she entered the amount of the invoice into the accounting-software program he’d installed. “How does it look?” he asked.

  She nodded. “So far, we’re under budget. Things don’t cost as much here as they do in San Francisco.”

  Mitch squeezed her shoulder. “You’ve been a tremendous help, Sarah. I don’t know what I would do without you.”

  She beamed. “Thanks, Dad. It’s been fun.” She looked around at the furnished space, the three desks, chairs, phones and computers. “Do you think I’ll still be able to help after you’ve hired people?”

  “You can count on it. I want Drew to join us, too.”

  Sarah’s smile faded. She drew a deep breath and formed the words she’d waited for an opportunity to voice. “I’m not sure Drew is ever going to be what you want him to be, Dad.”

  Mitch looked surprised. “I don’t have a plan for Drew. I’d like him to use his potential, but that’s about it. Most of all, I want him to be happy. I want that for both of you.”

  “Do you really mean that?”

  “I do,” her father said emphatically.

  “He doesn’t support what you’re doing here,” Sarah confessed. “He thinks GGI will ruin the smaller vineyards and bring a warehouse mentality to the valley.”

  Mitch nodded. “I gathered that. When did he become so concerned about Santa Ynez? As far as I know, he’d like to pack up and move back to San Francisco.”

  “He’d still like to do that,” Sarah agreed, “but down deep he’s an environmentalist. He believes in recycling and conserving fossil fuels and he won’t step into a Wal-Mart. He’s always been that way. When the migrant workers went on strike, he wouldn’t eat grapes or lettuce. Neither would Mom,” she added. “They were alike that way.”

  “What about you, sweetheart? Do you have an opinion on any of this?”

  Sarah tilted her head. “I’m not as smart as Drew,” she said finally. “I think I’m more like you than Mom.”

  Mitch grinned. “I’m taking that as a compliment.”

  “I think people are confused about what’s important.”

  “How so?” It was odd having an intellectual conversation with his daughter. Mitch was enjoying it.

  “It’s easy to believe in causes when you’re comfortable,” she explained. “It’s not so easy to be principled if you’re out of work and your family can’t afford to buy things.” She smiled at her father. “In other words, I think there’s a place for Wal-Mart. Not everyone can afford Saks or Nordstrom.”

  “You know what, Sarah. I think you’re every bit as smart as Drew, and in some ways, maybe you’re smarter.”

  “Don’t tell him that,” she warned. “He likes to have everyone think he’s the brilliant one.”

  All at once Mitch felt weak with love for this sensitive, worried child. Impulsively he kissed the part on Sarah’s head. “Don’t worry so much,” he said. “You’re not responsible for all of us.”

  Sarah’s eyes widened. “Maybe not all of us, but I am for Drew. Mom made me promise before she died.”

  He stared at his daughter. “Explain that, Sarah.”

  “Mom told me to take care of Drew. She said I would be all he had after she was gone.”

  Summoning all of his discipline, Mitch worked to keep his anger from showing. “She was wrong, sweetheart. People who are in the last throes of illness often say things they don’t mean. You don’t need to take care of Drew. What he can’t manage on his own, I’ll handle. You’ve got plenty on your shoulders just being you.”

  She looked unconvinced.

  Mitch took her hands in his. “I’ll tell you what. We’ll compromise. If you think Drew is having trouble with something, let me know. Okay?”

  She hesitated. “I’ll try.”

  “That’s good enough for me.”

  Drew rummaged through the cabinet for a nonstick pan, set it over a low flame and tossed in a pat of butter and two cloves of chopped garlic. Then he added three tofu patties and set the timer. The table was already set for three and the salad was mixed. All he had to do was reduce the sauce and steam the broccoli.

  He heard the front door open, followed by his father’s voice. “Something smells delicious.”

  Sarah called out, “Hi, Drew. We’re home.”

  “I’m in the kitchen. Dinner’s in ten minutes.” He turned up the heat under the broccoli.

  Ten minutes later, they were seated around the table. Mitch bit into his tofu patty carefully. He was pleasantly surprised. “This is incredible. I’m appointing you chief cook.”

  Drew’s skin pinkened with pleasure. “Thanks.”

  “How’s the job going?”

  “Great. I’m learning a lot. It’s fun. Mrs. Harris is a nice lady.”

  “Any calls while I was out?” Mitch asked.

  The boy’s flush deepened. “There’s a message reminding you about my hearing on Thursday.”

  “Three days from now,” his father said. “It’s on the calendar.”

  “Today is Tuesday, Dad. There’s another message, too. I think it’s from your boss.”

  “My boss?”

  “Yeah.” Drew avoided his father’s eyes. “You can listen to them if you want. I saved them both.”

  “I’ll do that, but not until I finish this excellent meal.”

  Drew relaxed. “It is good, isn’t it?”

  The phone rang. Drew tensed while Sarah eyed her father nervously.

  “Let it ring,” said Mitch. “We’re important, too.” Four rings later, Julianne’s voice sounded from the speaker. “Hi, Mitch. Did I get the time wrong? I’ll go ahead and order and try you later.”

  Mitch froze. Sarah clapped a hand over her mouth and Drew shook his head. “Good goin’, Dad.”

  Mitch crushed his napkin and stood. “I’ll be right back.” He walked into the den, picked up the phone and closed the door. The last several months had been nothing short of a nightmare. For the first time in his life, Mitch felt overwhelmed. The possibility of failure was very real. It served him right that the only woman he’d seriously considered in terms of forever should come into his life at the same time he’d taken on his children and a resistant community.

  Quickly he punched in the numbers of Julianne’s cell phone. She answered immediately. “I’m sorry, Julianne.” It didn’t occur to him to lie. “I got the days mixed up. I didn’t realize it was Tuesday. I’m a day behind because I worked most of the weekend. Please, forgive me.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” she said too quickly. “I’ll just have a quick bite to eat and go home.”

  Something wasn’t right. “Is anything wrong, other than my lapse?”

  Her silence was answer enough.

  “Come over,” he said.

  “It’s all right, Mitch. Don’t worry.”

  “Please. Drew made dinner. I can’t leave now, but I want to see you. Say you’ll come.”

  “When?”

  “Now.”

  She laughed and his heart lifted. “I’ve already ordered. I’ll eat first and then I’ll come.”

  “I’ll be waiting.”

  He hung up the phone and took several deep restorative breaths. One hurdle passed. The others would, too. He punched the playback button and listened to his two remaining messages. The board of directors’ meeting he remembered. Drew’s hearing he had not. Once more he was in the position of having to choose between his children and his job.

  Twenty-Six

  Julianne stood in front of Mitch’s front door berating herself for involving him in her personal history. She should have eaten her dinner and visited a friend, gone to the bookstore or to a movie. When was the last time she’d seen a movie? The last thing she wanted was a mercy invitation from Mitch Gillette. Contempt so often followed pity. She did not want Mitchell Gillette to feel sorry for her.

  Acknowledging that the damage was already done, she raised the ring on the brass knocker. Before she let i
t fall, the door opened. Mitch stood there, backlit by the warm glow of a chandelier. Without speaking he held out his arms and, as naturally as if she did it every day of her life, Julianne walked into them. They closed around her. Pressing her head into his shoulder, she stood there, lapping up the comfort he offered.

  “Thanks,” she said shakily, pulling away. “I needed that.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “No,” she said quickly, then, “Yes.” She rubbed her temples. “I don’t know.”

  He took her hand. “Come on. We’ll be more comfortable in the living room.”

  He led her into a comfortable room with deep couches, low tables and dim light. He poured brandy into two snifters. Gratefully, she accepted one of them. “Thank you.”

  He nodded and sat down beside her. “Can I help?”

  “I don’t think so,” she began. “It’s nothing really. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. It happened so very long ago that it shouldn’t matter anyway.”

  “I don’t know if time has anything to do with it,” he said slowly. “Sometimes, things don’t get resolved and we carry them around until they do.”

  She looked at him hopefully. “Do you have something like that, too?”

  “Lord, yes. There were so many things I wanted to say to Susan and never got the chance. I used to have imaginary conversations with her where she’d actually listen and, finally, understand.”

  Julianne leaned forward, her expressive eyes on his face. “What went wrong between you, Mitch?”

  He grimaced. “I don’t know where to start. She wanted someone I wasn’t. We didn’t share any of the same goals. She wanted children immediately. I wanted to sock some money away first. She spent as if we had unlimited funds. The word budget terrified her. I suppose it didn’t matter anyway, because we had a different vision for our future. In a nutshell, I was immature, she was dishonest and we were both selfish.” He rotated the glass in his hand. “Not a pretty picture. I hope I’m not scaring you away.”

  “How old were you?”

  “We married when I was twenty-seven. The kids were born three years later and we divorced two years after that.”

  “What did she do?”

  “Whatever she pleased. She had a trust fund.”

  “Did you resent that?”

  He leaned his head back on the cushion and stared at the ceiling. “I don’t think it was the money I resented. But her money had a great deal to do with the contempt I came to feel for her. She had no goals. She never finished anything. I realized after a while that she had nothing to talk about.”

  “The children see her differently.”

  “Of course they do. And they should. Other than being a terrible role model, she was good to them.”

  “Is she why you never remarried?”

  “A psychologist would probably say yes,” he admitted.

  “What about your mother? Is she still alive?”

  Mitch laughed. “No, you don’t. You came here because you were upset and you’ve got us talking about nothing but me. Tell me what’s bothering you.”

  Julianne swallowed the last of her brandy and held out her glass for more. Mitch refilled it.

  “Be careful,” he warned. “You’re not very big.”

  “Francesca’s mother is here,” she said.

  He waited.

  “She left Santa Ynez when Francesca was six years old. This is the first time she’s come back.”

  “Is there more?” he asked gently.

  Julianne nodded. She swirled the amber liquid and, tilting her head back, drained it in one gulp. Liquid fire filled her throat. Her eyes filled. She waved her hand in front of her face, momentarily diverted by an inability to utter more than a feeble rasp. “Water,” she gasped.

  Mitch left the couch, returning immediately with a tall glass of ice water. Julianne drank it quickly. Relief was immediate. “Thanks,” she said.

  “You’re welcome.” He grinned. “I think we should stick to wine.”

  She nodded, embarrassed.

  “Now, what were you going to tell me?”

  She knew that saying the words wouldn’t make a difference. It happened. Keeping it inside had no effect on the present. Breathing deeply, she concentrated on keeping her voice steady. “Lisa DeAngelo had an affair with my husband.”

  He didn’t react. It gave her confidence to continue. “When I found out I made him choose. The job at DeAngelo or me.”

  She was silent for a long time.

  “And?” he probed.

  Julianne lifted her chin. “Frank chose for him. He made her leave.”

  “Are you saying that Frank DeAngelo sent his wife away to keep his winemaker?”

  “No.” Julianne wet her lips, choosing her words carefully. Her mind was thick from the alcohol and the words were difficult to form. “Frank sent his wife away to keep his winemaker’s wife.”

  It was well after midnight when Julianne pulled into her own driveway. She unlocked the door and tiptoed down the hall to her room. A light flicked on in the kitchen. She froze, every nerve on edge. Then, with a sense of inevitable doom, she moved toward the source.

  Lisa DeAngelo sat at the small table, her long ragged fingers stroking the stem of a wine goblet. A half-empty bottle of Syrah sat in front of her. “I waited for you,” she said. “I even saved some wine. Big of me, wasn’t it?”

  Julianne, caught up in the dreamlike fiction of the moment, floated toward her. “You shouldn’t have bothered. I don’t want any.”

  “What do you want?”

  Julianne sat down and leaned her chin on her hand. “I want you to go away.”

  Lisa lifted one eyebrow. It emphasized the widow’s peak marking the center of her forehead. “None of it was personal, you know. Neither of us thought of you.”

  “Obviously not.”

  Lisa leaned forward, her lizard-green eyes fixed on Julianne’s face. “If you think about it, I should be the one hating you.”

  “I don’t care if you hate me or not, Lisa,” Julianne said calmly. “All I hoped for was to never see you again, but now that you mention it, I am curious. What have I ever done to you?”

  “You made my husband fall in love with you.”

  Julianne moved her hand, a quick sweeping gesture, brushing away the words. “Frank was old enough to be my father. Nothing ever came of it. You know that, and yet you deliberately set out to seduce Carl. Why?”

  “I wanted him,” she said simply. “Frank was older and so inflexible it was hard to breathe. I couldn’t live up to his expectations. Carl was impressionable, adoring. I was flattered.”

  She lifted one shoulder, a fluid, graceful gesture of a movement, the kind Julianne was incapable of, the kind that had ensnared Carl Harris.

  “I couldn’t resist.”

  “That’s your excuse?” Julianne felt the rage boil up inside her. “That’s enough to destroy two marriages?”

  “The only marriage that was destroyed was mine,” Lisa said evenly. “I’m the one who was forced to leave. Frank chose you over me, his wife. I’m the one who had to leave my home and children.”

  “You’ll get no sympathy for me. You were to blame.”

  Lisa’s eyes narrowed to thin glittering slits of color. “Do you think they’ll canonize you, Julianne? Long-suffering wife, devoted mother. Don’t you ever get tired of being perfect? Haven’t you ever been tempted to do anything outside of the box you’ve created?”

  “Unlike you, I have a conscience. Someone else’s husband would be off limits.”

  “Why did you stay with him?”

  “He was my husband, my children’s father.”

  Lisa shook her head. “You’ll have to do better than that.”

  Julianne rested her hands on the table. They were steady without the slightest hint of tremor. Lisa DeAngelo no longer intimidated her. She was just a woman, sad, homeless, a failure, without children or grandchildren to insulate her old age. “I would have lef
t him if he had been with anyone else. You were different. You were evil. I knew it and Frank knew it. Carl was an innocent, completely incapable of resisting you. You were clever, more than he ever was. He was simply no match for you. I knew that if you were gone, it would never happen again. Carl loved me. You were a diversion to the dark side.”

  “So, that’s how you justified asking Frank to send me away.”

  Julianne shook her head. “He came up with that one on his own. I offered to leave. He wanted Carl to stay.”

  “Carl Harris was an average winemaker at best,” Lisa said bitterly. “You were the one Frank wanted. Admit it, Julianne.”

  Memories assailed her, the sharp, feral scent of her instincts before Lisa’s banishment, and later, when all she’d imagined proved to be true, when the stabbing ache of her husband’s betrayal was so severe she couldn’t think of anything else had dulled to a bone-deep ache, Frank had been there, the port in her storm. “What are you doing here, Lisa?” she asked wearily. “Surely you can’t imagine there’s anything for you here.”

  “I wanted to see Francesca and my grandson.”

  “You don’t care about Francesca and it would surprise me if you remember the boy’s name.”

  “Of course I do.”

  Julianne was finished. She stood. “Good night, Lisa. You’ve had your visit. Please be gone by the time I’m up. It’s late and I think I’ll sleep in. Nine o’clock sounds like a reasonable time for you to leave.”

  Lisa pushed herself away from the table. “It’s not that easy. Do you think you can send me on my way and waltz up the stairs of this house that was once mine? Think again, Julianne. You’ve had your nice little ordered life all these years while I’ve had nothing. I’m not going to fade into the woodwork so easily.”

  “As usual, you refuse to take responsibility for your own actions. I’m sure you’ll do what you want. You always do. But this house is mine, too, and I say you go.”

  “Francescá wants me to stay.”

  Julianne felt a fist close over her heart. She pushed the doubt away. Francesca wouldn’t do that to her. “I’ll have to change her mind.”

  “Jake wants me to stay, too.”

  Julianne turned on her. Rage, white hot and consuming, began in the pit of her stomach. “Jake wants no such thing,” she said carefully. “You leave him out of this. Do you think you can twist every man around your little finger? He’s your daughter’s husband, for God’s sake. Have you no shame at all?”