I would have liked to have done it in France where I grew up, but she had made that virtually impossible because there was no place in France far enough away to avoid her controlling nature, and she would not hear the word no from me. "Maman, I'm happy here for now. I'm establishing myself, and building a reputation."
"You should be building a family," she sniffed.
"There will be time for that." I said the words, not knowing if they were true. My mother's greatest fear in life was to be alone, but I didn't share her worry. My greatest fear wasn't solitude—it was that nothing I did would ever matter, that I’d never be allowed to find out what kind of strength I had. Maman had a habit of arranging everything for me. And while I would have liked to meet a man, have a family perhaps, it wasn't my first priority. "Maman, listen, I need to get ready for work. I will call you tomorrow."
I could hear my mother sniff, offended that I would end a call with her so suddenly. "Very well," she said tightly. "J'taime, ma petite."
"J'taime, Maman." I slid my phone onto the round table next to the window and let out a long breath, rubbing my hands over my face. Talking to my mother was challenging at the best of times. Since moving to Temecula, where we were nine hours behind my home in France, I had found the only time I had to speak to her was early in the morning—before work, sometimes before coffee. And that was the ultimate challenge.
But I was keen to get dressed quickly and hurry to Chateau Le Sec to face the next part of my day, which would be far more fulfilling.
I dressed quickly—work clothes for me were jeans and a tank top with a loose flannel thrown over the top for the cooler mornings—and pulled my hair into a messy bun on top of my head. I slathered on sunscreen and finished my coffee. I was in the car a mere fifteen minutes after my frustrating conversation with my mother, and stepping through door at Chateau Le Sec ten minutes later.
Chloe Tennyson was already inside the tasting room, organizing things and dusting the long tasting counter as the first beams of true sunlight flooded the arched windows overlooking the patio outside and the Temecula Valley beyond.
"Bon matin," I sang out, stepping into what was quickly becoming one of my favorite places in the world.
Chloe turned with a huge smile, her blond hair in wild tendrils around her face, and sang back, "Magalie! Bon matin!" She pulled the coffee carafe from behind her and poured us each a cup, sliding mine across the counter to me.
Coffee had become our morning ritual, and I'd become addicted to the delicious American coffee they favored here. It more than did the job, and while there were some things about American cuisine that had been hard to adapt to, coffee was not one of them. I'd already been planning to set up some kind of underground coffee trade once I went back home.
"How is the harvest looking?" I asked Chloe as I took the first sip. I knew they'd been pulling grapes in over the past few days and was eager to get to work. Bringing in the grapes wasn’t something I’d been involved with, though I’d offered.
She smiled. Chloe had been an exchange student from France when she'd met Adam Tennyson, the owner of Chateau Le Sec. "The fruit is perfect," she said. "I cannot wait to see what you and Adam do with it this year."
I sipped my coffee, excitement for work roiling inside me. I was making wine, I was among new friends, and I was free of the entanglement my mother had pushed me into in France. My phone buzzed in my pocket and I pulled it out to see the text. My heart sank.
Maybe I wasn't free of my mother's plans for me, after all.
"What is it?" Chloe asked, putting down her cup as concern wrinkled her forehead.
"My mother," I said, reading the text a third time as shock trickled through me. "She's bought a ticket. She's coming in two weeks. And she's bringing Henri. She will not give up!"
Chloe sucked in a sharp breath and then whispered, "You don’t want your mother here?"
I shook my head. “My relationship with my mother is . . . impossible.”
“How do you mean? And wait, who is Henri?”
We switched to French—I had more words to describe exactly how frustrating life with Maman had been. “Maman is trying to force me into a marriage I don’t want—to Henri, and she doesn’t think I should be focusing on a career. She says I should marry someone capable and smart who will want to take care of me and worry about everything else later.”
“How romantic.” Chloe shook her head, her mouth drawn into a frown.
I told Chloe a little about how my mother had manipulated me my whole life, and how her latest effort had resulted in me reaching out to California wineries and ultimately ending up here. The man she’d tried to make me marry, Henri, was a friend of the family, a winemaker in Avignon. Maman had set up an "internship" for me there, leading me to believe she was actually supportive of my desire to be a winemaker. In truth, she had promised my hand in marriage to sweet, kind Henri—who was absolutely not my type and just enough older for it to be slightly creepy—and sent me there under false pretenses. That had been almost a year ago. I thought I'd set Henri straight, but my mother made it clear they both still harbored hope that I'd somehow change my mind. It had been the impetus for finding a job here and moving as far away from home as I could.
"I was clear enough that this wasn’t going to happen," I said. "I told her I wasn’t marrying him and then I moved halfway around the world, isn’t that clear?"
I texted my mother back furiously, but she didn’t respond.
"She does not seem like the type to take no for an answer," Chloe observed. "Why is she so committed to marrying you off?"
I sighed, putting my phone down and dropping my head into my hands. "She is terrified I will make her mistake."
"Which was?"
"Marrying for love." I looked back up at Chloe.
Chloe’s mouth dropped open. "What? Why would that be a mistake?"
I slumped into one of the tall stools next to the counter. I'd heard the story so many times, I didn't have to think to repeat it to Chloe. My mother had been young, beautiful, evidently not very smart. She'd fallen for my father, who had been a playboy. They were in love, but it was an affair of passion for him, and he wouldn't marry her, even after she was pregnant. Her heart was broken and her parents had disowned her because they'd already set up a match, which she'd broken to be with my father. When he'd moved on, she'd been alone with me, and life had not been easy. She’d worked multiple jobs, I’d been left home alone as a very young child, and we often weren’t sure where our next meal would come from.
"Your poor mother. Did your grandparents ever forgive her?"
I smiled, thinking of my grandfather's kind face. "Eventually, when I was three or so, but they wouldn’t help her financially." I lifted my coffee cup to my lips again. "Then Maman met Emile, and she's happy now and taken care of."
“She doesn’t love him?”
I shook my head. “She has been very clear that the biggest mistake she ever made was not listening to her parents, going ahead with the practical match they had made for her.”
Chloe made a clucking noise of understanding. "She thinks she's taking care of you."
"It's awful," I said.
"It is," Chloe agreed. "But it comes from love."
"Well I feel terrible for poor Henri. I’ve emailed him and explained everything, and I thought he understood." I put down my cup so I could explain my point better, waving my hands as I spoke. "Maybe he still thinks there's a chance I'll marry him. He isn't very assertive, and maybe my mother is wrangling him to come here."
"Maybe you need to show them both that there is no chance," Chloe suggested.
"I've told them."
"Yes, but show them." She wiggled her eyebrows.
"How?" I lifted my hands, palms up, in confusion.
"Be already taken when they arrive." Chloe smiled, her dark brown eyes shining above her full pink lips. She looked pleased with herself, like she'd just solved the world's greatest problem.
"I’m not eve
n dating anyone.” I shook my head, making a curl spring loose from my bun.
"Mr. Match," Chloe said. And then she proceeded to explain about a dating site she'd heard of on the news, and forced me into the back office to fill out the longest questionnaire of my life after going back to tell Adam I’d be late because I was helping her with something up front. It took two hours and included questions about my preferred fruits and my opinions about smoked fish.
"I don't understand why it cares what I think of hamsters as pets," I called out to Chloe at the tasting counter just outside the door.
"It's very scientific," she replied. “I saw it on the news.”
"It also says there are no guarantees," I told her, stepping back through the door after finishing the profile and hitting submit.
She turned and raised an eyebrow at me. "Look at you, darling. The dark lush hair, those deep soulful eyes. Your perfect French complexion and those curves! You'll be matched before you know it."
“It specifically says it could take months or even years and that the match depends on your perfect algorithmic match also being in the database. It has nothing to do with looks.”
Chloe shrugged, and I envied her easy certainty about everything. “But it doesn’t say it won’t happen right away. Worth a try.”
"I don't think I want to be matched," I moaned, readjusting my bun.
"It would only be to show your mother you aren't available. And Henri," Chloe reminded me. "Ooh, you know what would work best?"
A little pit of dread opened in my stomach. "What?"
"If you pretended to be engaged. Then there would be no questions at all."
"You want me to convince a man I haven't even met yet to pretend we are engaged? And make my mother believe this has all happened in two weeks?"
“Your mother is not an issue. She knows you might not tell her everything all the time, right?”
“I suppose.” I definitely did not tell Maman everything.
“So maybe you would have been keeping this a secret, too.”
“But if I just tell her I’m engaged now, maybe that will stop her from bringing Henri in the first place.” I pulled my phone back out and began texting. “There. I’ve just let her know there is no point in bringing Henri because I am already seeing someone, and that there will be plenty of time for her to meet him, so she should not rush to see me now.”
Chloe smiled, and we both watched my phone for a response.
We got one. Flight confirmation details.
“She’s coming anyway. And bringing Henri.”
"It will be fine." Chloe looked so certain, I almost believed she knew what she was talking about.
I put a hand on her shoulder, smiling at the few early visitors sipping wine at the counter as I headed for the back of the winery. I'd already ignored my duties too long today, thanks to the insane Mr. Match intake form. I'd think about this problem later.
* * *
Ready to read book 2 now? It’ll be out March 7th!
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Also by Delancey Stewart
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The MR. MATCH Series:
Book One: Scoring the Keeper’s Sister
Book Two: Scoring a Fake Fiancée
Book Three: Scoring a Prince
…more to come!
The LOVE IN THE VINES Series:
Vintage
Redemption Red
Beyond Redemption
A Holiday Delay
The Love in the Vines Box Set (Books 1-4)
The STARR RANCH WINERY Series:
Chasing a Starr
THE GIRLFRIENDS OF GOTHAM Series:
Men and Martinis
Highballs in the Hamptons
Cosmos and Commitment
The Girlfriends of Gotham Box Set
STANDALONES:
Without Words
Without Promises
Mr. Big
The PROHIBITED! Duet:
Prohibited!
The Glittering Life of Evie Mckenzie
Copyright © 2019 Delancey Stewart
All rights reserved.
SCORING THE KEEPER’S SISTER, MR. MATCH BOOK 1
by Delancey Stewart
All rights reserved. Published in the United States of America.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
SCORING THE KEEPER’S SISTER is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Scoring the Keeper’s Sister: Mr. Match Book 1 Page 16
