The Vintner's Vixen (River Hill Book 1)

by Rebecca Norinne

  Calm your goddamned horses, Noah thought. No one said anything about fucking her.

  Chemistry wasn’t the only subject Noah had studied in college. He also knew a thing or two about biology, and he recognized these primal urges were something that had been hardwired into his DNA eons ago. He could give in to them and act like an asshole caveman by dragging Angelica off by her hair, or he could let all his culture and breeding and years of etiquette classes and social charm do the job for him.

  Blinking away from the other man, Noah’s eyes darted to Angelica and found her staring at him with an amused gleam.

  “You were saying?” she asked, taking another swallow of her beer.

  Noah cleared his throat. “I was saying the music was loud and I was trying to sleep. Can I convince you to turn it down a few notches? I don’t have to get up early in the morning, but I like to.” Casting bait he knew Angelica couldn’t ignore, Noah added, “And Molly will be expecting her morning tromp through the woods.”

  “Oh yeah?” she asked, her interest mounting.

  “Yup,” he answered, shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans. She might not have demonstrated much interest in him over the last several weeks, but Angelica was engaged in a full-fledged love affair with his dog. “Three mornings a week we head out to Armstrong Redwoods State Park before the day-trippers descend on the trails. You been?”

  Angelica shook her head. “I’ve never heard of it.”

  “Oh yeah? You’ve seen The Empire Strikes Back though, right?”

  One of the guys snorted. “Dude, we work in Hollywood. Of course we’ve seen it.”

  Ignoring the interloper, Noah’s eyes stayed trained on Angelica. “That’s Endor.”

  Angelica’s face lit with recognition and she let out another tinkling laugh. “Oh my god! I know everyone hates the ewoks—”

  “—Not as much as Jar Jar Binks,” Noah reminded her.

  She shook her head and chuckled. “No, not as much as Jar Jar Binks. But I love the ewoks; they’re my favorite. They’re so cute and cuddly and … diabolical.” She leaned forward, her eyes gleaming with mischief.

  Cute, cuddly, and diabolical—three words Noah might use to describe Angelica too. He laughed, and she raised an eyebrow at him, almost as if she could tell exactly what he’d been thinking.

  Then she tilted her bottle to an empty stump next to her. “Why don’t you sit for a few minutes and we can debate the sheer idiocy of Padmé falling for Anakin.”

  Noah hadn’t been lying. He really wanted to get some sleep, but now that he’d given a name to these confusing feelings for Angelica, he also really wanted to explore them … so he sat. For the next several minutes, they chatted about their favorite moments from the Star Wars franchise, with Angelica’s friends butting in left and right to offer their take on something Noah couldn’t have cared less about. They were having an A and B conversation, and he really wished the others would C their fucking way out of it … but of course he wasn’t about to say that. No, Noah hoped when he and Angelica continued to talk animatedly amongst themselves her guests would get a fucking clue and leave. They’d monopolized her conversation enough for one night—it was Noah’s turn to have her attention, and he wanted it all for himself.

  Eventually, Roger—a cameraman, Noah had learned, and obviously the smartest of the bunch—slapped his palms down onto his knees and stood. Stretching his back, he said, “We’ve got an early morning so we’re going to head back to the hotel.” One by one his companions rose and tossed their empty bottles into the garbage. Before they left, he turned to Angelica. “See you at nine then?”

  She set her beer on the ground and shook Roger’s hand. “Looking forward to it. I can’t wait to start filming.”

  The six men climbed into three cars and pulled away, their brake lights flashing in the dark. And then it was just Noah and Angelica, alone, with nothing but the night sky twinkling overhead and the fire casting a warm glow over her face. A face Noah couldn’t stop staring at. And because of that, he realized she suddenly looked guilty.

  “Filming?” he asked.

  She fidgeted, wiping her hands back and forth along her thighs, as she stared down into the flames. Eventually, her eyes flicked to his. “I didn’t mention it?”

  “Since I don’t know what ‘it’ is, I couldn’t say. Are you doing another movie?” He poked at the fire with a long, coal-tipped branch.

  Noah found the idea surprising. Over the last several weeks, they’d chatted here and there about the movies she’d been in and he’d always gotten the sense that Angelica hated Hollywood. He could tell she loved acting—the craft of it, inhabiting the characters she portrayed and becoming them, plus the sheer mechanical work of being on camera—but he was sure she could definitely do without the ass kissing and politics that went with it.

  “Not exactly.” She stood and grabbed a nearby pitcher, tossing water over the flames to put them out.

  Noah jumped back in surprise when the wood hissed, and ash erupted in a steaming volcano. “Shit.” With Angelica’s retreating form several feet away now, he jogged to catch up, swiping white flecks from his torso and thighs.

  With a tug on the weathered screen door, Angelica stepped into the mudroom and Noah followed. She hadn’t invited him inside, but she hadn’t said “goodnight” yet either, so Noah assumed her sudden departure smack in the middle of their conversation came with an open invitation for him to join her.

  “Wait up.” A few seconds later, he found her standing at the old, chipped farmhouse sink, idly rubbing her thumb over one of the black grooves in the porcelain, her eyes staring at the blackness outside. Stepping to her side, Noah asked, “Hey, what was that all about?”

  Angelica flinched, and he wondered if she’d even heard him come in, heard him calling after her. He’d only known her a short while, but Noah had never seen her like this. Had he said or done something wrong? He wracked his brain to try and remember what it could have been and came up blank. They’d discussed Star Wars, her favorite films, his favorite TV shows, and then her friends had called it a night. Had it been something one of them had said? Admittedly, Noah hadn’t been paying too much attention to the other men—he only had eyes and ears for Angelica now that he’d realized his annoyance with her stemmed not from hatred, but instead an intense, combustible attraction—but he didn’t think that was it either.

  “Hey, what happened back there?” he asked, laying a tentative hand on the soft, warm skin of her forearm.

  Angelica dragged her eyes to his. Their gazes held for a few expectant heartbeats and then she sighed and turned to rest her hip against the counter. “I’ve been dreading this conversation all week,” she said. “And especially with you being so nice all of a sudden.”

  “Hey,” Noah replied with mock surprise and a cheeky grin. “I can be nice.”

  Angelica smiled back, her heart-shaped lips hitching up, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Not to me. You merely tolerate me.”

  Noah gripped the back of his neck and dropped his eyes. Flicking them back up, he said, “I think we can both agree we didn’t meet under the most auspicious of situations.”

  “No, I know that, but I also apologized profusely and tried to do what I could to make it right. I thought you were excited about the land back there.” She nodded toward the back of the house.

  Noah dropped his hand and shoved them both in the pocket of his jeans. “I am. Really.”

  “Then why the sour face and bad attitude whenever our paths cross? One time I actually smelled my armpits because I was sure that I stunk.” She cracked another small smile and Noah looked away guiltily.

  He’d known he was being a dick to her but had felt justified in his behavior, even after they’d signed their contract. After all, it hadn’t contained a provision that said he had to make nice with his nemesis. Except … Angelica wasn’t his nemesis. She was a beautiful woman who he found mildly exasperating and one he very much wanted to kiss. All the d
amn time. Noah wasn’t a player—he left the womanizing to Sean—but he’d never been dumbfounded by a woman either, not the way he was with Angelica. It was like she’d twisted him inside out and everything he’d thought he’d ever known about the fairer sex had been turned on its head.

  Which was why he dragged his hands from his pockets and took a step closer, bringing him within inches of that delectable body of hers. Why he stroked the pad of his finger softly down the side of her face until he reached her jaw. He raised her chin until their eyes met … and held, the black of Angelica’s pupils bleeding into the deep blue of her irises as her chest rose and fell with labored breaths.

  “You don’t stink,” Noah whispered as his head fell forward, his lips hovering over Angelica’s. “But I’d very much like to find out what you taste like.”

  Chapter Six

  He was kissing her. He was kissing her, and Angelica couldn’t have pulled away if she’d wanted to. And god help her, she did not want to.

  As his lips drifted to hers, she felt the pull between them like a physical force. His long fingers slid around her jawline, angling her head to meet his exploring lips. Her hands crept up to his shoulders without conscious thought, and her mouth opened under his to let their tongues slide against each other, tangling in a building frenzy.

  Oh, god. This was Noah. Prickly, grumpy Noah, who admittedly had the finest body she’d ever seen and a chin you could light matches off of. They’d spent six weeks sniping at each other over every little thing. She’d thought he hated her. Apparently, his feelings were… something else.

  She let her body move fully against his, feeling the edge of the countertop press into her back as an equally hard ridge in his jeans pressed against her front.

  He made a sound, low in his throat, and the hand that wasn’t at her neck slid down her body agonizingly slow until it reached her ass. His big hands fit all the way around her curves. What else did he have that was big? she wondered, moaning against his lips while his fingers flicked the edge of her t-shirt up. As they crept toward the waistline of her jeans, her body hummed with electricity.

  Wait. They shouldn’t be doing this.

  Angelica pulled her hands from around his neck, put them on his shoulders, and pushed. “Wait. Noah.” The effort to unseal her lips from his and speak was one of the hardest things she’d ever done. She felt the coolness of the air between them like someone had slapped her in the mouth with a heavy bag of ice cubes.

  “Um. What?” He leaned away, looking as dazed as she felt.

  They had a contract. She didn’t sleep with people she did business with. And she still had to tell him about the crew. She and Jai had hammered out the details with the network over the last month; filming and construction were going to start in earnest tomorrow.

  The camera crew had been over to survey the layout of the house all day. A few beers with the guys she’d be spending the next few months in close quarters with had seemed like a great icebreaker until Noah had showed up. And started kissing her.

  She rested her forehead against his broad chest, inhaling his clean, sharp scent and trying to ignore his fingers creeping back up under her shirt. “I need to talk to you,” she said, and his fingers paused, then slid reluctantly back down, dragging sparks along her sensitive skin. She shivered, and he pressed against her, sliding his erection along her thigh before putting his hands at her waist and stepping back a fraction of an inch.

  “About what?” He kissed her forehead when she raised her head. “If it’s condoms, I’m packing, I promise.”

  She snorted. “How thoughtful of you.”

  He had the grace to look embarrassed. “I didn’t plan—”

  “I know you didn’t.” And she did, because Noah wasn’t like that. And come to think of it, neither was she. Everything about what they were doing was so out of character for her it wasn’t even funny.

  But that’s not what she needed to discuss with him. Any talk of sex could wait. Right now, she needed to be straight with him and hope the tentative friendship they’d managed to carve out wouldn’t be too negatively impacted by her professional endeavors. The truth was. Noah wasn’t going to like what she had to tell him, and she didn’t relish the idea of going back to the Grumpy Noah version of him now that she’d had a taste of Sexy Noah.

  “It’s not that,” she said, setting her palm to her forehead and breathing out a sigh. “I’ve been meaning to tell you about this.” She just hadn’t been able to bring herself to do it, not when he’d been practically pleasant once or twice.

  And now—well, now it was too late, and she had to put the genie back into the bottle. The hard, chiseled, extremely attractive genie who still had his hands on her, sending energy short-circuiting through her body and making her short of breath.

  “About what?” His eyes were starting to clear, the haze of attraction retreating into his customary frown.

  “The filming.”

  “What filming?”

  She stepped out from between his arms, and he folded them as he watched her turn and fiddle with the coffee mugs in the drying rack next to the sink. She could feel his eyes boring into her shoulder blades. “I’ve signed on with Renovation Network Television to let them film my project.” There was silence from the looming presence behind her, so she soldiered on. “The crew will be on site for at least the next eight weeks, filming me and my construction crews as we do the renovation of this place.”

  “You’re doing a reality series?”

  “It’s not like I’m a Kardashian, Noah! It’s a home renovation show.”

  “Let me get this straight. You’re going to be bringing construction crews and film crews around here at all hours of the day and night?”

  “I mean, it’s not going to be at all hours—”

  “Because you have such a great history of communicating with contractors.” His voice dripped with sarcasm.

  That was too much. She whipped around and glared at him. “Are you seriously bringing that up again?”

  “It happened, didn’t it?”

  “And I made amends, Noah! You signed a damned contract!” She shoved her finger in his chest, glad of the reminder why she didn’t mix business with pleasure. “You were just telling me five minutes ago that you’re excited to start planting that hillside.”

  “I am. I would just prefer not to be on camera while doing it,” he bit out.

  “Nobody asked you to be on camera!”

  Not that he wouldn’t look good, of course. She lost herself for a brief second in a fantasy of watching him on a giant movie screen, twenty feet tall.

  “How the hell am I supposed to get any work done if you’ve got those jerks crawling all over the place?” The fantasy version of Noah on her mental movie screen scowled at her, and she jerked back to reality.

  “They’re filming me, not you. They’ll be all over the house and primary grounds. I’ll make sure they know to stay out of your way.”

  He rolled his eyes. “I’m sure.”

  “If it’s such a big deal, I’ll have them sign contracts,” she returned. “I hear you’re pretty into that.”

  “Please. Like you Hollywood types have any interest in doing what you’re told.” There was dead silence for a moment as they both registered what he’d said. He raised his eyes to hers, and she couldn’t interpret the expression in them. “I—”

  “—I think you should go,” she said as evenly as she could manage.

  So much for Sexy Noah.

  He pivoted without a word, and the screen door slammed behind him when he walked out.

  Well. That had gone just about as well as she’d expected.

  The next day, Angelica woke up both aroused and infuriated. Damn Noah Bradstone, anyway. She flung the covers away and shrugged into a tank top and stretchy, soft yoga pants. The camera crew wouldn’t be here for at least another two hours, so she had plenty of time before she had to strap herself into a real bra. Coffee was a much more urgent requirement. />
  She padded into the kitchen and bit the inside of her cheek as she passed the counter where he’d pressed into her last night. Her lips still felt soft, and she swore she could still taste him. She shook her head.

  Best get the coffee and stop your fantasizing.

  Angelica slammed beans into her grinder, then grinds into her press, gritting her teeth as she remembered each and every second of last night—both the good ones and the bad. It was probably just as well that he’d revealed what he really thought about “Hollywood types” since she’d been in danger of breaking her personal rules for a minute there.

  Coffee made, she sat down at the island with her laptop. Forget Noah, she had work to do. She tabbed to the window that contained the renovation checklist she kept stored in the cloud and began editing her timeline. An hour and a half later, she heard the rumble of wheels on the drive.

  “Shit!” she shrieked, racing up the stairs to her bedroom.

  No sports bra had ever been taken off as quickly as Angelica’s was just now. It wasn’t often these days that she changed undergarments twice in the span of a couple of hours, but there was no way she wanted the people she’d be working with to see the flattened uni-blob her comfy old racerback turned her breasts into. It was practical, and good for sitting around the house, but it definitely wasn’t sexy, and it certainly didn’t make her look camera-ready. Next, she switched the tank top she’d been wearing for a tee with a picture of Scooby Doo and Shaggy on it, and the yoga pants for baggy boyfriend jeans with a strategically placed hole in the knee. Her hair could stay in a ponytail; Roger had said they’d have a beauty crew in tow when they arrived. Finally, she tucked her socks into her back pocket and scurried for the front door.