Love in the Vineyard (Tavonesi #7)(55)

“Yes, sir.”

“Welcome. We’ll be expanding this pollinator project and native garden soon. So whatever Ms. Raley needs, see that she gets it.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Adrian.”

“Adrian,” Enrique repeated.

He turned to leave and then spun on his heel and turned back.

“And, Enrique—she’s not so good at asking for help. You might want to offer your services quite firmly. Maybe anticipate her needs.”

“I’m accustomed to meeting unspoken needs, sir. You can count on me.”

He didn’t correct the man a third time. If Enrique was more comfortable calling him sir, so be it. He did notice the duct tape holding the man’s shoes together. Likely Enrique was another of Coco’s projects. He only hoped the guy knew something about gardening. If the plan he’d cooked up on the flight back from Rome succeeded, they’d need more than a few knowledgeable workers.

He smiled to himself. And imagined how pleased Natasha was going to be when he broke the news.

He glanced at his phone. He had fifteen minutes to gear up and get on the polo field. If he was late, Zoe would have his head.





“Natasha! Over here. Coco will be along in a minute.” Anastasia patted the cushion of the vacant chair beside her.

Natasha made her way past the uniformed servers and what seemed like a horde of beautiful people. Sonoma fundraisers brought them out of the woodwork.

“I got one of these for you.” Anastasia held out a broad-brimmed straw hat with a ribbon circling the crown.

Natasha made out the words Zoe’s team embroidered into the ribbon. Maybe the taped dyslexia exercises Mary had given her were working. She listened to the cassettes each night before bed. But some nights the black mob of tangled letters returned and she lost her confidence. At least she could read a ribbon on a hat.

“It’s lovely, thank you.”

Natasha settled the hat on her head and wished she wore something other than her work jeans. But there hadn’t been time to change. The new lupine starts had rooted and she had to repot them; root-bound starts weren’t strong enough to thrive transplanting into the soils of the vineyard. And the pants she’d thrown into her backpack as she’d left her apartment that morning weren’t much dressier anyway.

Surrounded by long-legged socialites in short designer dresses and sparkling strappy sandals, she felt like the dark duckling of Swan Lake. Except she wasn’t going to be kissed by a prince and transformed into a beauty.

Anastasia gestured at the four horses and riders approaching from the barn. “No fair cheering for Adrian. We women have to stick together today.”

At the sight of Adrian mounted on a gleaming black horse, Natasha’s pulse skittered. The three men riding alongside him were handsome, but Adrian took her breath away. The white jersey stretching across his chest and the tight pants tucked into high boots couldn’t have been painted on him for a more devastatingly sexy effect. He waved over to where she sat with his sisters and then rode toward the opposite end of the field.

“Adrian’s got a good reach,” Coco said as she slipped into the chair next to Natasha. “But Zoe’s got a better seat.”

“Seat?” Horses were as foreign to Natasha as were handsome Italian wine scions.

Coco laughed. “We’d better bring this bella donna up to speed. The game starts in five minutes.”

Between the unfamiliar terms and Coco’s Italian accent, it was difficult to follow Coco’s quick summary of the rules. And the concept of right-of-way completely eluded Natasha. It seemed to her that any angle of approach would be dangerous for riders going as fast as Coco described.

“Let her just enjoy the game,” Anastasia broke in. “For goodness’ sake, it’s not like she’s going to mount up and ride.” She laid a hand on Natasha’s arm. “I’m the only one in the family that knows it’s just a game. If you listened to the rest of them, you’d think life and death hung in the balance of a match.”

“If she weren’t my identical twin, I’d think she’d been dropped out of the sky by a fairy,” Coco said with a mock scowl.

“A goose.” Anastasia laughed. “You always get your stories mixed up.”

“A stork,” Natasha said. “It’s a stork that brings babies.”

“I hope the stork takes bribes to hold off. It’ll be a long time before I’m ready for a delivery,” Coco said with a laugh. “Not that I don’t like children. It’s just—”

“Coco would be about as good with children as Adrian. They’ve both sworn off parenting,” Anastasia said with a wink to her sister. “It’s a good thing since neither of them have grown up yet themselves.”

She couldn’t know how her words skewered into Natasha’s heart. As if she needed one more reason to put another brick in the wall between her and Adrian.

A horn sounded, and Coco and Anastasia stood. Natasha unfolded from her seat and adjusted the hat to shade the glare from the bright afternoon sun. From the opposite end of the field, four more horses and riders galloped out of a tent. The women carried red and blue flags that trailed in the breeze.

“Zoe has a flair for the dramatic,” Coco said.

“Like you don’t?” Anastasia said in a teasing tone.