Rather than put everything back, I gathered the journal and photographs, cleaned up the mess I’d made, then descended the wooden steps that groaned under my feet.
Had it only been twenty-four hours since I stood outside my father’s study, eavesdropping on a conversation that stopped me cold?
“I understand the bank’s position.” His tone had been flat, defeated in a way I’d only heard once before. Three days ago. “But a few bad harvests in a row, then the late frost last spring, taking thirty percent of our tonnage, have put us in a position?—”
I’d pressed myself against the wall, barely breathing.
“Ninety days.” A long pause. “Yes, I realize that puts us right at New Year’s Eve.” Another pause. “If we can’t bring the account current by then, you’ll begin foreclosure.” His voice caught. “I see. Yes. Thank you for calling directly, not sending a letter. I appreciate that courtesy.”
The next thing I’d heard was the phone hitting the desk as if he’d thrown it.
I was about to walk past when I heard the desk chair creak, then a sound that chilled my blood—my father, Lucas Hope, the man who’d taught me to be strong no matter what, was crying.
I’d backed away silently.Ninety days.That was how long we were from losing everything—our home, our heritage, our livelihood.
Like yesterday, I retreated upstairs.
I sat on my bed, with Marilyn’s journal, rereading what she’d written about the Christmas Blessing Wine. What seemed like an exciting historical discovery ten minutes ago had just become something more—our only hope, given the time frame.
I grabbed my phone and checked the harvest schedule. Three blocks were left unpicked—designated for a special late-season reserve we’d planned to bottle in spring. Wine that wouldn’t matter now if we lost everything in ninety days.
Only Zinfandel, Syrah, and Mourvedre still had grapes on the vine.
My heart sank. We didn’t have Gamay, and our Syrah block was tiny, barely a quarter acre.
However, the Avila’s Los Caballeros Vineyards had extensive Gamay plantings from Cru’s experimental program with Burgundian varietals, and their Syrah was legendary.
I grabbed my laptop and started calculating. To make enough wine to matter—to potentially save us from foreclosure—we’d need at least a thousand bottles. Maybe fifteen hundred if we could manage it.
One ton of grapes yielded roughly seven hundred and twenty bottles. For fifteen hundred bottles, I’d need just over two tons total. If the blend required equal parts of each varietal, that was about three-quarters of a ton of each grape.
We had the Zinfandel. We could harvest three-quarters of a ton easily from our reserve block.
But the Gamay and most of the Syrah? I’d need the Avilas’ help for that.
And that was just the grapes. Carbonic maceration required specialized tanks. Ours were all full of this year’s conventional fermentation. Los Cab had the capacity. They had empty tanks. The equipment. The space.
I turned back to one of the pages I’d marked and reread what my great-grandmother had written.We have agreed—each of us keeps our portion.If the wine was as remarkable as the stories suggested, if we could recreate even a fraction of its magic, we could auction it for premium prices. Beaujolais Nouveau sold for thirty to fifty dollars a bottle at retail. But a onetime recreation of a mythical wine? With the Hope and Avila names behind it?
We could easily ask for two hundred dollars a bottle. Maybe more at the right auction. Fifteen hundred bottles at two hundred dollars each was three hundred thousand dollars. Even if we split it fifty-fifty with the Avilas for their grapes and resources, that was a hundred and fifty thousand for us.
What if we could get four hundred dollars a bottle? Six hundred? Even conservatively, split with the Avilas, we might clear enough to at least buy time. Maybe push the foreclosure back. Maybe convince the bank we had a plan.
It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t guaranteed. But it was something. The only something I had.
My cell phone buzzed.Three nights to showtime. You know the drill. You with me again this year?
The text was from Salazar Avila, who everyone called Snapper. Showtime referred to the bachelor auction, a fundraising event held every year at the Wicked Winemakers’ Ball—a post-harvest celebration that raised millions for the local Children’s Hospital.
“The drill” was an arrangement we’d first made five years ago and every October since. I’d bid, he’d pay, and Isabel Van Orr, who’d been chasing the second-youngest of the six Avila brothers since high school, would be outbid for the fifth time, saving Snapper from having to outmaneuver her relentless pursuit for another three-hundred-and-sixty-five days.
What did I get for my trouble? A favor. One I’d never collected.
This year, I knew exactly what I needed. Multiple things, actually. His family’s grapes. Their winery space. Their equipment. Help finding Concepción’s half of the formula. And somehow, I had to convince him and his family to partner with me on this without telling my father why. At least not until we had wine ready to sell.
Three nights later,I stood in front of my bedroom mirror, trying to make my hands stop shaking long enough to apply mascara. The black dress I’d worn to the last four auctions hung perfectly, as it always did. Classic lines, expensive fabric fromback when we could afford such things, the kind of dress that would never go out of style because it had never really been fashionable. It was appropriate. Respectable. Forgettable. Perfect for someone who didn’t want to draw attention.
My phone buzzed with a text from my sister, Felicity.Wagner surprised me, and we’re on our way from Napa. See you soon, pumpkin.
