“I know she is. I just—” I stopped, trying to figure out how to explain how I felt. “What if I screw this up?”
“You won’t.”
“I appreciate the vote of confidence.”
“Look, I know you.” He nudged me. “You’re one of the most stubborn, determined people I’ve ever met. When you want something, you don’t give up. And you want her.”
“I do.”
“Then stop overthinking it, and just be yourself. That’s who she wants anyway. One more thing,” Bit said. “Whatever happens tonight, whatever she does or doesn’t tell you—don’t push.”
“I know.”
“Do you? Because you’ve got that look like you’re about to storm a castle.”
“I’m not storming anything. I’m just tired of knowing she’s drowning and won’t let me throw her a rope, because she doesn’t trust that I can see her going under.”
Bit’s expression softened. “She’ll tell you. When she’s ready.”
“You said I’m going all in with her, but I can’t, Bit. Not until she tells me what I already know. I want her. I have for years, but she still refuses to admit the reason making the wine now is so important is because, if she doesn’t, her family will lose everything.”
“I’d tell you to be patient, but if I were in your shoes, I wouldn’t be able to be.”
“Thanks for admitting it.”
“Of course. Now, I better get in there and help my wife before she has a menu better suited for twenty rather than two.”
“You’re sure this is okay?”
Bit cocked his head. “This place is as much yours as it is mine. You don’t need my permission to have dinner here.”
“But I do need you and Eberly to make it.”
“Yeah, we’ve got you.”
10
SAFFRON
The drive home from Los Caballeros should have felt triumphant. We’d found it—Concepción’s half of the formula, complete with percentages and techniques and everything we needed to actually make the Christmas Blessing Wine. Instead, guilt sat in my passenger seat like an unwelcome hitchhiker.
I’d stood in the cave, with Snapper’s arms around me, his chest pressed against my back, both of us staring at what his great-grandmother had written, knowing it could literally save my family, and I still hadn’t told him why it mattered so much. Why it had to be this Christmas. Why I was so desperate I could barely breathe sometimes.
I parked in the driveway and sat in my truck for several minutes, staring at the house. It looked the same as always. Like I was seeing it through glass, something beautiful but untouchable, already slipping away.
Silence hit me when I walked inside. No Mom humming in the kitchen. Dad’s boots weren’t by the door. No sounds of anyone moving around upstairs. Just me and the quiet and too many thoughts I didn’t want to think.
I dropped my purse on the counter and stood in the kitchen, trying to figure out what to do with myself. Snapper wouldn’t pick me up for dinner until seven. That gave me—I checked my phone—almost eight hours to fill.
Eight hours alone with my thoughts sounded like torture.
I changed into work clothes and went outside. The October afternoon was warm, the kind of perfect fall day that reminded me why I loved wine country. I walked through our Zin block, running my hands over leaves that had started their autumn shift from green to gold and rust. The clusters appeared almost ready.
Wednesday or Thursday. That’s when we’d harvest. Two days, maybe three.
This was really happening. We were really going to make this wine, but what if it didn’t work? What if it wasn’t any good? What if the wine that everyone said was “legendary” was just average? More of an urban myth?
“You better be worth it.” I muttered to myself. “You better produce the best damn juice there’s ever been.”
