The drive to the Van Orr estate only took a few minutes. We parked near the winery and followed Baron inside. He led us deep into the cellar, to a room in the very back. We waited while he sorted through several keys before finding the right one. The lock clicked, and the door swung open with a groan that echoed off the stone walls.
Inside, the space was small—maybe twenty by twenty—lined with wooden racks that held bottles covered in decades of dust. Baron moved along the racks methodically, his finger tracing along labels, searching. His movements grew more agitated as he checked each rack. Once. Twice. A third time.
“They should be here.” His voice was tight. “Right here, in this section.”
He moved bottles, checked behind them, and did the same at the next rack.
“They’re gone.” His face pale and his breathing heavy. “The bottles are gone.”
My stomach dropped.
Baron’s gaze swept across those of us in the space, then locked on his daughter.
A weighted look passed between them.
“Isabel, do you know what happened to the bottles?”
We all turned toward her.
Her composure, which had been so carefully maintained all evening, cracked. Her chin trembled, and tears filled her eyes.
“I—” She pressed her hands to her face.
Kick, who was standing beside her, whispered something in her ear I couldn’t hear.
She shook her head, unable or unwilling to speak.
“Isabel?” Do you have something to say?” Baron asked.
“You don’t understand.” Her words came out choked. “None of you understand what it’s like.”
“What what’s like?” I asked.
She glanced at Kick, then at me. “I know about your little arrangement. How the two of you conspired against me, not just this year but in the past.”
“What are you talking about?” Baron asked.
“For the last five years, Snapper paid to have Saffron bid against me at the bachelor auction just so I wouldn’t win. That’s how much he didn’t want to take me on a stupid date. And this year, he was willing to put up seventy-five grand just to avoid what? Having to sit across a table from me and have dinner?” Her eyes filled with tears again that she tried to wipe away, but they fell too fast. “Am I really that bad?”
I took a step in her direction, and Kick shifted so he was between her and me.
“What the hell?” I said, glaring at him.
“You—”
Isabel interrupted him. “I don’t need you to stick up for me, Rascon. For all I know, you told me on purpose.”
When my brother’s face turned ten shades of red, I knew she was telling the truth. While I wanted to throat punch him, now wasn’t the time. Later? Absolutely.
“He also told me that, in exchange for saving you from having to take me on a date, Saffron asked you to help her make the Christmas Blessing Wine.”
I clenched my fists at my sides and was moving in my brother’s direction when Saffron put her hand on my arm.
“Don’t,” she whispered. “Let her finish.”
“Do you know what people say about me?” Isabel’s tone sharpened. “That I’m desperate. Pathetic. Last year, someonemade a betting pool on social media about how much I’d bid—” She stopped. “But I suppose you both knew that already.”
Guilt hit me like a fist to the gut.
