Devon closed the door behind him and leaned against it, trying to figure out how to deliver news that would break her heart.
"We need to talk," he said quietly. "There's been an article. About you. About what happened at the tasting room.”
The color drained from her face. "How bad?"
"Bad," he admitted. "But Emery—we're going to get through this. Together. I promise you that."
He just hoped it was a promise he could keep.
Six
The production facility felt different on Friday afternoon—quieter, more contemplative, as if the building itself was holding its breath before the weekend. Emery sat across from Gabe in his glass-walled office, surrounded by ledgers documenting decades of Stone Bridge's history. She'd been cross-referencing storage conditions with vintage years, building the kind of provenance documentation that serious collectors demanded.
"You've got good instincts for this," Gabe observed, watching her make notes in the margins of a harvest report from 1998. "Most people would just record the data. You're telling the story."
Emery looked up, surprised by the compliment. "That's what provenance is, really. Not just facts and figures, but the narrative of how something came to be. Why it matters."
"Is that what drew you to this work originally? The storytelling?"
The question was casual, but something in Gabe's tone suggested genuine curiosity. Emery set down her pen, considering how much to reveal.
"My parents used to take my sister and me to museums every weekend when we were kids," she said finally. "Not the big flashy exhibits—the archives. The storage rooms where they kept things not currently on display." She smiled at the memories filling her brain. How she’d hold her sister’s hand and skip through the massive hallway, listening to the heels of her patent leather shoes echo against the walls, while her father would smile that massive grin and remind them that history and art were bound together like the stars and the moon. "My mom would point to some dusty artifact, and then my dad would ask us to imagine its story. Who made it? Who owned it? How did it survive?"
"Your parents sound wonderful."
"They are." The words came out fierce, protective, as if the last two years hadn’t put a rift in their relationship. “They chose us. My sister and me. When they looked at the two of us, they said it was love at first sight. They built our family from intention, not accident. But adoption isn’t always easy, and there were some bumps in the road.”
Gabe went very still, his coffee mug halfway to his mouth. "That's... Quite the story.”
"It was. My mom talks about it sometimes—the bureaucracy, the home visits, the constant evaluations. But she says choosing us was the easiest decision she ever made. Everything else was just paperwork." Emery felt her throat tighten. "She always told us that biology doesn't make a family. Showing up every day does. Loving someone even when it's hard does."
"Your mom sounds like a wise woman."
"She is. Which makes the article about my father so much worse." Emery hadn't meant to say it, but the words tumbled out anyway. "Because if he did what they say he did—if he really accepted bribes, which he denies, but things are so oddly quietabout it all—then what does that say about the man who taught me about integrity?"
Gabe's expression shifted, something complicated passing across his features. His hand trembled slightly as he set down his mug, and for a moment, he looked like he wanted to say something—something important—but he sighed instead. "You don't know that he did anything wrong," Gabe said. “Especially since he’s telling you he didn’t.”
“He denies it, but he’s also telling me not to go defending him or making waves. To let the wheels of justice work, whatever the heck that means.” Emery’s chest tightened, as it did every time she allowed herself to think about her dad and the situation. "And that's the worst part. Not knowing. Not being able to ask more questions because he won't talk about it until it’s all cleared up.”
Gabe was quiet for a long moment, his gaze distant. "Sometimes, parents keep secrets to protect us. Even when the protection hurts more than the truth would."
There was weight in those words, layers of meaning Emery couldn't quite decipher. She watched Gabe struggle with something internal, saw his jaw clench and release.
"Gabe? Are you okay?"
"Yeah." He shook his head as if clearing cobwebs. "Sorry. Your story just... it resonated."
"Because of your grandfather?"
"Partly." Gabe stood abruptly and moved to the window overlooking the production floor. "My father spent his entire life trying to be the opposite of his dad. Honest, ethical, almost painfully rule-following. But he never talked about what it was like—watching his own father get arrested, seeing his mother ostracized. He kept all that pain locked away, trying to protect me from it."
"Did it work?"
"No. Because secrets don't protect—they just fester." Gabe turned back to face her. "When I was ten, some kid at school called my grandfather a murderer. I had no idea what he was talking about. Had to learn my family's history from gossip and old newspaper articles."
"God, Gabe. I'm so sorry."
"The point is, I understand what it's like to love someone and simultaneously wonder if you ever really knew them." His voice was gentle but firm. "But whatever your father did or didn't do—that's his burden, not yours. Just like my grandfather's crimes aren't mine to carry."
