“How are you, Alessia?”
“Busy,” I retort. “It’s green harvest, Alba. You know how it is.”
“I do.” But she’s assenting not just about what she knows of green harvest but more about what she knows about me.
I am the quiet Alighieri sister. The dull one.
Alba is beautiful, while I’m plain. She’s delicate and feminine, while my hands are rough like a farmer’s. But then, a winemaker is a farmer—a worker.
I end the call before she can say anything else.
The vines are waiting.
Diradamentodoesn’t pause for scandal, and it doesn’t care who my husband is seen with. The work demands everything I have—my focus, my judgment, and my equanimity.
I step back into the row, lift my shears, and make another cut.
I lift a bunch, thumb the grapes to test their firmness. The berries are small but swelling fast, tight-skinned and promising.
But a generous vine will ruin itself if you let it. It will feed everything and perfect nothing. Sacrifice is part of the job.
“Alessia?” a voice calls from behind me. “Are we starting next on the merlot block or the cab?”
I turn. Edam stands a few paces back, his hair pulled into a knot, sleeves rolled, sun already catching the sharp lines of his forearms.
He’s in his early thirties—older than me by a year, maybe two—but he has the alacrity and energy of a teenager.
Dirt streaks his cheek, and he makes me feel old.
“The merlot,” I tell him. “It’s running ahead.”
“Got it.”
He signals the others with a quick wave. They fan out between the rows, the soft metallic snip-snip beginning like the buzz of insects.
“Merlot is a pain in my ass,” Edam complains.
A laugh lifts behind me—bright, female, warm as fresh bread.
“Merlot is a dramatic grape.” Lucia steps into the row beside me with a bucket. Her dark hair is tied up with a scarf that used to be pretty, but is now a work rag. Her nails are as dirty as mine. Her hands are strong, scarred, and competent. “It likes attention.”
“Just like a woman to make wanting attention sound like a virtue,” Edam teases.
Lucia grins. “Spoken like a man who doesn’t know how to appreciate something valuable.”
“Oh, I know how to do that,caraLucia.” He winks at her.
I smile.
These two have been flirting for two vintages—and I have a feeling they’re sleeping together, but they haven’t said a thing to me, so I’m allowing them their privacy.
Lucia nudges my shoulder gently. “If he had been born a grape, he would be a Sangiovese. Stubborn. Acidic. Prone to sulking.”
I smile despite myself.Thisis obviously their foreplay.
Sweet.
“Sangiovese is noble,” I muse.
