Page 22 of The Vineyard Crush

“Nice goin’, cowgirl,” Ridge deadpanned at me with an arched brow and a twist of amusement shaping his lips. He shook his head in bemusement as I stuck my tongue out at him petulantly before squatting down to help Lily organize the keepsakes into chronological piles.

An array of whimsical childhood memories quickly took shape - bronzed baby booties, overlapped handprint drawings, a tiny pair of baby wranglers perfectly preserved in an oval frame. My heart clenched at a gap-toothed school portrait of Ridge grinning ear-to-ear, unruly chestnut waves tumbling over his brow and a dusty cowboy hat already perched atop his head.

“Is this you?” I asked, holding up the faded image as he leaned over for a closer look. He made a gruff noise of acknowledgment, sounding slightly chagrined.

“Yup, that’s me - ‘bout seven years old and already fleein’ the schoolhouse every chance I got to go ridin’ with my daddy and grandpaw.” One side of his mouth kicked up in a lopsided grin before he gestured to a laminated clipping from what looked like a county fair’s program. “Oh, and there’s my first rodeo ribbon!”

Warmth bloomed in my chest at the obvious fondness still coloring his voice over the childish accomplishment. “Oh you were so cute.” I mumbled looking closer to the picture. I found myself searching his face, drinking in the rare, unguarded light dancing behind his amber eyes as he reminisced. Somewhere between third grade and next summer’s rodeo season, that bright spark seemed to have been carelessly smothered…but embers still glowed stubbornly.

My reverie was broken as Lily tugged on the knee of my jeans, holding up a framed collection of rodeo photographs showcasing a lean, sun-bronzed teenager effortlessly manhandling a terrifyingly powerful bucking steed. “See, Emma? I toldja Dad was gonna be a real-life cowboy!”

Eleven

Ridge

Ifinished up the last of the chores around the horse shed, muscles burning pleasantly from an honest day’s labor. After delegating the remaining tasks to John and Dalton, my most reliable ranch hands, I retreated to the shaded corner where Avery’s baby chair was set up.

My youngest daughter slumbered peacefully amid the comforting scents of saddle leather and fresh hay, tiny rosebud lips parted slightly as she rode the gentle cadence of sleep.

Sinking onto a well-worn hay bale, I swiped a forearm across my brow while drinking in the serene tableau. Despite the chaotic whirlwind of the last year, these rare, achingly tender moments of stillness with my girls always managed to recenter me. To remind me why I pushed so relentlessly to keep our fractured family intact and functional.

“You know, you’re going to make her disappear staring at her like that.”

The familiar, wry rasp intruded on my private reverie, startling me from my thoughts. I glanced up to find Ethan leaning against the shed’s doorframe, trademark smirk firmly in place as he watched me doting on Avery.

“Don’t you have a million dollar operation to go mismanage?” I fired back without missing a beat, felt my own smile tugging despite his interruption.

Ethan’s answering snort echoed through the musty interior as he ambled further inside, clapping me on the shoulder as he passed. “Someone’s got to keep an eye on you to make sure you don’t turn into an overbearing helicopter father,” he drawled, dodging the half-hearted shove I aimed his way.

I couldn’t bite back the bark of grudging laughter at his ridiculous comment. Typical Ethan Harrisons - never one to quit while he’s behind when it comes to dishing out gratuitous digs and thinly-veiled insults wrapped up in that shit-eating grin.

“I can’t wait for them to start dating, you going to turn into a papa bear growling at 10 year olds for ‘touching’ his little girl.” He says

“You’re a sad, sick man, you know that?” I shot back, still chuckling as he plopped his lean frame down on the neighbouring hay bale. “Between you and my kids, I may very well end up going prematurely grey.”

Rather than rising to my own brand of male needling, Ethan simply waved me off with a casual flick of those perpetually ink-stained fingers. His expression grew more contemplative as he plucked a piece of straw from a nearby bale and began worrying it between his teeth.

“Seriously though…” he began, pausing until I slanted a look in his direction to indicate I was listening. “I’ve been giving a lot of thought to some operational shifts with the Amore di Vino.”

I tensed instinctively at his tone, recognizing the precursor to one of Ethan’s grand philosophical digressions about business and entrepreneurship. Over the last few years, he’d been steadily transitioning from the role of wine-making genius to taking a much more hands-on role with the business of wine empire and resort, he built.

While I was glad to see him building his empire, he certainly had a way of droning on about every nitty-gritty logistical detail ad nauseam. Squaring my body towards his out of ingrained politeness, I settled in for what was sure to be another long-winded monologue.

“I’m thinking about pivoting the core business model to double down on hospitality and destination experiences,” he explained, warming to the topic with familiar gusto. “Really capitalizing on the estate’s natural beauty and pastoral atmosphere to create a luxury retreat-style environment for our guests.”

I tried valiantly to concentrate as he outlined his grand vision, full of buzzwords like “thematic immersion” and “curated experiences”. But before long, my attention started straying despite my best efforts.

The truth was, ever since Emma’s unexpected appearance at my house the three nights ago, she had utterly dominated my thought streams in a way I hadn’t allowed another woman to for years. Every time I tried to corral my runaway mind back to Ethan’s entrepreneurial speechifying, stray flashes of memory would kick my hindbrain into overdrive.

The soft citrusy perfume of her shampoo that still clung to my pillowcase the next morning when I awoke, even hours after she’d departed…the vivid recollection of her slight frame near me, although in my mind the night ended quite different…

Just thinking about the range of vulnerability Emma had bared to me in those unchaperoned minutes made my pulse kick up in a way it hadn’t in longer than I cared to admit. Despite the years between us, the unbridgeable differences in our respective stages of life, she’d disarmed me utterly with her soft smiles and off-kilter charm.

And maybe it was a character flaw of my own, but there was something about her contradictory combination of effortless beauty and chronic self-doubt that made me ache to…what? Reassure her? Protect her from her own toughest critic - herself? Discover what other layers and unvarnished truths lay underneath that deceptively delicate exterior?

Truthfully, I didn’t know the root desire driving my sudden, intense fascination with the youngest Harrisons sister. What I did know was that it had been all I could do not to trace the glistening tracks of her lashes with my fingertips last night. To pull her fully into my embrace and—

“Dude, you’re not even listening to me!”

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