Page 19 of Love You Always

Wheeling my stool a few feet away, I cross my arms and take her in, confounded by the study in contrasts.

“You find the wedding planning unbearable?” I can’t let it go.

“Forget. It.”

“I can’t.”

“That’s your problem, not mine.” Her mouth forms a stiff line, and all her prior joy disappears behind a mask of seriousness.

I wait, thinking maybe she’ll reconsider and spill some tea if I give her the opening. Some people are uncomfortable enoughwith silence that they talk just to fill it. I’m not one of them. Apparently, neither is she.

“Fine.” I open a drawer in the lab table. “This is a refractometer. Should I bother telling you what it does, or do you already know?”

Her stoic expression cracks slightly but I don’t get anywhere close to a smile. “You should tell me.”

“It measures the sugar levels. The Brix. I’m looking for something between fourteen and sixteen.”

Her eyes blaze to life. “Cool.”

“Yeah? Is that a science nerd term?”

She shrugs. “It does the job. Do you have a sense just by tasting them, or is it hard to tell?”

“Depends. I should’ve taken a few grapes of each sample so you could taste them before I put them under the refractometer.” Out in the vineyards, I was just trying to get my job done and get rid of my inquisitive sidekick, but her interest is reminding me of the few things I like about this job.

“Next time.”

I shoot her a side-eye. “This is the one and only time. We had a deal, remember?”

“We’ll see about that,” she says, standing from her stool. The swiveling seat moves along with her and she grabs the lab table with both hands to steady herself, but the motion sends her tipping toward me. I steady her with a hand on her shoulder, acutely aware of the warmth of her skin and the fact that I don’t want to let go yet. She looks down at my steady grip and up at me. Her eyes are unreadable, but her lips part and she lets out a quiet exhale that sounds like a sigh.

“You okay there?”

“Fine as fuck.” She swallows and blinks a few times.

I suppress a smile. She’s an unfiltered, slightly clumsy nerd. I like it.

Her breath hitches when I remove my hand, and she stays there, still as a stone. Then she licks her goddamn lips.

Our faces are inches apart. It would be so easy to lean closer, to taste those lips I’ve been staring at all morning. But I’m not about to make a pass at an engaged woman.

“When’s your wedding date?” I rasp. She startles and backs away.

“April ninth.” A rendition of “Here Comes the Sun” starts playing in her purse, and she fishes around in the oversized blue bag. “Speak of the devil,” she says, letting out a sigh that seems directed at her phone.

She answers the phone by punching at it with her index finger. “Hi, Callum…yeah. Hold on—what?... We need to talk about this… Okay, sure…I’m coming.” She hangs up and shoves the phone back into her purse. I pick up the next test tube, but she shakes her head. “I can’t do this now. I’m sorry.” Her whole demeanor has shifted in a matter of seconds. Her smile disappears. The sparkle of interest in her eyes is gone. “I have to go.”

Before I can ask her anything, she’s moving for the door. Doesn’t matter. There’s no way I’m leaving that conversation unfinished, even if I have to dig into tabloid news to find out what she meant.

“Bye,” I call after her.

And she’s gone, leaving a cold void where there was warmth and joy a moment ago. Leaving me with a sense that everything I thought I knew about life has changed, even if I can’t say exactly how. But now that she’s gone, the wild mess of her hair blowing in the breeze behind her as she heads toward the parking lot, all I can think is that I want her to come back.

CHAPTER 8

Ella

“I thoughtwe pushed the fitting to next week,” I tell Pippa, my stylist and queen of my closet. If not for her, I’d own stacks of sweatpants and tees. That’s it.

---