Page 2 of Love You Always

PJ digs into the computer bag dangling from her shoulder and pulls out a spiral notebook with a blue bird on the cover. She taps it with a finger and opens it up to show me a scribbled note at the top of one page. “I’ve been manifesting getting us a spread inTown and Countrymagazine for months, and I just landed it.” She looks like a pixie, grinning at me with her head tilted to the side. In her red lipstick, short skirt, and cowboy boots, she looks like she’s ready to pose for a photo shoot on a ranch.

“Yeah? What’s the angle?”

Her broad smile reveals a poppy seed in her teeth. I indicate the seed by pointing between my own teeth. “Lemme guess, you had the new lemon poppy seed scone from Sweet Butter?” It’s the café here, which doubles as a breakfast stop for most of my siblings, who live in houses around the two-hundred-acre property.

“Guilty.” PJ scrubs at the seed and flashes her teeth at me again. I nod that she succeeded. “They’re playing up the rustic charm of a third-generation diamond in the rough.”

“Translation, please.”

“We’re rescuing a hidden gem in the wine country from financial ruin and turning it into a wedding destination with therenovated inn. Beatrix has before and after photos of the inn, which readers love. Family-run places are hot right now.”

My brain snags on one word. “Ruin?”

Her smile turns into a frown to match mine.

“I had to give them something juicy. They love a comeback story.” Teeth gritted, she watches me for a reaction. PJ is one of the few people who’s not afraid of my moods. I guess when you’re the little sister to three older brothers, you can’t be bothered by a mood.

“A comeback story.” I take a sip of my lukewarm coffee and consider this. “So they’re going to dig around in the disaster of this past year and write about all the things we did wrong? Dad would hate that.”

“We’re talking about a front-pageTown and Countrymagazine story that will have gorgeous photos and will keep us busy and booked for years to come. Relax.”

“Yeah, okay. Maybe.” I scrub a hand through my hair and try not to think about all the ways this could go south. The reporter could draw attention to our financial problems. Someone could pay too much attention to how things are running under my supervision and start asking questions about our father’s declining health. Or some issue I haven’t begun to stress about.

I’m tempted to tell her to scrap the whole thing when PJ glances out my window. “Oh, she’s here!” It’s the kind of reverence reserved for royalty or heads of state.

“Who’s here?”

“Ella Fieldstone. She just drove up in that little blue electric car that’s all over social media.”

If there were a way to roll my eyes farther back into my head, I’d do it. Ella Fieldstone and her dumb car only intensify my headache. Forget the bad ink she gets for being difficult—I didn’t like her when I met her years ago. Her diva vibe rubbed me the wrong way back when I lived in LA, and I don’t need a second interaction.

“People are so lame. Why do they care what car some celebrity drives?”

“Because it’sher, and whatever she does gets attention. Did you know that car sales in that color blue spiked twenty percent after she bought hers? She’s one of the biggest influencers. She’s the reason we got theTown and Countryspread—having her wedding here is huge. It’ll make us the hottest venue in the county, and we can’t manufacture that kind of good publicity. Besides, you’re the one who’s been stressing about how to make ends meet—this will help us.”

That annoys me even more. The idea that I should be grateful for Ella Fieldstone’s wedding chaps my hide.

I can’t even rely on Jax anymore to take my side. Our middle brother will put our balance sheet before my preferences. Before he met his wife, Ruby, his surly, single-dad moods matched my own. Now, he’s stupidly happy and in love, leaving me to be the resident baddie in the family.

If I’m honest, sometimes it hurts to be the only one of my siblings who doesn’t have a partner, sealed off from being stupidly in love. Then, I remind myself that I’m better off protected from emotions that might derail me. My focus is on business. Numbers. I trust them more than people.

“I’m still in charge of running the winery, so I think I should have a pretty large say.” The truth is that I don’t have answers for how we’d make up the kind of income that would come from being the hottest wedding venue in the county, assuming PJ is correct.

“Good luck with that. Beatrix says it’s a go, and Jax is all about the spreadsheets. It’s three against one, dude.”

Her phone beeps with a text, and her brow furrows as her thumbs start moving across the screen.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

“Trix says she can’t meet with Ella for an hour. She’s here on the wrong day or time or something.”

“What a shame.” I suppress a smile, secretly delighted that the celebrity downstairs isn’t going to have red carpets rolled out just because she showed up when she felt like it.

“I have a call with an East Coast editor in five minutes. Can you go down and entertain her until Beatrix can get here?”

“I’m busy.” I sneak a look out the window and stand up to get a better view of the small blue car parked crookedly in a space in the gravel lot outside the barn. Figures, she’s too fancy to bother parking her car straight. Who cares if she takes up more than one spot? “But I can go down and tell her to take a hike.”

The driver’s side door swings open, and one bare leg unfolds before a swish of pink floral fabric drops over the limb, obscuring it from view. It’s followed by a sweep of wild hair streaked with blond. The wind has its way with the long strands as a slim arm reaches up and swats the hair away, and the woman tucks a handful behind her ear.

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