Page 41 of Lighting Up Christmas

Riley sighed happily as she dried the plates.

“This was better than a restaurant,” she said. “I will never look at grilled cheese sandwiches the same. The four cheeses you chose blended together like an orchestra—a tang, a savory, a hint of sweet, and then a bite of spice.” She put her fingers to her lips and made a kissing sound and an explosion movement with her fingers.

Had Brin ever complimented him like this, so totally engaged?

He didn’t care. Brin was the past. And while Riley wasn’t his future, he felt like she’d banished the ghost of Brin that he hadn’t even known had needed to be exorcised. He had barely thought of her recently—what she would think, what she would say, what she would want. And over the past couple of years as he juggled the vineyard and work, memories of his mom—her demands, criticisms, snapped suggestions as to what he should be doing with his life—had stopped taunting him at unexpected moments.

He’d finally found some peace, and maybe one day soon he’d be able to take one of her phone calls without dread swirling in his stomach.

“Shall we get to work?” Riley asked, rubbing her palms together like she was trying to spark a fire.

Work. Right. The website. Why she was here. Not just for lunch.

Somehow, he’d forgotten, and the lunch had begun to feel more like a date.

A date.

He hadn’t dated since…she who shall not be named.

He smiled. Brin would hate being in the same category as Voldemort.

Riley had been talking about winery sites she’d bookmarked. She abruptly stopped talking, and after a beat, Zhang tuned in.

She had her laptop out, but she was staring at him, smiling.

“What?”

“You have such a beautiful smile,” she breathed. “Sorry. It was just unexpected. I’ve rarely seen you smile. It’s like the sun peeking out of a rain cloud on a spring day. I’ve wanted to make you smile since the first morning we met.”

The image surprised him. He was confident no one had compared him to the sun ever—a rain cloud, definitely.

“When you held my truck hostage?”

She nodded.

“Why?”

“Why hostage?” She grinned as if deliberately misunderstanding. “I wanted to meet you—well, not you, but I saw the logo of your winery, and I’ve wanted to branch into more commercial work when my father and uncle stepped back this fall, and I thought if I could get a gig with your winery, I could build on that.”

“Mission accomplished.”

She hummed the theme fromMission Impossibleand then returned to the table, booting up her computer that was a new, top model. Good. She didn’t skimp on the crucial basics.

“Why did you want to make me smile?” he pushed as she typed in her password.

He shouldn’t ask. He shouldn’t, but…even he couldn’t explain the impulse that had kicked the words out of his mouth.

She looked over at him, and she was closer than he’d thought she’d be, leaning forward on his barstool as if she were going to confide a secret and there was someone around to overhear, and since he owned nearly six-hundred acres, there was no one but the two of them.

“I…” She paused, clearly searching for the right words. He had no idea what those were, but he wanted them, the real ones. “I…like people, enjoy interacting with them, sharing a conversation and a laugh, and you looked so…so alone.”

He reared back.

“I am alone,” he stated the obvious, “by choice.” It was the truth, but he sounded defensive.

Her green eyes searched his. No, they were more hazel. The color that was like Proteus, constantly changing shades in different light sources.

“I felt…” she said, and then stopped.

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