Page 73 of Out of Bounds
“A while back. My grandfather hadn’t purchased the place then. He’s just had shares on it. I had a feeling he would though. He loves Italy. I think he couldn’t wait to retire and come set up roots here.”
“I can see he loves it here.”
“He would have spoken more about how he met my grandmother but he tends to hold off on that story when he’s around Diane because he doesn’t want to make her feel like their meeting wasn’t valuable to him.”
“That’s sweet of him,” I reply.
“Yeah, I always think so. He met my grandmother not far from here. He enlisted in the Navy as soon as he was eighteen and he travelled the world. It was while he was on his travels that he met her. They got married here and she followed him back to the states.”
“Really?”
“Yes, much to her family’s disapproval because she was supposed to marry someone else. Until this day there’s a feud and I’ve never met that side of the family. When he saw how much she missed it here, he used to take her here every year for her birthday. each time she’d always try to make peace with her parents, but they never forgave her. She got cancer and he brought her back here to die. It was only then they came to see her and I guess you could say they made peace.”
The story grips me.
“It’s sad they waited so long.”
“I know. It makes me wonder what it would have been like if I’d known that side of the family. It took my grandfather twenty years before he moved on and married Diane.”
Twenty years. My God. I can’t imagine that type of grief.
“He must have really loved your grandmother.”
“He did. He used to call her his love at first sight girl.”
As he speaks I wonder if that’s how he’ll be when it comes to Amelia.
The thought pulls on my heart and I hate that I feel the jealousy I’ve always felt when it comes to her. To my knowledge, Ethan hasn’t had a steady girlfriend since Amelia. I haven’t been around him enough for me to say he hasn’t mentioned her. Maybe he has to someone like Logan, or even Bryce. There’s been no reason to mention her to anyone else like me, but of course I’m curious. The longer I spend with him the more I want to know.
We stop by a little stone bench with a pond and I look around.
“Do you want to sit here for a while. There’s plenty more to see.”
“Yes.”
We sit side by side and he turns to face me.
“How are you feeling the whole thing with our plan?” he asks carefully.
“I’m okay.” Because I’m not really thinking about it. I’m enjoying myself too much which is something I don’t do. this is escapism for me. If I’m to stop and think though it will make my head spin for a whole lot of reasons.
I’m still stuck on the fact that he’s giving me the house and fixing it up himself. That means I have money I wouldn’t have had before to put toward doing extra things for the spa. Right now, I’m actually in profit even though I’m still just breaking even with what I earn at the salon. My mind would explode if I even thought about his billion dollar fortune of which I’m not touching.
I actually don’t want to think that far because it means the end of us. I’m not sure how that will work. It’s weird that when I woke up in Vegas to what scared the hell out of me is now scaring me for a different reason.
“Sorry Mac asked a lot of questions when we first arrived and about the whole Miranda thing.”
I laugh. “Why did you make up Miranda?”
“Bree, I thought I knew what I was doing. Me and my crazy ideas. My mythical girl worked for five years and got him off my back. You should have seen the type of women he used to set me up with.”
I continue laughing. “Did you ever go on any dates?”
“No. Not once. Thank God. The last thing I want to look like is an asshole to someone my grandfather knows.”
I stare at him and think about that comment. Since getting to know him I’ve seen this side of him that is different from the Ethan of the past. There’s no way that guy would be sitting here next to me in a vineyard.
He searches my eyes. “What?”
