Vineyard Dreams (Beyond The Red Carpet #4)

Chapter 8

8

E lle descended the stairs into the cool cellar, her footsteps echoing against the stone walls. The dim light cast shadows across the rows of closely packed barrels as she navigated the narrow space, searching for the perfect bottle for the upcoming wine tasting.

As her fingers traced the dusty labels, her thoughts drifted to Harper. Elle could still picture the intense, anxious look in her deep brown eyes as the panic had overtaken her. In that moment of vulnerability, Elle had witnessed a side of Harper that few others had likely seen.

Elle hoped that Harper was okay. She hadn’t spoken to her since that day in the cellar, which was almost a week ago now, and she knew how much Harper valued her privacy, her space. Elle had already wandered up to her house and knocked on her door to officially welcome her. She didn’t want to keep reaching out. Harper had her number if she wanted to spend any more time together, and Elle smiled to herself as she thought about how crazy that idea was.

Why would Harper Reeves want to spend more time with her? She was one of the world’s most famous actresses. Elle had offered to show her around, and that’s what she’d done. It was an offer she made to help Harper figure out what she wanted to do with the business side of things.

Harper wasn’t looking for a friend. Elle might have found her easy to talk to, but Harper had said she was here to relax, and to Elle that meant being left alone.

Elle’s hands moved on autopilot, selecting a bottle she knew her guests would appreciate. Her mind, however, was far from the task at hand. She was still thinking about Harper. Elle couldn’t imagine what it must be like for her to think that she was coming back to her childhood home, to take over her father’s vineyard, and then to find it abandoned.

Clearly, money was not an issue. Elle would never spend any kind of money without carefully considering it, and it sounded like Harper had offered to buy her uncle out on a whim. Elle didn’t even want to think about the kind of money Harper must have spent and to get so little in return for it… Even if money wasn’t a problem, it still would be a blow, especially when it was her own uncle who had essentially swindled her.

As she made her way back up the stairs, she shook her head, but then a thought began to take shape. If Harper felt like she was in over her head… Elle paused at the top of the stairs, the idea quickly coming together in her mind.

What if she rented Harper’s vineyard? She could use the space to expand her own operations. It would be a mutually beneficial arrangement, allowing Harper to see her father’s vineyard thriving again, but without all of the stress of actually making it happen.

Elle hesitated, her thumb hovering over Harper’s contact in her phone. She had just convinced herself that Harper wouldn’t want to keep spending time with her, that she was here for solitude and relaxation. But this was different. This was a business proposition, an opportunity to take some of the pressure off Harper’s shoulders.

Before she could talk herself out of it, Elle typed out a message.

Hey. I had an idea I wanted to run by you. Would you be interested in coming over for dinner tonight?

Elle hit send, her heart racing as she wondered if she was crazy for even thinking this would work. She knew it was a long shot, but when Stephanie was alive, she’d dreamed of expanding someday. They were only starting to see their first signs of success back then, but Stephanie was already thinking ahead, wondering how they could grow their business.

Elle clutched the bottle in her hand as she closed the cellar door behind her, swallowing down the grief that bubbled up every so often. The last ten years had gone by in a blur. She’d worked harder than she ever had. Life went on and it was just her running the vineyard without Stephanie by her side.

The second year had been the hardest. The first, she couldn’t even remember. She’d hardly slept, always the first to arrive here and the last to leave, almost afraid to go back to her empty home, knowing that everything around her would remind her of Stephanie.

But the second year was when it really hit her that Stephanie was gone.

And now, with the prospect of expanding the vineyard right there in front of her, Elle felt that burning in her chest, that feeling that life wasn’t fair hitting her harder than it had in years.