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“Okay… Well, thanks…” The way she says it with a distasteful frown makes it seem anything but okay. “I know you’re just being nice. I don’t mean to be weird about it…It’s really…it’s fine.” But I can tell it’s not okay and it’s not fine.
I get up from the table and go over to where she’s standing by the sink, wadding up the paper towel and straightening it out again. I’m not sure she realizes she’s doing it, so I gently take it from her hands. Then I realize I don’t know my way around her kitchen, so I open a couple of cupboards until she points me to the one with a trashcan inside.
Once I deposit the paper towel, I return to where she’s leaning a hip against the sink and watching me. I’m at a loss. I barely know her, but I don’t want to keep my distance.
I want to sit down and get comfortable, but she hasn’t invited me outside of the kitchen. So I go back to the chair andlower myself into it. It has a stiff back, and it’s not particularly comfortable, which makes me wonder about who designs chairs.
My kitchen table chairs at home are equally awful, though I can’t take responsibility for picking them. I was so busy with work when I bought my house that one of my VPs sent her designer over. Before I knew what had happened, I had a fully furnished house with things like sconces and valances and other details I’d never have included if left to my own devices.
I’m still idly fascinated by the design choices people make when they know about these things. So I find myself smoothing a crease in a single flowered placemat in the middle of PJ’s table and wondering about her thought process.
“Did you have the option of a tablecloth?”
“What?” Her answer is sharp, like she’s snapping a fortune cookie in half.
I point at the placemat. “Doesn’t protect much of the table. Just wondering.”
“I have no idea. I think I just liked the design.”
I don’t know why, but I find it a relief that she didn’t reason through a long process to arrive at the single placemat. It makes me feel like I’m not so far outside of normal.
On her way back to the table, PJ opens a long cupboard and takes out a box of Wheat Thins. Scraping a finger under the flap, she opens the box and digs in for a handful before offering it to me.
“I’m good.” I shake my head, and she deposits the box between us on the table.
“How much did Archer tell you?” Her wary tone makes me sorry I brought up her dad, which is obviously a sore subject.
“Not much. Just that his dementia had advanced to an Alzheimer’s diagnosis, and he’s no longer in charge of the company.”
Slapping a hand over her forehead, she lets it drop down over her eyes. “Were there people near enough to you in the restaurant to have overheard the conversation?”
I think back, picturing our table in a booth in the corner of the busy restaurant. It was so loud in there with its hardwood floors and nothing to absorb sound that we could barely hear each other, let alone conversations one table over. I assure her that no one could have overheard, which seems to put her slightly more at ease.
“What’s going on, PJ?”
She shoots me a look and presses her lips together as though there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell she’ll tell me anything.
“Remember, I’m a guy hiding out here because I made my own mistakes talking out of school.”
“Exactly. You’re a talker.”
“PJ, I swear, everything you and your family tell me is in the vault. I’m very discreet. I have to be. I only say stupid things in public forums about my own company, and that’s only when I’m fed up with what’s going on around me—at my own company. Trust me.”
That at least gets a small laugh out of her, and I see her shoulders relax an inch. This woman is an interesting combination of spitfire and vulnerability, and it intrigues me to follow where the line between the two leads.
She tells me a little more about the old friend who seemed to be sniffing around an opportunity to invest in Buttercup Hill if the winery is in financial trouble. “The last thing I’m going to do is confirm his bullshit info.”
“Is it bullshit?”
“It is until I say it’s not.”
I like her confidence.
“What does your family say about it?” It seems like the logical question to ask.
“Ha. I haven’t told them. There’s no reason to get everyone all upset about something that hemightpursue when I told him to take a hike.”
I nod and look away, afraid that making eye contact will convey what I think.
