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“He sure is excitable, isn’t he?” Danica asked.
“Actually, he’s usually lazier than dirt. Not today, apparently.”
“Could have fooled me,” she said, watching him zoom around us and then throw himself on the ground beside her for more pets. She put both hands on him and scratched behind his ears, which made him thump his tail so loudly on the pavement, I was sure he would break it.
“Yeah, well, he got his name for a reason, I guess,” I said, looking at the ridiculous dog.
“So,” Danica said after a moment, and our eyes locked in on each other. Immediately, I shook my head and held out my hand.
“Let’s get the work done first, okay? Cam is on my ass. We can talk after we get done.” I stood, and she followed me after one last rub of Joker’s belly. “And we do need to talk.”
Nodding by means of response, she followed me as we walked around back and into the vines. We were quiet as we made our way pretty deep into them to where the first piece of her notes began. I could spy Alex and Noah in the distance and sighed. Of course they would be there watching.
Alex was leaned against the fence, Noah sitting on the top bar. They were watching us and trying to look like they weren’t. I could see right through it. Finally, they noticed me watching them, and I flipped them off. Cackling, they began to murmur between them while I ignored them going forward. No use in caring what they were going to say or do; it was going to annoy me no matter what it was.
“This one here looks great,” Danica said, kneeling and lightly taking a vine between two fingers. “Did you do the soil treatment I suggested?”
“I did. I was surprised at how quickly it would have an effect.”
“It works pretty quickly,” she said. “Maybe not as quickly as this though. This looks like you were already implementing something else before I got to you.”
“I had a few things in the works,” I said. “But it was the soil hybrid treatment that really kicked things into high gear.”
We continued to talk about vines for a bit, occasionally discussing some of the ideas and treatments she had suggested, and which ones had been successful. As much as I wanted to think I could do it all on my own, the truth was, her ideas had been very good, and she deserved to know just how much an effect they had. We were in a much better position now than we had been that I felt like she might like to know that if we got the approvals we needed, she was a big reason why. Not just in signing off, but in the actual changes I’d made to get the vineyard back rocking and rolling again.
After moving around the property for a bit and going over the changes and the current situation, we made our way back toward the main buildings. My ears burned as I cleared my throat. Danica was arranging new samples she had taken in a small briefcase, and I wondered how she felt when she tested the last batch. Did she think about me while she did?
Danica stood, brushing some dirt off the front of her shirt, and I decided to throw caution in the wind. The worst she could do was say no and tell me it wasn’t appropriate or that she wasn’t interested.
“So,” I said. “Would you like to come back to my place for lunch? I have a meal waiting there that I would only need to get warmed up properly. Would only take a few minutes.”
“Sure,” she said, the smile stretching across her lips, seeming like she didn’t know how to react to seeing that someone had actually taken all her ideas into account and followed all of her advice.
I was almost taken aback that I didn’t have to talk her into lunch. Words had formed in my mind, and an argument was all queued up to try to get her there and discuss things in the intimacy of my house. Stumbling over my words and fighting a smile spreading across my own face, I nodded.
“Follow me, then,” I said, and she fell into step beside me as I made my way back to the house.
We walked in silence for a bit and then began to chat about various parts of the property and how she thought they had been expanding. Joker padded up beside her, and she giggled as he licked the back of her ankle.
“Sorry about that,” I said.
“No, it’s fine.”
We had made it to the door, and I opened it up. She went in ahead of me, and I stopped Joker from following her in with my leg in his path.
