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She revoked that hand as soon as we were at the door, though.
We didn’t have to wait long after ringing the bell. Moments later, the front door swung open, sending a comforting rush of warmth and the aroma of dinner.
“Riii, how are you darling?” our host for the evening asked, throwing her arms around me for a hug.
“Eva James, it’s been too damn long.” I chuckled, returning her warm greeting as I stepped inside, then pulled Nalani with me. “This is my fiancée, Nalani Stark. Nalani, this is—”
“Evangeline James,” she spoke over me, extending a hand. “My sales rep handles your account, so I don’t think we’ve formally met, but I’m a huge fan.”
“Of the winery?” Eva asked, clasping the hand Nalani offered.
She shook her head. “No. Of you taking half in your divorce from Leon James. Honey Branch wine is absolutely lovely too though.”
Eva’s eyes just went big at first, but then a huge grin spread over her face. “Orion… Iloveher.” She laughed, discarding Nalani’s hand to pull her in for a hug instead. Ignoring me, she helped Nalani out of her coat and then hooked an arm around her waist, leading her toward the dining room. “Tell me you’ve already got the pre-nup in place, right?”
My mouth dropped open as those two moved on, but I recovered as Eva’snewpartner, Luke, approached.
“How you doing, man?” he asked, and I shook his hand as I took in my surroundings. “Been a while.”
“Yeah, it has,” I agreed. “I was sorry to hear about your grandmother.”
His grandfather had been the most recent passing, but I knew without it being said aloud that there was no love lostthere.That motherfucker had been mean as shit when my grandmother was coming to visit Georgia Freeman—the original owner of Honey Branch, no relation to the Freemans known for the bridal shop—at the vineyard and was dragging us out here with her.
I couldn’t imagine age had softened him, at all.
“Thank you.” Luke nodded. “I remember the flowers your family sent,” he said, gesturing for me to follow him to the dining room, where the women were already seated and had cracked open a bottle of wine.
I wasn’t surprised they were hitting it off.
Eva was a big personality and the one I knew better of the couple. I was familiar with Luke from back in the day, but I knew Eva before she’d come to Sugar Valley.
I was friends with the man Nalani had congratulated Eva on getting a rumored half-billion dollars from in the divorce.
Not that she’d had to fight very hard for it.
Leon loved Eva down to her toes. Honestly, it was a relationship that on the surface, I’d admired. He lost me on his “open marriage” antics, which my father would’ve been disgusted by, and as it turned out, was how he ended up losing Eva, too.
But their friendship had remained, soourfriendship had remained. I’d be lying to myself if I tried to claim her approval didn’t mean anything to me. She wasn’t privy to the arrangement behind it all, but she’d been deeply immersed enough in moneyed circles that she likely suspected this wasn’t purely a love connection.
“Sit down,” she insisted, when she saw us in the doorway. “Let’s eat. This food didn’t fix itself.”
I took another deep inhale, trying to pinpoint what I was smelling from the covered dishes at the center of the table. “You cooked?” I asked and she and Luke both started laughing.
“You know damn well this woman doesn’t cook,” Luke said. “I was the chef today.”
“And you looked quite sexy in that role, babe,” Eva purred, offering her lips as he bent next to her.
Something made me glance at Nalani just in time to catch the wistful look on her face as she watched their affectionate display. Her chest rose and fell in a soft, inaudible sigh before she looked away.
“Thank you again for opening the winery space to us on such short notice,” I said as everybody took their seats, and began passing the dishes of food around. “It’s appreciated.”
“It’s not a problem; it’s my pleasure, actually,” Eva said. “I’ve been wanting to see what we could do with a winter wedding, so it gave me an opportunity. That Shiloh you’ve got on your team? I might have to poach her from you.”
I chuckled. “She’s an expensive pain in my ass, but she does get things done, doesn’t she?”
“Mmmhmm. Especially pulling together a wedding to… what?” she asked, looking between me and Nalani. “Get inheritance money? Secure a business deal? Hide a baby?”
Nalani’s eyes went wide, but she didn’t say anything, focusing a little too hard on moving food around on her plate.
