Maybe Zander was right. Maybe they’d be better off going with someone else, because having Evangeline around on a daily basis was sure to be complicated.
But that was absurd, wasn’t it? He was a grown man. He could resist temptation.
Light glinted against the wine bottle in the center of the table, flashing a glimpse of the dark liquid it contained. Shimmering garnet red. Then Evangeline removed the tongs from the flame and slipped the ring over the bottle’s narrow neck.
She pressed the ring in place and then loosened the tongs, rotating the ring slightly and pressing again. Satisfied, she removed the tongs altogether, placed them in a shallow pan of water and then dipped the shaving brush into the ice bucket. The bottle made a cracking sound, like ice under pressure, as Evangeline ran the brush over the spot where she’d heated the glass.
Instinct told Ryan what was coming next, but he was still thoroughly impressed when she wrapped a cloth napkin around her hand to take hold of the top of the bottle and it snapped off cleanly in her grasp.
“Voilà,” she said quietly. Her bottom lip slipped between her teeth as her gaze collided with his.
Temptation.
Most definitely.
“Impressive.” Zander arched a brow. “What exactly did we just witness?”
“It’s called tonging,” she explained as she held the little pot of red wax over the blowtorch’s flame. “Traditionally, this method is reserved for opening vintage port. Aged properly, port sits for twenty, sometimes fifty years. The cork can disintegrate and crumble if you open it with a corkscrew.”
She tipped the copper pot in a swirling motion until the wax ran smooth. “No one wants bits of cork in a wine they’ve waited half a century to drink. Tonging allows you to bypass the cork altogether.”
Zander nodded. “Clever.”
Evangeline dipped the severed top in the melted liquid and then did the same to the sharp edge of the bottle’s remaining portion after she poured the wine into the decanter.
Crimson wax dripped down the bottle, and Ryan was struck by the fact that she’d managed to create a dramatic table decoration in addition to putting on a show.
She poured three glasses from the decanter and handed two of them to Zander and Ryan. “This is Bordeaux, not port, obviously. The method can be used to open any kind of bottle. It’s rather fun, don’t you think?”
Ryan sipped his wine. It was good, but try as he might, he couldn’t taste cassis, black cherry and licorice. Instead, his senses swirled with the memory of their night together. He tasted Evangeline’s lips, chilled from the winter air, rich with longing. He tasted her porcelain skin, sweet like vanilla.
He tasted trouble.
So very much trouble.
Zander stared into his glass. “I think—”
For the second time in the span of a half hour, Ryan cut him off. He was sure to hear about it later, but by then it would be too late. “Evangeline Holly, you’re hired.”
She’d done it.
The job offer was conditional. After Ryan told her she was hired, Zander had added the caveat that she continue studying for her sommelier certification exam. If she didn’t pass on the first try, she was out.
But that was okay, even though the test was notoriously difficult and people often had to repeat it several times. Evangeline didn’t care. She’d make it work. She’d study until she knew every wine in existence.
She was a wine director! She’d gotten the job, and she’d done it all on her own.
Probably.
Maybe.
She liked to believe the tonging had secured her the position or that her knowledge and passion superseded the fact that she had no official qualifications. Or actual work experience as a sommelier, unless she counted pouring wine in the tasting room at her family’s vineyard as a kid.
But that had been ages ago—nearly seventeen years. She’d been playing catch-up ever since, trying her best to put her world back together after her mother left, ripping the rug out from under her.
Ripping the rug out from under all of them.
Evangeline’s heart gave a little tug, just like it always did when she thought about her mother, but she swallowed her feelings down. She shouldn’t be dwelling on loss right now—not when she had every reason to celebrate.
“Almost every reason, anyway,” she muttered.
Olive swiveled her head and gazed up at Evangeline. Bee stared straight ahead. They trotted at the ends of their leashes, tails wagging as they headed toward the dog park at the end of the block.
Their coats were dusted with snow, and tiny puffs of vapor hung in the air with every breath from the happy dogs’ mouths. Despite their advanced ages, they loved going for walks. Unfortunately, the fact that they weren’t supposed to be living in Evangeline’s apartment meant they only got to go outside early in the morning and late at night. Thank goodness for puppy pads.
Now that she had a job—a great job—she needed to do something about the dog situation.
And she would.
She just wished she could shake the nagging feeling that the only reason she’d gotten the job in the first place had been because of Ryan Wilde.
He’d hired her, not Zander. And there’d been an unmistakable flash of surprise on the CEO’s face when Ryan announced that the job was hers. She’d told herself to ignore it. She deserved the job. Wine was in her blood. She’d be great.
She’d simply have to avoid Ryan as much as possible. That shouldn’t be too hard. He worked business hours, and Evangeline’s day started at 4:00 p.m. That meant an hour or two overlap. She could survive that. Couldn’t she?
Eventually, she’d be able to look at him without imagining his lips against her throat, his body rising and falling above hers. She’d be able to say his name without remembering the way she’d cried it out in the dark.
Ryan.
Ryan.
Ryan.
“It’s going to be fine.” She swallowed. Hard. “It’s going to be fine, because it has to.”
At the sound of her voice again, Olive’s tail wagged even harder. Olive and Bee were the sweetest dogs in the world. She’d have kept them even if they’d been monsters, though. Even if it meant she was at risk of getting tossed out of her building.
Dogs weren’t allowed at her grandfather’s new extended care facility. But if Evangeline kept Olive and Bee, she could at least bring them to visit him every once in a while. She owed that much to her grandfather. Robert Holly was the one person who’d been there for her when the vineyard, and all that went with it, withered and died. The only one.
“You guys aren’t the worst cuddle bugs to have around,” Evangeline said as they waited to cross the street. Taxis whizzed past in a dizzying blur of bright yellow against the early morning snowfall.
She glanced down at Olive, and a memory flashed instantly into Evangeline’s consciousness—Ryan, shirtless, standing beside her bed, petting the little dog and looking like something out of a beefcake-bachelors-with-puppies calendar.
Oh God.
How was she supposed to work with the man every day when she couldn’t stop thinking about what he looked like beneath his exquisitely