Wine Astray: Spirit of the Soul Wine Shop Mystery (A Rysen Morris Mystery Book 1) (4 page)

No.  The dream had been worth chasing.  Just because it had fallen apart didn't mean—

"Rysen?"  It was Beatrice who pulled her out of her thoughts this time.  "Are you ready to get going to lunch?"

"Yes.  Sure."  She kept her eyes carefully off of Josh.  "I want to get back to my sister's shop as soon as we're done, too, so where should we go?"

That didn't sound too brusque.  She hoped.

Lunch was a pleasant conversation over plates of pasta at an Italian bistro at the other end of Main Street.  Rysen remembered it as a bookstore, but apparently it wasn't the only business in town to change hands and then change everything else.  The food was really good and it didn't take too long for Rysen to forget how upset she had been to see Beatrice in Josh's arms.  They were happy together, from everything Beatrice told her.  They'd met at her shop right after he had come back to town.  He'd helped her through the pain of her mother's death.  He liked flowers, and liked working with his hands.

Everything else had just fallen into place.

Tearing apart hot, soft breadsticks and dipping them in garlic butter, they talked over prices and a delivery schedule for the wine from Christina's shop, and then the hour was over too soon.  They made a promise to meet again next week and this time, Rysen suggested, Beatrice should bring Josh with her.

Main Street was a lot longer than she remembered it ever being but she still wanted to walk in the bright sunshine and gentle breeze and stretch her legs.  The town was starting to feel like home again to be sure.  Everything was changed, and she wasn't sure any more where she fit in.  Yup.  Just like home used to be before she moved away to start her life over.

Back at Christina's shop she stopped just inside the door.  No one was here.  No customers.  No Christina.  Maybe the security consultation had gone so well that her sister had decided to leave the store completely unattended and just let the customers pay for their own wine on the honor system.

"Christina?" she called out, knowing that no matter how good the consultation had gone her sister would never trust sunburnt tourists to pay full price for a bottle of wine.  Maybe she was still consulting with whoever this mysterious stranger was, with his amazing advice to sell them on how to keep the shop safe.  "Hey, where are you?"

"Down here!" she heard her sister shout from down in the cellar.

Rysen started for the worn stone steps that led down to the musty, dry space where they stored the wine at a cool and mostly constant temperature.  Her sister was there, writing inventory on a clipboard with that same apron on over her clothes.  "Hey, sis," she said.  "How was lunch?  Did you get the details on the order?"

"Yes, I did.  Where's this security consultant?  Did he even show up?"

Christina's smile brightened.  "He sure did.  Wait until you hear everything we're going to do.  Big changes are coming, sis.  Big changes."

Oh good, Rysen thought.  More changes.  Still, she couldn't help but catch her sister's enthusiasm.  Smiling and sitting and talking like little girls, like they used to, she and her sister made plans to save the shop.             

The little guest bed was definitely not the most comfortable thing in the world.  After a week at her sister's house she had the sheets rumpled in just the right way, but there was no room to move around in the single bed, and Rysen had always been one to move around in her sleep.  It was one of the things Kevin had complained about most, actually.  How stupid did a guy have to be to complain when a girl ended up laying across him halfway through the night?

Whatever.  She sat up now in bed and stretched and reminded herself that part of her life was done.  If she wanted to find a guy that enjoyed her body next to his, she couldn't spend all day in bed.

In the bathroom she looked herself over in the mirror.  Puffy eyes.  Messy hair.  Blah.  She'd scare a zombie away with that complexion.  To the shower she went.  She stripped down naked and let the spray from the shower beat against her shoulders and loosen the knots.  Working in her sister's shop was hard work, lifting crates and carrying the dwindling bottle supply up the stairs.  She wasn't used to that.  The company she'd been working at—the same one that fired her—had been a place to think and design, not do manual labor.  She was enjoying the physical labor and her body was getting a workout at the same time.

Today was when Christina's next shipment was due.  Which meant more lifting and moving and stocking shelves.  If this security consultant was worth the money Christina had pulled together to pay him there should be no problem and delivery would be smooth sailing. 

Rysen really, really hoped he was, because she didn't want to have her sister's shop fail.  She could see how much it meant to Christina.  Rysen would hate to think that her bad luck had followed her just to rub off on her sister.

When she went downstairs, Christina was making them both coffee, dancing around the kitchen and humming.

Rysen was a little annoyed that her sister was in such a good mood when all she wanted to do was crawl back into bed.  Thoughts of Kevin had once again ruined her morning.  Not to mention seeing Josh in Beatrice's arms.  Maybe that was why she was having trouble sleeping.  She made herself a promise right then that she wouldn't think about men again.  Ever.

Yeah.  Right.

"Good morning, Ry," her sister sang, pouring out the dark coffee into matching ceramic cups.

“What are you in such a good mood for?  Did I miss something?”

"Wow, grouch," Christina joked with her.  "Here, take your cup.  You need this."

Rysen took the coffee with a grumble, but it did smell good, and the first sip made her feel more like herself.  "Fine.  Thank you.  So tell me what the reason is for your good mood, already.  We have a lot of work to do today at the shop, don't we?"

“Yes!  Exactly!  I get more wine today, the shop is going to be fine and I won't have to worry anymore.  Brandon is at the shop now, and he's going to keep an eye on everything until we get there."

"Uh, Brandon?"

"The security guy.  Oh, he's so smart Rysen.  You won't believe the things he came up with, the plan he has for making sure I don't have to go through this anymore.  Come on, get ready, we can go meet him."

Christina drove them to the shop after a breakfast of a few pieces of toast with peanut butter, a meal the sisters had shared often when they were young and their dad had been busy, leaving the girls to fend for themselves.  It was a little memory of a childhood that hadn't been great, but it made Rysen smile.

The shop was still locked up with the "CLOSED" sign in the window, most of the lights inside still off.  Christina parked out front this time, turning off the engine, staring out the windshield over the steering wheel at the dark windows of her business.

"Huh," she said.

"Where's your security guy?" Rysen asked.

Worry started to etch lines in Christina's brow.  "Maybe he's inside waiting for us.  That's it.  He's guarding our shipment inside.  Come on."

Rysen followed her through the door.  When Christina flicked on the ceiling lights, they revealed the same bare shelves.  Where they had expected boxes and crates to be stacked up in the middle of the showroom there was only empty floor.  Everything was the same as they had left it yesterday.

Except for the guy leaning back against the counter with his arms folded and his piercing eyes staring them both down.

"Thought it'd be you," he said in that same subtle accent, which seemed more Australian to Rysen now than British.  "Wanted to be sure."

"What are you doing here?" Rysen demanded.  "You can't be in my sister's store!"

"Ry, calm down," Christina told her, pulling her back by her elbow.  "This is Brandon Dennicort, our security consultant."

Rysen blinked.  The guy she had literally run into, the guy with all the muscles and the face of a male model…he was the security consultant?

She felt her cheeks heating up again.

"Brandon," Christina asked, "where's the shipment?  Did you put it downstairs already or something?"

He looked at her, his face grim, and slowly nodded his head.  "Nothing came.  Wanted to ask you if I got the time wrong.  Guessing I didn't."

Rysen's heart sank.  Christina had been depending on that delivery coming into the store today.  The few bottles of wine they got every other day from local wine makers weren't holding them.  A couple of tourists had already come and then walked out again when they saw how little inventory they had.

"Chris…" Rysen started to say.

“I need to make a phone call," Christina said quickly, excusing herself to the back office, closing the door with a firm little snick.

Which left Rysen and—what was his name?  Brandon?—alone in an awkward silence.  She took the time to look him over again.  When she'd been joking about needing eye candy here at the shop she didn't realize her sister would take it to heart.  Or maybe this was just the luck of the draw.  Either way, Brandon was way hot, and he was still staring at her, and his lip curled in this little smile that made her wonder what he was thinking.

Was it this morning she had sworn off thinking about guys?  Right.  Um.  Right.  Especially with her sister's employees.

"I guess you can, you know, go," she said to him, suddenly all tongue tied.  "Unless you're waiting for a check?  Do we like, pay you by the day or something?"

"Your sis has me paid up for a week," Brandon explained, his eyes still focused on Rysen.  "She'll get what she's paid for."

"Oh really?" she snapped, feeling like he was examining her, or something.  She didn't know if she should be flattered or punch him in his cute nose.  "Tell me then, Mister Security Guy, if Christina is getting what she paid for then where is her shipment?"

He shrugged.  "Not here."

Rysen waited for more but he just stood there, arms crossed, not speaking.  "Really?  Not here?  That's the best your security expertise can tell us?"

"Too right.  For now, at least.  Nothing happened on this end.  The wine she had last night, she still has today.  That's thanks to me."  There wasn't a hint of humility in those words and Rysen felt irrationally annoyed at his smugness.  "I installed a new alarm system for her.  Security cameras, too.  Plus I slept on the floor back there."

"How nice," Rysen quipped.  "You've moved in."

"All part of the package."

"I don't care about your package," Rysen told him.  He grinned as she said it, and it suddenly dawned on her what she'd said.  She felt the heat flooding into her face and swallowed hard.  "You…know what I mean.  How much is my sister paying you to sleep on her floor?"

He tapped a finger against the side of his nose.  "That's betwixt me and her, Miss Rysen.  She's paid me fair.  Of course, she's paying in installments.  I know when honest people need time to pay for my services.  We'll work out future payment…well, in the future."

"Oh."  Rysen didn't know what to say to that.  This guy wasn't ripping her sister off, and he actually did sound like he knew what he was doing.  She'd been starting to worry that this was just some jack of all trades making a quick buck off someone else's problems.  Maybe she'd pegged him wrong.

"Ask you a question?" he said to her, pushing away from the counter and walking over to her.

"Uh, sure."

“Just how often do her shipments not come in?”  He sounded genuinely interested to know.  Maybe it was just part of his job, she thought.

"She told me she's lost one a month.  This would make three."  Rysen took a moment to remember everything her sister had told her.  Brandon was close enough now that she could smell his cologne, a musky, spiced scent.  "She's been working off the stock she already had, but give it a few weeks and she'll have to close down.  She can't keep paying for stock that never arrives."

"And she's gone to the police?"  It wasn't so much a question as a fact, and Rysen could see wheels turning in his mind behind those gorgeous eyes.

"Yes, she's gone to the police."  Rysen took a few steps away, trying to make it look like she had to tidy up the small selection of wine on a shelf.  Really, she just needed a little space from Brandon.  This close to him, her mind and body were starting to react to his presence, his scent, his warm voice.  Damn it, she told herself, get it together.  He's working for Christina.  He's not some stranger you're going to ask out on a date.

That idea blossomed into an image that made her bite her lip and shuffle the bottles of wine again.  Stop it, she told herself again.  You don't even know him.

"The police were no help," she said, to keep the conversation moving forward.  "Christina complained to the shipping company too, with the same results.  She's out of options.  We were hoping a security consultant would be able to do something."

He was about to say something, and his hand reached out for hers—when had he gotten so close to her again?—and Rysen felt a little breath escape her parted lips.

Which was when Christina came back into the room from the office.  She was so upset that she shoved the door open as hard as she could and made it bang against the wall.

“Well, they say there’s nothing that they can do, but I got them to promise to send me a partial shipment tomorrow.  At an additional cost," Christina grumbled.  She stopped short of Rysen and Brandon, blinking, her eyes narrowing for just a moment before she went back to her grumbling.

Rysen wondered what her sister was thinking, seeing her and Brandon standing here like this…

Oh.  Of course.  She really wished she didn't blush so easily.  Turning her face away, she stepped around the set of chest-high shelves, putting them between her and Brandon.

"I’ll be down in the cellar," Christina finally said, "counting what's left of our inventory."

Rysen wished she could do something to help her sister.  She heard Christina stomping down the stairs to the cellar, muttering to herself the whole time.  There had to be some way to keep the shipments coming.  But what?

"I know that look, I know what you’re thinking," Brandon said to her.  Her eyebrows shot up. How on earth would he know what she was thinking by the look on her face?  "You’re determined to help your sister?"

It was surprising to hear her own thoughts echoing in his question, like he could actually read her mind.  No guy should be able to do that.  "Yes," she told him anyway.  "I won't let my sister down.  I owe her too much."

"Is that the only reason?" he asked her, cocking his head to the side.

"I…I don't know what you mean."

He smiled with a little shake of his head.  "Don't worry about it.  I think I might know how to help Christina.  You trust me?"

Rysen felt herself drawn toward him in spite of herself, leaning over the shelves, locking eyes with him and not caring if Christina or anyone else saw.  "I don't even know you."

"So ask me something.”

"Like what?"

He spread his hands wide.  "Like anything."

Was he for real?  "Okay, fine.  Where are you from?"

"You mean because of the accent?"

Rysen nodded.

"Yeah, a lot of people ask me that.  I'm from New York City originally."  When she stared at him incredulously he laughed.  "By way of Sydney, Australia, of course.  See?  Now you know something about me."

"That isn't much," she pointed out.

"Don't have to know someone for long," he said in a low, intimate voice, "to know what kind of person they are.  Take you for instance.  I've known you for all of ten minutes, and I already know you're one I can trust."

Oh, dear God, this man was pushing all the right buttons.  Did she trust him?  Rysen didn't know the answer to that one, but she did know one thing for certain.

As crazy as it sounded to herself she was starting to fall in love with Brandon.

***

Christina was down in the dumps for the rest of the day.  Nothing that Rysen did would cheer her up.  Not that she blamed her sister at all.  Even Chunky Monkey ice cream couldn’t fix what was wrong.  And Chunky Monkey fixed everything.  The more that she saw her sister mope around the house, the more Rysen’s resolve hardened.  She just hoped Brandon's plan would work.

After she got her sister to bed, she felt exhausted.  What she needed was a good soak in a tub and a glass of wine and a foot rub…