“Well, you know that you can stay here as long as you need. I already made up the guest room for you. And sharing a bathroom will be fun. Right?”

She pulled her hair back and tied it into a little knot that looked cute. I’d tried that once before and ended up looking like a balding rat.

“Yeah. It will be like we’re sisters. We can fight over makeup and counter space and stuff.” I offered up a smile for the first time.

Jeanine moved from the barstool over to the couch, and I watched it swallow her as she sat down.

“Do you think James knows what happened? Like, do you think he saw you leave?”

“I have no idea.”

“Well, are you going to tell him?”

“I wasn’t planning on talking to him ever again,” I said, and I meant it.

He was the whole reason I was in this mess in the first place. Because of him, I’d broken the only hard rule I’d ever been given in my life. And in doing so, I’d lost everything.

“Oh, so you’re just going to pretend like last night never happened?” she asked skeptically.

“I’ve done it before. It’s not that hard,” I reminded her, referring to the one-night stand I’d had six months back. After it was over, I’d wiped it from my mind and never thought about it again.

“It wasn’t with James before.”

“James doesn’t change anything,” I said, trying to convince myself that it was the truth.

“James changes everything.” She rolled her eyes at me and huffed out a long breath. “Can you at least be honest with yourself?”

Her tone was soft, and it sent me right over the emotional cliff that I’d been barely hanging on to.

“No.” I sat there, shaking my head back and forth. “I can’t be honest with myself. Because being with James isn’t an option for me. So, I have to lie to you, to me, to anyone who asks. I have to pretend like I don’t want him. I have to convince myself that he doesn’t matter.”

Her face scrunched together. “You already lost your job, Julia. You don’t have to lose the guy, too.”

Her statement rang with a certain air of truth that I didn’t want to accept. I couldn’t allow myself to believe that the winery was lost to me forever. It couldn’t be gone for good. I wanted to be able to go back home and run what I was entitled to.

“I’m not willing to give up the winery just yet.”

“I understand that. I just think you should be able to have both. There has to be a way. Don’t you think there’s got to be some sort of compromise?”