Take Me Higher (12 page)

Turning to Syrah, she said, ‘That, of course, includes what is needed at Ruy Blas. But I want to make one thing clear. The object of this investment is to keep the Napa Valley for wine instead of a tourist haven that Ira or anyone else might capitalise on.’

The group were stunned into silence by Diana’s suggestion. Overwhelmed to have the famous actress as their patron. Syrah sensed that Diana might be making this offer as a means of revenge on Ira. But there was no way Syrah could allow her to chance her money if that was the purpose behind the gesture placed so generously before them. She rose from her chair and, taking Diana’s hand, pulled her up. ‘Will you all excuse us for a few minutes?’ she asked as the two women walked from the pool to the gardens.

‘You’re not doing this as some sort of revenge on Ira, for being the bastard he has been? If that’s the reason, I can’t allow you to gamble your life’s savings, it simply isn’t worth it,’ said Syrah.

Diana laughed then told her, ‘I admit I would like to thwart Ira’s dream just once but that’s different from revenge. Revenge it might have been had I still wanted a life with him. That’s no longer the case. My love for Ira is gone and nothing can revive it. It’s all quite straightforward: I want to save the Valley from him. I will fight in any way I can to see that he falls flat on his face in this bid to take over the small independent vineyards. I’m doing it for them, for you and Keoki,
for me, maybe even for Ethan. Remember I come from poor mountain farming people who had to beat off the banks and the land developers all their working lives. It’s quite simple, Ira doesn’t deserve to be a force in the Napa Valley. Or maybe, put even more simply, I don’t want him to be.’

The two women hugged each other and then, arm in arm, walked back to James and shook his hand. ‘Allies in a quest,’ said Syrah.

‘I don’t know what to say. This is so unexpected, so marvellous for all concerned,’ replied an overwhelmed James.

‘And it means so much to me. Frankly I was daunted by all I have to do and concerned about going it alone. But now with your support, Diana, and knowing I will be accepted and helped by the other vineyards in the Valley, I will learn my new trade as I work my vineyard and my cellar. I will settle for nothing less than producing the best Richebourg-Ruy Blas yet.’

‘Now
that’s
what we need to hear,’ commented Melba, and everyone gave Syrah a standing ovation and burst into laughter, released from a dark place into the light.

Willoughby’s timing was perfect. It was then that he announced lunch was served. It was a joyful occasion. The first course was fresh asparagus with a light hollandaise sauce.

Syrah warned, ‘Keoki, I don’t see asparagus on our table for a long time after this meal.’

When the main course came, stuffed roasted quail and game chips with a compôte of fresh cranberries, she said, ‘We’ll be lucky to have pasta to eat, quail will seem like a dream. In fact, all our life here in Southern California will be like a glorious dream compared to the hard working life ahead of us.’

When the pudding was served she began again. It was a gorgeous Baked Alaska with a Cherry Jubilee sauce poured over it. ‘How divinely extravagant! Eat your fill, Keoki, because I don’t see many meals like this in our future.’

‘Stop! Just stop there, Syrah,’ said James, but with a twinkle in his eye.

Turning to Keoki, he said, ‘Your mom is so busy mourning the loss of Baked Alaska in her life she’s forgotten to tell you what living on Ruy Blas and in the Napa Valley will be like. Oh, yes, you will miss all
the things you grew up with here: the Pacific Ocean rolling up to your front door, living on a grand scale, your friends and school. Melba’s cooking with extravagant produce may change to beans on toast but, hey, she’ll make them taste like filet mignon. Turn sardines into smoked salmon.’

Everyone laughed and that included Syrah who said, ‘I can’t believe I said those things! Imagine mourning the loss of a Baked Alaska after what I have been going through.’ And she raised her glass and made a toast, ‘To my son, and what lies before us in the Valley.’

Chapter 10

In the weeks that had passed since James had fallen in love with Syrah at the graveside at Ethan’s funeral, and later boldly taken her in his arms in the garden, he had come to realise that a mere seduction of her would not be enough for either one of them. Sex, love and friendship would govern the affair that neither one of them would ever break. They were, right from the beginning in the garden of the château, embroiled in a serious involvement which meant they would have to live double lives, something he was loath to demand from her.

It was for that reason that, once Syrah had returned to Malibu, he made a supreme and conscious effort to spend more constructive and loving time with his wife. It took no effort to be with the children whom he loved. Betsy and Carrie were the only reason he remained with his wife. The marriage had been going wrong for them for years but it was bearable so long as he had not fallen in love elsewhere.

James tried, those first weeks after falling in love with Syrah, to control his ardour for her. He cultivated several sexual encounters in his quest to dampen the fire burning within him for her. It worked … but only for a few days. After each fling Syrah was back in his mind and his heart. James was more lonely, more hungry than ever to be with her. To have her always in his life.

Now that Syrah was moving to the valley to run Ruy Blas, she would be closer to him and his world. That both thrilled and frightened him. He knew under those new circumstances he would be unable to resist his desire for her. Before the lunch at Diana’s house he had thought he would bide his time. Maybe their love would fade enough for them to live with it and do nothing about it. He had thought that they would both be able, for a while, to live a clandestine life together because there were two families at stake and greater pressures than love to deal
with. But of course he was wrong. Their love and lust for each other was too good, too right, to be conducted as a cheap backstreet romance.

Now here he was waiting at a private airfield several miles from Ruy Blas for Syrah, Keoki and Melba to circle the field in her tangerine Boeing Stearman and he had yet to sit down and tell her about the state of his marriage and his love for his two daughters which governed everything in his life. He loved Syrah the more for never having asked about them and wondered if she even knew they existed. Trust. It was all a matter of trust. She trusted him to tell her about his personal life, any commitments he might have, when it was the right time to do so and not before. Every day he had talked to her on the telephone he had asked the same question, ‘Is this the right time?’

He saw a flash of colour in the bright blue sky, a sun beam on the tangerine double-winged plane, and once more he asked himself, Is it now? Has the moment come to confess all to the woman I love?

The plane landed and it was high excitement that greeted James and the airfield’s owner, Jake Blackwolf, who had agreed to allow Syrah the run of the grass airfield that ran down the centre of his vineyard. Jake was one of the small growers committed to helping her get on her feet in the wine trade.

‘Welcome to the Valley, Miss Syrah. You keep your plane here as long as you like. It’s a lot rougher field than the one your daddy made for you at Richebourg-Conti but no matter, you’ll get used to it, and I’m proud to have Ethan’s girl using it,’ he told her while shaking her hand.

They settled the plane next to Jake’s Leopard Moth in a shabby but adequate hangar and all piled into James’s Range Rover to set off for Ruy Blas. Melba could hardly keep her eyes off Jake Blackwolf who was, like James, a full-blooded Native American whose forefathers had always been chiefs of the Yurok tribe. He was tanned and lean, his white hair worn long and tied back in a pony tail. There was something noble in his bearing. He made Melba stand a little taller, raise her chin a little higher. Jake emanated a power that quietly took you over. Having met him, Melba for the first time truly understood that she, Syrah and Keoki were returning to the earth, to a real world inhabited by real people with whom they had nothing in common. She felt humbled by this stranger as well as safe with men like him and James. In this luscious
valley of many vineyards, she felt more of a pioneer than a stranger, one who might have crossed the great plains a hundred or so years ago discovering the grass roots of America.

To feel like that on landing was one thing but once they drove through the ancient iron gates emblazoned ‘Ruy Blas’ and guarded by a blond young man with a rifle slung over his shoulder, who tipped his Stetson to James and Syrah, she realised that settling into this life was going to be more of a struggle than she had expected it to be. The house was little more than a shack and had been damaged by the fire Caleb’s men had set yet everything else, particularly the row upon row of vines, was pristine, kept in perfect order and magnificent condition. It didn’t take long for the three from Malibu to realise they were now living in a working vineyard where vines came first and humans second.

Each of them put on a good face for the others and took their new life one day at a time. There were more people working on the Ruy Blas vineyard than Syrah had realised. She was impressed by Henri and the dedication he and the staff showed to the vineyard as well as how helpful they were to her, Keoki and Melba. But after no more than a week Syrah felt the pressure of money being so scarce and the people, though kind, incredibly provincial. She did not find it unpleasant exactly, merely difficult to get used to.

Almost every day James was there to give them all support and for the first time Syrah and he had time to be alone together. Syrah bathed in the light of James’s affection for her. Every day their kisses and caresses took on a new intimacy that turned their world into something more heavenly than earth-bound. So many times during a day their need to consummate their lust for one another became too strong to resist and sexual fantasies seemed always on the brink of being fulfilled. Unable to resist, their sex life was conducted in thrilling episodes: in a wood on a sunny day, naked in a cove with the Pacific Ocean crashing over them, one night at dusk among the vines. And every day James thought he must tell Syrah he could not marry her.

He had been waiting for the right moment, the right time and place, to talk to her about his plight. And then one day while he was making love to her, when they were both on the edge of coming together in a long and exquisite orgasm, he knew there would never be a right time. They came and the orgasm was so intense, the experience so
overwhelmingly thrilling, that James knew nothing in the world could ever take away what they had together. Nothing but a reluctant decision to part.

He slid off her body and held her in his arms as she went down on him and licked his penis. She wanted not to waste a drop of his lust. He felt the same way about Syrah and was thrilled when she came twice more as he lingered over her cunt with his tongue and lips. Then he inched his way up her body and cradled her in his arms.

He spoke softly but clearly. ‘My wife’s name is Katherine and I will never leave her because I love my children. In the past I have tried to leave her, but she will never allow me to. You see, she blackmails me with threats of destroying my daughters’ love for me. Indeed, destroying their lives if necessary.’

James could see the shocked expression on Syrah’s face. ‘Oh, my dear, you do want to marry me then?’

‘With all my heart and soul,’ he replied.

‘Then what are you saying, James? Or, to put it more bluntly, what are you asking me? That I must make the decision to be your mistress and nothing more?’ asked Syrah.

‘You must think about this, my dearest heart. Until you make that decision I would like us to agree to go on seeing each other as we have been but to try to cool our ardour. I feel it only fair that I should spend some time with my wife and the girls, and you, Syrah, should try and find a man who can marry you and give you what you so richly deserve: a husband of your own to pamper, love and adore you.’

Syrah was aware that there was little she could do about their situation. It was all up to James. If he could not bear for her to live in a clandestine relationship, it was no easier for her to put any pressure on him and force him to take a drastic step that might harm his children. She truly loved James. So much so that it was not at all painful for her to stay with him in any way that she could, seeing him how and when that was possible. Finally they agreed to be discreet but not secretive about being together.

And so they saw each other at the vineyard and on outings where they could enjoy each other and make love. Only the pain of separation each time they parted haunted their every meeting, their every kiss. For Syrah that pain was sharp and short-lived because in her heart she
felt certain James was her man, that they were destined to love no other. He was hers. She had even come to accept that they might possibly have other husbands, other wives, but they would never leave each other or love another in the same way. At James’s insistence, though, Syrah was determined at least to look for another man so as not to be a burden on James and the love they were able to share.

The joy of her life those first few weeks at Ruy Blas was first and foremost walking through her vineyard: she enjoyed seeing the row upon row of vines with their luscious array of bright green leaves and tight sensual clusters of grapes, the scent of the fruit, feeling underfoot the earth, the hot sun above as it beat down and ripened her crop. The winery that Ethan had installed for Ruy Blas became a second home for her, the place where she studied methods of blending, saw for herself the care with which her grapes were treated in every process they went through. There was so much to learn and James, Henri and the other workers admired her enthusiasm to master it all. She worked from dawn to dusk, either on the land, in the winery or in Ethan’s cellar where she was beginning to appreciate the magnificent vintages. It calmed her to think of them as better than money in the bank; excited her to see herself as an important vineyard owner with a cellar that was sure to save Ruy Blas if bad times hit it. The more she worked and learned, the more Syrah wanted to push forward. Before long she had made up her mind to begin the studies that would eventually lead to her taking stringent exams to become a Master of Wine just as Ethan had been and as James was.

And so her days were filled with work, finding ways to make ends meet and loving James. She had never been happier except possibly when Keoki had been born. If Syrah was disconcerted about anything it was what was going on at Richebourg-Conti. It was only just surviving on its stocks and managing the outstanding bank loans with enormous difficulty. Because the banks were unhappy about the loss of Ruy Blas and Ethan’s cellar they had even threatened foreclosure on Richebourg-Conti unless something drastic was done to inject money into the vineyard and its winery.

Caleb and Paula, under severe pressure, lost all sense of decency and mounted a renewed attack on Syrah. Before she could even approach the banks to raise money for her vineyard, Caleb advised them of her
ignorance of the wine industry and said she should be considered a bad risk. Syrah was dependent on credit from the merchants who dealt in supplies for the wine industry. There were few who ignored Caleb’s warning to them that giving her credit would be foolhardy and seen as an offence against Richebourg-Conti, bad enough for Caleb and Paula to withdraw any custom they were at present giving the traders.

Not for a day did her brother and sister-in-law stop harassing her with endless demands for machinery and barrels they claimed were owned by them and only loaned to Ruy Blas. Such demands cost Syrah time and trouble and constant litigation which she could not afford. They hired bullies to stalk and taunt her, Keoki, even Melba, and created a dozen small problems merely to waste her time: a lorry load of fertiliser dropped on the road to the house from the vineyard, earth moved and piled up in the entrance to the caves that had been converted into Ethan’s wine cellar; the worst was a herd of sheep let loose among the vines.

Constant harassment was making Syrah’s life a misery, her struggle harder. Yet fearful as she was for herself and her child, and for the vineyard which she now had guarded twenty-four hours a day against sabotage, she continued to throw herself headlong into learning about her chosen trade. Her reward was that every day she found herself happier than she had ever dreamed she could be.

Only after working at Ruy Blas for nearly a month did she begin to understand what a valuable gift Ethan had left her. She worked incessantly on valuing her wine collection and deciding how to market it, but first and foremost was the commitment she had made to study wine with the Association of Masters of Wine. She travelled from vineyard to vineyard in California and abroad to learn from friendly owners every aspect of wine making so she could produce the finest wine Ruy Blas could possibly yield.

Keoki settled in better than anyone had expected he would and became the pride of Ruy Blas. He loved the vineyards and was as eager to learn about and be a part of them as his mother was. He spent a great deal of time with James, especially when Syrah was away earning money to keep the vineyard going. After conferring with James, her old friend Diego Juarez and Henry Hawthorne Halliwell, all wine men sympathetic to what she was doing, on their advice Syrah sold only enough rare wine from her cellar to give her half what she needed to keep going.
The other half she decided she would earn by flying. They all agreed that the cellar was her most valuable asset and should be depleted as little as possible.

Diego and Henry had flown to Ruy Blas to see the cellar and its contents and there they saw a side of Syrah they’d never dreamed existed. The sacrifices that she and her son were making to work the vineyard impressed them beyond measure. They offered any support she might need, no little thing. These were big men in the wine world. Henry was a world-famous connoisseur of fine wine, a collector and Master of Wine. He was a prominent New York socialite, old money but with a new ethic of achievement. For many years he and Syrah had been friends, playboy and playgirl together. Beguiled by her latest manifestation, and fascinated by her struggles to make a success of her vineyard on her terms and in her way, he willingly became her client and bought the wine it was necessary for her to sell. Overnight the world learned that Syrah Richebourg had, and was trading, one of the most extraordinary cellars of fine wine. Within weeks enquiries were flooding in. She was the new and sought after wine name, her fame even extending to the Internet.