Grayson, still pleased with his joke, followed suit. “See you back at the winery.”
Maverick walked over to Edith and Ella’s table.
“I hope you weren’t planning to slip out of here without saying hello,” Edith chastised.
“Of course not,” he lied.
“You remember Ella Decker?” Edith pointed to Ella, who looked even prettier today than she had last week at Whiskey Abbey. Why couldn’t she have aged horribly?
Maverick nodded, forcing himself to establish eye contact with Ella, who looked just as uneasy with this reunion as she had the one at the bar.
“Maverick,” she said softly.
Sweet Jesus, he really shouldn’t love the sound of his name coming from her lips as much as he did. “Ella. Nice to see you again,” he said, fighting to sound like a normal, civil, polite human being. He’d come off like an ass at Whiskey Abbey, and he hoped to correct course on that, not wanting Ella to think she had any power over him anymore.
She smiled. “You too.”
“I understand you were the guest of honor at Edith’s book club meeting,” he said, searching for some harmless chitchat.
Mila, Remi, Gretchen, and Kasi had spent too much of the past Sunday night’s family dinner gushing about how much they’d enjoyed talking to Ella. Maverick had tried to ignore their conversation by listening to Dad and Levi discuss the crops his oldest brother was planting on Lucky Penny Farm, but in the end…he wound up hanging on every word the girls said.
“I was,” she replied. “It was nice of Edith to invite me to attend.”
“And now you’ll be here for even longer,” Edith said to Ella, before turning her attention back to Maverick. “I’ve convinced her to stay in town indefinitely. She’ll be writing her next Grace Decker book at Millholland House! How exciting is that?”
Ella’s gaze had been on Edith, but she snuck a quick, surreptitious look in his direction, as if worried about how Maverick might take the news that she was staying.
Somehow, he managed to keep his poker face under control. “That’s great,” he said, proud that his tone came across as more dismissive than interested. Right now, he figured he was in a good position to earn an Oscar for his act. Rather than take a chance at losing it, he decided to cut and run. “Well, I need to get back to work. I hope you enjoy your visit, Ella.”
“Thanks.”
He bent down and gave Edith a kiss on the cheek. It was his standard goodbye to the dear old woman, and she’d be suspicious if he didn’t. “Edith, always a pleasure.” He added his signature wink, and she smacked him on the arm.
“Get out of here, you shameless charmer,” she teased.
Maverick didn’t need to be asked twice.
He’d almost made a clean escape when Nora caught him by the back door.
“Oh, Mav. Good timing. I need help moving a file cabinet in my office. Do you have a second?”
He nodded, following his cousin upstairs. Ordinarily, he’d be amused by her request because Nora was forever shifting furniture, never satisfied with any room setup for long, but today, he was struggling to find humor in anything.
She pointed to the filing cabinet. “I think it would be more functional if that was closer to the desk, but it’s heavy as shit. Can you slide it? Maybe just a foot or two.”
In the end, she decided three feet was the sweet spot. For this week.
“Thanks,” she said, turning when Lark appeared in the doorway.
“Nora? You got a minute? One of the new girls has a question about the schedule I don’t know the answer to.”
Nora nodded, thanking Maverick again, before leaving him alone in her office.
He started to follow her out, but something on the corner of her desk caught his eye. It was a paperback…a romance novel written by Grace Decker.
Despite his better judgment, he picked it up, reading the back cover. He had to read it twice, plus check the author’s name again, just to be sure it reallywasone of Ella’s books.
The premise of the book wasn’t what he expected. Apparently, the heroine was a journalist, working undercover in a sex club. According to the blurb, her real identity is discovered, and the club owner’s “punishment” reveals her previously undiscovered submissive side.