POV: Rosalind
Daniel joined me at the winery after closing, bringing a bottle from the Steele private collection.
I heard his car before I saw it—the familiar purr of the Aston Martin pulling into the empty lot. I'd just finished locking up, counting the register, when he walked in. Jacket off, tie loosened, carrying a bottle I recognized from the cellar at our house. A 1982 Bordeaux. The kind you opened for celebrations or funerals or moments when nothing else would do.
"You're here," I said.
"Thought I'd join you." He walked past me to the bar, set the bottle down with care. "Unless you'd rather be alone."
"No. Stay."
He poured the wine himself, two glasses with the kind of reverence the vintage deserved. Then he sat on the customer side of the bar—not behind it where partners stood, but across from me where strangers ordered drinks. He pulled me closer with a hand at my hip, positioned between his legs, close enough that I felt the warmth of him.
"To survival," he said, raising his glass.
"That's a dark toast."
"It's an honest one." He took a sip, closed his eyes. "God, that's good. Remind me why we've been saving this."
"For a special occasion."
"This feels special enough." He set down his glass, kept his hand on my hip. "Being here. With you. No associates. No performance."
We drank in silence for a moment. The winery felt different at night—softer, somehow. The paintings on the walls took on different shadows. The bottles behind the bar caught light from the street lamps outside and turned it into amber and ruby and gold.
"I've been thinking about the early years," Daniel said. "When I was building Steele's expansion. Twenty-three, twenty-four years old. Convinced I was smarter than everyone else."
"You probably were."
"Smart enough to recognize opportunities. Too young to understand consequences." He took another sip. "I made deals with people I shouldn't have trusted. Formed alliances based on convenience rather than compatibility. And when those alliances started threatening the company's legitimacy, I broke them."
"To keep the company solvent."
"To keep myself clean." His jaw tightened. "I told myself it was about protecting the business. About building something sustainable. But really, I was protecting my reputation. My future. I cut people loose who'd helped me get where I was because keeping them around would have cost me opportunities I wanted more."
I set down my glass. "Do you regret it?"
"I regret how I did it. Not that I did it." He looked at me then, eyes dark and honest. "Those partnerships were toxic. They would have destroyed everything I was trying to build. But I could have handled the exits with more grace. More honesty. Instead, I made it transactional. Money and contracts and very clear boundaries that said: you're out, I'm in, don't come back."
"Do those people ever truly disappear?"
"No." Daniel's voice was flat. "They wait for weakness, not apology. They take their money, sign their agreements, and then they watch. Waiting for the moment when you need them more than they need you. When your position weakens. That's when they resurface."
"With what? Threats?"
"Reminders. That they were there. That they remember. That certain favors might need to be returned." He pulled me closer, rested his forehead against my collarbone. "That's what I miscalculated. I thought generous exits were enough. I thought money could buy silence and distance. But I forgot that pride matters more than money to men who've been dismissed."
I ran my fingers through his hair. Let him rest there against me while the wine sat between us and the night pressed against the windows.
"You're proud of Luca," I said softly.
Daniel lifted his head. "What?"
"Earlier. You said he's choosing his own path. That he's not just following your blueprint." I looked at him. "That's pride. I can hear it in your voice when you talk about him."
Something softened in Daniel's face. "He's better than I was at his age. More thoughtful. Less arrogant. He questions things instead of just accepting them." He took a slow sip of wine. "I want him to build something that doesn't require the kind of compromises I made. Something clean. Something he can be proud of."
Daniel kissed me then—slowly, deeply, his hand firm on my hip, anchoring me to him. When he pulled back, he rested his head against my shoulder, and I felt the weight of him. Not just physical weight, but the accumulated burden of twenty-five years of decisions he couldn't unmake.
"Someone from my past has requested a meeting," he said quietly. "To clear the air, they said. Discuss old business. Ensure mutual understanding."
My stomach tightened. "Don't go."
"I don't want to."
"Then don't."
"If I don't, they'll come here." He lifted his head, looked at me with something that might have been regret. "They've already made that clear. The meeting happens on neutral ground, or it happens in a place that matters to me. And they know the winery matters."
The realization settled over me like ice water.
The winery. My space. The one thing I'd built that was supposed to be separate from Daniel's business. And they'd identified it. Marked it. Turned it into leverage before I'd even understood it was being weaponized.
"They've been watching," I said.
"For weeks. Maybe months." Daniel's hand tightened on my hip. "The permits inquiry. The guest list questions. They weren't just gathering information. They were making sure I knew they could reach you if they wanted to. That nowhere is truly separate."
"So the winery is leverage."
"Yes."