The Secrets of the Lost Vineyard

by Erin Palmisano

Genres: Friendship; Women's Fiction; Contemporary Romance; Holiday Romance

Synopsis

A perfect summer read from bestselling author Erin Palmisano, set in a lush vineyard in Argentina and featuring her trademark warmth and romance.

A secret inheritance. A lost vineyard. A love story that refused to fade.

Victoria Bishop always knew she was adopted - but just as she is shattered by the news that her fiance is leaving her, a letter arrives that changes everything.

An inherited vineyard in Argentina presents the perfect escape - six months in the lush hills beyond Mendoza, preparing it for sale. However, Victoria soon discovers that the vines are barren, having produced no grapes for years.

The problem seems connected to the family she knows nothing about, and the village she feels out of place in - it seems no one wants her there. Delving into the past, Victoria pieces together a devastating love story.

And then there's Victoria's next-door neighbour Dev, the charming winemaker who might be able to help heal the vineyard ... and maybe Victoria's heart, as well.

From bestselling author Erin Palmisano comes a story of friendship, family, food and romance set in the gorgeous wine-making region of Mendoza, Argentina - the perfect summer read for fans of Lucinda Riley, Emily Henry and Joanne Harris.

Publisher: Hachette New Zealand

Print pages: 384

Sample

‘Ms Bishop, did you need me to repeat the question?’ The reply was silence. ‘Ms Bishop?’

‘Victoria?’ a familiar voice now asked.

Victoria turned her attention to her ex-fiancé, Michael Griffon. She stared at the man with whom she’d spent the last six years of her life.

He’d been boyish at twenty-six, when they’d met. Big, soft blue eyes with long lashes, dirty blonde hair grown slightly too long. Victoria remembered the day he first walked into her life, a fresh young wannabe actor who’d just signed with an agency Victoria worked with often. He didn’t have much experience, but Victoria’s gift, as her boss Levi always said, was her ability to see the potential in a person and their talent.

‘Our aim here at LGM, or Levi Gold Management, is to help you on your way to having the career that best suits you,’ Victoria had said.

‘Let me take you to dinner tonight,’ Michael had interrupted.

Victoria rarely blushed, but she did then. ‘I, um. Thank you, Michael, but if I plan to be your manager, that will not be possible.’

‘Then don’t be my manager,’ he’d said, leaning forward. ‘Let me take you out instead.’

Victoria had sat back at her desk and crossed her arms, pressing her lips together to keep from smiling. ‘No.’

When they came out of the office, Monique had said to him, ‘Ah, Victoria’s latest project! Welcome to the team.’

Now he was thirty-two, his blonde hair darker and cropped short, his frame filled out, and he’d had a beard for the past five years. He looked like a man. He was a man.

And he was also a successful actor because of Victoria’s belief in him six years ago, despite the unwise decision to start a personal relationship. But she’d seen his potential, she took him under LGM’s wing, and he was now their biggest and most successful client to date. He’d been on a popular Netflix show for the last four years and recently been cast in his second feature film role, though he was yet to take the lead.

‘Ms Bishop,’ the mediator between them asked her again. ‘Do you need me to repeat the question?’

‘Yes please,’ she answered, hating the way her voice cracked. She should have brought someone with her today, but instead it was just her, her ex-fiancé and their mediator, looking at lists of their life to divide up between them. Not a shared life anymore. Not a them; not a we.

The mediator was a woman in her forties named Pen, who was all business, no nonsense, but Victoria saw a flash of sympathy in her eyes. ‘This has all been easy so far – thanks to you both for your willingness to work together. You each have your own income, your own vehicles, and you have agreed upon your personal assets within the house. So now, it is just the house.’

The house. The beautiful 1920s Spanish-style villa on 15th Street in Santa Monica they’d purchased a year ago. Until then, they’d both lived in apartments in the city. A four-bedroom house with an actual yard, in the perfect school district, was part of Victoria’s dream to start a family.

The longing for what could have been – what she’d lost – suddenly made her choke up and she turned her head, blinking fast and tilting her face to try and stop the tears. She refused to break down now.

‘Victoria,’ Michael said. ‘I’m sorry. I want you to be comfortable and able to move on. I will buy you out, so you don’t have to worry about the mortgage or any of those things.’

His voice was kind and genuine, and for a moment she felt like he really was doing this for her. After all, he was earning much more than her now and he had paid for most of the house already. To offer her half was generous, even though it was probably the law. But she looked up suddenly.

‘You want the house?’

It was Victoria who wanted the house. She was the one who wanted the family so desperately.

Michael had been surprised back when Victoria said she was ready to start a family young. She’d had to explain to Michael that as a person who was adopted, even though her adoptive parents were amazing, to have her own child and family and lavish them with everything wasn’t just a dream, it was a necessity. After actively trying for over a year, when nothing happened, she finally went to see a doctor.

‘It’s called anovulation,’ the doctor had said. ‘It is when the ovaries don’t release an oocyte during the menstrual cycle. It would explain your infrequent periods since you were a girl.’

‘So how do I fix it?’ she’d asked, trying not to allow the fear to infiltrate her blood. She had to have children.

‘We’ll do tests, but often the cause can be guesswork. If you are actively trying to get pregnant, a woman with anovulation’s best effort is to start with ovulation induction, and if that doesn’t work, IVF.’

After five cycles on Letrozole, the maximum her doctor and their budget would allow, they started IVF.

Michael didn’t seem too enthusiastic about the cost or the fact that the doctor said that the chance of it working for her was under thirty per cent, but he agreed. As treatment started and hope bloomed, they bought her dream house. Victoria planned the decor as she stabbed herself with hormones twice daily.

When that also failed, it was like her sense of who she was and her purpose in life failed as well. She’d fallen into a depression for a time, had become someone Michael didn’t recognise. Someone Victoria herself struggled to recognise, too.

But soon enough she was getting up and deciding to try again. Michael, however, said no.

‘Michael, we’ve only tried once!’ she cried. ‘We can try again.’

‘Vic,’ he’d pleaded. ‘You know what the doctor said, that you are—’

‘Don’t you say that word!’ she’d yelled, covering her ears. But it was in the air and they’d both heard it. Infertile.

He came to her, trying to take her in his arms. ‘I don’t want this to be our life. Either you accept that we will move on together and whatever happens between us with or without children is enough for you, or not.’

She’d cried in his arms and nodded, but she knew it was not enough. Something in Victoria broke then, and things between her and Michael just … fell apart.

‘Why do you want the house?’ she repeated now, feeling an impending doom in her belly, heating her from the inside.

‘Victoria …’ he said, hesitating.

‘It’s an old character house that you never even liked. You wanted something modern up in the Palisades. Why do you want the house now?’ she repeated.

He turned his eyes away and ran his fingers through his hair. The truth punched her in the gut.

‘Oh god, is there someone else?’ she asked.

He ran his fingers through his hair and wouldn’t meet her eyes. ‘I didn’t mean for it to happen so soon, but yes, there is someone else.’

‘And she wants my house,’ Victoria whispered. ‘A four-bedroom house for a family.’ The pain in her gut was so strong, she suddenly felt sick and stood up.

‘I think perhaps now would be a good time for a short break,’ Pen said calmly, not getting out of her seat, as Michael put his face in his hands.

‘I think now is a good time for us to finish this mediation,’ Victoria said.

‘Yes, we can re-schedule for another time that suits to finish,’ Pen started.

‘No, I want this done today. I accept Michael’s offer to buy me out at the market rate, based on my own lawyer’s assessment, if Michael’s lawyer agrees.’

Pen took notes and got the paperwork ready for her to take with her.

‘Victoria,’ Michael said quietly, but Victoria glared at him.

‘I want you out of my life.’



Victoria was in a state of shock and grief when she got outside.

‘Está bien, Victoria?’ Javi, the driver from LGM, asked her.

She and Javi only ever spoke in Spanish. Despite the fact that her adoption was closed, what little her parents knew, they shared. Victoria’s birth mother was Latina, though they didn’t know where from. So, they ensured that Victoria was bilingual from birth, hiring babysitters that could speak Spanish, even though they themselves couldn’t. Spanish came naturally to Victoria, and she spoke it as often as she could, which was easy enough in Los Angeles.

‘Javi, gracias por esperarme, thank you for waiting for me. I think I’ll walk back today,’ she said.

‘But you’re in your favourite heels! The Loubsomethings!’ he called.

‘You’re right. Can you please take my shoes back to LGM,’ she said, handing him the red-soled heels Michael had bought her for her last birthday. At the time, she’d thought it was such a generous gift, but it occurred to her today that she hated heels. She never wore them. So why did Michael buy them for her?

She was tempted to tell Javi to throw them over a cliff, but knew he’d have to get at least to Malibu for that to happen.

‘Oh, and this,’ she added, handing him a folder. ‘Give it to Ange. Shoes to Monique.’

‘Please, Victoria, I beg of you to not do this,’ Javi said, with tears in his eyes.

Victoria suddenly looked down at herself and what she’d handed Javi and realised what it looked like. She couldn’t help but laugh.

‘I’m just walking back along the beach, I promise,’ she assured him. ‘No search parties needed.’

Javi didn’t look convinced. She appreciated the support she had.

She took pity on him and showed him her phone. ‘Here,’ she said, opening the location app and sharing her location with him. ‘Now you can find me with your phone, and so can Ange and Monique and Levi.’

He looked relieved.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Also, Victoria?’

She turned. ‘Yes?’

‘Whatever it is, it will get better, okay? You’ll be okay, I promise,’ he said.

She smiled genuinely for the first time that day.

‘Gracias, Javi.’



As she expected, when Victoria arrived back at the office a half hour later, Levi and his wife Ange, her bosses, were sitting with Monique at the big dining table they had in the common kitchen area, a spread of just-delivered food on the table.

‘We ordered Gjusta, just for you, Vic,’ Levi said.

‘That’s my favourite,’ she said, the walk having calmed her slightly. ‘Did you get the burrata flatbread?’

‘And the Tuscan kale salad,’ Ange said. ‘Victoria, our food budget has gone up tremendously since you’ve worked here.’

‘I take that as a compliment,’ she said, sitting across from them. She picked up a piece of the flatbread and nibbled on it. She wasn’t hungry – not with so much emotion rolling around inside of her – but they’d gone out of their way to make her feel better and she owed it to them to try to enjoy it, especially considering what she was about to do. Levi had no idea what was coming.

She managed another bite of the bread and put it down. They all watched her movement.

‘Levi,’ she began, but he stood abruptly, and the table shook.

‘No, I refuse to accept your resignation.’

Okay, so he did know what was coming. Not that she should be surprised. She and Michael had tried not to fall in love when she was still his manager, but they had. They’d managed to keep it a secret for a few months before finally deciding that they wanted a future together and had to come clean. Levi had shrugged – it was common in Hollywood – but he started managing Michael himself. Still, it was a small, intimate company, and they saw one another at the office almost daily.

‘I’m sorry, Levi, but I cannot continue here, knowing I’ll see him all the time, and … with her. He’s with someone else,’ she finished.

‘Already?’ Monique gasped.

‘How do you know?’ Ange asked at the same time.

Victoria slouched lower in her seat. ‘When he told me he wanted the house—’

‘The Spanish-style house that you loved and he never liked before?’ Monique asked.

‘Yup,’ she said, extending the ‘p’. ‘I guessed. He confirmed it was true.’

‘Who is she?’

Victoria shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’ She turned back to Levi. ‘I signed Michael, I nurtured his career, and even though you are officially his manager now, this is a small company. Do you honestly expect me to wake up every morning and come into work and keep telling the world how amazing he is, after everything we’ve been through?’

Levi sat. ‘No, I don’t, Victoria. But nor do I expect you to throw away a long, lucrative career that you love. Surely there is another solution.’

‘Drop his sorry ass,’ Monique said, her teeth clenched. She was never Michael’s biggest fan, but finding out about another woman? That was a cut-off for Monique, even though Victoria didn’t know all the details yet.

‘We can’t lose Michael,’ Ange began, her eyes wide. ‘He’s our biggest client – he’s probably paying for all Victoria’s lunches.’ The joke fell flat, but Victoria knew she meant well.

‘No, you definitely can’t lose Michael as your client – he’s too important to the business. So the only solution …’

‘It is not the only solution; it is simply the only one you are seeing right now, Victoria. Take a week off,’ Levi said, nodding. ‘In that time, we’ll figure something out.’

Victoria resigned herself to giving her friends the time to think it over, but a week ahead with no plans and no work made her suddenly feel panicky and anxious.

‘But what will I do?’ she asked.

Monique put her arm around Victoria. ‘Take a break, relax, go through that goal planner I gave you, remember?’

‘Okay,’ Victoria nodded. ‘I’ll take the week off, but when I come back, I can’t promise that any solution is going to be one that works for me – I need you to understand that.’

Ange and Levi nodded. They’d been married so long they even nodded at the same pace.

Victoria pulled off a piece of flatbread, smiling suddenly. ‘I can try cooking again! I just know with some time and practice, I could be a good cook. How about a dinner party at mine, say, Monday? Do you have plans?’

They all answered at the same time with great enthusiasm.

‘Air hockey tournament.’

‘Amateur night at the Comedy Club!’

‘Actors showcase,’ Levi said.

‘Wow, good one, boss,’ Monique whispered to Levi.

‘You both work in talent management and air hockey and amateur night are what you came up with?’ he whispered back.

‘Wow, really?’ Victoria said, impressed and not noticing their whispers. ‘I should write those down for my list. There are actual air hockey tournaments? That is so cool! Okay what about Tuesday then?’

‘Bingo night!’ Monique called, at the same time as Ange’s ‘book club’ and Levi’s ‘bat mitzvah.’

Victoria looked at them shrewdly. ‘Are you guys going through the alphabet making excuses not to come to my house for dinner?’

‘No!’ they said at the same time.

‘We’d love to come, Victoria,’ Ange said. ‘I mean, obviously not Monday or Tuesday, but later in the week, maybe we can have a potluck at ours?’

‘But I want to cook for you guys!’ Victoria said. ‘I know the last time was a disaster, but—’

‘And the time before that,’ Levi pointed out.

‘And the time before that, too,’ Monique reminded her.

‘Yes, well,’ she said, getting frustrated, ‘I was busy then. Distracted. Now, I’ll be perfectly focused on one thing only. Cooking. Wednesday is out, but what about Thursday?’

‘Date night,’ Levi and Ange said together, as Monique was left silent.

Victoria crossed her arms, raised her eyebrows, and looked at Monique.

‘We were up to C, for cheaters,’ she muttered discreetly.

Levi shrugged unrepentantly. ‘She skipped Wednesday. Fair game.’

‘Great,’ Victoria said sarcastically. ‘Monique, my ex-best friend, wins the prize of coming to my house for dinner.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, come on. I’m not really that bad, am I?’

‘Yes!’ the others said as one.

The week felt endless to Victoria, which was surprising considering how productive she was.

For Christmas one year, Monique had given her a journal called My Goal Planner.

‘But I do so much already!’ Victoria had laughed, flipping through the book.

‘You work too much, that’s for sure. But outside of your job and Michael, what have you really done for fun for yourself in the past few years?’ Monique had asked. ‘This is supposed to be about the stuff we always say we’ll get around to and we never do. Come on, we’ll fill some out together.’

She had indulged Monique, but this was around the time she and Michael were talking to the doctors about the IVF treatment, and Victoria, always the optimist, was certain that by the end of the winter she was going to be pregnant.

On the first morning of her forced week off, she went to find that goal planner, but realised she didn’t know which box it was in.

During their last fight, Michael had told her that he didn’t love her the way that he used to. And that was it for Victoria. She’d fought hard for their relationship, but she didn’t want to fight that. She didn’t think she could bear it. She’d moved in with Monique while she looked for a new apartment. The house she’d loved was for dreams that could and would never come to be now.

She’d been so excited to decorate the villa to make it a cozy home, but she hadn’t even been there long enough to start. After that last devastating revelation from Michael, she’d packed her boxes and eventually moved them into her new rental. They sat there now, largely untouched. It was a nice apartment with a courtyard, close to Venice in Santa Monica, but she’d had no motivation to unpack, let alone decorate it. Until now, with a long week off work ahead of her.

Normally Victoria would be fully invested in a new project, but this didn’t feel like a project – more of a quick fix to get to something else, so she went to IKEA, the easiest place to go in and pick out furniture for her one bedroom. By the end of that first day she’d selected new furniture, had it delivered and put it together herself, decorated the apartment and unpacked her few boxes.

She looked around and could barely bring herself to smile. It was so lifeless. So barren.

Like you, she thought to herself.

She shook her head free of the negative thoughts. ‘No, Victoria, think positive. Now your apartment can actually be of use. People can sit here now.’

She texted Monique.

Come over for a champagne?

Tinder date. Be there Thursday for dinner. Please don’t burn your house down. Or poison me. Uber Eats?

Ha. Ha. Ha. Have fun, get laid! And I will impress the shit out of you with my mad cooking skills on Thursday!

She tried to ignore her gnawing disappointment in the prospect of being alone the next few days with all this time on her hands.

She opened the goal planner she’d found when she unpacked her books. Victoria couldn’t help but smile as she went through the list she and Monique had created.

She sighed. It wasn’t as if she’d spent her whole life waiting to have babies and be a mother. The truth was, she hadn’t thought about it too much through her twenties, but after a couple of years with Michael, she’d realised that she was in a happy relationship, she was in love, she was engaged and she was nearing thirty. She knew that women could have children much later now, but she didn’t know anything about her medical history. She’d always had very irregular periods, and she knew that every year over thirty lessened her chances.

It was still only the beginning of her week off, and Victoria was feeling depressed and aimless. She could beg Levi to at least let her work from home so that she’d have something to focus on, but she knew that wasn’t the solution. She loved where she worked and had loved her job, but now Michael was out of her life with absolutely no chance of coming back into it, she had to think about her future.

She managed her own clients who would come with her to another management company, but was that what she wanted? Her career and Michael’s had been intertwined for so long she hadn’t even really thought about whether she still loved being a talent manager the way she had when she was fresh to LA, or if it was Michael who had excited her. She’d made a career out of seeing the potential in others and working that potential into lucrative careers for her clients.

But what of her own potential?

Her phone dinged.

Just got back from our cruise, Bicky – we wish you could have come with us! Catching up on everything now but we love you! Mom and Dad

Victoria smiled. She didn’t have the energy to call her parents yet, but just reading their text made her feel better. She texted them back and then picked up her goal list, deciding it was what she was going to focus on.

‘Alright, Victoria, let’s get some of these things ticked off the list,’ she said, opening her computer. She typed surf lessons in Venice Beach.

‘Starting with you … .’

‘Knock knock!’ Monique said in lieu of actually knocking when she arrived on Thursday night.

‘Jesus, you scared me to death!’ Victoria called from another room. ‘That spare key was for emergencies – normal people wait for an invitation!’

‘I defy all vampire rules,’ she quipped. ‘Where are you?’

‘Bathroom, be right out. Have a seat!’ Victoria said enthusiastically.

‘I can see why you invited me around. I finally have somewhere to sit that isn’t on top of one of your boxes.’ Monique looked around. ‘What did you do, rob IKEA?’

‘More like IKEA robbed me,’ Victoria said, coming out of the bathroom. ‘I literally went in and found a kitchen, bedroom and living area, took photos, went to the front and said, “give me these.”’

Monique howled with laughter, and Victoria joined her with a chuckle. ‘I wish I was joking.’

She stepped into the light to hug Monique, but Monique jumped ba. . .