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Cici pressed her lips together and tried to count to three. “You talked to your dad about this?”

“Oh, sure. But he’s cool with it, don’t worry.”

Cici cleared her throat softly, and chose her words carefully. She had a sudden, disturbingly gratifying picture of serving up her ex-husband’s head on a platter, lined with curly endive and surrounded by spiced apple rings, at the wedding buffet. “How did this, um, all come about?”

Lori hesitated, but she made no attempt to disguise the excitement in her voice as she confided, “Actually, there is this guy I met online...” And before her mother could smother her groan, she went on, “Don’t worry, he’s really nice. And he’s awfully cute—at least the picture he posted is—and we’ve been having the best time, e-mailing back and forth. He’s at the University of Milan, studying law. You have to be really smart to go to the University of Milan, but that’s where he is. He was helping me to research a paper, and then I heard about this internship, and it turns out his father actually knows the owner of Cascino Giovani, which is—yes!—at the top of approved sponsors, and he’s giving me a personal reference, which pretty much means I’m in. Well, as long as I keep my GPA up for another three weeks, anyway! He writes the most beautiful letters,” she confided, with a touch of wistfulness in her tone. “Sergio, not his father. Are all Italians so ... poetic?”

Cici ground her teeth together and drew in a slow breath. “I’m sure I wouldn’t know.”

The sun, slanting behind the neatly tied rows of just-budding grape vines, broke a sweat on her face. She heard the sound of a truck engine—too well-tuned to be Farley’s—and tires crunching on the gravel driveway. She twisted around to see Dominic DuPoncier’s white pickup rounding the far corner of the house, moving toward the vineyard. Dominic, in straw hat and plaid shirt, lifted his arm through the open window toward her. “Afternoon, Miss Cici!” he called. Cici waved back.

Dominic was the county extension agent, and his father, as it happened, had been responsible for developing the original Blackwell Farms vineyard and winery on this very site. He had spent his youth working with his father at what was now Ladybug Farm, and he was so excited when the women approached him with the plan of reestablishing the vineyard that he had volunteered his expertise, his labor, and practically every free hour he had for the past year helping them get started. He babied their vines as though they were his pets, and when he talked about wine making he left no doubt in anyone’s mind why it was considered an art.

And thinking about him gave Cici an idea.

She said, “You know, Lori, I think an internship is probably a good idea. I’m just not sure Italy is the best choice.”

“Well, maybe. But the positions at all the best wineries in France were already filled.”

That was exactly what she had hoped Lori would say. “We have some excellent wineries in the U.S.,” she said. “New York, Napa...”

“Oh, Mother, please. If you’re talking wine, you’re talking Europe.”

“Or European winemakers,” she pointed out. “And I’m betting there’s nothing you can learn at Casa Wherever—”

“Cascino Giovani,” Lori supplied.

“—that you couldn’t learn from Dominic DuPoncier. He not only worked at some of the best wineries in New York, he studied under one of the most accomplished winemakers in France: his own father.”

Lori laughed. “Nice try, Mom. And don’t worry, I intend to learn loads of stuff from Dominic. But not until you have an actual winery for me to intern at.”

Cici worked hard to keep her tone neutral. “I thought your plan was to get a degree in wine making—

“Enology” supplied Lori helpfully.

“Right. A degree in wine making from Cornell after you get your business degree from UVA next year. Wouldn’t it be more helpful to do your internship then?”

“Well, that’s what I thought, too. But then I met Sergio in this online forum and we got to chatting, and that’s just not the way it’s done in places where