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    “It’s not as though we don’t have anything to do,” Lindsay agreed with Bridget. But her gaze was fixed thoughtfully on the vista through the kitchen window: the muddy lawn, the bare branches, the stark winter orchard and abandoned vineyard that marched in sad, straggling rows behind the barn. “It’s just that it’s all kind of routine by now. We need something new.”
    “I don’t,” Bridget protested. “I’ve done enough new things in the past four years to last a lifetime.”
    “You know,” Lindsay said slowly, turning from the window. “Maybe it doesn’t have to be something completely new.”
    A light dawned in Cici’s eyes as she looked up from the book. “Maybe,” she said, “it could be something we didn’t finish.”
    “The winery,” they both said at once.
    Alarm flashed briefly in Bridget’s eyes. “But—our vines are dead. The hailstorm killed them.”
    Lindsay turned to her excitedly. “Not all of them. Only the new ones. Dominic said there was a good chance some of the old ones would come back this spring. And don’t forget, he took all those cuttings just in case.”
    “And the old vines are all we need,” Cici said. “If we’re going to restore this place, we should restore it—back to the way it was.” She held up the book like a Bible. “House, gardens, winery, tasting room, everything!”
    “Now that’s what I call a project,” declared Lindsay with satisfaction.
    “That’s what I call an adventure,” Cici returned, grinning.
    Ida Mae stared at them. “You all don’t have the kind of money it takes to run a winery.”
    “We’ve got a barn filled with equipment,” Lindsay said, “and that’s the most expensive part.”
    “Come on, Ida Mae,” Cici said. “Wouldn’t you like to see Blackwell Farms the way it used to be? Complete with Blackwell Farms wine?”
    “It ain’t never gonna be the way it used to be,” she declared flatly and turned back to washing dishes. “And you can’t make Blackwell Farms wine.”
    Lindsay and Cici grinned at each other. “But it sure would be fun to try,” Cici said.
    “It takes more than a few old vines to make wine,” Bridget said. “Ida Mae is right. I don’t think you should get your hopes up.”
    “Well,” conceded Lindsay, “we’ll have to get Dominic out here, of course, and see what he says.”
    Cici and Bridget shared a quick glance and a suppressed smile. Dominic had been the county extension agent until he elected to take an early retirement a few months back, and he was an expert vintner. More importantly, it had been his father who established the original Blackwell Farms Winery in the sixties, and Dominic had served as his apprentice. He’d grown up on Ladybug Farm. When the ladies had their brief flirtation with the idea of restoring the vineyard the previous year, he’d been almost as excited as they were—and almost as disappointed when a freak hailstorm destroyed their efforts overnight.
    It was no secret that Dominic had a huge crush on Lindsay. What was slightly less well known—and what had, in fact, been the source of much teasing and speculation over the past year—was how Lindsay felt about him.
    “Well,” Bridget conceded, now that the hint of romance was in the air, “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to talk to him.”
    “Of course,” agreed Cici, straight-faced. “We have to talk to him.”
    Lindsay looked sternly from one to the other, and just as Cici and Bridget were about to burst into giggles, the back door opened and Noah came in.
    He was a tall, broad-shouldered eighteen-year-old, whose latest effort at self-expression was a Mohawk haircut and a pierced ear with a silver skull earring. There was nothing to be done about the earring, but apparently he’d already grown tired of the haircut, as evidenced by the bristly growth around his neck and temples. He entered the room in the way of most teenage boys: like a storm wind, dropping his backpack on the floor,