The Complete Where Dreams - Volume 1 of 2

JANUARY 1-4

Cassidy didn’t glance toward the last covered bottle of wine. She always preferred to let a wine speak for itself. She had little respect for judges who looked ahead, setting their expectations before they had discovered what was really in the wine.

But this was different.

This was a blind-tasting challenge. Ten bottles of wine lined up on an immaculate white tablecloth. An okay ambience with a modern motif, the restaurant had been around six months or so.

They should have decanted the wines into identical carafes for a truly blind tasting, but at least the foil had been stripped away and the brown paper presentation was always more popular with the crowd.

The final wine’s color was splendid. A ruby red so opaque it was almost black. The initial nose was a bit closed, but the wine had been properly served at sixty degrees, nicely below room temperature. Another point to the event’s sponsor. A quick swirl revealed abundant tears running down the inside of the glass. And the wine opened a bit. She swirled again. Dark fruit. Brown spice. Tarragon. Even… No, she wasn’t going to jump to conclusions. A bad habit on one hand. And on the other, she had an audience.

The restaurant owner had done a nice job of marketing his “Ten on January Tenth” challenge, pulling more than just the usual crowd of oenophiles out of the woodwork. He’d promised some fine wines in the collection, both U.S. and European. The nice spread of free appetizers hadn’t hurt either, though they needed to be farther from the tasting table. Twice she’d had to cross to the far side of the dining room to make sure the scent was the wine and not his Italian herbs. The second time the owner noticed, and in moments the waiters had shifted the more aromatic foods to the farther end of the buffet. Good service.

The sip and quick intake of breath over the wine as it still swam on her tongue gave the expected results. Lemony, and a confirmation of the anise on the nose rode into the finish. She spit into the bucket and nosed the wine again.

There was something more. She didn’t have it yet.

Another swirl and sip. More air. Another spit. Exactly the same dark richness.

Ah, there it was: not something there, but something missing. Almost no tannins at all. A wine this dark, yet so clean; it definitely wasn’t mainstream. It was a true challenge wine to set apart the real tasters.

She opened her eyes and realized that the restaurant was completely silent. Every face was turned in her direction, even the early diners had stopped eating to watch her. Mr. Terence, that obnoxious cookbook chef who coyly avoided any request for his first name—it probably said “Mister” on his birth certificate—had peeked at the wine label and then crumpled his bit of notepaper. The restaurant owner had noticed and was scowling. There was someone who had just lost his next invitation here.

Cassidy didn’t need to look.

It took her several moments to come back to the wine, the taste still rolling across her tongue. To come back and realize that she really had done something; she had moved out of the crowd of being but one of many in the New York tastings. Here, in Seattle, the many were waiting to hear her verdict. Hers.

The temptation to dismiss the phenomenon as a big frog in a small pond was there. But Josh was here from Gourmet Week as well, which had made her nervous through the first four wines. He’d actually trained under Parker. He too wore a look of anticipation. He held up a piece of notepaper, carefully folded to show he was ready, and nodded for her to go ahead. Well, there was no avoiding it, and she didn’t need to on this one.

“Italian. Apulia.” Some of the diners’ faces blanked. “That’s the region. The boot-heel of Italy.”

Josh was grinning when she turned to face Mister Terence who was making a show of hiding the bottle.

“Taurino from the Negroamaro grape. The Notarpanaro Salento Rosso. Either the ’97 or the ’01, but I’d bet on the former.”

Terence’s face fell and Josh flipped open his slip of paper and turned it for her to see. He’d written just a number on it, “97.” The restaurant owner clapped his hands together and laughed, his teeth bright in his dark, Italian face.

“An exquisite final choice, Mr. Parrano. It truly completes the other wines. Even a rearrangement of your last name. A nice touch.”

He bowed deeply before taking her shoulders and kissing each cheek.

“Angelo.” He had one of those Italian accents that was designed to make a woman melt and it wasn’t hard to give in to it. “Please call me, Angelo, Ms. Knowles. Always Angelo.”

“Cassidy then.” She let herself melt a bit farther, her wine columnist attitude slipping off a little more.

He took her hand and raised it. “Ten wines and not a miss.” Josh had missed one, but a totally understandable mixup unless you’d specifically studied the Loire Valley Vouvrays. He’d gotten the region and grape, but not the winery. Mister Terence had missed the Vouvray placing it as an Oregon Pinot of all silliness, the Taurino, and three others, two of them quite obvious mistakes. Two of the three amateurs had bested his score though they both missed the Vouvray, a tricky wine because of its gentle voice, and the Taurino.

“A meal on the house. No, you don’t get to order, I will make the menu specially for you.”

Everyone applauded as he conducted her to a table set for two. Angelo looked around and waved for Josh to take the other seat; Josh might be happily married but he was an old friend and a lively dinner companion. Angelo left Terence out in the cold with the three amateurs to browse the free appetizer table.

“If you give me the meal, I can’t write it up. Conflict of interest.”

“Some other time, you come back and I charge you double. Not tonight.” He lowered his voice. “I’ve been waiting for an excuse to chase that hoity-toity Mr. Terence out of here, but you have taken care of that for me. He won’t dare show his face for quite a while to come. For this I am eternally grateful. And you are eternally welcome in my restaurant.”

She nodded, not minding being used to that end in the least, and then glanced at Josh. “Perhaps I could make one request about the menu.”

She raised an eyebrow and Josh laughed, then flipped open his slip of paper again. Angelo tried to look angry but he couldn’t hold it for more than a moment. He stepped back to the tasting table and, securing the Taurino from Terence with a slight tug, he placed it at their table.

“The meal shall match this perfectly.”