His mom gasped in horror. “Marcus Antony Edward Capriotti! You smoked marijuana?” She sucked in a breath, her eyes narrowed. “Did you smoke in this house?”

Jesus. How had they gotten here? “Do you really want the answer to that question?”

“So much for being the one who can do no wrong,” Alyssa said with glee. “Can’t wait to tell Bae.”

Mia rolled her eyes when Alyssa took out her cell phone. “Bae?”

“It’s my new nickname for Owen. If you have pet names for each other, it keeps the love alive, you know.”

“What I know,” Mia said, “is that the word Bae is the Danish word for poop. You’re not doing another of those silly cleanses, are you? ’Cuz they’re killing your brain cells.”

“I find them helpful,” Alyssa said. “You should try one with me.”

“Drinking Bloody Marys is as close to a cleanse as I’ll ever get.”

Suddenly came the sound of a car starting up in the parking lot. Mark looked around.

Lanie was gone.

“Nice going,” he said. “You’ve all chased her off.” He started to go after her, but his mom grabbed his hand.

“She’s just going to town to pick something up at the print shop. She’ll be back. Leave her be for a moment to think.”

“You’re sleeping with that wonderful girl,” his grandma said, her hand to her chest. “My heart’s happy. When’s the wedding?”

There was a collective choked sound. Some, wiser than others, dug back into their food, but only a few, because the Capriottis loved nothing more than drama.

“Mom,” Cora said without taking her gaze off Mark. “Not now.”

“But—”

“Mom, love you,” Cora said. “But this is my child, so I get to be point on this. I know my son. He’s an unmovable tree unless he wants to be moved.”

Mark raised a brow, but she cocked her head, daring him to say otherwise.

“You’re so certain she’ll be back?” he asked.

“Of course. I don’t hire quitters. I might have an idiot for a son, but that woman’s at the top of her game, and I’m paying her to be. She’ll be back in spite of you. Once she’s had some time alone, she might even forgive you for being an idiot.”

Someone began a slow clap. Uncle Jack. The others joined in, laughing.

“You’re all a bunch of lunatics,” Mark said in disgust.

His mom hugged him. “We’re Team Marcus, that’s all,” she said. “We want to see you happy.”

“I woke up plenty happy. You all sucked it right out of me.”

Mia laughed and opened her mouth, but Alyssa wrapped an arm around her neck and covered her little sister’s mouth. “That’s not what we’re trying to do,” Alyssa said. “We just want you to know it’s okay to be happy. It’s not okay to close yourself off because you made one stupid choice about one stupid woman.”

“We know what you gave up to be here,” his mom said quietly. “You gave up everything.”

“Not everything,” he said. “There are men who’d kill for what I have right here.”

His mom squeezed his hand and smiled, but her eyes were still worried. “I agree with you. So why on earth wouldn’t you drop your silly rule and let someone into your life?”

Mark turned his head and gave Alyssa a death glare. “It was a secret for a reason,” he said. “You’re all on me to let a woman into my life. But we’re not talking about an anonymous woman here, we’re talking about one of the winery’s employees.” He shook his head. “And in case you’ve forgotten, there are two little girls inside the house who already had one parent desert them. I’m not going to do the same.”

“If you think that by loving a woman you’d be deserting your children,” his mom said, “I’ve taught you nothing at all.” She stepped a little closer and got right up in his face. Which she had to crane her neck to do, but somehow she managed to make it feel like she was two feet taller than him. “And sidenote,” she said. “This wouldn’t be coming up at all if you yourself weren’t clearly feeling something for Lanie.”

“Mom.” He shook his head. “There’s a difference between sex and love, and the reason I know this is because the day I turned sixteen, you sat me down and threw a box of condoms at me and told me that until I knew my heart as good as I knew my other body parts, it was just sex.”

“The condoms were because you’d gotten caught and nearly arrested in the backseat of some girl’s car. You were back there with her and her best friend, and everyone’s parents wanted me to castrate you.”

Alyssa snorted but shut up when both Mark and Cora gave her a level glare. She lifted her hands in surrender. “Hey, don’t look at me. What do I know about such manners? I’m an angel with a great husband. I’m also Mom’s favorite.”

Cora ignored her. “Listen to me, Marcus. That woman challenges you, and we’ve all been amazed at how she is with the girls. She treats them like adults and they eat it up. She loves them and they love her. So why can’t you just drop your stupid rule and let yourself be happy with her?”

“Because the last time I dropped my ‘stupid rule,’ I ended up being a single parent to twins, of whom one still isn’t speaking.”

“Mark,” his mom said softly, looking behind him.

He turned around and shit, there stood Sierra, silent, staring up at him with those soulful eyes. Fuck. “Hey, munchkin—”

She whirled and ran off into the house.

Fan-fucking-tastic. Lanie was gone and now so was Sierra, two of the most important females in his life, hurting because of him.

He pulled out his phone as he strode into the house, calling Lanie.

Not only didn’t she answer his call, she ignored it. “Call me back,” he said to her voice mail. “We need to talk.”

Someone “tsked” and he turned to face his grandpa. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Look, Grandpa, I’ve got a lot on my plate, so either get it off your chest or keep it to yourself.”

“Women don’t like to be told what to do.”

No shit. “I didn’t tell her what to do.”

“You told her that you two needed to talk. You can’t go in like that, barrels blazing. They’ll circle around to your six and stab you dead.”

Mark’s eye started to twitch. Good. He was going to stroke out. It would save him a lot of trouble.

“All I’m saying,” his grandpa said, “is that you have to nicely ask if she has time to have a chat. And then you let her come to you. Otherwise, you’re a sitting duck.”

Shaking his head, he went upstairs and found Samantha in her room playing a game on the kid tablet Mia had bought for her.

In the meantime, his phone remained ominously silent. “Hey, baby. Where’s Sierra?”

Samantha, without taking her gaze off the screen, shrugged.

Mark sighed and then crouched before her, having to put his face between hers and the screen to get her attention. “Hi.”