My Father Left Our Napa Vineyard to Whichever Child Could Agree With the Others. The Mediator They Sent Changed Everything

“Have dinner with me,” I said. “At the vineyard. Saturday.”

“Is that a negotiation, Mr. Moretti?”

“It’s the only offer I’m making.”

She took the bottle out of my hand, read the label and smiled.

“Accepted,” she said.

She came on Saturday. And the Saturday after that. By harvest, she was in the vineyard at six in the morning in borrowed boots, cutting grapes next to the pickers and laughing at my terrible Italian.

On the last night of harvest, we walked the old vines on the hill again, the same path where she’d told me she had to leave.

I stopped at the top and kissed her while the whole valley turned pink and gold beneath us.

“My father wanted us to fight,” I said when we finally stopped.

“Your father,” Juliet said, “had no idea who he was dealing with.”

Gianna says Juliet is the best thing to happen to the Morettis in fifty years. Marco named the inn’s restaurant after her, which she pretends to find embarrassing.

And every bottle of our new vintage has one word on the back label, under the Moretti name.

Unanimous.

Would you have risked your career for him the way Juliet did? Tell me what you would have done in the comments.