Joe again followed her example, removing his suit jacket. His white shirt still looked crisp despite the heat. He slung the jacket over his shoulder, then loosened the knot of his tie as he gazed around, taking everything in with alert, interested eyes.
Tara was proud of the family business and everything they’d accomplished, and after feeling humiliated by him that morning, she wanted to impress this man. After his earlier sarcastic comment, she wanted to dazzle him with how complex the olive business was, prove to this hotshot MBA he didn’t know everything.
The large building that housed the mill, with metal walls and roof, was designed for function, not beauty. She started across the ochre-colored, packed-earth parking lot toward it, her spiky heels sinking into the ground.
Damn. She usually didn’t dress like this when she came to the mill. The black skirt was warm in the hot sun and her heels were extremely impractical for tramping around outside.
“Hold on,” she muttered to Joe and turned back to her car. She unlocked the trunk and reached in to pull out a pair of flip-flops. Standing on one leg, then the other, she slid her black pumps off and tossed them into the trunk, then slipped her feet into the flip-flops. She slammed the lid of the trunk back down. “There.” She dusted her hands off and picked up her purse and briefcase again, then turned to see him watching her with amusement and…oh hell…unmistakable sexual interest.
She’d given him a bit of a show of her legs as she changed shoes, dammit. She licked her lips, met his gaze. “I…um…don’t usually wear heels when I come out here.”
He nodded, his eyes on her mouth as her tongue moved over her lips, and heat flooded over her that was definitely not from the summer sun. This man was not intimidated by her like so many others. And that was such a knee-weakening turn-on, she had to suck in a deep breath. She swallowed and then, getting a grip on herself, she turned and strode across the parking lot, trying to look confident and professional in flip-flops with big pink daisies on them.
Tara and Joe entered the mill through a side door and walked into a cool office area. Air conditioning, thank God. She was still having that hot flash.
“Hi, Tara!” Donna, the receptionist-slash-secretary-slash-office manager greeted her with a smile, which Tara returned. They exchanged some small talk, and then Tara introduced Joe with a lack of enthusiasm she knew was noted by both Donna and Joe. “Is Juan in his office?”
“I’m in here,” a voice called through an open door and Tara walked over, feeling Joe close behind her. Again she performed introductions. Juan’s eyebrows drew down, then lifted. He shot Joe a narrow-eyed glance then turned back to Tara.
“I’ve already called Customs again and found out what we need to do,” Juan told her. “We have to go there and clean off the roots of every tree.”
“How many trees had dirt on them?”
“Only one. But to make sure, we have to open every one.”
“Oh my God,” she groaned. “That’s a hundred trees.”
“I know. I’ll go tomorrow and I’ll take a couple of the guys with me.”
“Where are the trees?” Joe asked.
“Los Angeles.” Juan grimaced. “They’re being held by Customs at LAX.”
“Great,” Tara said with a sigh. “That’ll take you guys all day. I’ll come with you.”
“Uh…” Juan hesitated and glanced at Joe, which made her frown.
“I don’t think you need to go along to do that,” Joe said to her casually. “I’m sure Juan is capable of handling it.”
She tried to keep the frown from taking over her face even as annoyance rose up inside her. Who the hell was he to tell her what Juan was capable of? But another glance at Juan told her that, yes, Juan had taken her remark to mean she thought he couldn’t deal with the issue himself. And that he wanted to.
And dammit, she didn’t have time for that anyway. Swallowing a sigh, she nodded. “Of course he is.” She gave a tight smile.
“The trees are Grappolo from Italy,” Juan explained to Joe. “Some kinds of trees we buy here, some we propagate ourselves, but these ones had to be ordered from Italy.”
Joe nodded his understanding. “Pain in the ass, having to go all the way to LA.” He and Juan shared a look and this time Tara couldn’t stop her scowl.
“Okay,” she said briskly. “I’ve got to talk to Blair about some things. I’m hoping to have time to show Joe around the mill and the ranch. Maybe later you can take us out?”
“Sure,” Juan said. “Just come on back when you’re ready and we’ll go for a drive.”
“Juan’s young, but he has a degree in crop science and management,” Tara told Joe after they left his office. “He’s so smart about the horticulture part of the business. He and Blair keep the ranch and the mill running.”
They spent the next hour with Blair, manager of the mill, discussing problems with pressing equipment, replacement parts and the information Blair had on mechanical harvesting. He and Juan had just toured a ranch up in Sonoma that was using the new high density planting methods and mechanical harvesting Tara was anxious to explore.
“But they only produce oil,” Blair reminded Tara. She frowned.
“Probably a stupid question,” Joe said. “But what does that matter?”
“Not stupid at all. Mechanical harvesting can damage the olives,” Blair explained. “Olives that are going to be eaten need to be hand picked.”
Tara was nodding, thinking. “I still think it’s worthwhile exploring,” she said. “I’d like to go see that ranch too.”
Blair nodded. “Of course. Why don’t you take all this information I brought back and have a look at it. Let me know if you have any questions.”
“Okay.” She stuffed the thick folder into her briefcase.
“I’ll e-mail you some links too,” Blair said. “There’s a lot more information on the internet.”
Joe grinned. “No internet fear here?”
Blair smiled back. “Nah, not me,” he said. “I spend hours online doing research on equipment, pressing techniques…you name it.” Again, Tara bristled at the easy way Joe seemed to connect with the two men here at the ranch. Not that she didn’t have a good working relationship with them—they did whatever she told them to do. But it was a distant, reserved relationship—almost like they were afraid of her.
“Okay, time for more olive education,” she told Joe. “There’s not too much happening at this time of year, as we harvest in the fall, but we can show you around.” Blair came with them and she was glad because he was the expert. She knew the basics of milling, but that wasn’t her area of expertise. Joe seemed fascinated by all the equipment and the huge steel tanks that stored oil.
Blair and Tara showed him the route olives took, starting from their arrival at the mill. “This is where we weigh them, then they get dumped into a hopper to separate them from any leaves and twigs.”
“From there they go on a conveyor belt to a washer,” Blair explained. “They travel through a water bath that removes any other foreign materials. Then they go to the hammer mill where they’re crushed to a paste.”
They walked through the mill and Tara watched Joe, taking in his careful attention. “In the malaxor, the paste is slowly turned to separate the oil from the paste, then pumped to that big horizontal centrifuge where the oil is removed and the remaining paste is sent outside as waste. The oil and some remaining vegetable water are sent to this smaller vertical centrifuge. Any water left is removed and the olive oil is collected in these stainless steel drums. The oil is decanted for about a month before being bottled. Eventually it’s pumped into the big storage tanks.”