Spooning Daisy (25 page)

“Y’ know, Max, you really ought to stop spying and sneaking up on people,” Daisy said.

“I own this lodge. I can damn well do whatever I want. And I
fired
you.”

“You can’t fire me. I have a contract.”

“Sue me.”

“I will. For sexual harassment.”

“
What?
”

“You heard me.”

“I heard you. I just don’t believe you.”

“Well, let me refresh your memory.”

Rita, suddenly wide-awake, darted her eyes from one opponent to the other as if she were following a ball.

Until Max looked at her. “I want to talk to Daisy alone.”

“Oh, c’mon,” Rita groaned. “This is just getting good.”

“Out!”

“Don’t you think—”

“NOW.”

Rita dragged herself from the kitchen, taking her coffee with her.

Staring at Daisy, Max made his way around the island toward her. “What’s this crap about sexual harassment?”

“Yesterday you attacked me.”

“I attacked
you
? You attacked
me
.”

“You have a very selective memory, Mr. Kendall.” But her bravado shrank as Max neared her.

“Remind me,” he said, backing her into a corner.

His energy pressed into her. “You were doing exactly what you’re doing now—”

“Walking?”

“
Stalking,
actually.”

“With a bum leg?” He made her sound ridiculous.

“That bum leg doesn’t seem to restrict you under
any
circumstance.” She made him sound . . .

“You went for my throat. I was only defending myself.”

“With your lips?”

Max gripped the counter on either side of Daisy, trapping her. “Whatever works.”

He was inches from her and close enough that she smelled the fresh soap scent lingering on his skin from that morning’s shower, close enough to spot a tiny razor nick on his chin, close enough to remember why Max Kendall was absolutely the worst thing that could happen to her.

“I won’t be intimidated.”

“
Jamais de la vie, bébé
.”

“Or seduced,” she added with unexpected resolve, her heart breaking into a gallop at the memory of their last French lesson.

His smile seemed to contradict her. But Max didn’t test his presumption. Grabbing a mug from the cupboard, he poured coffee. “I’m not easy to work for.”

“I doubt your standards are higher than mine.”

His jaw tensed. “We have rules around here.”

“I can imagine.”

“Rule number one: Don’t ever disagree with me in front of guests or staff. Rule number two: Don’t ever disagree with me
period
.”

“Oh, puh-lease—”

Max stopped right before his first sip of coffee. “You think I’m kidding?”

“I think you’re being a prick for my benefit.”

“I do nothing for
your
benefit.”

“Whatever you say.”

“That’s right. Whatever
I
say.”

“But while we’re throwing down the gauntlet, let’s get one thing straight. This is strictly business. You need me as much as I need this job—for the moment anyway. So keep your
French
in your pants,
bébé
.”

Max’s blue eyes actually twinkled, or so Daisy imagined.

“That won’t be a problem for me. I just hope it won’t be a problem for you.”

“I can manage. But if I start to weaken, I’ll remind myself what an opportunistic cheat you are.”

His jaw tensed as if he were trying to hold back words. Then he sipped his coffee . . . and frowned. “What the hell did you do to my coffee?”

Daisy jerked back. “The coffee is fabulous.”

Max took another swallow. “It’s not coffee, it’s . . . something else.”

“It’s
good
coffee.”

“It’s not
my
coffee.”

“You mean, campfire sludge?”

“I mean regular, old-fashioned coffee.”

“It’s just a little cinnamon, rum flavoring, and nutmeg. Rita loves this coffee, and so will everyone else who isn’t stuck in a culinary time warp.”

“Wild men drink coffee that tastes like coffee—”

Daisy started to roll her eyes.

“—and they don’t eat mango chutney!”

Halfway through their orbit, Daisy’s eyes were back on Max. “That explains the case of A-1 in the pantry.”

“Yes, it does. So don’t try to turn my restaurant into some wimpy West Coast bistro.
Comprenez?
” Max banged his mug on the counter, splashing the coffee over its rim and onto his hand. “I want real coffee!” He marched from the kitchen, trailing smoke.

“That went well.” How would she ever reclaim her Golden Spoon if she had to serve sludge and bottled sauce? She began to rethink her decision to stay. Not that she had many options.

She could go to Anchorage, but the upscale hotels and restaurants she’d want to work at would probably show her to the door once Jason gave them an earful about her
violent
streak. And he would. Because Jason was still pissed about the golf clubs and the widescreen TV
and
Max Kendall. It wasn’t Daisy’s fault that Max and the future Mrs. Jason Whittaker had known each other in the biblical sense. But Jason had it in his mind that the evening at Mama’s had been a setup so Daisy could rub his nose in his fiancée’s infidelity. In a way, it was both flattering and insulting. Flattering that he gave her that much credit; insulting that he thought she cared enough to go to the trouble.

When it got right down to it, the thought of Max and Tina probably bugged Daisy as much as it did Jason. If anyone had had a nose rubbed in their shortcomings, it had been Daisy. And Max had managed to do it again with the blonde.

“Just get over it!” Daisy demanded as she turned her attention to a second coffeemaker. Because having few options wasn’t the only reason Daisy was staying—

. . .
without me, you and Elizabeth would’ve starved.

Max had remembered her turtle’s name. In a flash, Daisy had seen Max in a less jaded light. She could barely admit it to herself, that’s how bizarre it was, but there was more to Max than met the eye.

It had taken Jason months to even acknowledge Elizabeth, let alone call her by name. Mostly he referred to her as
the turtle,
if he referred to her at all. Even Roberto, her very sensuous Italian chef, had disregarded Elizabeth, except as a possible soup du jour. Only Bobby had afforded Elizabeth the respect she deserved.

I should’ve stuck with Bobby
. Where had the decades between then and now taken her first boyfriend?

Now there was Max, the man who . . .

Well, the list was long and varied, but in this particular case, the man who
knew her turtle’s name
. A small but immense gesture and one impossible to ignore. An oxymoron. Max Kendall.

Then again, maybe Max was one of those men who finagled his way into a woman’s heart by way of her vulnerabilities.

Her brows scrunched. Except Max didn’t seem to be all that interested in her heart. In fact, he seemed genuinely
dis
interested in her heart—and every other body part. “Stop it!” She shouldn’t be thinking about Max Kendall; she should be thinking about the Royal Academy of Chefs. Max Kendall and his antiquated taste buds were standing between her and her Golden Spoon.

“So . . .” Rita hedged. “Am I looking for a new chef?”

Max looked up from the papers on his desk at Rita in his doorway. “Yes.”

“Yes?”

“What’d you think? We’d all live happily ever after?”

Coffee mug in hand, Rita ventured a few steps into Max’s office. “But Daisy said—”

“Daisy can say whatever she wants. She’s only here until something better comes along. And then”—Max snapped his fingers—“that’s how fast she’ll be outta here.”

“I can’t believe Daisy would leave us in the lurch.”

“Get some ads out. Use my attorney’s address in Anchorage for replies. Just in case.”

“Just in case?”

“Just in case Daisy should stumble onto one of the ads. And Rita?”

“Yeah?”

“Remember where your loyalties lie.”

Rita sipped from her mug as if she needed a moment to see Daisy as Max did. She shrugged. “Well, she makes really great coffee.”

“Why don’t you get on those ads?”

Rita started to leave, then turned back. “Almost forgot. Ferris Fitzsimonds called. Heard you were looking for a pilot.”

“Hmm.”

“You’re not hiring Fitz . . . are you?”

“It’s hard to find good pilots this late in the season. All the charters had their pilots booked months ago.”

“But he’s a drunk.”

“Not when he flies.”

“That’s a fine line.”

“No,” Max said. “That’s a bush pilot.”

“Sounds like an excuse.”

“It’s a characteristic.”

“
You’re
not a drunk.”

“I’m not a bush pilot.”

“You were.”

“And I was a drunk.”

A deep furrow lodged between her brows as Rita tried to reconcile Max’s confession with the man she’d known for seven years.

“Did Fitz leave a number?” Max asked, to save Rita from thinking so hard.

“He’s staying in Seldovia at the Boardwalk Inn.”

“Anything else?”

She shook her head and turned for the open door, leaving Max alone in his office sanctuary.

He returned to the pile of e-mails confirming reservations. Flipping through papers, he smiled at the personal comments from returning guests, but stopped at the reservation for his former navy flight commander, Peter “Knife” Newton.

Pete came every year; in between visits, Max received a Christmas card from him and the missus, updating their lives. No longer in the navy, Pete owned a very successful construction company with his son-in-law, building roads and highways all over the South.

And of course, there was always a Christmas card from their daughter Ellen. She was married again—although no one considered her first marriage legitimate—and now had a three-year-old son named Max and a baby daughter named Avery. A third child, if there was one, would be named Kendall.

“Knock-knock.”

Max looked up from Pete’s printed e-mail.

“Wow,” Daisy said, stepping into his office of wood, stone, and leather. “You got a lotta testosterone going on in here.”

Max nodded to the mug in Daisy’s hand. “Is that my coffee?”

“Campfire sludge.” Navigating between the plump twin leather chairs on the guest side of his expansive mahogany desk, she set the mug down near the sleek computer monitor. Her eyes traveled the length of the desk. “Aren’t you missing a mattress?”

Max leaned back in his buttery-soft cordovan chair and let Daisy get it out of her system. As she focused her attention on his office, Max brought the mug to his lips . . .

. . . and gagged with his first sip. Tears moistened his eyes as he stifled a cough. But he would not give Daisy the satisfaction she wanted.

“Jacques Cousteau called. He wants his fish back.” Daisy stared at seven impressive feet from tip to tale of a stuffed swordfish above the stone fireplace. Then, as if the thought just struck her, she turned to Max. “That’s not from around here.”

“It’s from Mexico.”

“I bet it was something to see when it was
alive
.”

He considered telling her that it wasn’t
his
catch when—

“I’m surprised there aren’t more dead animals on your walls.”

“I bet you are.”

Her brows tweaked together. “You spend a lot of time in Mexico?”

“Used to.”

“Anywhere in particular?”

Max paused at the sudden congeniality lacing their conversation. “Acapulco.”

“So your T-shirt is the real deal, huh?”

“The real deal?”

“Not just a week’s vacation.”

Suspicious of conversation that had no purpose, he asked, “Is there something you want?”

Daisy started to answer, then sighed. “How’s the coffee?”

“You could blacktop a road with it.”

“Then it’s to your satisfaction?”

“It’s horrible and you know it.”

The corners of her mouth lifted. “Y’ know, Max, we both want the same thing, maybe not for the same reasons, but Wild Man’s success works to everyone’s benefit.”

“But it’s at the
definition
of success where we part company. I don’t care what some magazine critic thinks about my lodge. I care what my clients think. I’m not in this for the
spoons
. I do this because I like it.”

“But why not have both?”

“I don’t want to be blinded by my own brilliance.”

Her brows arced. “Blinded by your own brilliance?”

“I have work, Daisy, and so do you.” He diverted his attention back to the stack of papers.

“Y’ know, Max, compromise is the cornerstone—”

He hammered the desk with his fist; Daisy winced.

“Enough! Go do your job and let me do mine.” He held out his coffee cup. “Take this tar with you and do it over!”

Mug in hand, Daisy left Max’s office in a sizzle.

Chapter Twenty-Six

“H
e’s an absolute jerk!”

In a comfy pair of sweats after a long day, Daisy paced the length of her cabin, stretching the telephone cord then releasing it to curl back into itself while she filled Charity in on the events, right down to the A-1 and the campfire sludge. This was the sixth time she’d called since arriving in Otter Bite yesterday.