The Chef's Choice (16 page)

He stalked away.

“Jack, wait.”

“What?” He stopped and turned to face Damon again, his expression closed. “Make it quick. I've got a long drive.”

“Look.” Damon put his hands on his hips and looked down, then raised his head to meet Jack's gaze. “A lot's gone on in the past two years. I know I screwed up toward the end of our partnership and I'm sorry. We made a good team.”

“We did.”

“Maybe we could again, sometime.”

“Maybe sooner than later.” It was Jack's turn to pause. “That's part of why I came up here, to talk to you, but now I'm wondering if I should bother.”

“What do you mean?” Damon asked.

“It depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“On whether I can depend on you.” Those gray eyes assessed him. “Can I do that?”

And Damon had a sense of his future hanging in the air before him. Did he reach out for it or not? Slowly, he nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, you can. What's on your mind?”

“I've been in some negotiations with Dimitri Stephanopolous.”

Damon stared. “Dimitri Stephanopolous?”

“You've heard of him?”

“Who hasn't?” The single biggest developer on the globe, with properties on every continent. Currently building the world's biggest resort in Dubai, Damon recalled reading. “What are you doing with him?”

“He opened a new casino in Vegas last summer. Fifty stories, twenty-eight hundred rooms.” Jack turned to watch Cady water the flower baskets hanging from the edge of the porch. “It's got four upscale restaurants and every one of them is hemorrhaging money. He's brought me on board to turn that around.”

The hair on the back of Damon's neck prickled. “And?”

Jack's eyes cut back to him. “I want you to be my executive chef. This is the big one, Damon. If we get a foothold in the Stephanopolous empire, we grow as it grows. We turn Pommes de Terres into an international brand. You could be the next Todd English or Wolfgang Puck, if you keep your head on straight. Are you interested?”

It was what he'd been waiting for. It was bigger than he'd ever imagined. “It depends. I want to know more about it. I also want to know more about this Stephanopolous character, assuming he's the one I'd be dealing with.”

“You'd be dealing with me. They've given me full authority over the restaurants—in writing, I might add.”

Damon smiled faintly. “I would have expected nothing less.” Jack Worth was the one restaurateur in Manhattan nobody ever tried to cheat, and for good reason. “What are you going to do about all those restaurants you're talking about in New York?”

Jack shrugged. “Keep making money off of them. I figure with the right executive chef out in Vegas, I only need to be out there half-time. The right executive chef,” he repeated. “Of course, that executive chef would have to live there. I'd figured you'd be a natural for it.” He glanced over at Cady again. “That was before I realized you might be settling down.”

Damon's gaze followed Jack's. Cady reached up to water another basket, her hair glinting red in the sunlight, her body lithe and strong. He remembered what it was like to hold her in the moonlight. He wondered what it would be like to wake with her in his arms.

“I never really thought it would happen with you,” Jack said.

“Huh?” Damon turned to him.

“She's got you, doesn't she?”

Damon's eyes narrowed. “Did you come here to offer me a job or talk about my personal life?”

“Maybe a little of both.”

“Stick to Vegas,” Damon advised. “My personal life is under control.”

“Whatever you say. Think it over this weekend,” Jack said. “I'll give you a call next week.” He gave Cady another glance. “Just a stopover,” he repeated. “Remember that.”

“Thanks for letting me stay with you,” Max told Cady as she set down her garment bag. “Although maybe thanks is overstating the case.” Putting her hands on her hips, she surveyed the controlled chaos of the living room.

“Hey, I put fresh sheets on the hide-a-bed and I cleaned the bathroom,” Cady said. “And I'm saving you from spending two days in the same house as Walker's wife.”

“Leaving Mom and Dad to deal with her.”

“Elise isn't so bad with them. You're the one who seems to bring out her claws.”

“That's because she knows I see through her.”

“I think she's jealous,” Cady countered. “Or intimidated. She can spend money all day—”

“And does,” Max put in.

“—on clothes and makeup,” Cady continued with a grin, “and never come close to looking as good as you do.”

“And there are plenty of people out there that put me in the same spot,” Max said. “I don't know why she's so hung up on it. We don't even live in the same city for God's sakes.”

Cady shrugged. She'd long ago solved the issue of how to compete with Max by choosing not to. Being herself, for better or worse, was far easier.

“Anyway,” Max continued, “how I look or how Elise looks isn't important—”

“Tell that to her.”

“I just don't like the way she treats Walker.”

“That makes two of us. You want something to drink, by the way? Coke? Snapple?”

“Zinfandel? Cabernet?” Max slipped her shoes off and stretched luxuriously. “Getting out of Portland on a Friday is bad enough, but then there's all the weekender traffic to fight getting here. It took me almost two hours.”

“Just wait until July,” Cady said.

“Oh, great, something to look forward to.”

“Hey, you're here. Kick back and relax. We don't have anything to do until tomorrow.” Cady walked into the kitchen, then popped her head back out. “I forgot, I actually do have some wine. Damon left a bottle last time he was here.”

“‘The last time he was here'? Your saucepan jockey has seen this place?”

Cady stuck her head out of the kitchen and grinned. “Twice. He even made dinner last time, which is why the wine.”

“Now that's love.”

“Oh, well, I don't know about that,” she said uncomfortably.

“Relax.” Max leaned against the wall at the entry to the kitchen. “I was just joking. Do Mom and Dad know?”

“Mom's figured it out,” Cady said, pouring the wine into juice glasses.

“It's pretty hard to get anything past her. I never managed it in high school, anyway.” Max eyed her glass. “You know, you can buy actual wine goblets at a discount store for a few dollars.”

“Yeah, but these have character.” Cady walked past her into the living room.

“Is that what that's called?” Max followed her. “So Mom figured it out?”

“She saw him coming out of the greenhouse after we'd been fooling around.”

Max raised a brow as she dropped to the couch next to Cady. “Fooling around with a little
f
or a big
f?
”

“Little
f
,” Cady retorted. “Jeez, give me a little bit of credit for having a brain.”

“Just asking,” Max said. “It was still kind of taking a chance if you were trying to keep things quiet.”

“I know.” Cady's gaze flicked up to the ceiling. “He'd just come by to say hi and we got a little carried away.”

“Ah, young love.” Max clacked her glass against Cady's. “Here's to fooling around. So how is it going?”

“I don't know. Okay, I guess.”

“You guess?”

“Well, it's hardly gotten started.”

“Are you kidding? You guys just got involved. The time's like dog years. It's been, what, three weeks? That's like the equivalent of a decade or two.”

“Well, yeah, but considering the hours we both work, it doesn't translate into a whole lot of time together. I have Saturdays off, he doesn't. He has Mondays off, I work. We both get Sundays off but that's about it. And he's at the restaurant every night besides that until eleven or twelve.”

“Which shouldn't stop a pair of determined love bunnies,” Max pointed out.

Cady rolled her eyes. “It's not just about the sex part, you know. I mean, the sex part's good—”

“Good?” Max raised a brow.

“Well, phenomenal.” Enough to give her a little buzz just at the thought. “I mean, yeah, it amazes me every time. It seems like the most incredible thing in the world that we get to keep doing it again and again. But I just…”

“Just what?”

“I just wish we had more time to be together. We have to be careful around the inn, and after Mom saw us in the greenhouse, I feel like we can't be alone there, either.” She shook her head. “Then again, it's a hell of a lot more than I've ever had with any other guy, ever. The way he makes me feel…Sometimes I look in the mirror and I can't stop smiling because I just can't believe it's actually happening to me.”

“You ask me,” Max said, “it's long past time that the male population figured out what a hot number you are.”

“I don't need the whole population.” Cady sighed. “I just need one.” The right one.

“I'll see what I can do about that.” Max looked at her assessingly. “What are you planning to wear to the party?”

“Oh, I don't know. My black jacket and pants, probably.”

“To your father's sixtieth birthday party?”

“It's all I have,” Cady defended. “And I don't have the kind of money to blow on something dressy to wear once.”

“If you bought the right thing, you'd wear it more than once.”

“Max, I am not going shopping.”

“Ah, now we get down to the real reason.” Max rose and went to rummage around in her garment bag. “You're lucky you have a big sister who loves you. Aha!” She pulled out a swatch of brilliantly colored fabric swathed in plastic. “Here we go.”

Cady's policy was generally to be suspicious of any clothing that came in dry-cleaning bags. “What's that, a dress?”

“You did wear them, last time I checked.”

“Sometimes.” Mostly when forced. “It's not one of those tight things you always wear, right? And no heels?” It wasn't dressing up she objected to, per se, it was the time it took to do it and then being uncomfortable in clothing she couldn't move in.

Max glanced at her, amused. “Don't worry. It's not too tight and not too short. And no heels because mine wouldn't fit you. Sandals will do, if you have them.” She held the dress up against Cady. “Yep, perfect with your eyes. We'll just take care of your makeup and do your hair. Your saucepan jockey won't know what hit him.”

“That's what I'm afraid of,” Cady mumbled.

S
aturday dawned brilliant and clear. By the time they got over to the Compass Rose, it was the middle of the day—as Cady had feared, there turned out to be shopping after all. They parked down by their parents' house, not wanting to take a spot in the crowded guest lot. Indeed, as they were getting out of Max's car to walk to their parents' house, a sleek, graphite-colored convertible pulled up beside them.

“Excuse me, can I leave my car here?” the dark-haired driver asked.

“Guest parking is back by the inn,” Cady told him.

Ignoring her, he turned off his engine.

“Freaking guests,” Cady muttered to Max. “You're going to have to move your car, sir,” she said more loudly as the man got out. “This area is for family only.”

He stared down at her from behind his expensive mirrored sunglasses. “How do you know I'm not?”

“Because family shows up more than once a year, Walker, you dolt,” she said and launched herself at him for a hug. He might have looked like a summer person but he was, and always would be, her big brother, Grace Harbor born and bred. And for all that he was only down in Manhattan, they saw each other far too seldom. He looked thinner, she saw, and careworn in some indefinable way.

“Hey, Cades, how's tricks?” he asked, giving her a dim version of the smile that had broken girls' hearts from the time he was young.

She wondered, but decided not to ask just then. “I'm good. How about you?”

The answer to that question had once been a no-brainer. Walker had been the success story of the family, the one who'd gone to the Ivy League school, gotten the scholarships, the hot Wall Street job. Marrying into a wealthy family seemed only par for the course.

Even if his bride had been the boss's daughter.

“I'm hanging in there. Hey, Max,” he said, hugging her in turn.

“Hey.” She studied him. “You're looking a little rode hard and put away wet.”

“Gee, you look good, too,” he said wryly.

“Where's Elise?” Cady asked. “I thought she was coming, too.”

“She had other things going on.”

Max crossed her arms. “Other things than her father-in-law's sixtieth birthday?”

“Yeah, well, you know how it goes.”

“No, but I can imagine.”

“I'll tell her you sent your love,” Walker said.

Max's lips twitched. “You do that.”

He ran his fingers through his cropped hair and circled his shoulders.

“Long drive?” Cady asked.

“New York seems farther away from Grace Harbor than it used to.”

“Continental drift,” she told him.

He smiled briefly. “That must be it. So how are the rental units doing? Is Dad still in the dark about the hoedown?”

Cady glanced at the house ahead. “So far, and I don't think he's faking.”

“That would be something if we could surprise him.”

“I think he's been distracted. Worried about the inn and maybe a little down over turning sixty.”

“Beats the alternative,” Walker observed. “Is he over at the inn now?”

Cady shook her head. “Mom's got him working on the boiler in the basement. We wanted to keep him out of the way so he doesn't get it in his head to go over to the restaurant.”

“What's the plan to get him there for the party?”

“I'm going to go get him right before we start and fake him out with a story about a broken pipe or something,” Cady said.

“My idea,” Max put in.

“I always knew you were devious.” He ducked as she swatted at him. “So you walk in and everybody pops out of the woodwork and yells surprise.”

“Not so loud,” Cady said. “We're getting close to the house. I'll go in and get Mom and Dad.” She hurried down the walk and up the steps.

Walker shook his head. “She never runs down, does she?”

“Sooner or later, we all do,” Max said.

He stopped for a minute on the front walk as though wanting to put off the moment of seeing his parents.

“So what's really going on?” Max asked quietly. Only a year apart, she and Walker had been inseparable growing up, climbing trees, making forts, beaning each other with snowballs and water balloons. The frequency of snowball fights had lessened as they grew up, but the closeness had remained.

At least until Walker had married Elise Barrett.

Now, Walker jammed his hands in his pockets and stared over at the water. “Things aren't great.”

“Work or home? Or both?”

“They kind of go hand in hand, don't they?”

“You tell me.”

He shook his head, leaned down to pick up a rock and throw it toward the water. “You know, we always fought fair, you and I. We might have had some knock-down-drag-outs, but we never drew blood.”

“Except for the time I punched you in the nose.” Max studied her nails.

“You got lucky.”

“Nevertheless. So what are you guys fighting about?”

“There needs to be a reason?”

It was supposed to be a joke. It wasn't supposed to sound hollow down beneath. For a moment, Walker was silent. Then he turned toward the steps. “Ah, it's no big deal. We'll work it out.” He flashed a smile that didn't last long enough. “Let's forget about it all and just have a good time.”

Damon strode through the kitchen like a general on inspection. “Okay, people, thirty minutes and counting. English—” he turned to the Leeds-born chef who worked the appetizer station “—where are we at on apps?”

“The crab cakes, Thai shrimp and the portabella in puff pastry are all done.” English pointed to the sheet pans of hors d'oeuvres sitting on the central counter.

“The tuna crostini?”

“Just finishing the bread and they'll be ready to assemble.”

It was one thing to do one hundred and fifty covers spread out over the course of a night. It was another thing entirely to serve a four-course meal to fifty-some-odd people simultaneously. And while Damon had left the planning of the party in Roman's hands, Roman hadn't worked five-hundred-plate charity benefits the way he had. When the sous chef had asked for help earlier that morning, Damon had been happy to step in.

“Okay, let's start getting the apps on serving platters for the waiters. Roman, how are we doing on the entrées?”

“The lobsters are prepped, the duck is in the
sous vide
. I'm searing off the pork now.”

“Sauces all done?”

“Yes, Chef.”

“Good. Rosalie, salads and soup?”

“Ready to go, Chef.”

He'd had teams with better pedigrees, perhaps, but none who'd worked so hard and with so little complaint. Every one of them had shown up early that day, pleased to be helping out with Ian McBain's birthday dinner. Fondness for the man permeated the staff but it was more than that—it was a happy kitchen in general, completely lacking the flavor of ruthless ambition and backbiting Damon had encountered in other restaurants.

If he left, Damon thought, he'd miss them.

If he left.

It wasn't the time to be thinking about Jack Worth's offer, but it was hard not to. In one way, it was like being handed a gift. Sure, there'd been a time when the term “Vegas cuisine” had been a punch line but that time was long past. Casinos and restaurateurs alike had figured out that people came to the city with money to spend and that rather than blow it on roast beast and baked ziti in some buffet, many of them were happy to pay for serious food. Le Cirque, Aureole, Nobu—some of the finest restaurants in the world had opened outposts in Las Vegas. He could do worse that throw his own hand in.

But it was the greater opportunity that made his mouth go dry. A foothold in the Stephanopolous empire was very probably the biggest chance he would ever have, career wise. Restaurants around the world, international board meetings, spin-off companies…

In comparison, Grace Harbor and the world of the Compass Rose seemed very small. A Michelin-starred chef working at a country inn, Jack had said.

And yet, he'd been happy there. Day after day, for the past two months, he'd woken up smiling and eager to get started. Day after day, he'd felt a part of something very like family. Grace Harbor had brought a satisfaction to his life he hadn't realized he was missing.

And it had brought Cady.

It was right between them. He didn't understand it and it certainly wasn't anything he'd expected, but the relationship made him feel better than anything ever had. And he wasn't at all sure that he was ready to walk away from it. Or her.

Stephanopolous, the casino, the restaurants—the opportunity for money, challenge, influence. Just thinking about the possibilities made his head spin. It was a chance to do huge things, a chance to build the empire he and Jack had always talked about, a chance to live the dream.

The only problem was, he wasn't sure it was still his dream.

He shook his head. Later, he told himself. He'd figure it out later.

“Now, what happened again?” Ian asked as he followed Cady through the afternoon shadows to the restaurant.

Excitement bubbled through her, but she kept her voice modulated to concern and frustration. “The fire alarm just started going off and it won't stop. There's no smell of smoke or anything, and we've already called the fire department. We've tried to reset it but no luck. We thought maybe you could figure it out.”

“Christ on a crutch, can't I have one blessed day without something going wrong?” he demanded as they walked into the Sextant. “Your mother's trying to cook a nice dinner, all you kids are here, all dressed up. It was going to be a nice night. Just once I'd like to—”

“Surprise!”

The chorus was deafening. People were packed in the waiting area and clear back into the dining room itself.

Ian's jaw dropped. For a moment, he just stared, his expression flashing from shock to amazement to delight. “Well I'll be a sonofagun,” he burst out. “What are all you people doing here?”

“Happy birthday,” someone shouted.

Ian turned in a circle, grinning like a madman. “Barbara, Mike, you're supposed to be in Georgia.”

“We figured we could take a break for a special occasion,” his sister told him as they hugged.

He worked his way through the crowd, shaking hands and laughing before turning back to Cady and Amanda and Max. “Am I right in thinking you're the three responsible for this?”

“It was Cady's idea,” Amanda said.

“We all worked on it,” Cady countered.

“Thank you.” Ian came over and pulled her close. “I suppose you knew all about this yesterday when I was being a sad sack,” he murmured.

She gave him a smacking kiss. “I don't remember anyone being a sad sack. I just remember talking with my favorite dad.”

“I'm your only dad.”

“Well, how about that?”

Grinning, he hugged her again, scooping in Max and Amanda while he was at it.

“Somebody get this man a drink,” Walker called and the music started up.

It was the best kind of party, one where enough of the guests knew each other to make conversation easy and enough of them didn't to keep things interesting. Jokes flew thick and fast, and if reunited friends got a little teary eyed, nobody commented. They were too busy savoring the appetizers, each more decadent than the last.

“Oh my God,” Tania said, “these shrimp things are to die for.”

“You said that about the crab cakes,” Cady observed.

“And the crostini,” Walker contributed.

“In fact, I think you've said that about every appetizer you've tasted. And you're still breathing.” Cady shook her head. “How much of a miracle is that?”

“That's one word for it,” Walker said, deadpan.

Tania eyed him. “I'd watch it, Walker McBain. I know where your skeletons are buried. But I'll forgive you if you bring me another martini.”

Just then, there was a clinking of knives against glasses as Ian McBain got up on a chair. “Hey, everyone, can I have your attention? I'd like to make a toast,” he said, straining to be heard over the hubbub.

“Pipe down!” his brother-in-law, Mike, boomed. “The man's trying to talk.”

The room quieted until finally everyone was listening. Ian cleared his throat. “First, I'd like to thank everyone for coming.”

“Sounds like you're trying to shoo us out before dinner,” someone called out.

Ian grinned. “If you know what's good for you, you'll stay, because we've got about the best chefs in the world here. Anyway, it's not every day a man turns sixty. It's enough to make a guy think. But as a very wise person told me yesterday—” Cady saw him flick her a glance “—what matters is not the numbers, it's the good things in your life. So here's to counting my blessings—all of you here tonight, and especially my beautiful wife and my three great kids. Oh, and the staff here at Compass Rose who helped pull this off. I'm a lucky, lucky man. Here's to all of you.”