Oh, that would suck. “Yikes. Bad luck.”
Gray gave rueful laugh. “Worse than that, they called her the other day to cancel, said they couldn’t refund her deposit yet, and wouldn’t give a reason.”
“Well, everybody knows the reason now. Guess the Leightons saw that one coming.”
“Not fast enough to get out of town, apparently. Maybe they had bodies to bury or some—” Gray slapped his hand over his mouth and went pale. “Oh God, that was horribly inappropriate.”
He looked so appalled at himself that Cameron couldn’t suppress a chuckle. “I’m sure people are saying worse. Besides, for all we know….”
“Sorry, coming home and listening to my family try not to panic for the last forty-eight hours is getting to me.”
That sounded rough. “Hence the rental?” Cameron guessed, though that didn’t explain a six-month lease when the wedding was so soon.
“Something like that. Although it was time for a change,” Gray added but didn’t explain further.
“Well, welcome back. Let me show you the house.”
The bones of the two-story cottage weren’t terribly different from Cameron’s own house. There were concrete steps up to a deep front porch. Gray wasn’t troubled by them, though, jogging up ahead of Cameron.
“And thanks for that,” Cameron murmured to himself. Gray was wearing pale pink chino shorts that showed off his tan and his butt. “I think you’ll like it,” Cameron said out loud as he trotted up to the front door.
“The ad said the kitchen had been reno’d?” Gray asked.
“Sure has.” Cameron escorted them inside and to the kitchen. “Do you cook?”
The expression on Gray’s face as he took in the kitchen answered that question emphatically. If his earlier sunny smile had been attractive, this enraptured grin surpassed it. He took in the granite countertops, the deep farmhouse sink, and the gleaming new appliances.
“I’m a chef,” Gray said as he ran his hand over the smooth surface of the large butcher-block island.
It was a good thing he was so enthralled with the kitchen’s details that he didn’t notice Cameron’s heart eyes. A beautiful man who cooks.
“Currently between gigs,” Gray said almost to himself as he poked his head in the pantry before kneeling down to inspect the oven.
That explains the six-month lease. “Sorry to hear,” he said.
“Hazard of deciding to combine work with a relationship. But better to just walk out than give Matt a lapful of bouillabaisse, not that I ever thought of that.”
Cameron’s jaw dropped.
Gray turned around and looked up. “That was probably TMI, sorry. And slightly bitter….”
“Bitter wasn’t what came to mind,” Cameron said honestly. You’re gay was the first thing, but probably better not to blurt that out. He went for the slightly subtler “I’ve probably gone out with a few guys who deserved a lapful of bull, uh, bullya—”
“Hot fish soup,” Gray supplied, an eyebrow slightly raised, though Cameron wasn’t sure if that was a you like guys too eyebrow or a you can’t even pronounce quality cuisine eyebrow.
“That,” Cameron agreed. “But my cooking skills haven’t been up to the challenge.”
“Just as well; it’d be a terrible waste of good soup.”
Cam laughed. “Not the way I’d make it. But I’ll take the tip.” He bit his lips at the unintentional innuendo, quickly adding, “Ready to see the rest of the house?”
Chapter 2
THE REST of the house was cute, but after that kitchen, Gray wouldn’t have cared what it looked like. It was a nice bonus that the master bath upstairs had also been redone with a wide vanity and soaking tub. The included furniture was decent too. He could definitely make this work.
He was conscious of Cameron behind him, probably waiting to hear a verdict. He was also conscious of Cameron generally. He was terribly cute, in a rumpled sort of way, although that probably came with being a property manager. It was a good look for him. It was a good look, period, a total one-eighty from Matt, who always strove for a GQ style. That style had turned Gray’s head the first time, but he definitely wasn’t immune to Cameron’s charms—brown hair that curled a little in the humidity, warm brown eyes with long lashes, a smattering of freckles, a dust of soft-looking stubble, and the smile that seemed to hint at a sly sense of humor. Cameron had said he’d “gone out with a few guys,” which Gray had not expected to hear, and then he’d blurted out that comment about taking the tip, which made Gray’s mind wander briefly to a very unprofessional place. Gray had always told his friends in Philly that he’d felt like his hometown’s token gay kid, but apparently that was wrong. Cameron was just enough younger that they hadn’t crossed paths when they were in school, but it was very nice to meet him now. Most of Gray’s friends from home had moved away or settled down with wives and kids, and it would be good to have someone to hang out with if Gray stayed in town for a while. He didn’t want to come off as creepy or desperate, though.
“It’s great, thanks. I really appreciate y’all getting it ready so fast too,” he said, which was a little stilted maybe but at least not weird.
“We aim to please.” Cameron’s eyes twinkled, and Gray wondered if he was being flirted with or if he was just so out of practice he was interpreting innocent remarks that way.
“You succeeded,” Gray said truthfully.
Cameron shrugged and his mouth moved like he was going to say something, but he paused and then just said, “Glad to do it. Anyway, I have to run to my next appointment, but there’s a lot of info about the house in the folder if you have any questions or problems. Oh, and here’s my card. Call if you need anything.”
Gray wondered if he imagined the stress on the “anything” or the spark in Cameron’s eye, but he wasn’t sure.
Gray thanked him and shoved the card in his pocket, then watched Cameron trot down the stairs and out the door. It wasn’t until he drove away that Gray remembered he hadn’t actually signed the lease.
He’d have an excuse to see Cameron again, then.
As good as that sounded, flirting was going to have to take a back seat to his reason for being home, at least for a while. He’d told Jess he’d come by as soon he got settled.
GRAY FOUND his sister in the office at the community rec center, reviewing the schedule with the staff.
“Pam, you’re on for water aerobics Wednesday and Leslie for Senior Swim. If that’s good, I’ll take the beginners.” She caught his eye and gestured for him to wait in the alcove that housed her desk. While he waited, he checked out the posters tacked up on the painted cinder block walls, all celebrating some sort of exercise or physical activity. One of them, creased and tattered at the edges, was of a tow-headed teenager catching a baseball. Gray had given Jess that poster before he’d blown out his shoulder in college. She’d kept it after his injury, promising she’d go into sports medicine so she could fix him up. She’d been fourteen.
His shoulder hadn’t been fixable, not for any sort of a baseball career, but Jess was going to start PA school in the fall. He was so damn proud of her. Jess was pretty down-to-earth, but he couldn’t blame her for being stressed about the wedding. Even if everything had been going smoothly, anyone would be, but the stress of losing the venue had to make it ten times worse.
When the meeting was over, she came over to Gray for a shoulder bump. “Thanks for coming. Want to get some fresh air and talk?”
He followed her to the outdoor track, its surface covered with a dusting of pollen. “So be honest, how’re you feeling?” Gray said as they walked around the oval, trying in vain not to kick up the yellow dust.
“A little better now that Mom and Doug talked me down a bit. I know it’s silly. It’s the marriage that’s the important thing, not the wedding.” She was really trying to convince herself. Gray admired her for it, but his heart went out to her.
“That’s true, but anyone would be disappointed, and it sucks to
have all that work and planning go down the drain. On the other hand, someday you might be able to appreciate this will make a hell of a story.”
“Seriously.” Jess rolled her eyes. “At least now I know why they hedged on refunding the deposit. Defense lawyers aren’t cheap. Hope they get a family discount.”
Gray snorted. “Good you’ve still got a sense of humor.”
“I might rather have a location for the wedding. Mom and Dad are pushing for the golf club, but….” She shrugged.
Gray understood her lack of enthusiasm. The only reason their family were members was because their dad was their accountant.
“Still, they have your date free?” Gray tried to sound encouraging even if he couldn’t sound excited. They had to have the wedding somewhere.
“Well, sort of. They have another wedding in the ballroom but can sandwich us in the tent after a bridge tournament, but that means no time for setting up anything special. It’ll look like the parish hall at church, only a zillion times more expensive—and before you ask, the parish hall is out thanks to the renovation, and First Pres. is already booked. Kelley’s dad is pastor at Holy Grace AME, and he said he’d be happy to have us if it wasn’t women’s retreat weekend.”
“You picked a popular weekend. At least the golf club sounds not awesome but doable.”
“Barely. They won’t have enough tables and chairs, they don’t allow outside rentals, and the area for the tent isn’t the most accessible, which sucks.”
“Doug’s mom,” Gray agreed. He’d only met Doug’s parents once when they’d visited Philly and eaten at the restaurant. He’d liked them because they were enthusiastic and adventurous about food, and he remembered that Doug’s mom, Laura, used a wheelchair. “So that leaves us where?”
Jess made a face Gray called her fake beauty queen smile. “Everyone’s been suggesting having it at Divertissement because it’s so nice and full of Old South charm.” The tone of her voice told Gray her opinion on that. She rolled her eyes. “Because I want to celebrate in a place whose website has a big white house with the tagline Return to a More Genteel Era?”
“Yeah, that’s a no-go.” Divertissement was the antebellum rice plantation outside of town. Growing up, Gray had thought it was beautiful and romantic, until someone sat him down and told him to get his head out of his ass and see it for what it was: a place that presented some of the most whitewashed—literally and figuratively—history possible. Now he cringed to think he ever thought it was lovely, and he was glad Jess shared his opinion.
“Thanks for understanding. Mom and Dad get it, but Grandpa thinks I’m making a mountain out of a molehill, and if I’m going to be so picky, I can get married in the backyard. To be honest, I’m nearly that desperate, but I’m trying to look on the bright side, or I will when I can find it.”
Gray felt for her. Jess usually managed a sunny disposition in the face of adversity, but he could tell she was struggling. “We’ll find a place, and don’t worry about the catering. I’ll deal with the food.”
“Gray, I can’t ask you to do that! The wedding’s in less than two weeks!”
“It’s no problem,” Gray lied, because to be honest, he had no idea where he’d be able to get equipment let alone the help he’d need, but he hated to see his little sister upset. He wanted to fix it, and he would fix it. He just needed to bluff a little. For now. “Just email me the menu you worked out with the Leightons, and I’ll use that as a template. I was already going to make dinner at Mom and Dad’s tomorrow, and we can talk more about it then.”
“For real?” Jess sounded hopeful.
“I’ve done bigger jobs with less,” he added, because if he was going to jump on the exaggeration train, he was going to do it full throttle.
“Gray!” Jess stopped and wrapped her arms around him, squeezing tightly. “You’re the greatest and I don’t deserve you, especially when I’m being such a pill about all this.” She threw out her arm in a gesture that was meant to encompass everything about her wedding or maybe everything period. It probably felt like the same thing at this point.
“You do deserve it, and you’re not being a pill. It probably makes it worse that you feel bad about feeling bad about it,” Gray guessed.
Jess grabbed his arm. “That’s exactly it! Like if I were a better person I wouldn’t care if we got married in a cow field or a truck stop, but it sucks because I do care. Does that make me a—”
Gray cut her off before she could finish. “Don’t even say it. No, anyone would be pissed off because you put a lot of thought and effort and money into having a nice ceremony and a good party. You’re totally justified. Hell, I’m pissed off and it isn’t even my wedding, not that I’ll ever have one at this rate.”
“You need to work on getting a date, bro,” Jess said, taking the bait to change the subject. Gray would happily let her rib him about his lack of love life if it kept her from ruminating over the site problem.
Gray listened with amusement as she offered increasingly ludicrous suggestions, from his seventh-grade math teacher (gay and single, but nearly seventy now) to posting a “date my brother” on Instagram, tagging both the Eagles and the Flyers. That had her giggling until she had to return to work and Gray had to drive out to the grocery store to stock his own pantry and pick up ingredients for a family dinner. It was his thing to cook the dinners when he was home for a visit, and this time wouldn’t be any different, even though he wasn’t staying at home.
He drove down to the big supermarket, or what passed for big without going all the way into Charleston. The drive reminded him of so many things he loved about the South Carolina Lowcountry: the way the tall skinny pines and Spanish-moss-draped oaks lined the road until you came around a curve and the trees stopped where the marshes began, the ribbons of water meandering through the tall green grass. He’d missed that view so much in Philadelphia that it ached sometimes. He’d once tried to explain to Matt, who’d just gotten huffy and accused Gray of hating on Matt’s hometown, which wasn’t what Gray had said at all. Philadelphia was beautiful, and he was very fond of it, but it didn’t draw him in like the Lowcountry did, didn’t feel like home.
Now he was back, and maybe for good. That had been the plan for a while, even if he hadn’t planned on going it alone.
“It takes an awfully good man to be better than none at all,” Mom had said when Gray confided that he wasn’t sure if he was planning to stay home now that the plan to open a restaurant with Matt had gone up in smoke. “If this is what you want to do, you can, Matt or no Matt, and sweetheart, no Matt sounds like a much better plan.”
He needed a plan for his own future, but the first order of business was to pull off the food for Jess’s wedding. That would be a boost, and it would be even better if he was able to serve it somewhere other than the Callahan family backyard.
As soon as he passed through the automatic doors of the supermarket, Gray felt better. He’d always liked going to the grocery, even as a kid, when he drove his mom crazy trying to put his hands on everything, asking what it was called and what it tasted like. He couldn’t count the times she’d had to help him pick up a smushed piece of produce, then explain to the lady at the checkout why they were buying it. Now he found grocery shopping soothing, whether he was on a deadline with a menu to plan or if he were just choosing what he or whomever he was cooking for liked to eat. One of his greatest pleasures was preparing something for someone and watching them savor it. That made planning the food for Jess’s reception fun, despite the amount of work.
He pulled up Jess’s email on his phone and looked over the menu. It looked fine, if a little typical. They had been planning heavy hors d’oeuvres rather than a sit-down dinner, which was a relief given his time constraints. Besides, smaller plates were more fun to cook. Both Jess and Doug were fond of the current trend for “make your own” stations, and Gray had a few ideas for those, too, as well as composed dishes.
He surveyed the produce, always his first stop
for inspiration with the myriad of colors and textures. A crostini bar could be a good choice, with several types of bread and crackers, and he’d be able to make some of his own condiments. A tangy pesto and a spicy tomato jam maybe, and there was a pear chutney recipe he’d been wanting to make again. He’d hit a farmer’s market for the others. He should be able to get a good fig jam, and maybe some muscadine, too, if he was lucky. Cheeses he’d get from a cheesemonger or maybe even a local dairy—he’d do some Googling later for that. They wanted a variety rather than a set cuisine. Fusion is cool, Jess had said in the email, which meant that Gray only had to be concerned with a harmonious menu rather than a thematic one.
Spring and summer rolls were another good way to do that. He could have cold fresh ones with vegetables like a traditional basil, probably a shrimp one, and maybe some fruit ones, too, something like a spicy mango. He’d also do a few more substantial, traditional things like biscuit sliders with ham or fried chicken, mushroom tarts, and deviled eggs—maybe quail eggs on little pumpernickel rounds. Was it too much pastry if he did gougères with pancetta and tomato as well as the tarts? And what about sweets?
“Pardon me!” a gray-haired woman exclaimed, jolting him from his recipe reverie.
Gray looked up to see he had hemmed her and her cart in a corner by the eggs. “Sorry!” He backed up and gave her an apologetic smile, not quite sure when he’d gotten over to the dairy aisle. He looked down at his cart, which was almost embarrassingly full.
Well he did have to practice, he rationalized. Still, he’d intended to pick up something for his family for dinner and he hadn’t done that, so he backtracked through the store until he found what he needed. He’d do something easy and comforting, roast chicken with some vegetables. The asparagus looked good, so he grabbed a bunch, and the citrus was looking especially appealing, so he grabbed a few grapefruits to do a salad. As he dropped them in the little plastic bag, he remembered an article he’d seen in some bar and booze magazine. It was about signature cocktails for weddings, and there had been a fizzy one, with sparkling wine, grapefruit, honey, and thyme. He’d suggest that too.
Place Setting Page 3