Reaching into the pocket of his shirt, St. John removed a folded check. “Hannah told me you won’t give her a bill for catering the food, but I’m not my wife, so I want you to have this.”
Tonya held up both hands. “I can’t, St. John.”
“Yes, you can.” He took her hand, placed the check on her palm, and closed her fingers over it, glaring and daring her to refuse it. Nodding, she slipped it into the pocket of her black pinstriped pants. “That’s better.” The doorbell rang, and he reached for Hannah’s hand and kissed the back of it. “That must be our first guest.”
Hannah nodded, smiling. “Let’s get this party started.”
They left to answer the door, and a minute later LeAnn walked into the sunroom. “Oh, my goodness,” she whispered under her breath. “I’ve never seen a charcuterie and cheese spread like this one.”
Tonya laughed at her stunned expression. “I decided to go with a different theme from the usual buffalo wings, guacamole, and chips.”
“Honey, you really outdid yourself with this banquet. Like Emeril says, you really kicked it up a notch. It’s funny that I never thought of you as a chef until now. Maybe it’s because you’re wearing your outfit.”
Tonya glanced down at the white three-quarter-sleeve chef’s coat and black pinstriped chef’s pants. Tonight she had covered her hair with a pinstriped black skullcap instead of her usual bandana, and black leather clogs added several inches to her five-five height. She wanted to tell LeAnn that she hadn’t worn her chef attire since last May when she was downsized from Wakefield Hamilton.
She heard a familiar baritone, and then she saw Gage with Hannah. Her eyes met his, as a slow smile parted her lips when he set down a plastic crate near a portable bar. Not seeing him for a week made her senses spin so that suddenly she felt like a breathless girl meeting her idol for the first time. It took all of her self-control not to launch herself at him and kiss him with all the desire coursing through her body. There were times when she wanted Gage so much that she had to bite her tongue not to blurt out to him to make love to her. Then her mind played tricks on her in which she would dredge up old fears that made her a prisoner of her own emotional fear: the trepidation that she’d fall in love and it would result in her letting her heart overrule her head. Tonya found it ironic that she could tell Jasmine and Nydia how to deal with the men in their lives, and now she needed someone to tell her how to deal with hers.
“Tonya, are you okay?”
She blinked as if coming out of a trance and she turned to look at Hannah. “I think so. Why?”
“Because you look like a deer caught in the headlights.”
“I’m going to need your opinion about something.”
Hannah rested a hand on Tonya’s back. “Is that something named Gage Toussaint?”
Tonya went completely still, wondering whether Hannah was that perceptive or she was that transparent. “You know?”
Hannah smiled. “I only know because of the way he’s staring at you. And I must confess that my cousins mentioned they saw him bring you back to the house.”
“That’s the day he took me to his house for Sunday dinner.”
“So, you’re seeing each other?”
“Yes. But that’s not what I want to talk to you about.”
“I think I know what’s bothering you, because I went through the same thing when I got involved with St. John. Come over tomorrow after you leave the restaurant and we’ll talk.”
* * *
Gage picked up a bottle of water, opened it, and took a long swallow before making his way over to Tonya. A single glance at the table with the meat, cheese, and fruit epitomized her training and extraordinary creativity. It was the perfect blueprint for a still life.
Wrapping an arm around her waist, he kissed her forehead. “You are amazing. Everything looks incredible and much too pretty to eat.”
She smiled up at him through her lashes. “I did not get up at dawn to put all this together for folks not to eat. What time did you and Eustace begin cooking?”
“Not until nine. My brother cussed the entire time he had to fry more than fifty pounds of wings for two parties. We dropped off the last order an hour ago. Eustace went home to shower and change, so he’s probably right behind me.” Gage glanced over her head. “Are you finished with everything?”
“No. I still have to grill the shrimp, fry the Thai sweet chili chicken, and bake the General Tso’s chicken.”
He leaned in closer, and the clean masculine scent of his cologne wafted to her nostrils. “I’ll wait until everyone gets here, then I’ll grill the shrimp for you.”
“Thank you.” Tonya exhaled an audible sigh. “I’m going to wait for the halftime festivities, then I’m going home to take a bath and relax.”
“Do you want company later?”
She gave him a tired smile. “As tempting as that may sound, I’m going to say no.”
Gage chided himself for being selfish. It was apparent Tonya had been on her feet since dawn cooking and preparing for Hannah and St. John’s guests, while he’d shared cooking for two parties with his brother. “I’m sorry—”
“There’s no need to apologize,” she said, interrupting him. “We can always see each other over the weekend.”
“I’ve made plans not to work next weekend. And because I did promise to take you around the city, maybe you can clear your calendar and pencil me in.”
She laughed softly. “I’ll jot you down for Saturday morning through Sunday night.”
Gage resisted the urge to pump his fist. He didn’t want to believe he would have Tonya all to himself for more than forty-eight hours. “Thank you, babe.”
Eustace joined them, putting an arm around Gage’s neck in a mock chokehold. “I need you to help me, brother.”
“With what?”
“We have to figure out how we can steal Tonya away from Hannah, so we can increase our catering business.”
Reaching up, Gage forcibly removed Eustace’s arm. “You’re wrong and that’s cold, brother.”
Eustace gave Tonya a bear hug. “You can’t blame me for trying.”
“No harm, no foul, boss,” she mumbled against his broad chest.
He released her. “I can’t believe you put all of this together by yourself.”
“Hannah and St. John did help slicing the veggies.”
Eustace angled his head. “Don’t be so modest, Tonya. Your presentations are works of art.”
“That’s where we agree,” Gage said to Eustace. He took Tonya’s hand, threading their fingers together. “Come, babe, and show me what else you need to do so you can get off your feet.”
Chapter 16
Tonya pulled alongside the curb in front of Hannah’s house and parked. She had kept her promise to leave the party at the beginning of the halftime entertainment, and she drove back to the Garden District. She had accepted compliments from the McNairs’ guests, while graciously rejecting their offers to cater parties for them. With the exception of Eustace and Gage, LeAnn, and Paige, the other attendees were St. John’s colleagues and his and Hannah’s former high school classmates.
She had filled the bathtub with her favorite scented bath salt and lost track of time soaking in the water until it cooled too much for her to remain. Fortified with a glass of wine, she crawled into bed and went to sleep.
* * *
Tonya woke early Monday morning refreshed and ready to begin her day mixing dough for bread. Eustace was unusually quiet, and when she asked if he was okay, he grunted that he had wrecked his diet and now had to work out twice as hard to shed the extra pounds he gained from overindulging at the party. She had decided not to remind him that he could have chosen from the vegetarian platters instead of wings, meatballs, and sweetened chicken dishes. Nicole and Melinda, sensing their father’s dark mood, kept their distance, and the day ended with little or no conversation. She stayed an extra hour after closing to put up several batches of dough to get a jump on the ne
xt day’s baked goods before returning home to shower and change.
Hannah was waiting on the McNairs’ porch when she shut off the engine and alighted from the Pilot. She climbed the steps and hugged her friend. “You don’t look any worse for wear after last night,” she said, smiling.
Hannah rolled her eyes upward. “I may look okay, but I’m still recovering from eating too much.”
“Now you sound like Eustace.”
“That’s because the man’s on a mission to lose weight before his high school reunion.” She looped arms with Tonya. “Come inside and rest yourself. St. John won’t be home until six. Thankfully, there’re still a few leftovers so I don’t have to cook tonight.”
“Do you cook every night?”
Hannah shook her head as pale, layered strands grazing her chin swayed with the motion. “No. St. John and I take turns, depending on what we want to eat. Most times LeAnn and Paige don’t join us. I still believe they’re not comfortable living here, even though I told them this is as much their home as mine.”
Tonya walked with Hannah into the sunroom and sat on facing cushioned chaises. “Maybe if you and St. John weren’t newlyweds, they wouldn’t feel like interlopers.”
“Their bedrooms are at the opposite end of the hallway from ours, so we rarely run into one another. Just the other day they hinted about taking another cruise, this time to the French and Italian Riviera.”
“It’s nice when you have the time to globetrot.”
“My cousins never married or had children, which meant they always lived their lives by their leave. They were the sole heirs to my uncle’s estate, so they don’t have to subsist on a fixed income.”
“Good for them.”
Turning fifty had been a reawakening for Tonya; she sat down to prioritize her future. The first item was learning to live healthier, which meant losing weight and eating clean. She had also directed her financial planner to unload her shares in several Wall Street–traded companies and purchase tax-free municipal bonds. The seven years she worked for Wakefield Hamilton allowed her financial stability with a salary commensurate with her education and experience, and she had anticipated working for the investment bank until she retired.
“Where are my manners? Can I get you anything to eat or drink?” Hannah asked, breaking into her musings.
“No, thank you.” Tonya sucked in a lungful of air, and then slowly exhaled. “I need your advice about how I should proceed with Gage.”
“You’re not sleeping with him.” It was a statement.
“No, but it’s not as if I don’t want to.”
“Has he hinted that he wants more than friendship?” Tonya nodded. “Then what’s stopping you? You’re both consenting adults.”
“My attraction to your husband’s cousin is similar to what I experienced when I first met my ex.”
“Weren’t you in high school when you got involved with your ex-husband?”
“Yes, but—”
“No buts, Tonya. Fast-forward thirty years and you are not the same wide-eyed young girl you were then.”
“I know that, Hannah! It’s not about age, but my initial reaction to him.” Tonya saw pinpoints of red dotting her friend’s fair complexion. “I’m sorry I snapped at you.” She covered her face with her hands. “I may as well tell you the whole story about my marriage.”
She watched Hannah’s expression change from curiosity to shock when she told her about having to defer her dreams in order to save her marriage. “After my divorce I swore I’d never get so involved with a man that I’d have to give up or sacrifice my own happiness for him.”
“Do you think you have a monopoly on loving and losing?” Hannah questioned. “I was still in high school when I fell in love with Robert. And he wasn’t that different from your Samuel, because he tried to talk me out of going to law school, and if he hadn’t been away so much, I probably would’ve given in to him. There are some men who resent independent women because they want them to need them. Are you in love with Gage?”
“Not yet.”
A smile flitted over Hannah’s lips. “Does ‘not yet’ translate into you are falling in love with him? And has he asked you to give up anything?”
“Yes to your first question and no to the second.”
“Then what’s your problem, Tonya?”
“When I fall in love, I don’t go halfway but all in, because I don’t know how to separate what’s good to me from what’s good for me. I’ve have a couple of relationships since my divorce, and each time I put up a wall to keep the men at a distance because I’m not emotionally equipped to love and lose. I lost my younger brother to a drug overdose, and it still haunts me to this day.”
“I’m sorry, Tonya. Again, we’re not that different because I, too, lost a brother. He was nine years old when he died from meningococcal meningitis. Has Gage said anything negative about you having your restaurant?”
“No.”
Hannah shook her head. “You keep telling me that Gage hasn’t tried to change you, so I don’t know why we’re having this conversation. I’m an attorney, not a therapist, but you have to learn to accept that people we love we will also lose. I loved and lost Robert even before he passed away. Once he confessed to sleeping with other women, I was devastated, and I actually thought about killing him but I knew he wasn’t worth me spending the rest of my life in prison. I moved out of our bedroom and never slept with him again. In my naïveté I’d believed I had a faithful husband, yet in twenty-nine years of marriage he’d slept with so many women that he couldn’t remember their names. And even before becoming a widow I’d lost both my parents.”
Tonya closed her eyes. “I must really sound selfish and gauche.”
Reaching over, she held Tonya’s hand. “No, you don’t. You’re only human. You have a fear of loving and losing, while I feared sleeping with a man because I was married to a philanderer. If Gage is anything like St. John, then you should have a wonderful relationship with him. I don’t know whether he’s told you, but his first marriage wasn’t something to write home about.”
“You know about that?”
Hannah smiled. “Yes. Don’t forget that even though I was a DuPont, I’m also a Baptiste and a Toussaint because I’m married to St. John, which means I’m privy to family secrets. Should I assume Gage told you about his ex?”
“Yes, he did.”
“Then he’s also familiar with loving and losing. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe some of your anxiety is coming from how quickly you’re falling for him.”
Tonya forced a tight smile. Again she wondered if she was that transparent. “You’re right.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Hannah crooned as if she had discovered a map leading to buried treasure. “I hadn’t realized I’d fallen in love with St. John when we were in school because we were dating other people. But when I returned for the reunion last year and found out he was single, I invited him to DuPont House with the excuse that we had to catch up on what had been going on in our lives.”
“Did he come?”
“Not at first. He took me out to dinner, and after that it was all she wrote. I wasn’t back two weeks when I realized I wanted to sleep with him, and by the time you guys came down we’d been screwing like rabbits.” Hannah counted on her fingers. “And five months later we were married. I never could’ve imagined being this happy, and it was all because I was willing to risk falling in love again. My grandmamma used to say, ‘opportunity is like a baldheaded man; you have to catch it when it’s coming towards you or your hand will slip off and it’s gone forever.’ In other words, Tonya, you’re being given the opportunity to start over in a new place with a business you’ve always wanted, and with a new man who respects you for you. Gage has a reputation of being into himself, and if he’s willing to open up and share himself, then you’d be a fool not to accept him. Remember, we all have an expiration date, and none of us know when that is, but I’ll be damned if I’m not goi
ng to enjoy what time I have left on this earth.”
Tonya digested everything Hannah said and knew she was right. She had spent the past sixteen, almost seventeen, years living in the past because the man she had married and vowed to love in the good times and bad times had turned into a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
She nodded. “I’m glad we had this talk. And as my grandmamma used to say, ‘tomorrow isn’t promised,’ so I’m going to make the best of what life is offering me. None of us knew that day when we went to Wakefield Hamilton that it would be our last day. And their offering us a severance package could not soften the shock of suddenly finding ourselves unemployed.”
“Remember I needed a pep talk when I went back to clean out my apartment and told you guys that I wasn’t marrying St. John.”
Tonya grimaced. “Please don’t remind me of what we said to you, because I don’t know where that came from.”
“You said what needed to be said, other than knocking my hard head up against a wall. I’d been so hung up on Robert cheating on me that I didn’t want to hear what St. John had to say about why he’d cheated on his wife. Once he told me, I couldn’t stop crying, because he’d stayed in a marriage where his wife wouldn’t let him touch her because her uncle had sexually abused her when she was a child.”
“Oh, no!” Tonya gasped.
Hannah nodded. “So we’re not alone when it comes to screwed-up marriages.”
“How right you are, because if Jasmine’s ex had done to me what he did to her, I know I would be serving time right now. I would’ve cut that SOB so low he would have to walk on his knees to get around.”
Pressing a hand to her chest, Hannah laughed until tears rolled down her face. “Same here, but I would’ve waited for him to go to sleep and give him a Lorena Bobbitt and then tossed his junk down the garbage disposal.”
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