by Jeannie Watt
A flash of anger lit his eyes, but didn’t flare into a full-fledged blaze. “You don’t know that.”
Her forehead wrinkled. “Yes. I do. I can’t see you staying here. Not unless you can open a restaurant, and with the Nevada economy being what it is, that would be professional and financial suicide.”
He was no stranger to professional suicide, but she did have a point. And she was so damned cool about her assessment of their situation, and his shortcomings, that he had to do something about it.
“Then maybe you and the baby could relocate to wherever I get a job, and then I could be the steady one,” he observed mildly.
SOMEHOW REGGIE MANAGED TO HOLD in the hysterical laughter that rose in her throat, because she knew exactly what he was doing—baiting her. The tension between them hadn’t let up one bit since he’d arrived in the kitchen, so she’d been avoiding him. Now Tom was initiating contact in the way most natural to him—by tossing down a gauntlet. Fine. She’d pick it up.
“Go with you so you can get fired, and we’d have to pull up stakes and leave?” she asked.
He raised one eyebrow, a feat that never failed to impress her. “I haven’t been fired from every job.”
“Name one.”
He calmly opened the locker, hung the coat inside. “I’ve had several. Those didn’t make the headlines.”
Reggie pressed her palms together and tilted her fingertips toward him. “Let me tell you why I wouldn’t go with you, Tom, even if I wanted to—which I don’t. Because your career will take precedence. It would always be the deciding factor.”
“I’m not going to lie to you, Reggie. My career is important to me.” He closed the locker door. “But that doesn’t mean I’m incapable of focusing on other things.”
“But for how long?”
“You might be surprised,” he said.
She lifted her chin. “I truly hope I am. And for now, I need for you to keep doing exactly what you’re doing.”
“Fine, Reggie.” He shrugged philosophically, but she wasn’t fooled. He was stewing beneath his cool facade. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“You knew the deal when you signed on,” she said.
He raised a hand in surrender. “I did. I just thought that we’d develop a different kind of relationship.”
“Like one where you’re in charge?”
“Those are my favorite,” he said, just before the door shut behind him.
EDEN SPENT THE NEXT DAY IN THE kitchen with a minimum of four things going at all times, and when she wasn’t talking to Reggie, she had the phone to her ear, dealing with clients or purveyors as she worked one-handed. Tom wouldn’t mind employing her. In fact, he’d always had a soft spot for Reggie’s siblings.
When he and Reggie had been together, Eden had been in culinary school in California, but every time she got the chance she’d come back to Reno to stay in the house Reggie and Tom shared. And when Justin wasn’t in trouble somewhere, he tended to be there, too, since the Tremonts were tight in a way that Tom had never been with his family, such as it was.
His dad had enjoyed great success as a photographer, and since Tom’s mother had died when he was barely a year old, his father had married again. Several times. Nice women who disappeared after a few years, tired of being left at home while Tom’s dad traveled. Tom had ended up at boarding school between marriages, or with his dad on the road. Some people might say he’d had a terrible childhood, but Tom hadn’t minded. He’d simply learned to take care of himself. The Tremonts, on the other hand, stuck together like glue, having practically raised one another. And Patty seemed as if she wanted to become an honorary member of the family.
Leaving Tom as the outsider looking in.
Early in the afternoon Eden and Reggie left the kitchen—Reggie to meet with a vendor, Eden with a bride-to-be—leaving Tom and Patty to man the kitchen. Justin was also there, but he was shut up in his room, which was akin to being in a fortress of solitude. No one ever bothered him, because no one, with the possible exception of Patty, wanted to go anywhere near a superfancy dessert or a nine-foot cake. Some people were born to ice. Others weren’t.
Patty rarely talked to Tom, except for the occasional clipped direction or announcement, and she stayed as far away from him as physically possible ever since the ill-fated onion-chopping lesson. And although she was moderately competent, Tom saw a few things he could help with.
But he didn’t…until she started working the dough for mini pizzas. Tom knew squat about piecrust, but pizza dough he understood.
“Let the dough rest before you work it,” he said when she punched it down and then turned it out of the bowl.
“I have my instructions.”
Yeah, yeah, yeah. “It’ll be better if you rest it before you work it. Portion it, then cover it with a towel and let it rest for an hour.”
“It doesn’t say anything about resting it,” Patty said primly.
“Did it ever occur to you that I might know what I’m talking about?”
She turned in a huff. “And did it occur to you that I don’t care what you know? I work for Reggie. Just like you.”
I don’t work for her. I’m here for free.
“Fine. Do whatever you want.” Damn. He felt as if he were on a playground.
Patty didn’t answer and immediately started working the dough, which tore instead of stretching.
Because it wasn’t rested…?.
Tom moved to the other side of his counter station, so that his back was to her and he didn’t have to watch her mutilate the dough.
But Patty couldn’t leave it at torturing the pizza crusts. No. She apparently complained to Reggie when the boss returned late that afternoon. Tattled on him.
Patty was gone and Tom was changing out of his jacket when Reggie came up to him, the gleam of battle in her eyes.
“Stop trying to direct Patty. It upsets her. As far as she knows you two are on a level playing field.”
Oh, yeah. Well, apparently Patty wasn’t all that observant. “I’m trying to teach her something.”
“That’s not your job, Tom.”
“All right, all right,” he said, putting his hands up. “I’ll keep my mouth shut.” Reggie started for the door without a word. “You don’t believe me.”
“I’m trying to,” she said with a sigh.
“What do you think I’m going to do?”
She turned and walked back toward him, her heels clicking on the tile. “I think you’re going to do as you please.” One corner of her mouth tightened. “I think you can’t help trying to take control of the kitchen. All kitchens.”
“I’m working on that.” He couldn’t help trying to set matters right when they were obviously wrong, but on the other hand, he was at the kitchen every day, chopping and doing prep he hadn’t done in years. For Reggie. But she didn’t seem to see that.
“You’re saying you can change?”
He closed the locker and turned, to find her staring at him in disbelief. “I’m saying I have to change.” It wasn’t easy to let those words out.
“Tom…you’ve built a career and destroyed it…because you refuse to change.”
“It’s not destroyed,” he snapped.
“Well, it’s pretty damned close, if you have to hide out for six months.”
He made a touché mark in the air with his index finger.
“We are what we are.” Reggie folded her arms. It looked as if she was about to start tapping her foot. “I’m not going to pretend to be something else to get what I want. And neither should you, because that’s what got us in trouble the last time.”
He rubbed his forehead as if trying to massage away a headache before saying with exaggerated patience, “I was not pretending to be something I wasn’t. I was figuring out who I was. I was twenty-three years old.”
“Did you want to cater?”
“I had my doubts,” he admitted.
“Did you talk to me about them?”
&n
bsp; “I was working through them.”
“Then had a chance to escape, and took it.”
“It was an opportunity. And yeah. I took it. Did I miss you? Yes.”
“Did you come back? No.”
“Well, I’m back now, Reggie. And I’m staying for a while.” He could see from her expression that she either didn’t believe him or she didn’t want to believe him. “You honestly have no faith in me at all, do you?”
“You haven’t inspired a lot of faith lately. In anyone.”
“Why in the hell did you sleep with me all these years later, if I’m such a loser?”
She lifted her eyes and met his gaze. “To prove to myself I was over you. To see if I could walk away with no regrets. Just like you did.”
It took him a few seconds to find his voice. “That was the only reason?”
She didn’t even flinch. “Yes.”
“Did it work?” he growled.
She put a hand to her belly. “Next time I’m coming up with a better plan.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
She was a liar. Such a bald-faced liar.
Reggie stopped her car at the intersection of the alley and the street and made a conscious effort to look both ways. Twice.
Yes, she’d slept with Tom to prove a point. No, that wasn’t the only reason. Her reasoning had been complicated and flawed, and had involved telling herself a couple big lies. Like that she was over him. She might no longer be in love with him as she’d once been, but it seemed as though she’d never really be free of feeling things for him. Even if she wasn’t pregnant.
Now he was here in her kitchen—thanks to those lies she’d told herself—and she was going to have to do something other than make him chop vegetables and do grunt work.
She was losing hope that, after they spent some time together, the tension between them would ease and they would fall into a working relationship. She was wielding control with an iron fist and was afraid to stop, and he was doing as told and resenting every second. She was just as uncomfortable and defensive now as she had been the very first morning he’d showed up for work.
Something had to give, and she was afraid that if she wasn’t careful, it would be her.
TOM DROVE HIS RENTAL CAR TO the hotel and searched for the closest parking space. The lot was jammed, being a Saturday night, and he knew from the previous night that it was probably going to be another loud one. Lots of parties and noise in the halls, but he wasn’t in a party mood right now.
Running into Reggie in San Francisco had been unexpected and interesting. She’d changed, become more confident, more assertive—although she hadn’t been a slouch when they’d been together. She’d invited him for drinks the first night; he’d asked her to dinner the second. And then he’d made the mistake of thinking, when she came on to him that last night, that she’d gotten over their breakup, regretted it as much as he did.
He’d thought when they’d made love that it was an acknowledgment of all the good things they’d once shared. A celebration, if you will. A hot, hot celebration. Instead it had been a vendetta on her part. A screw-you in more ways than one.
Tom yanked the keys out of the ignition.
Cool. Very cool. She’d wanted to stick it to him, and now they were stuck together because of the kid.
Tom got out of the car and walked the half mile to the hotel entrance, keys gripped tightly in one hand. She’d slept with him to prove a bloody point, and he’d been feeling all soft and squishy about it—except for the part where she’d disappeared without a goodbye.
That should have been a hint, but he’d been too thick-headed to read it for what it was.
He bypassed the revolving door for the regular door, which he yanked open. The crowd in the lobby parted as he strode through to the banks of elevators, where about twenty or thirty people were waiting for a ride up. There was some kind of convention in the hotel that involved legions of women. Tom stood and stared at the elevator light.
“Hey,” one of the women, dressed in a pink suit, said loudly. “Are you Tom Gerard? Chef Tom Gerard?”
He looked into her overly made up eyes and said, “No” in his best conversation-killing voice.
“Are you sure?” Unfazed, she smiled up at him flirtatiously. “Although—” she elbowed her chubby friend “—I could make do with a look-alike.”
Everyone was staring at him now. He forced the corners of his mouth into a smilelike grimace and went back to staring at the light.
“Don’t be shy,” the woman cooed.
I’m not shy, lady. I’m about to destroy you.
Tom pulled a long breath in through his nose, still clutching the keys tightly, willing the elevator to come. Now.
“Here.” The woman poked something at him and he automatically took it with his free hand. A business card with a cell-phone number. She smiled, playing to the crowd. “Maybe you could call if you get…lonely…tonight?”
Her friend giggled.
Tom folded the card in half with a quick move of his fingers. “Not…” he reached out to tuck the card into the woman’s décolletage just above the top button of her pink suit jacket “…interested. Now, bug off.” The bell rang and the doors opened.
The woman went even pinker than her suit as Tom pushed by her onto the elevator. A few people got on with him, but not as many as could have fit. Those who did cut him sidelong looks on the ride up.
Great. Just great.
He didn’t want word to get out to the general public that he was working for a catering kitchen. He didn’t care if Pete knew, but general rumors were not going to do his career any favors. More importantly, though, given a slow news day, the gossip-teers might dig into why he was in such a lowly job…and find out about Reggie’s pregnancy. That simply wasn’t acceptable. Not yet, anyway.
But he wasn’t blowing out of town, as Reggie undoubtedly wanted him to do—not before the issues were settled. He was nothing if not tenacious, and he’d meant it when he’d told her he was in this for the long haul.
For both of those reasons, he needed to get the hell out of this hotel.
TOM HAD INTENDED TO SPEND afternoons after his shifts at Tremont looking at apartments. He ended up looking at houses.
Apartments had parking lots and hallways, and places where he might bump into people who might figure out who he was. Butt into his business. With a house he would have more privacy, and right now, while he sorted through all the unfinished business in his life, privacy was a must. So a house it was.
As he’d suspected, he couldn’t find a month-to-month rental, or even a six-month one. It was a year or nothing. But the half year sublease on his New York apartment paid the entire year’s lease on the average Reno house. With change.
Pete would have had a cow at his poor business sense, but Tom had no problem signing a lease on a house he was going to abandon once he and Reggie were on terms he could accept. Civil terms conducive to raising a child together. Although right now, he couldn’t say that he and Reggie were doing the civil thing well.
He was pissed over the reason she’d slept with him. He felt used. Definitely a first for him.
Trees hung low over the street as Tom cruised toward the address of the third rental on his list. He’d visited two the day before and was squeezing this one in before heading to work.
The neighborhood seemed nice enough—one he wouldn’t expect to be robbed in. If he had something worth stealing. A couple houses had toys in the yards and the lawns were all well kept.
He parked in the double drive, and before he could get out of the car, the real estate agent pulled in next to him.
“I see you found the place all right,” she chirped.
“I used to live in Reno.”
“Are you sure this is the neighborhood you’re most interested in? I mean, we do have other options in areas more conducive to say, entertaining.”
“I’m not planning on entertaining,” he said. The woman’s smile ebbed slightly. “I wan
t a quiet area with a small house.”
Because he wasn’t used to living in many more than four rooms. Five at the most. All he really required was a decent kitchen and a bathroom.
“Well, this is quiet,” the woman conceded. She pulled a key out of her blazer pocket. “Shall we take a look?”
“Yes. Let’s.”
The house was a house. The kitchen was adequate, as he’d suspected from the photos on the real estate website, and the rest of the house livable. It had a small backyard that Tom stood in for a moment, looking up at the leaves of the one giant tree. Shade. Cool.
The house was on a corner lot with a cinder block wall separating it from the street and a cedar board fence too tall to see over dividing the property from the house next door.
The real estate lady—Sharon somebody—hovered on the steps. He hadn’t responded as she’d pointed out various features, and finally she’d quit talking.
“I’ll take it,” Tom said.
“Wonderful,” she gushed. “If you wouldn’t mind following me to the office, we can fill out the lease there and…no?” she asked when Tom shook his head.
“I’ve got to get to work. I’ll stop by this afternoon.”
“Very well.”
Sharon had the look of someone who’d almost made a sale, but hadn’t, which prompted Tom to say, “Honest.”
She smiled. “I believe you.” She went to her car, then before she got inside, she said, “What made you decide to settle in Reno, Chef Gerard?” She’d been studying him as he’d looked at the house, and he’d wondered if she’d recognized him. If she hadn’t, then the name he signed on the lease later would have been a dead giveaway.
“I’m taking time out from the rat race. No restaurant. I’ll only be in town for a few months.” He approached her car, gave her one of his best smiles. “I’d appreciate it if word didn’t get out that I’m here.”
“Not a problem. And maybe if you decide you like living in Reno and want to trade up, you’ll remember me?”