Relish (The Cass Chronicles Book 2)

by Susannah Shannon

  "Are you getting a divorce?" Cass did a bit of quick math. Her parents had been married thirty-four years. Once you got that far, didn't you get a free pass or something?

  "Honey, I don't honestly know. Your dad is a wonderful man."

  Oh God, thought Cass that sounded like what you said before an ominous "But…"

  "We want different things right now."

  Cass wanted to flare with anger, but her mom was beginning to cry. "But, Mom, how did you just now decide you want different things?" Her mother cried and Cass found herself gripping the steering wheel.

  "Honey, marriage is always two people trying to find common ground. We found it for a long time, but we are just can't right now."

  "I don't know what to say. I want you to be happy. I want Daddy to be happy." She was such a child, she thought crossly to herself, she wanted to cry, "But I want you to be happy together!" She restrained herself.

  "So you have an apartment?" She didn't want to hear about the fucking apartment, she really didn't. She wanted to blame it, as if a piece of nearby real estate could somehow be the cause of such turmoil.

  "I do, it's along the canal. I can walk to school. Some of the other teachers live here, too."

  "So are you teaching this semester?"

  "Third grade, my favorite age."

  "That's crazy, Daddy just retired."

  "Daddy retired, but I still want to teach. He thought that my doing a bit of subbing would be enough, but really that just reminded me how much I love teaching. An opening came up for someone's maternity leave and I took it."

  "Do you like it?"

  "It will do for now."

  "I love you, Mom."

  "Oh, honey, I love you too. Your dad is very angry. We still love each other, but sometimes that might not be enough." They hung up and Cass rested her head on her steering wheel.

  She sat for a long time. How could love not be enough? How could, love, history, shared friends, a family, a lifetime not be enough?

  She called her dad. There was none of the gentle pain that her mother had expressed. "If she thinks she can just change everything and then come back home, she's got another thing coming. We said there were all these things we would do when I retired. She wanted to do some more teaching—I said 'sure, honey, I'll golf on those days'. But then that wasn't enough. No, she suddenly has this fire to have her own class again."

  "Well, couldn't she teach full time?"

  "We had plans for when I retired! I worked my ass off, and now she wants to… I should never have agreed to her subbing. If she hadn't even tried it again, she wouldn't have decided she just had to teach full time again. I can't believe she would just throw our whole life away. Mark my words, she's going to end up with nothing to show for it!"

  She knew that she should defend her mother, who was anything but selfish. She was blindsided by the whole thing. Had her mother always been unhappy? Was her entire childhood one big lie? She managed to say some hollow, soothing things to her still seething, bitter dad, and hung up, morosely.

  There had to be a way to make sure that she and Killian didn't just stop making each other happy.

  Perhaps those books she had been reading were the ticket. She would make sure they didn't start wanting different things. She would surrender enough so that she wouldn't ever need to worry about them growing apart. By force of will, she would make their marriage bulletproof.

  Chapter 7 - Accounted For

  Cass knocked on the door of Lloyd's cottage. She had an armload of fresh towels. When she did not receive an answer, she opened the door. She wasn't sure where he could be, maybe Killian had arranged for someone else to take him 'nonfishing' as her husband called it. The bathroom door was tightly closed. She hadn't thought those doors even had locks. The humidity could do funny things. She'd send Killian over to sort it out later. She set the towels on a chair and gave the place a quick once over. It was a dicey thing, this sort of housekeeping. She needed to make sure the lodge's guests felt looked after, and yet still felt that their privacy was respected. She had often thought this was easier for housekeepers of hotels where the guests were essentially anonymous. She needed to eat dinner with these people. She would have thought that Lloyd was a very tidy man. Apparently she had been wrong about that. The bed looked like a small bomb had gone off in it—blankets on the floor, pillows akimbo. Bending to pick them up she saw a 'Trench Outfitters' key ring on the floor. Hazel must have dropped her keys the last time she had tidied the cottage up. Since they so rarely locked anything, they wouldn't have been missed. There was a small pile of receipts and scraps of paper lying on the bureau. She'd come to recognize that as the sign of a man emptying his pockets. Since one man's trash was another man's treasure, she didn't toss those things. In the pile was a high quality business card—heavy cream cardstock. Her experience with wedding invitations meant that she recognized a home printing job when she saw one. This was not one.

  "Lloyd Miller, CPA IRS Chief Auditor."

  This gave her pause. She suddenly remembered the sharp interest Lloyd had taken when Travis had mentioned doing Hazel's taxes. Cass had no doubt that any loophole Travis had found was faulty, if not outright illegal. That explained why he came so often and never caught any fish. What he was trawling for did not have gills. She remembered the way Hazel seemed to smile at Lloyd when she thought no one was watching. Hazel had a crush on a man who was there to audit the lodge. Cass worked around the small telling pile of detritus. She was giving the bed a quick smooth over when the cell phone on the bedside table chirped. She knew better, she knew the unspoken rules that allowed for them to be friends with their paying guests. A sort of 'don't ask don't tell' policy. But Lloyd was not actually a guest, and since he was at the lodge snooping, he was most certainly not their friend. She looked at the phone. A small picture of a pretty young woman appeared on the screen and underneath it the text, "Hi, Dad. Mom is out of the hospital. I'm okay. Call me when you can."

  The son of a bitch was married.

  CassCooks Blog Post

  Of Succor, Stodge and Sprightliness

  There is definitely something to be said for winter food... And here in Alaska we say it a lot. When you need warmth and succor, nothing quite does the trick like a hearty stew glistening with red wine gravy. Although a close second would be Italian sausage bubbling in tomato sauce piled high atop cheesy polenta. My stomach seems to be on a roll. Somewhere in the top five is chicken and dumplings. (Reminder: I am from the Midwest and chicken and dumplings means hefty noodles—not fluffy biscuit type drop dumplings.) If that offends you, start you own blog. Those have their place I'm sure, but they do not belong in the upper pantheon of the comfort food rotation. Warmth, inducing as it may be, still offers the danger of coziness blending into stodginess. The closeness of an eiderdown can move from warm and soothing to muffling. When you feel your palate deadening from a surfeit of rich food, action must be taken. Nothing will do the trick quite like the cleansing lift of citrus.

  I ran out of lemons the other day—I know I am shocked too. Since a trip to Costco is an all day endeavor for me, I had to make do. I emptied the cabinets while I was trying to decide which vinegar to use to spring my taste buds from their seasonal doldrums. A container of juice packed grapefruit segments rolled off of the counter. Even I, heathen that I am, recognize a gift from the almighty when it falls literally at my feet.

  The result was chicken breasts with sautéed grapefruit. It literally looks like jewels on your plate and sends your taste buds into hand stands.

  Begin with:

  Two whole chicken breasts—cut into thin cutlets. (Lay your hand flat—do you hear me—FLAT on top of the chicken and work your knife through the meat, parallel to your hand. Cut each breast in half longwise and then do the same to each half. Very cold chicken will make this process a bit easier. Go slow. Now season your chicken with salt and white pepper—you can use black, but it will not be as pretty. Part of the point of pink food is prettiness. Swirl a
pat of butter around a sauté pan. NO cast iron—you will be making a delicious acidic pan sauce and the citrus will not only leach iron into your sauce, it will literally taste rusty. It will pit and damage your pans... You have been warned. Heed me, for I know of whence I speak. I may or may not have (I totally did) destroyed a cast iron pan that had probably accompanied a female antecedent of mine on a covered wagon. A batch of balsamic vinegar glazed veal chops did what hailstorms, scurvy and age failed to do.

  Give your chicken a quick sauté. You want it golden and brown. Set it aside, you may need to do this in batches—remember, we never crowd the pan. A crowded pan will not cook that much faster than two batches will, and it will give you rubbery seized up poached, chicken. Not what we are aiming for here. Now, into the pan juices, add the grapefruit juice and cook down until its syrupy. Add a little dollop of heavy cream and swirl your pan around like the superstar chef you are. Return the chicken and the grapefruit segments and make sure everything is warm all the way through—over low heat. Unusually for me, I find that rice or potatoes aren't the best accompaniment. Oh pick your jaw up—you'll catch flies like that. The best way to proceed is to lay it on a bed of fresh spinach. The heat will gently cook the spinach. Now serve forth, pretty as a Preppy's spring break in Palm Springs.

  Make sure you look in the archives for a variety of salads with grapefruit.

  Keep your life delicious!

  Cass

  Cass closed her lap top and glanced over at her mother-in-law. "I'm wondering if I should rework this to use an actual grapefruit; I could use the zest."

  "Yeah, but sectioning them is a pain."

  "Oh God, that's true."

  "We had a wedding breakfast when Jim and I got married and I thought broiled grapefruit was the height of elegance. It took our mothers' days to segment those. Jim came home from his bachelor party and jumped in helping his mom. Hundreds of them segmented up and then topped with brown sugar. Our whole honeymoon his hands smelled like grapefruit."

  Cass was delighted with this anecdote. She hadn't gotten to meet her father-in-law, but the family he had led still reflected the man's character, work ethic and humor. She would have loved him she was sure.

  Hazel finished her recollection. "Of course, it was the 1970s—a lot of questionable food was happening. And he was a fisherman, so his hands could have smelled much much worse…"

  The yelling outside caused both women to jump. A car door slammed, and Ava's voice cut through the winter's chill. She was very unhappy about something. The much lower, calmer voice of Torsten underpinned their argument. Hazel and Cass glanced sideways at each other. "Crap. I forgot to check on the bathroom in the left hall." Cass jumped up to go do it.

  Hazel stopped her. "I did it." A dilemma presented itself. Did they openly sneak to the door to eavesdrop, or together rise above their baser instincts? They both felt a sudden urge to put their coffee cups in the sink, which just happened to be under the window. They needn't have bothered; Ava's voice carried like a pocket full of quarters. She was upset about trying to get some work done from the lodge. Her frustration was understandable; connections on the computer, or even cell phones could be sporadic at best in Slicktrench. She'd missed an online meeting since travel in rural Alaska was apt to take far longer than predicted.

  "This has been the stupidest trip ever! Your family will have to visit us in Juneau where it's at least the twenty-first century." Torsten was calmly offering suggestions—he even offered to take her out on the boat, since out on the open water was sometimes the best place to get a signal.

  Hazel and Cass glanced at each other—it was barely fifteen degrees. "It would be even colder out on the open water wouldn't it?" Hazel nodded.

  "Don't be ridiculous," Ava snapped. The voices grew louder and Hazel and Cass both tried to look busy. It was absurd, two women standing at a spotless, empty sink trying to look engrossed in some activity.

  "Hello, dear." Hazel hugged Ava. Cass could feel the cold billowing in through the door. She wasn't sure it all had to do with the wind chill factor. The men folk followed and the heat of Killian's kiss on her neck coupled with his cold face was exhilarating. What was it about her and paradoxes?

  "I'll see if I can get my fucking lap top connected." Ava stormed past Hazel.

  "Was it like that the whole way?" Cass whispered. Killian's nod was grim.

  "Thank God, your career fits into our life, cause I'm not moving to Juneau," he answered.

  Hazel moved in for a quick squeeze. "Well, Cassie knows she belongs here. Ava will settle in once she's a Nelson. We just have to give her time." The way Killian rolled his eyes made it abundantly clear what he thought of that idea.

  Cass asked Killian to look at the bathroom door in Lloyd's cottage while people began to gather for dinner. She had no sooner handed Torsten and Lloyd beers when Killian silently opened the kitchen door and wordlessly gestured her to follow him. He held his finger to his lips. The unmistakable howl of a wolf sounded near by. It hung over them like a symphony of longing, power and brutal beauty. Killian was standing behind her and pulled her close so that his jacket wrapped around both of them. The howl was answered from a different direction. "Like I would ever live anywhere else," he whispered.

  All Cass could do was nod. She had planned to show Killian the job offer. Watching his grim expression as he had born witness to Ava's antics, convinced her that she shouldn't. Somehow the idea of just closing the door on the opportunity seemed less excruciating than being told that it was an absurd, selfish idea, anyway. She realized that she could never take it. Killian's life was here and she had agreed to fit into his world when she'd married him. Any doubts she'd had about her course of action were washed away by the knowledge of her parents' separation and her husband's exasperation with the high strung Ava. She wanted Killian. She wanted them to stay connected. She'd just keep reading the books that swore that sublimating her own desires would ultimately be worth it.

  Once they were back in the warm kitchen she asked him if he had the bathroom door fixed.

  "Door's fine, not stuck at all."

  Chapter 8 - Kookaburras and Cleavers

  She had tried every conceivable variation she could think of. A very lemony cake and milk chocolate frosting was gag inducing. A lightly lemony cake and very dark chocolate frosting was somewhat better, but still far from good enough. In discussing this with Ava, Cass tried to present it as a deficit on the side of the baker (a view she decidedly did not actually hold). Ava didn't seem all that interested in the discussion. She was a demanding bride, but didn't seem to be getting any enjoyment out of making everyone in Slicktrench dance to her oddly flavored tune. Ava spent most of her time working on her laptop. Torsten seemed to be avoiding her, although you couldn't really blame the man. Cass was not excited about the prospect of a wedding cake that left the guests puzzled. In fact, the notion made her downright tetchy. Some skilled craftsman had sent her a handmade cleaver, in hopes that she would mention it on CassCooks. Between her sudden hatred of Lloyd and her vexation with Ava, she had plenty of emotions to vent through bashing and smashing. She took some of her frustrations out on the remains of the ham that was still loitering around the pantry.

  CassCooks Blog Post

  A scallop of potatoes layered with ham is a very good way to use up ham left over from a buffet. This is a tricky proposition. Ham is expensive grocery real estate. You certainly don't want to throw any of it away. However, ham is one of those things that sits out on your buffet. There will be bits and pieces that have been passed on and touched. There are things in life that we can choose to not face head on. So we will choose an application that will result in the thorough cooking of these leftovers.

  Scalloped potatoes are one of those things that sound simple, but aren't. I know, I know, your great grandmother threw together casseroles out of potatoes layered with flour and milk and they were a thrifty family favorite. Your grandmother had two advantages that you do not have. One, she was feeding
people who didn't know any better. And, two, even more importantly, didn't have cameras on their cell phone. A simply tossed together 'scallop' of potatoes will consist of dull greying potatoes slices afloat in a grainy amniotic fluid. We are going to avoid these pitfalls.

  For this application you will need large potatoes, preferably of the russet persuasion. Time for some brutal honesty; by the time these potatoes are cooked in milk and coated in cheese and pork, they have ceased to be a vegetable they have moved into another state, where they exist as soothing ballast. They won't retain enough vitamins to dust a fiddle with anyway. The peels must therefore go. I am sorry. I try very hard to be peel friendly, but it just won't fly this time. I'd go with one large potato per person, plus an extra one, per five guests. (So if you are serving five, you need six spuds, if you are serving ten you need twelve). Slice them thinly and put into an oven-safe pot. Pour whole milk over them, liberally salt and pepper and simmer until no traces of resistance remains. Individuality has its place in a free society, but scalloped potatoes is not that place. Undercooked potatoes are a scourge. When soft, remove some potato slices to your prepared casserole (by which I mean thoroughly sprayed with cooking spray), layer with finely chopped slivers of ham. SERIOUSLY visit 'Kitchentools by Hand.com'—they made me a cleaver and it makes me want to work like some sort of woodsman professional chopper so much that you can't believe it. Okay, layer, potatoes, ham and grated cheddar (I'd go for a sharp white, myself). Repeat until your pan is full, or until you are sadly out of potatoes. Pour in some of the milk you boiled the taters in—almost to the surface, and cheese lavishly. Bake in a hot oven at 375 for thirty minutes. Warm, cozy and showcases the flavor of good ham.

  Keep your life delicious,