“Charles, we’re not in any position to make that happen. Not yet. We’d have to sell a heck of a lot of scones and pastries before we could make it profitable enough to generate the salary I make here. You should know that. You created the executive pastry position for me.”
“What if money wasn’t an issue? What if I could guarantee your salary until the tearoom was up and running on its own? All I would ask in return is for you to work with your mother and sisters to run the Forsyth so Wiladean feels comfortable enough to retire and travel with me.”
“Did Gigi put you up to this?”
Charles raised his brow and cocked his head ever so slightly to the side.
Jane gasped. Suddenly everything snapped into place.
“Charles? Are you Gigi’s secret investor?”
It made sense. Charles had the proceeds from the sale of seventy-five percent of Wila. If Charles married Gigi, he would be family. That’s the only way Gigi would’ve taken on a business partner, if she was madly in love with someone who was beyond reproach. That was Charles.
“Have you discussed this with Liam?” Jane asked. “The part about me leaving?”
“No, I wanted to talk to you first.”
“What do you think?”
“I know he plans on returning to New York in a few weeks. I wouldn’t want to leave him in the lurch. I mean if this was something we decided was viable.
“I understand that this is something you need to think about. Why don’t you, Wiladean and I plan a time to sit down and discuss the details?”
* * *
“Where’s Jane?” Liam asked.
“She’s in a meeting with Charles,” Tilly said.
He picked up the notebook with the mocha cake recipe Tilly had been using as a guide to measuring ingredients.
Liam had given Jane the mocha cake recipe—a new one they’d started serving at La Bula a couple of months ago. It had become one of their bestselling desserts. This recipe in Jane’s notebook was similar, but it wasn’t his recipe. This one had more chocolate and more espresso powder—
No, this wasn’t right.
“Tilly, where did this recipe come from?”
“Um...” The young woman eyed him warily, as if he’d asked a trick question. “Jane gave it to me?” She had an annoying habit of making all her sentences sound like questions when she talked to him. “That’s her notebook?” Tilly said. “It’s where she keeps all the recipes we use here?”
Liam started thumbing through the pages, hoping to find the original that he had given Jane, but by the time he reached the back of the notebook, he hadn’t found it. However, his eyes did fall on something interesting on the last page. It was titled “Goals.”
The first three items—Move to New York City. Graduate from culinary school. Work in an upscale restaurant in New York City—were all neatly lined through.
Beneath those three items was a list of seventeen more. Pay off student loan and debt incurred in New York. Go to Paris. Own my own pâtisserie. Get married. Have at least two kids—
That was as far as he read before someone snatched the book out of his hands.
“What are you doing?” Jane asked, annoyance clipping her voice. She snapped the notebook shut and glared at him.
“I was looking for the mocha cake recipe I sent you.”
Her brow was still knit into a tight frown when she opened to the front of the book. “It’s right here. There was no need for you to go nosing through my personal notes.”
She set the book, which was open to her version of the recipe he’d given her, on the table.
“I didn’t realize those pages were personal,” he said.
“Sorry?” Tilly squeaked. “It’s sort of my fault? I told him that was where you kept all the notes and recipes for us to use in the kitchen?”
Jane’s face softened. “It’s okay, Tilly.” She turned to Liam. “The recipes for this kitchen are in the front.” She indicated a divider. “The rest is personal.” She waved her hand in the air as if erasing the situation. “I’ll move my personal notes to a different notebook.”
“Again, I’m sorry,” he said. “I did not mean to invade your privacy.”
She flushed and he had a feeling she was thinking about the other night. Hell, so was he.
He glanced at the open page. “That’s not the recipe I gave you.”
“This is the recipe that I refined from the recipe that you gave me,” she said. “I made it better.”
He didn’t want to call her out in front of Tilly. He’d learned the hard way that calling someone out in the middle of the kitchen wasn’t the best way to handle a conflict. Only new mistakes. Charles was in the office and the pantry wasn’t a good place to take their disagreement...for so many reasons.
“You want to—” he jerked his head toward the door “—step outside for a moment, please?”
She followed him outside into the alleyway and stood there with her arms crossed.
“The last time we were at a standoff was when you let your assistant at La Bula, Jonah Smith, take the night off after I’d scheduled him. We both know how that turned out. You’re smart and you’re a hell of a pastry chef, but you don’t always know what’s best, Jane. This recipe—or at least the version I gave you—is a favorite at La Bula.”
“This isn’t La Bula,” she said.
“I don’t care,” Liam said.
“So, I get no say?” she asked.
“Of course, you get a say.”
“Just not right now,” she said. “When then? When do I get a say in what I bake? You’re questioning my rum baba, which has been a favorite at Wila. You won’t even discuss the tweaks I’ve made to the mocha cake. You haven’t even tasted it. We sort of talked about things yesterday, but we didn’t really. We talked around the issue. I need to know that we’re okay.”
Liam froze and then instantly melted when he looked into her eyes.
When had he lost his rational mind? The last he remembered seeing it was right before he’d seen her in that black tank top, but it was the taste of her lips that had sent him over the edge. Yesterday, those tanned legs and red toenails had rendered him helpless.
“We are. As far as I’m concerned. I have absolutely no regrets.”
Jane blinked. “None?”
“Zero. I hope you don’t, either.” He reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. His thumb skimmed her jawline...her bottom lip. All he had to do was lean in and—
The kitchen door opened. They jumped apart as they turned to see one of the line cooks standing frozen in the doorway. He had a package of cigarettes in his hand, no doubt heading for a smoke break. He stopped short of stepping outside, looking at Liam and Jane. “Oops. Sorry. I’ll come back later.”
“No,” they said together, a little too emphatically.
“We’re just discussing mocha cake,” Jane said as if it was the answer to everything.
“Cool,” the cook said. “Carry on. Please.”
He closed the door, leaving them alone again.
“Liam, I have to let you know that Gigi has found enough money for me to be full-time at the tearoom...the money is from her secret investor.”
“It’s Charles, right?”
She grimaced. “Did he, uh... Did he tell you that?”
“No, but it’s pretty obvious.”
She shrugged, smiled, bobbed her head in a noncommittal way that wasn’t quite a nod of affirmation, wasn’t quite a shake of denial.
“Are you giving me your notice?” he asked.
“The tearoom won’t be open for a while. I could help you find my replacement. I’d even help you train the person.”
A million thoughts pinged around Liam’s brain. But the one that pushed forward and demanded center stage said, “That means once you leave, you won�
�t work for me anymore.”
She nodded and he pulled her in to a kiss that tasted like heaven.
* * *
Liam had kissed her. This time there hadn’t been a drop of alcohol involved and he’d kissed her.
Maybe that’s exactly what she’d expected him to do. It was definitely what she’d hoped he would do...whether she knew it or not.
But she’d just told him about her plan without even knowing if the tearoom could support her. All for a kiss.
The anxious wave in her stomach suggested that this might be the push out of the nest she needed. Maybe. But first she needed to make sure her grandmother wasn’t just dreaming out loud and that Charles had been serious.
Even though Charles was a businessperson who wasn’t prone to flights of fancy, she needed to talk to Gigi before she made things final with Liam.
And then, of course, there was Liam.
She steeled herself and firmly resolved that the chance of exploring things with Liam would not have a single bearing on her decision to leave Wila.
He’d made her no promises, other than that he was leaving at the end of the month.
Executive pastry chef jobs were not plentiful. Once she relinquished her position at Wila and helped him hire someone else, she was on her own. The again, by relinquishing her position at Wila, she was giving herself the ultimate promotion—the fulfillment of a dream.
Okay, yes, and maybe a chance at love. Liam had been the first guy in a long time—the first since her breakup with Guillermo—to awaken her senses, to make her sit up and take notice.
Liam Wright of all people. He was so not her type. Those tattoos and that attitude. He was so intense. He scared her a little bit. He thrilled her. What was that saying about every day you should do something that scared you?
Yeah—that.
And she wasn’t his type, either. Yet here she stood with the feel of his kiss still on her lips. The taste of him still in her mouth.
Maybe that’s why neither of them had found anyone. Until now.
She sent Gigi a quick text to tell her she wanted to stop by the inn when the team broke for lunch.
Gigi: Honey, what is it? Is everything okay?
Jane: Everything’s fine. Need to talk about the tearoom.
Gigi: I’ll make sandwiches and tea.
* * *
“This is an unexpected pleasure,” Gigi said, when Jane walked into the inn’s kitchen. “I can’t remember the last time you and I had lunch, just the two of us. I made your favorite—tuna, cheddar and arugula on whole wheat. The arugula is from the garden.”
“This is nice, Gigi. Thank you for doing this on such short notice.”
“You know there’s nothing I’d rather do. I’m happiest when I’m with my family.”
Jane had to be back at the restaurant in fifty minutes and that included the ten minutes it would take her to walk from the inn to downtown. She had no choice but to cut to the chase.
“I wish I had more time, but I can’t be late getting back to work. This afternoon, I’m working one-on-one with Liam.”
“Oh, that Liam is a good-looking boy.” Gigi set two plates piled high with sandwiches and homemade sweet-potato chips on the table. “I don’t blame you for wanting to get back.”
“Gigi, this isn’t about Liam. This is about my career.”
Mostly. And Liam’s kiss.
Her grandmother placed two glasses of iced tea with lemon rounds and mint sprigs next to the plates and then took her seat across from Jane at the table.
“I’m sorry,” Jane said. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. I’m just a little anxious about things.”
Gigi reached out and put her hand on Jane’s. Her joints were gnarled and age spots mottled her skin, but they were beautiful hands that were a testament to how she had never hesitated to drop everything and make tuna sandwiches at a moment’s notice or be the first one to roll up her sleeves and dive into hard work at the inn. Jane wanted to think that she’d inherited that trait from her grandmother.
“I needed to double-check that the numbers really do add up and we can support this new tearoom. If so, I’d like to give my notice at Wila so that Liam can find someone to replace me and I can help train her or him before I leave.”
“Wait right here,” Gigi said.
She returned a moment later with a manila folder.
“I think this is what you need to see.”
Gigi took several papers out of the folder and laid them out on the table. One was a balance sheet that projected a loss for the first two years. The second year’s loss was half of the first. Gigi slid another sheet of paper containing an explanation of how they would meet Jane’s salary via a business loan—Jane suspected it was from Charles—and the inn would absorb the loss. Finally, there was a brief outline of how they could make the tearoom profitable by the third year.
Jane’s hands trembled as she read the plan that mapped out a path to make her and Gigi’s dreams come true.
“This makes sense,” she said. “This could work.”
“All we need is an executive pastry chef who is part of this family and is willing to take the responsibility of a start-up.”
Jane smiled at her grandmother and blinked back the tears swimming in her eyes. “I know just the person for the job.”
* * *
Liam was happy that Jane had lingered at her station and knocked on the office door after everyone left.
“Do you have a minute?” she asked.
“Always for you,” he said.
She held out a piece of paper.
“What’s this?” he asked as he took it.
When he glanced at it, he saw that it was her resignation.
“You really meant it,” he said. “Everything else aside—and believe me, there are no regrets—makes me feel like I should try to convince you to stay. But you’ve made up your mind, haven’t you?”
She nodded and sat in the chair across from his desk.
“Like I said, I’m happy to stay until after you find my replacement. And I’ll help you train whoever you hire.”
“I’ll take you up on that. I’m not even going to start looking until after we reopen.”
“That’s smart,” she said, as they made their way to the bar.
“Are you up for a drink?” he asked. “We need to toast your new venture.”
“That sounds superb,” she said. “But one thing I wanted to say is that I understand that, since I’m giving my notice, the Paris trip is off the table. I will make it there someday. In fact, if you want me to make your rum baba recipe instead of mine for the grand reopening, I will. No need for the vote.”
He set two champagne flutes on the bar.
“Are you having bettor’s remorse?” he asked as he extracted a bottle of Veuve Clicquot from the cooler, brought it around to the other side of the bar and took a seat next to her. “You afraid you’ll lose?”
He shot her his most flirtatious smile as popped the cork.
“I am so not afraid of you,” she said as she watched him pour the bubbly into a flute.
“Good.” He handed her one of the flutes and claimed the other for himself. “You shouldn’t be. I promise I won’t hurt you.”
The two of them clinked glasses and fell into an electrically charged silence.
They made small talk for a while, sharing bits and pieces of themselves. Among other things, he told her about how decidedly uncool he’d been growing up in the coolest city in the world, New York. She gushed about her sisters. He learned that she was the oldest of three. When he guessed that she was the popular homecoming queen, the type who would’ve never deigned to look at him twice, he learned that all three Clark sisters had been homecoming queens in their respective years.
“But I couldn’t wait to get out of Savannah and move t
o New York. It seemed like the place where any dream you have can come true.” She sipped her champagne and said quietly, “Or it can swallow you whole.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t treat you better when you were there,” he said.
She shook her head midsip. “Stop apologizing. It was a formative experience. I can honestly say that it was a growing experience. Not a fun one, but I’m a stronger person because of it.”
She crossed her legs and her calf brushed his leg.
He shifted to reestablish the contact.
She didn’t shy away.
“I’m glad I got the chance to make it up to you,” he said. “Why don’t you come to Paris with me anyway?”
“Liam... I wish I could, but I can’t go to Paris and let Wila foot the bill knowing that I’m leaving to open my own shop.”
“What if I wanted to show you Paris?”
She gazed into her drink for a moment. “I wish I could see Paris through your eyes. Maybe someday that will happen, but not right now.”
Something between them sparked and ignited.
He shifted closer. His hand was on her back, caressing her shoulder, sliding down her arm until he was holding her hand... She slid off the bar stool, positioning herself so that she was standing in front of him, between his legs.
His breath was hot on her temple...his lips skimmed her cheekbone... She looked up at him and his eyes were hazy and hooded, and the next thing she knew his lips were on hers.
They stood there like that, holding each other, kissing each other for an endless span. It could’ve been all night; it could’ve been a moment. All she knew was that a deep, hungry part of her was disappearing into the shelter of his arms, into a place where only the two of them existed—no models, no restaurants, no critics.
No hiding. No pretending. No denying.
Not secreted away in the pantry; not fueled by beer.
Just her and him.
A man and a woman who wanted each other.
Southern Charm & Second Chances Page 12