by Meg Benjamin
He asked her why she hadn’t gone to work for her father, and she told him about the restaurant sale. It was the first time she’d told anyone all the details, even Allie.
“I had this dream about managing the restaurant ever since I was a kid, in fact. In the front of the house, not the kitchen or the dining room. So I told my dad I wanted to go back to work there after I graduated, that I thought the things I’d learned in hospitality management could be useful. He didn’t say much at the time, just sort of nodded and let me hostess in the afternoons for a while.”
Nando ran a piece of rye grass between his fingers. “Did he tell you he was thinking about selling?”
Kit shook her head. “Not at first. I think he was still sort of mulling over the offer.”
“Then what happened?”
She took a deep breath. “He called us all together, the three of us who were still in town, that is. Me, my brother Art and my sister Juana. He told us he’d had a good offer and was thinking of selling, but he’d pass the restaurant on to us if that’s what we wanted. Juana said no right off the bat—she’s a social worker and she’s got no interest in switching to food service. Art’s an accountant. We talked about it, he and I, but it would have been mainly me doing all the work in the restaurant—the ordering, the menus, the hiring, the day-to-day management. All of it.”
Nando’s forehead furrowed. “But wasn’t that what you were looking for?”
Kit stared down at her hands. “Yes, but… It was the family restaurant. If I blew it, I’d be blowing all my father’s work, his reputation. And I’d always know everybody was watching me, waiting to see if I could handle it. Papi had had years to build the place up, and I’d have to try to keep it going the way he had.”
“And you were afraid you couldn’t do it,” he said quietly.
She nodded slowly. “I had my chance. And I flinched. Papi understood. He knew how I felt, how scared I was. But the thing is, I should have had the guts to do it. I should have believed in myself and gone ahead. I just…didn’t.”
Nando ran his fingers gently up and down her arm. “I’m sorry.”
Kit sighed, telling herself to knock it off. Whatever she should have done, she had to live with what she had done. “I could have looked for something else in San Antonio, and I’d probably have found a job—Papi could have helped me find something in the restaurant business there. But I couldn’t stay around and watch strangers take over Antonio’s instead of me. I called Aunt Allie, and she said to come on up.”
“Did you tell her what happened?”
“Some of it.”
“Did you want to work at Sweet Thing?”
Kit shook her head. “Allie doesn’t need anybody in the front of the house either. She runs everything, and she’s got the kitchen operation down to a science. Unlike Mabel Morgenstern, she hires the right staff and then she holds onto them, although she’d probably have given me a job running the cash register or something if I’d asked.”
Nando tossed a piece of bark toward the lake, watching it bounce off a rock before sinking. “She’s a good person to be connected to around here. Everybody loves her.” With the exception of the asshole who’d broken in and trashed her restaurant, of course.
Kit shrugged. “So how’s your family?”
“Same as usual. Esteban’s the assistant wine master, but Cliff Barrett doesn’t leave him a whole lot to do. Dad’s still running the vineyards. Mom’s still driving everybody crazy. My sister Blanca is still living in Albuquerque and refusing to come home for Thanksgiving, which drives Mom crazy so it sort of evens out.”
She turned to look out over the lake. “Do they still want you to quit the police force and come to work at the winery?”
“Sure. They’ll never believe I could be happy doing anything except making wine.” Nando shook his head. “Secretly, I think they’re sort of proud of me, but they’ll never admit it to my face.”
“They’re good people,” She said slowly. “I like them.”
“So do I, but they still make me nuts.”
Kit shrugged. “That’s their job. They love you.”
Nando picked another piece of rye grass
“Speaking of Sweet Thing, as we were not that long ago, want to go see if we can grab some iced tea and ham sandwiches there for lunch?”
He frowned. “I thought Allie was still closed down.”
“She is, but she’s got the kitchen open, thanks to you. She’s making bread for all her regulars, plus she’s always got some ham around.”
He pushed himself off the picnic table. “You’ve got a deal.”
To her everlasting credit, Allie didn’t blink when she saw them together. And she was willing to sacrifice a fresh loaf of seven grain, along with some Virginia ham and cheddar cheese, for sandwiches. They sat at one of the unused tables on the restaurant patio, leaning back in their Adirondack chairs to bask in the sun.
“I don’t suppose you’ve got any new ideas about who messed up the restaurant,” Kit asked. The cleaning crew had made some inroads in the lake of jam and honey still hardening in the middle of the bakery floor, but it looked like the floor might need refinishing. She only hoped the crew could loosen the rest of the mess without dynamite.
Nando shook his head. “He didn’t leave any samples this time, which is a good thing, I guess, since this is a restaurant.”
“Right.” She blew out a breath. “Allie found something else missing, by the way, although I don’t know how important it is.”
“Anything’s potentially important.” He leaned toward her. “What was it?”
“A little china bowl she kept near the cash register. I don’t think it’s worth anything. I mean she got it at a flea market.”
“What does it look like?”
Kit held her fingers together in a circle. “About so round. White with purple flowers. It had pennies for change.”
“Did he take the pennies too?”
She frowned. “I’m not sure. I’ll ask. Does it mean anything?”
Nando shrugged. “Not yet. But it will when we find him. If he kept it, it could tie him to the burglary.”
“Why would he keep it?”
He shrugged again. “I don’t know. Sometimes crooks keep souvenirs, don’t ask me why. Maybe we’ll figure it out when we find out who he is.” He leaned forward, pushing himself up from the chair. “I’d probably better get home. I’ve got night duty this week, and I need to get changed before I head to the station.”
Kit glanced at her watch and discovered the afternoon was almost over. They’d spent most of the day together. Funny—it hadn’t seemed that long while it was happening. She followed him to the back gate. “Thanks for breakfast.”
“Thanks for lunch.”
He smiled down at her and her heart suddenly kicked up a notch. She’d managed to push all her thoughts about what this day meant to the back of her mind while it was happening. Now they threatened to come tumbling back to the front again.
Nando ran his fingers down the slope of her nose, his smile narrowing slightly. “I’d like to see you again, Catarina. Would that be okay with you?”
Her heart gave another thump. She was surprised he couldn’t hear it. “Yes. I think so.”
“Of course I’m working nights all this week.” He sighed. “And I assume you’re working days like usual.”
She nodded. “Start at ten, get off around six.”
“When’s your day off?”
Kit’s smile turned dry. “This is it. Remember what I said about not enough staff?”
“I might be off on Wednesday.” He shrugged. “We could meet at the Faro after you get off work.”
Kit cast a quick glance back toward the kitchen, lowering her voice slightly. “Wednesday is supposed to be Allie’s super secret shower. I’m going to try to get off early so I can meet Docia.”
“Shower?” His eyebrows went up. “The wedding’s coming up that soon? Hell, I had August in the office pool.”
“The wedding’s definitely bearing down on us.” She gave him a better smile this time. “I’ll make sure you get an invitation.”
“Well, then, Ms. Maldonado, shall we say next Sunday?” He leaned down slightly, brushing his lips across hers, then wrapping his arms more tightly around her waist as the kiss deepened.
Kit leaned against him, feeling the same warmth descending to her toes. The same ache in her core. The same everything, just like before.
No. Not like before. They still hadn’t discussed what had happened between them the first time. She leaned back, touching his cheek for a moment, trying to find something in those black magic eyes that would give her a clue about what was going on.
“Next Sunday, Officer,” she whispered finally. “Count on it.”
Chapter Thirteen
Kit spent two days working very hard and not thinking about Nando Avrogado. Or actually trying not to think about Nando because every time she did, she ended up confused. What were they doing together anyway? What was happening between them? She hadn’t talked that much to anyone for a long time. Around eighteen months, in fact. And she’d never told anybody else how miserable the end of Antonio’s had been for her in San Antonio.
She’d always been able to talk to him when they were together. He still listened better than anyone she knew except maybe her sister Juana. Were they getting back together again? Or were they turning into friends? But she didn’t usually feel like jumping her friends no matter how close they were. And she definitely felt like jumping Nando whenever she spent more than five minutes around him.
Friends with benefits? Kit shuddered. Nothing like turning into a cliché as you aged. And they still hadn’t talked about all the things that had come between them the first time. Until they did, she had a feeling they’d never be able to trust each other again.
Allie’s shower was scheduled to begin at eight o’clock on Wednesday evening. It was also supposed to be a complete and total surprise, which meant everybody Kit had talked to had been sworn to absolute cross-your-heart secrecy. Allie still turned pale every time she heard the word wedding. Kit had a feeling her aunt would have taken off for an extended buying trip to Dallas if she’d known a shower was coming up. Particularly the kind of shower she and Docia had in mind.
She’d managed to get Mabel Morgenstern to agree to let her leave the Rose an hour early by promising to come in an hour early the next day, and also promising to straighten out another mess with the Woodrose’s software, this time the scheduling software Mabel used herself. She wasn’t sure who was going to handle the reservations after she left for the day, but Joe told her not to worry about it and she decided to take him at his word.
And that was another problem she knew she’d have to deal with eventually: Joe LeBlanc. It wasn’t like they had a real romantic relationship exactly. But they had something. And it was something she needed to straighten out. If it was just a passing flirtation, she could probably move it to a somewhat less serious plateau. But if, as she suspected, their friendship had a serious side, she’d have to decide if her relationship with Nando made it impossible to have a friendship with Joe.
That was, of course, assuming that she actually had a relationship with Nando. Or that she knew what that relationship was. Screw it! I’m not going to think about this anymore.
At five thirty, she tossed her purse and a couple of sacks of Darcy’s custom-made tortilla chips into her car and headed toward town. Docia had been tasked with bringing Allie to the shower location without letting her know what was going on. Kit wasn’t sure how she’d manage it, but she had a feeling Docia could cope with subterfuge better than most people.
She parked in the lot behind the Lucky Lady dress shop, then waited until Mrs. Dupree unlocked the back door. Janie’s mother had worked there for almost twenty years, and Kit figured not much fazed her in terms of clothes-buying ideas. Particularly given that Janie was now a Toleffson and unusual things seemed to happen around them with great regularity.
Kit stepped inside the shop at six and blinked—Docia was setting up a couple of ice buckets with champagne near a circle of chairs at the center of the shop. A low coffee table held a variety of snacks that Kit recognized from the Faro. So Clem had gotten her catering job after all. A strategically arranged rack of dresses concealed the table and chairs from the plate-glass window at the front of the store.
She hurried forward. “Where’s Aunt Allie? Is she already here? Did I miss it?”
Docia put her hand on her arm. “It’s okay. Janie’s bringing her instead of me. I figured it wouldn’t seem as weird if Janie said she needed to come here to see her mom, assuming she can come up with a good excuse for why she’d be working late.” She nodded at Mrs. Dupree, who regarded the shop with a critical eye.
“Are we going to need to clear more space?” she asked. “Are y’all going to be doing games?”
Docia shook her head. “No games. Well, no organized games, anyway.” She grinned at Mrs. Dupree. “Didn’t Janie explain what this is all about?”
Mrs. Dupree frowned slightly. “Well, yes. I mean she told me what you were planning to do. But surely that won’t take the whole evening, will it? I mean, I’ve got everything pretty much organized the way you said. If you want to do something fun, though, I’ve got a good shower game where you tear napkins into the shape of brides.”
Docia regarded the ice chest at the side of the room with narrowed eyes. “I think by the time we’ve gone through all the champagne I brought we won’t be up to tearing anything—at least not on purpose. Fortunately, we’ve all got designated drivers.”
Kit frowned. “I don’t.” She wondered what Nando would think if she called him at the station for a ride home.
Docia grinned. “Don’t worry about it. Wonder said he could transport you and Allie both back to her place. Your car will be safe in the lot until tomorrow.”
“Wonder’s on chauffeur duty? He never seemed to be all that enthusiastic about ferrying people around before.”
“Believe me, anything that will get Allie closer to marching down the aisle is fine with him. And if worse comes to worst, we can call on the entire Toleffson brotherhood. Cal’s got the SUV with seats for six.”
Kit glanced up as someone rapped on the back door and Mrs. Dupree let Jess Toleffson and Morgan Toleffson in. Jess carried a couple of boxes wrapped in silver paper, and Morgan had a bottle under each arm, her dark brown curls floating around her head.
“I brought some wine from Cedar Creek,” she said. “Allie always likes the Morgan’s Blend.” She caught sight of Kit and grinned. “Hey, stranger, when are you coming out to the winery to say hi?”
Kit blew out a breath. “Maybe sometime when I get a spare millisecond.” Going to Cedar Creek had been low on her list of priorities since it always reminded her of Nando. But then again, maybe that wasn’t as much of a problem anymore.
Docia glanced at Jess. “Is Lars okay with giving people rides home?”
“Lars is babysitting,” Morgan said. “Erik said he’d be available if we needed any extra drivers.”
Kit sighed, wondering just how embarrassing it would be to have the Chief of Police drive her home if she was too tipsy to walk.
Mrs. Dupree opened the back door again to admit Deirdre and Clem, along with a pleasantly rounded woman Kit recognized as Bethany Rankin, the mayor’s wife.
“We saw Janie and Allie down the block, headed this way,” Deirdre said breathlessly. “They should be here any minute.”
“I just brought the rest of the buffet.” Clem put two more plates down on the table. “I’ll slip out the back way.”
Docia shook her head. “Stick around. The more the merrier. Besides, we may need another vote on some of these dresses.”
Clem frowned. “Vote? I’ve got dinner to fix.”
“Have a seat. Margene can take care of the kitchen for a night. I already talked to Tom about it.” Deirdre gestured toward the chairs. “Clem’s
great on makeovers. Absolutely great.”
Clem narrowed her eyes, but went back to arranging her platters.
Mrs. Dupree glanced toward the front of the store. “I’ll go out there and wait.” She licked her lips. “My, I hope I don’t give everything away as soon as she looks at me.”
“Ssh, everybody,” Docia whispered.
That inspired a round of giggles from everybody except Clem, who was inspecting her appetizers critically. “I should have made more quesadillas. Whose chips are those?”
“Ssh,” Docia hissed more urgently.
Mrs. Dupree’s voice from the front of the store sounded incredibly artificial. “Why Janie, sweetheart. And Allie Maldonado. What a nice surprise!”
Docia rolled her eyes. “Okay everybody, showtime. Get out there before Allie heads back out the door.”
“Surprise,” Jess and Morgan chorused together.
Bethany Rankin slipped by them, taking a firm grip on Allie’s arm before she could turn around. “Come on, Allie, it’s shower time. No escape.”
Allie cast a narrow-eyed glance at Kit over Deirdre’s shoulder. “Was this your idea?”
“This was everybody’s idea,” Docia said firmly. “Now sit down. Have a quesadilla. Clem made them and they’re terrific.”
Clem smiled, dipping one of Darcy’s chips into some green tomato salsa. “Bet your ass they are.”
Morgan began pouring champagne into flutes, passing them around quickly, as Docia dropped into a chair beside Allie.
“Here,” she said, handing Allie a glass. “Take a swallow.”
Allie sipped. She looked a little like someone who’d just been given a nice cup of hemlock. “You know I hate showers.”
Docia shook her head. “Horseshit. You and Janie and Bethany gave me the best shower ever, even though I fought you tooth and nail. We’re now going to return the favor. This is going to be the second best shower ever, and we’re all going to have a great time.”