“I’d have thought you’d be relieved to get back to that very peace and quiet.”
“I am. I will miss everyone, but I do miss having my haven to go to, my oasis. Do you feel that way about your kitchen set? After all, you’re the only one who cooks there. Or Gateau’s kitchens?”
He nodded. “Maybe not in the way you feel about your shop, but yes, I miss creating for myself, and not the camera.”
“Do you ever cook or bake in your own kitchen? In your brownstone?”
He shook his head. “No. If I was going to spend time alone, it was usually at Gateau, after hours. I think that is the place that feels most like home to me.”
“I feel that way about my kitchen here. Although, I have to say, having Charlotte here, and Alva, Dre ... all of us cooking at the cottage has changed my feelings about it. It definitely feels more like a home to me now, too.”
“That’s good,” he said. “I envy you that. Finding your place, your home.”
“You don’t feel that way about New York? I thought you were like one with the vibe and energy of the city.”
“I was. Am. I suppose. There is an energy there I can’t imagine living without, not fully. But, I have to admit, having spent time here, where things aren’t so rushed, where there isn’t such a sense of urgency all of the time, has actually been kind of nice. It’s ... settled me, I think. I’ve learned the value, anyway, of taking a true time-out, of removing myself entirely from the chaos. I’m happier. More content.”
“Good.” There was sincerity in her voice. “I’m glad we’re both taking something from this that’s bigger, maybe, than just having gotten to spend time together.”
“That’s just it, Lei. I can’t separate the happiness, the contentedness of my time here, and my time with you. It’s all intertwined.”
“You have beaches in New York. You could get a place in the Hamptons.”
“I don’t know if it would bring the same peace, the same balance, to be there alone.”
“Maybe you won’t always be alone.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Why? Maybe that’s something else we’ll take from this, the knowledge of how good connecting feels, to be part of something bigger than just ourselves, or our work accomplishments.”
“Is that how you feel? You want to go searching for this same connection? With someone else?”
“No.” She reached out and cupped his cheek with her hand, letting the wind whip her hair freely again. But she kept her gaze on his. “I couldn’t hope to ever find this. I don’t think anyone is that lucky, twice. I’m still feeling blessed that I found it once.”
He covered her hand when she’d have taken it away. “Then don’t throw it away.”
Something fierce and strong and ... possessive flashed in her eyes, and his heart immediately took wing, but then she looked down, and pulled her hand from his. “If there was a way I thought we could keep this, being together, you know I would.” She looked up. “But we can’t keep it like this. Because it’s going to end tomorrow. Then everything changes, whether we want it to or not.”
He looked away then, too, and struggled to regroup. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t badger you. I know it’s not just you making this choice. I’m just stubborn, as you know, and I hate giving up.”
“We’re not giving up. We’ve taken everything we could, and we need to find a way to be happy for what we have had.”
“I am, Leilani. Don’t think I regret this. I don’t, not a single second.”
“Good. Then that’s where we start.” She turned, and started down the beach again.
He watched her walk a few steps, then closed his eyes, and asked himself how he was going to deal with it when every time he opened his eyes after today, he was never going to find her within his sight.
Or lying next to him, sleeping. Smiling down at him as she woke him up in the best way a woman could stir a man from sleep. Tugging him into the shower. Pouting when they had to leave to go to work. Smiling again as she tried to talk him into five more minutes in bed.
Rolling her eyes as she screwed up the twentieth take on the simplest part of the recipe. Dancing in the kitchen when she thought no one was looking. Cooking with Charlotte and laughing over things only they understood.
“I don’t know how to do that,” he said to himself. “I can’t start, because that means letting you go.”
She couldn’t have heard him, she was too far down the beach. But she stopped walking then, and realized he was still standing where she’d left him.
Turning back, she waited a few seconds, then walked back toward him. She stopped in front of him, and looked up into his face, but didn’t say anything.
He reached out, tucked a windblown strand of hair behind her ear. And the words were just there. “I love you, Leilani.”
Her expression crumpled for the briefest of seconds, then smoothed, though her bottom lip quivered slightly. “I love you, too, Charlie Hingle Baxter Dunne.”
He reached for her, but she quickly jerked back a step. “Don’t,” she said, and he heard the raw emotion in her voice. “And don’t make me be the bad guy. It’s not fair. This is unfair enough already, for us both.”
“You’re right. It’s not fair.” He knew, in that moment, exactly what it felt like to lose something so vital, so precious, that he didn’t think he’d survive without it. It was heart-shattering, and blindingly, viciously cruel. He thought the pain of it might drive him straight to his knees. “So, I’ll do it, then. But know this, Lei. You’re in my care. You’re in my heart. And no matter what the world brings us, you always will be.”
Then he turned and walked away.
Chapter 19
Leilani picked up the filled pastry bag and aimed it at the first row of cupcakes. The stereo was blasting out the theme to Mission Impossible. She made a face as the opening riff crescendoed into the staccato beat of the refrain. It was an impossible mission, apparently, because she wasn’t feeling the least bit better knowing she had two hundred cupcakes to fill or pipe frosting onto before opening that day. “No salvation cakes for you.”
So what else was new?
She felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. Only one person would be calling her this early in the morning. She put down the pastry bag, clicked the mute button on the stereo remote, then put the phone on speaker.
“Morning, Charlotte.”
“So?” was all she said. A single word, but loaded with anticipation.
Lani knew exactly what she was referring to. “I told you yesterday, it’s not going to happen. He’s not going to call.”
“Damn him,” Charlotte swore. “I know they got back in the city from the Lancaster taping yesterday. Well, I know Baxter did. Carlo gets back tomorrow. He went to visit his mother first. I thought for certain—”
“You thought. But I knew. We don’t talk, Char. We text. We e-mail. But we never talk. We’re ... pen pals. Friends.”
Charlotte’s response to that was language so blue even Lani was shocked.
“Did you just say—”
“Damn straight I did. It was one thing, when he was on the road, for you two to play at this silly game—”
“It’s not a silly game.” Okay, so it was definitely a game, Lani conceded, but there was nothing silly about it. It was all her fault. She’d said no communication, but then she’d gone and caved first. She’d made it three whole days. Then she’d texted him. Just to make sure he’d landed in Texas okay. Or that’s what she told herself. And to thank him, for being strong enough for both of them to walk away, end it right, so they could be okay with it. Move on. He’d texted her back that he was fine and that it was good to hear from her.
And that’s how it had started. They’d sent notes, all anecdotal, about what was going on. Never anything personal, never anything emotional. Just ... two people, two friends ... staying in touch. She’d e-mailed him a scanned copy of one of Alva’s more ... incendiary articles, and he’d responded with an a
ttached file of his appearance doing the Top Ten List on Letterman. She’d sent him the front page photo of Laura Jo and Felipe’s engagement announcement. And he’d texted her with photos of some of the strangest regional desserts she’d ever seen ... along with photos of every “Biggest Ball of Yarn” and “Worlds Largest Prairie Dog” type things he’d discovered as he crisscrossed the country in his decked out tour bus.
A friendship. A good one. She was proud of herself for how mature they were being about the whole thing—which is what she said to Charlotte. “We’re being grown-ups about this. Taking the good from what we had here, the part we can keep.”
“Then why is it that two mature grown-ups can’t talk on the phone?”
Lani didn’t answer that, because anything she said was going to be as lame out loud as it sounded in her head. They’d never come out and said phone calls were verboten. They just ... never called.
As long as it was just words on a screen, or photos—not one of which included either of them, except for his Top Ten appearance—she could handle being friends. It beat losing him forever. Thankfully there hadn’t been any tape of show footage sent to her, or she knew she’d have watched it in an ongoing loop. Every day. And night. This way, she could just smile at his texts, feel connected to him, and ... not think about the rest.
“Except you don’t sleep well, you’re not eating right, you don’t seem to be enjoying your life.”
“I do, too, enjoy my life. I love my life. That’s the one thing that hasn’t changed, and thank God for that.”
“In the way you cling to it like a teddy bear for security, yes, you love it. But I don’t know if the love affair is so healthy anymore.”
Lani fell silent, and Charlotte did, too. Finally, Lani gave voice to the thing that had been eating away at her for nine long weeks. “I miss him, Char. I miss him so much I can barely stand it. It’s like I’m not breathing now. Not deeply and fully. It’s like I can only take shallow breaths, so I can hold it all together, and not fall completely apart.” She blew out a shaky breath. “There. I said it.”
“Good. What are you going to do about it?”
Lani didn’t bother pretending she hadn’t been giving it plenty of thought. It was all she thought about. “I-I don’t know. Exactly. I don’t want to give up the shop, but I don’t want to be pen pals with him. I don’t think I can handle it much longer. So, I either have to cut that off ...”
“Or?”
She took a breath, then just blurted it out. “Or ... start the process of closing the shop and moving back to New York. I don’t want to run a place there, but I am thinking maybe of catering. I know that will be a slow start, but I can’t leave here immediately, so I’ll have time to book in advance and hopefully hit the ground running.” She held her breath, waiting for the squeals of happiness and joy that were surely to follow her capitulation. After all, that meant she was also going back to Charlotte.
Instead, her announcement was met with total, deafening silence.
“Did you hear what I said?”
“I did. And you sounded quite miserable about it. Like a woman walking to the gallows.” Her accent was becoming more pronounced as the conversation continued and Lani knew she was far more upset than she was letting on.
And, the bitch of it was ... Charlotte was right. Lani wasn’t remotely enthusiastic about the idea. But it was all she had. “Well, what the hell do you want me to do then?”
“Selfishly, I was hoping to hear those exact words ... but with actual enthusiasm. How can I be happy about saying I told you so if I think you’re miserable?”
Lani smiled at that, even though she was still upset. “Well, you’re right, I’m not super excited about it, but I keep telling myself that being with Baxter will make it all doable. Who knows, I hated being on set, on camera, and he made that fun. Maybe he’ll make me feel enthusiastic about catering. Or being a private chef. I don’t know. I don’t care what I do. Whatever ends up working. As long as we’re together.”
“What about Sugarberry? I don’t mean the shop, I mean—”
“I know what you mean.” Lani sighed and slumped a little against the worktable. “I don’t know, Char. I just know I’m miserable here without him, so I at least want to—need to—try to be away from here with him. I don’t know what else to do.” She jumped when a knock came at the back door. “Oh God, not now.”
“What?” Charlotte asked.
“Knock at the door. This early, it has to be Alva. Since she started doing her column, she got Dwight to give her her own desk at the paper. I think she’s in there before sunrise every day. She even has an old-fashioned newspaper visor, only it’s lavender.”
“Hasn’t she been baking with you a few nights a week, after hours? How does a woman her age operate on no sleep?”
“I don’t know, but if she can find a way to bottle it, she’ll die a very wealthy woman. And I’ll be the first to buy stock. I’ll call you back.” She disconnected and slipped the phone into her pocket.
“It was unlocked. I hope you don’t mind.”
Lani spun around so fast she had to grip the worktable to keep from sliding straight to the floor. “Baxter?”
He smiled, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Who else barges into your kitchen before daybreak? Bad ’abit, I know.”
Her heart was beating so fast, it seemed to interfere with her ability to process what her eyes were seeing. But, even so, she’d heard the slip of the accent. “Is something wrong? Did something happen? Is someone hurt? Are you okay?”
The smile took on a semblance of his trademark grin then. “No, no, luv, no worries on that. We’re all fine. Everyone’s fine.” He fidgeted, shifting his weight. “That’s no’ entirely true. I’m no’ fine. No’ fine atall.”
“Baxter—”
“I know we agreed. No future, no way. And I appreciate, more than you know, your willingness to keep the lines of communication open. That’s been the only thing that’s kept me sane, I think. But it’s—I don’t know if I can—”
“I don’t know if I can, either,” she said, finishing for him. “It’s been my lifeline, too. But I think ... I think it’s strangling my heart, Baxter. I don’t think I can just be friends with you.” Her voice cracked on the last part.
“I know,” he said. “It’s the same for me.”
In that moment, Lani knew what her choice was. She loved Sugarberry, she loved her father, she loved her shop, and all of her customers. But she loved Baxter more. How was it she hadn’t already figured out what, in that moment, seemed so very, very simple?
“Well, I’ve been thinking,” she began, in case he was there to tell her it was over and done and no more texting, no more e-mailing. Though, he could have just stopped writing back. Couldn’t he? She tried to keep her heart from beating straight out of her chest, but she couldn’t keep the tremor from her voice. “In fact, I was just telling Charlotte. I—I’m thinking I want to come back to New York. Cater. Maybe private chef. I don’t know. It will take time to get out from under this, see if I can break my lease, I don’t know. But—”
“You don’t really want to come back, do you?” he asked.
She didn’t think she’d ever heard him sound so dead serious. For once, she couldn’t read his every emotion on his face, either. In fact, he was more or less expressionless at the moment. “What I want ...” She took a breath, and just put it out there. “What I want is you. And you’re in New York. I’ll always love Sugarberry, but my father is here, so I have an excuse to come down and visit, holidays and whatnot.”
“You said you told Charlotte. Have you told him?”
“My father? No, not yet.”
“Good.”
Her heart fell. “Oh.”
Baxter crossed the room, and she would have scrambled away from his touch if she’d anticipated the sudden move. It was hard enough just looking at him while he turned her offer down. Touching him would be nothing short of painful.
�
��Good, because I’m in a bit of a dilemma, and I was ’opin’ you could help me out.”
“What are you talking about?”
“We finished taping the next season.”
“I know,” she said, confused. “We’ve been texting about it. Nonstop.”
“Right, right. Well, I’ve had an offer come my way, and I’m very excited about it, but it will mean expanding the time between seasons—which we’ve been discussing anyway. We started doing two seasons a year because it was a good way to launch, and build momentum, but the show’s been established pretty well. We’ve discussed making the season longer by a few episodes, and only doing one stretch a year—which will give me time for this other project.”
“Which is?”
“I’ve been asked to do a series of cookbooks. One geared to my viewers, home cooks, with recipes they can try in their own kitchens. And another geared toward teaching home cooks how to be chefs, but in layman’s terms. There’s also talk of doing one based on the road tour stops, but the publisher wants to see how the first two work out.”
“That’s—that’s amazing,” she said, surprised, but thrilled for him. “They’re going to do great. It’s a perfect fit for you.”
“I thought so, too. Thing is ... I need a kitchen.”
“You have several.”
“A private kitchen. One where I can test recipes and work on what I’m going to include in the books, how I’m going to convey them in writing, so anyone can do them. I have six months to get started on them, maybe complete one, before I’ll have to stop and break to tape the next season.”
“Six months,” she repeated, as her heart tripped all over the place. “So ... what are you saying, Baxter?”
He was standing quite close, but he put his hands, those beautiful big warm hands she’d never thought she’d feel again, on her cheeks. “I’m saying I want to use your kitchen. At the cottage, or I could install one upstairs. I don’t care where, but I need space, and peace and quiet, and I need you. By my side.”
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