Beck knew what he meant. “Being around her parents always makes Skye dial herself back.”
Jeremiah nodded, still staring down at his bowl. “That’s part of why I asked her to come back to Africa with me—I wanted to get her out of that house, away from her family.”
That went through Beck like a harpoon, hooking his heart. He couldn’t even argue with the sentiment; he’d wanted to break the chains that bound Skye to her parents, too. But if she went all the way to Africa with this guy … she’d really be lost to Beck.
He shook his head to clear it. Fuck it. Skye didn’t need to go to Africa for Beck to lose her.
The door opened, and Skye was back, this time with a small salad of roasted beets, arugula pesto, and bright, jewel-like segments of orange.
“The play of savory and sweet here symbolizes the night I got my first kiss—and all the kisses that followed with the man I married.”
Beck stared at her. He knew she could feel it, because her cheeks went almost as red as the beets on his plate, but she still didn’t look at him.
“I wanted this dish to be bold, exciting, a wake-up call for the senses, because that’s how I felt at that time in my life—as if I was waking up for the first time.”
The memory of Skye as she’d been that first night swam before Beck’s eyes, and while he was savoring that, the real Skye whisked herself out of the room.
Left with nothing to do but taste her dish, Beck let the citrus bite of the orange tighten his tastebuds and play with the deep, earthy sweetness of the roasted beets. The pesto dressing had a bite to it, a spiciness from the arugula that Beck loved. She was really bringing it today, cooking with dash and vitality.
He swallowed and allowed himself to realize the truth. There was a very real possibility that he could walk away from this day with nothing at all.
She could very easily win the RSC competition, and then go off to Africa with Jeremiah Raleigh and leave Beck with … nothing.
Nothing but the knowledge that he’d stood up and risked it all for the chance to be with the woman he loved.
Spearing up the last segment of orange, Beck knew he’d do it the same way again, if he had the chance.
*
Skye pushed back into the kitchen and bent over, hands on her paisley-covered knees, for her now-traditional post-serving hyperventilation.
God. She just hadn’t counted on how flipping difficult it would be to stand ten feet away from the man she loved and not go vaulting over the table to kiss the life out of him.
“I’m not going to tell you to breathe again,” Fiona said, already stacking the next round of plates on the trays. “You never listen anyway. Is there anything I can do that would actually be helpful?”
“You’re already doing it,” Skye gasped, pushing herself upright and rushing over to check the plates before they went out. The tray held six small, individual cast-iron ramekins, each one filled with a creamy, hot vegetable gratin, the swiss cheese topping golden brown and bubbling. “These look gorgeous, thank you.”
“Of course.” Fiona studied her for a long moment, and Skye read the worry in her friend’s pale blue eyes. “You gonna be okay?”
Skye looked down at the plate, tweaking a fennel frond garnish. “I think so. This next one is the hardest, but it’s important.”
Unspoken was Skye’s conviction that if Henry could break free of a lifetime of tight-lipped, closemouthed silence, she could share a little bit of her grief and loss.
“I’ll be right behind you,” she told Fiona. “Just give me a second.”
Fee nodded and hefted one of the trays, leaving Skye alone in the kitchen. Bowing her head, Skye centered herself and breathed in. She imagined the breath bringing her serenity and calm, filling her up, but all the time, she was aware of that black hole of grief deep inside—the part of her that couldn’t be touched or filled or changed.
It would always be there, she knew. Oh, it was smaller than it had been right after she lost the baby. She could go days without thinking about it or noticing it. But it never went away … and the truth was, she didn’t want it to.
The idea that she might one day forget filled her with horror and a sick sort of fear that made her stand there, breathing deeply and futilely, for another few moments.
There’s not enough breathing in the world to make this easier.
“Right,” she said aloud, psyching herself up. “You can do this.”
Holding her head high, Skye picked up the tray and marched across the hall. Fiona had already laid her plates down on the judging table, and she came forward swiftly to grab Skye’s tray.
Immediately missing the weight and purpose of the tray in her hands, Skye found herself twisting the drawstring holding her pants up. She had to force herself to clasp her hands calmly in front of her.
“What we have here is a gratin of roasted fresh fennel, carrots, parsnips, turnips, and fingerling potatoes, with a mornay sauce and Gruyère cheese on top. Please be careful; the ramekins are very hot.”
She waited until everyone was looking down at their gratins, blowing on steaming spoonfuls of fork-tender veggies covered in decadent cream sauce, before she spoke.
“This dish represents loss. It’s pure comfort food, an upscale version of the casserole you bring to a grieving family—this is the kind of dish I made for myself a lot after…” she swallowed, blew out a shaky breath. “After I lost my baby.”
Everyone who was eating paused, and she caught an aborted twitch of movement from Devon Sparks. She hated that this story was likely to cause him pain, considering everything he and his wife were going through with her pregnancy, but still, most of her attention was on the other end of the table.
On Jeremiah, who’d never heard about any of this, and on Beck. Most of all, Beck.
She locked eyes with him, and the steady strength of his presence helped her go on. “At my first ultrasound, about five months in, I found out that our baby had Turner syndrome, a chromosomal abnormality that can affect the development of the heart. It’s not always lethal—there are Turner syndrome kids who are born healthy and grow up to live happy, normal lives. But in most cases, the condition results in a miscarriage. Our baby wasn’t one of the healthy ones.”
The silence in the room was so complete, Skye could hear the rush of her own blood and every thud of her fractured heart.
Beck’s fierce expression never wavered, but as she lost herself in his eyes, she saw a single tear well up and track down his cheek. He gave her a smile, nothing more than the barest quirk at the corners of his firm lips, but it was enough. Skye lifted her chin and let her gaze take in the rest of the room.
“That was nearly ten years ago now, and I rarely speak of it. Sometimes I feel like society would prefer that I just get over it and move on—as if somehow the loss of a child before it’s ever born isn’t real. Isn’t devastating. But it was. It is, and not just for me—after the miscarriage, any time I opened up about what I’d been through, I’d meet a woman who’d been through something similar. It happens so much more often than you’d think, in this day and age of modern medicine—and far more often than anyone talks about. But I wanted to dedicate a dish in my life-story meal to my daughter, because it happened to me, and my daughter was real. Her loss shaped me as a woman, as a person, and as a cook. And it’s time I honored that. Thank you.”
She made eye contact with every person behind the judges’ table; she saw sympathy and pain on Claire’s and Kane’s faces, and something like terror in Devon’s eyes as his hand fumbled for the cell phone lying beside his plate. Good—she hoped he called his wife. Eva Jansen looked shocked, but not as shocked as Jeremiah, whose brown eyes were wide with surprise and sorrow.
And then there was Beck, who had tears running silently down both cheeks now, but who looked, more than anything … proud.
Fiona wrapped an arm around Skye’s shoulders and gave her a comforting squeeze, but Skye realized as they turned to leave … she was actuall
y okay.
Better than okay. She felt lighter, somehow. Cleaner.
“Come on,” she told Fiona. “We’re almost done.”
Chapter 30
Beck didn’t know he was crying until he noticed how cold and wet his face was. But after watching Skye stand up straight and tall under the burden of her grief, he couldn’t be ashamed. He just wiped his napkin over his cheeks and took another bite of Skye’s version of comfort food.
This was another one of her vegetarian dishes where he didn’t even miss the meat. What would diced chicken add to this except bulk? The creamy chunks of potato and starchy parsnip were plenty substantial, while the other vegetables lent a satisfying sweetness to the rich, cheesy dish.
“She’s kind of amazing, isn’t she?” Jeremiah sounded wistful, almost, as if he’d never truly appreciated Skye before.
“Yes,” Beck said shortly. What else was there to say, really?
“I wish…” The other guy broke off, shaking his head.
Beck never got to find out what Jeremiah wished, because Skye and her sous-chef returned with their next dish—and instead of six individual plates, this one came out in a single large, round copper pan, mounded with golden rice and studded with black clam shells.
The platinum pixie sous-chef set the steaming pan down in the middle of the table while Skye passed small ceramic bowls to the judges and tasters.
“This is my take on paella, a communal Spanish dish that really embodies the spirit of friendship, togetherness, and many different kinds of people coming together to create a wonderful new whole. In the last few years, my friends have been everything to me—they helped me find myself again, and reach for the new dream of owning and running my own restaurant.”
She took a visibly deep breath and sent a tentative smile to their end of the table. Beck watched Jeremiah smile back and felt a chill take hold of his midsection.
“This dish is meant to be shared among friends,” Skye continued softly. “It’s casual and communal, fun and delicious—not to be taken too seriously, but not to be taken for granted, either. I hope you enjoy it.”
Trying his damnedest to let go of the things he couldn’t change—and not to push Jeremiah Raleigh out of his chair and stomp on his head—Beck leaned over and scooped a portion of the seasoned rice and shellfish into his bowl. He made sure to dig down to the bottom of the paella pan, looking for the best part: the toasty, crackling crust that formed along the bottom of the pan where it got the hottest.
The paella was as good as any Beck had tasted along the coast of Spain when his boat had docked there. The subtle saffron flavor pervaded the dish, more of an aroma than a taste, and every morsel of shrimp, every fresh, briny clam, was perfectly cooked and juicy.
Skye’s soft voice broke into his enjoyment of a particularly tender coil of squid. “This is for Jeremiah—thanks for coming today, and for reminding me that I was alive and I deserved to be happy.”
Beck felt his stomach drop into his shoes, and had to swallow hard to keep from throwing up.
That was it, then. Jeremiah was the one.
Beck stared into space in front of him, paella forgotten, and spent long minutes trying to process the disappointment turning his insides to lead. He’d made his play—and he’d lost everything. Including the competition, probably, because so far Skye’s meal had been flawless.
But when the door of the judging chamber swung open, Skye came back in alone … and empty-handed.
“Is there a problem?” Eva Jansen inquired, perfectly arched brows lifting.
Skye smiled, and in the instant before she spoke, Beck had time to notice that even with her hair flying out of the knot on top of her head and a smear of what looked like tomato paste on her cheekbone, she looked more at ease, more sure of herself, than he’d ever seen her.
“Nope, no problem. But there’s no fifth course, either.”
A ripple of shock traveled down the table and zinged straight up Beck’s spine. Without meaning to, he half-rose out of his seat, but before he could even figure out what he thought he was going to do, Skye pinned him with a look.
“It’s okay, Henry. This is my choice. And I choose to present the final course of my life-story meal as an open-ended question. I don’t know how things are going to turn out, or what my future holds—so how could I make a dish to illustrate it?”
“My dear girl,” Claire Durand murmured, “It’s possible you’ve taken the parameters of this challenge a bit too literally. Are you sure there’s nothing you’d like to present?”
Skye swallowed, but held her head high and met the judges’ incredulous stares with a calm smile. “I’m sure. And after the stunning honesty and courage displayed by my competitor, Henry Beck, how could I do less than try to match it? My future is a giant question mark—but for the first time, that doesn’t scare me.”
She looked over at Beck, who hadn’t managed to make himself unbend enough to sit down. For the first time since she came into the room, she seemed uncertain. “I’m not scared of my future, because I know who I want at my side.”
She held out her hand. Beck could see the fine tremor of her fingers. “Henry?”
He blinked. She couldn’t mean …
Like a fool, he turned and stared down at Jeremiah Raleigh’s blond head. “But what about him?”
Jeremiah tipped his chair back on two legs to stare up at Beck with a quizzical look. “What about me? Skye and I are over.”
Beck gaped down at the man, reeling, as Eva Jansen stood up and clapped her hands together once.
“Well! This has been a very exciting day for all of us. The judges have some deliberating to do, and it sounds like the three of you have a few things to talk about as well. Why don’t you head back to the kitchen, and I’ll come get you when the judges have reached a decision?”
Feeling a little dazed, Beck moved on autopilot to follow Skye out of the judging chamber, with Jeremiah on his heels. Once the three of them were back in the relative privacy of the kitchen—give or take a couple of sous-chefs, who jumped apart guiltily when the door opened, clearly in the middle of a gossipfest—Beck rounded on Raleigh. His desperation for answers must have come across as ferocious aggression, because Raleigh took a step back.
“Hey! Ease down. If anyone here deserves to get worked up, I think it might be me. After all, I’m the one that got dumped.”
Beck was still trying to process those words, and dial his expression up to something civilized, when Skye smacked her boyfriend—ex-boyfriend—in the arm.
“Oh, come on! Considering you let me stumble all the way through that break-up speech before telling me you’d met someone else, you get zero sympathy from me, buster.”
Jeremiah cocked his head, gazing at Skye fondly. “Well, there is that. Alicia’s amazing—maybe not as good a cook as you. Although I’ll deny I said that with my dying breath, so don’t get any ideas.”
Dropping the teasing smirk, Jeremiah grabbed for Skye’s hand. “Seriously, though. I see why you didn’t want to give all this up to come cook on a camp stove or over an open fire. You fought hard to get where you are—don’t let anyone tell you your time would be better spent doing something else.”
“Thanks, Jeremiah, that means a lot to me.” Skye went in for a hug, and it was all Beck could do not to snarl and push his way between them.
He’d been pulled in too many different directions today, opened too many old wounds and drained their poison out onto the ground. Now here he was. Standing here, fists clenched and chest heaving, watching what ought to be a private moment between two people who obviously cared about each other—even if they weren’t together anymore.
Skye and Jeremiah weren’t together anymore.
Staggering a little, Beck blinked, and when his eyes opened again, he was sitting on the floor with a very worried-looking Skye kneeling next to him.
And no one else was in the kitchen with them.
“Henry! Are you okay? I think you’re dehydrate
d. When was the last time you had a drink of water? Your sous-chef went to get a bottle from the vending machine down the hall.”
Beck stopped the flow of Skye’s nervous, worried speech by pulling her into his lap.
“Winslow left to give us a minute,” Beck said, lips pressed to her temple. Skye’s spicy-sweet curls tickled his nose and made him smile.
Skye, who’d stiffened when he grabbed her, slowly relaxed against him as her arms stole around his shoulders. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Are you sure you broke up with that guy?” Beck countered, his fingers automatically shaping themselves to soft curve of her back.
She nodded. Her voice was muffled against his chest, but Beck felt every word. “I told him I couldn’t be with him, because I’d realized I was still in love with my husband.”
The whole long day of intensity and emotions suddenly crashed to a halt. Cupping one hand around the back of Skye’s head, he tilted it until he could look into the gorgeous blue summer of her eyes.
And then he kissed her.
*
When Henry Beck’s mouth covered hers, Skye couldn’t stop the inarticulate moan of joy that broke in her throat. When his tongue stroked her, she couldn’t stop herself from tightening the grip of her fingers in his hair where it curled against his neck.
And when he shifted both of them so that Skye was on her back on the kitchen floor with Beck covering her like a sexy blanket, she didn’t even try to stop herself from arching against him.
Still … she tore her mouth away from the kiss long enough to gasp in a breath and said, “Winslow and Fiona … they’ll be back soon.”
“Win’s got more game than that,” Beck assured her, nuzzling her cheek.
His fingers flexed against her scalp, sending prickles down her arms and legs. Skye had to work hard to keep up any sort of rational thought.
“But the judges … I don’t think it’s going to take them long to decide.”
That made Beck pause. Propping himself on his elbows, he stared down at her face from mere inches away.
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