“Goodbye, Caleb,” she said, opening the old door the rest of the way with a decisive little tug, thankful for the rush of cool morning air that swept in. The perfect temperature for the cold, harsh reality that awaited her once she stepped outside of Castellanos for good. Once outside, she turned to pull the door closed behind her, careful not to look at him this time, then paused and rested her forehead on the frame, just for a moment after hearing it click shut. As if that brief moment would be long enough for her to recenter what felt like her entire world.
It was only because she’d paused like that that she heard his voice when he said, “I didn’t use to have any regrets. Now, I think I do.”
Chapter 4
“Earth to Caleb?” Cassi waved her hand in front of her brother’s face, drawing him from his thoughts. Again. “Where is your head, adelfouli?” she asked, her teasing smile crinkling the corners of her matching blue eyes. “We’re never going to get through this if you can’t focus.”
She gestured to the biggest steel table in the Castellanos kitchen, presently strewn with a variety of papers, thickly stuffed folders, multitudinous receipts, and a big stack of those marbled black and white notebooks. And that was just what they’d managed to narrow things down to after spending the previous two days tearing through the most immediate piles on George’s desk.
Caleb shook his head, his expression abashed. “Sorry, I’m just distracted by what we’re going to tell the family.” That much was true; it just wasn’t the entire truth. The look on his sister’s face told him she knew it as well. “It’s already clear that Castellanos isn’t operating.” He propped his elbows on the table and felt the tightness in his chest grow heavier as he looked around the empty kitchen.
“Well, it was operating a week ago,” she said. “And from what I can tell, it looks like it’s still been operating in the black, or should be given the receipts. But he’s not paying his vendors fully, or his staff.” She set the sheaf of papers she held back down on the table and raked a hand through her dark curls. “That’s just not the George we know and love. He wouldn’t do that. I say we figure this out before we say anything.” She shrugged. “Maybe we can work out where things went so terribly wrong and turn this thing around, get the doors open again. No one needs to know about the road bumps. That’s for George to tell them, if he chooses to.” Her smile turned wry. “Of course, he’s going to owe the two of us a very big conversation, but beyond that?” She lifted a shoulder, as if this was all something they could handle.
Caleb’s brief laugh was humorless. “When did you become the eternal optimist?”
“Since I’ve gone out and seen a lot of this big world. When you see how much people are capable of doing with so very, very little, it makes this situation look like a cakewalk.” She propped her elbows on the table, rested her chin on her curled hands, and fluttered her eyelashes, much as he’d imagined her doing several days ago. “Speaking of cake, when do I get to meet the baker? Someone promised me a trip to cookie heaven.”
Caleb smiled at that. Cassi was nothing if not determined. “Bellaluna’s is just a block or so away. Corner of Pumpkin and Spice. You can head over there anytime. Sofia would love to meet you.”
“Sofia? Is that your baker’s name? Pretty. And have I mentioned how much I love the street names here? Honestly, it’s like the most adorable little coastal town, ever. It looks like some idealized picture postcard of the Maine seashore, only it’s real. And with pumpkins! Have you seen the pumpkin patch at the edge of town? I don’t know what they’re feeding those things, but as soon as we sort things out here, I intend to find out. They’re the size of small cars.”
Caleb just let his sister bounce from topic to topic. It was oddly calming, as if things were normal, when they absolutely were not normal. And he wasn’t only thinking of the utter debacle that his first management position had turned into.
“Tell me more about Miss Sofia,” Cassi said, circling back. Some would listen to her scattershot conversational style and assume she was equally scattered. Nothing could be further from the truth. She merely had the ability to conduct multiple layers of conversation at the same time, without ever dropping a thread.
“Sofia is Sofia Bellaluna, current owner of the bakery,” Caleb said, a tired but very real smile curving his lips as he thought of the delightful older woman. “If I were a few decades older, I would definitely be considering my pursuit.” His smile grew and it felt good. “I’d be flattered to think of her as my anything. She’s a remarkable woman.” Maybe it was because this was the closest he’d allowed himself to get to speaking about Abriana, but it felt like some part of the unrest constantly stirring inside of him settled, just letting the Bellalunas into his thoughts at all.
“She’s the baker?” Cassi looked sincerely surprised. It wasn’t often she got things wrong.
Of course, she hadn’t gotten it wrong this time, either. Caleb debated what to say. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to talk about Abriana. In fact, he was dying to talk about her. He wished he was sitting there right now telling his sister all about this amazing woman he’d met, instantly connected with, and planned to do everything in his power to keep in his life. The only thing stopping him from talking about it, putting that plan into motion, was the hard-to-get-around fact that Abriana had been right. Leaving Philly, the family restaurant, not to mention the extended Dimitriou and Castellanos clan was unfathomable to him.
To do what? He looked around the room. Try to reestablish his uncle’s restaurant? The restaurant that still belonged to said uncle, who would be returning to it, at some point? Managing Dimi’s or starting his own place wasn’t a job Caleb had ever aspired to in the first place. Lander was the born manager in the family, and Matteo would very probably take over one of their uncle’s restaurants, also in Philly, when he retired in the not-so-distant future. Caleb was a cook, the natural-born chef of the family, and that’s where he quite happily planned to stay.
The touch of Cassi’s hand on his arm startled him. She’d come all the way around to his side of the table and he hadn’t even noticed. She squeezed his arm, then tugged one of his curls, a habit she’d started somewhere around the time she’d taken her first step.
“What’s wrong?” she asked him quietly and kindly. “Beyond this mess,” she added. “I thought you were just worried about George, about being handed this family disaster-in-the-making. But this restlessness is more than that. I’ve never seen you like this.”
Caleb dipped his chin for a moment, then shook his head. He needed to talk to someone, and there was no better listener than his baby sister. He covered the hand she’d laid on his forearm and squeezed. “I’m sorry. I am. I ask you to help me figure a way out of this mess, then can’t stay focused on it myself.”
She pulled up a stool and sat next to him, shifting so she faced him. “I’ve been teasing you about the baker, but . . . this is about her, isn’t it? What’s the situation? Didn’t you two just meet? How could there be a problem already?” She offered him a teasing smile. “Maybe that’s a cue to run and run fast.”
He let out a short laugh, shook his head. “The problem isn’t that we have issues when we’re together. The issue is that we can’t be together in the first place.”
“Is she seeing someone?”
“No, it’s not that. She’s a lot like me.”
“Ah, married to her kitchen, is she?”
Caleb nudged Cassi’s knee with his, but his smile was abashed. “Maybe.”
He let out a sigh and rubbed a hand over his face. “She’s genuine and open, no artifice and no bull, and expects the same. She’s fast and sharp and has a laugh you want more of. She’s easy to talk to and pays attention. She listens, and she shares, even when it makes her a little uncomfortable. She’s not the type to shrink back, but she makes me want to step in and find a way to help.” He turned to his sister. “She’s like me, Cass. Like us. She is dedicated to her kitchen, to feeding people, to her family. She do
esn’t accept mediocrity, in her work, or—”
“In her choice of companionship?” Cassi filled in, her smile one of love and affection and not a little surprise at his heartfelt tribute. “Well, she couldn’t possibly hope for any better person than you, then. And if she turned your head, got you to think of something other than whatever recipe you’re working on, she really must be something, too.”
“That’s just it, Cassi.” He looked directly at her and just put it out there. “I think she could be everything.”
Cassi’s dark eyebrows lifted and her eyes widened. “Well. Whoa.” She took a moment to process his statement, then shook her head. “I . . . never thought I’d hear you say that.” She slid off the stool and kissed him on the cheek. “But I’m so glad I did. So, is it that she’s not feeling what you’re feeling?” She slid back on her stool, her feet dangling well above the floor. She was the opposite of her tall and, in the case of both Lander and Matty, burly brothers. “Because, and I’m not trying to tamp down your enthusiasm, I’m sure she’s as wonderful as you say she is, but for a person you just met, that was a pretty major tribute speech you gave right there. Maybe you need to dial it back a little. Maybe you’re scaring her off.”
Caleb looked at her in disbelief. “This is not Matty you’re talking to, king of the broken hearts. Or Lander, the white knight who never met a damsel in distress he didn’t want to sweep up and save. We’re talking about me. Guy with nose stuck in cookbook who usually doesn’t notice a woman unless he actually trips over her, and that would probably be because he misplaced his glasses.”
“Again,” they both said at the same time, and laughed.
“All true. And yet, big tribute speech,” she repeated. “Just saying. Might be construed as too much, too soon by the fairer sex.”
“It’s not just me, Cass. I’m not in it—wasn’t in it—alone. Like I said, she’s direct and up front.”
“So, she told you she felt the same way? Actual words?”
Caleb chuckled at that. “Actual words.”
“Hmm.” Cassi folded her arms and crossed her legs as she studied him. “How are both of you so certain? I mean, how do you know so much about her? You just met her the day before I got here.” She grinned and wiggled her eyebrows. “Just what did she put in that cookie, anyway?”
“Wait until you taste one. I should have saved one of the muffins she brought by before you got here, but we sort of mangled one of them, and then I was trying to figure out what else she put into them, and suddenly there weren’t any left.”
“How did you two mangle a muffin?” Cassi lifted a hand. “Maybe I don’t want to know.” Then her eyes grew wide. “Caleb Vasilios Dimitriou, you did not.”
“Did not what?” he asked, totally confused.
She made a swirling motion with her hand. “You know what. You might be guy-with-nose-in-cookbook, but you’re still a guy. Please tell me you did not pull a Matty and end up in bed the first time you were alone with her for more than five minutes.”
“Stop. This unbridled respect you have for me is just too much,” he said dryly. “When have I ever given the impression that I—”
“When have you ever waxed rhapsodic over a woman?” she countered. “So, just how much knowledge do you have of her, and by knowledge, I mean—”
“I know what you mean. And we did not pull a Matty,” he said, then ducked his chin. “But we might possibly have wanted to.”
“Ah-ha!” Cassi crowed. Then reached out and swatted his arm, and not gently. “Also, how dare you? You’re the one who gives me reason to believe that good guys do exist. Don’t go ruining that for me.”
“I am a very good guy,” he told her. “I also don’t kiss and tell,” he said, rubbing his arm. “Not even to you. But, so we’re clear, there’s nothing to tell except for the kissing.”
“Well,” she said, mollified. “Good.” She swept her gaze over the chaos of paper strewn across the table. “Because this is the only table big enough to hold all this stuff, and I don’t need to be sitting here thinking that you—”
“All right, all right,” Caleb said. “No worktables were impugned or otherwise used in an unsafe or unsanitary fashion. Satisfied?”
But Cassi’s thoughts had clearly already raced on ahead. “I should meet her. Talk to her. Girl-to-girl. Woman-to-woman.” She wiggled her eyebrows at him. “Sister-to-future sister-in-law.”
“Now, hold on,” Caleb said, feeling the first stirrings of alarm. “I told you all this because I trust you. There will be no independent acts of matchmakery.”
“Ha,” she told him. “I think you underestimate me. Remember when you were pining over Jessica Bastallanos but too chicken to ask her out? Who got you that date to the winter dance of your sophomore year?” She pointed to herself. “I believe that would be me.”
“She dumped me for Braden Stackhouse right in the middle of the final dance,” he reminded her.
“Let’s not quibble about the details. I can hardly be held responsible for your poor judgment in picking her in the first place, or for her being a ridiculous, two-timing bi—”
“Water under the bridge,” Caleb cut in.
“I was going to say bimbo,” she replied primly.
“Right,” he said with a chuckle. “And thanks for the offer.” His voice gentled then. “I mean it. This is . . . I need to figure out what I want to do about it, or if I want to. Her life is here. Mine is in Philly. That is our issue, and she’s not willing to risk getting involved in the short term when there’s no foreseeable way to get to a long term. I respect that. I have to. Because I agree with her.”
“Ah,” Cassi said, softly this time. “Ouch. I’m sorry, Cay. That sucks.”
“Indeed. But Abriana was right to nip it in the bud before someone got hurt. Or both someones.”
Cassi eyed her brother, her expression contemplative. “I think you’re right to step back,” she said. “It’s hard not to go after what you want, but if there’s just no compromise to be had, that means one of you would have to give up all of what you love, so the other person can have what he or she loves. And that’s not good for either of you. So . . . yeah.”
Perversely, that wasn’t at all what he wanted to hear.
He’d shifted his gaze back to the table, but when she didn’t say anything else, he looked back to find her holding him in steady regard.
“She really is all that, huh?” Cassi asked.
He didn’t have to nod, certain his sister could read everything there was to see right there on his face.
“And she was swept away, too?” She didn’t let him reply. Her smile was sincere, and full of love when she said, “Of course she was.”
His mouth curved briefly at one corner; then he looked away, wishing now that he’d never brought this up.
Cassi sighed a little herself. “I’m sorry, adelfouli. You deserve all the love.” She looked back at the table, then sat up straighter and squared her shoulders. Cassi might be able to read him like a book, but the one advantage of that was she always knew when it was time to shift the subject. “So,” she said, “who is going to call Uncle George and drag this story out of him? You? Or me?”
* * *
It was pushing midnight when Caleb finally began climbing the stairs to the little third-floor apartment. Cassi had opted to stay out at George and Alethea’s house, thinking maybe she could find more clues there to what was going on. They’d agreed to hold off on contacting George or anyone else until they dug through everything. With Castellanos closed for business, they had plenty of time on their hands.
They had been able to get a timeline of sorts established, at least from the restaurant side, as to when the money coming in had stopped aligning with the money going out. But they had no idea where it had gone, or for what purpose. Caleb and Cassi were both struggling to understand why George had chosen to handle things as he had, why he’d asked Caleb to come. He could have just locked the doors, gone off to Greece, and no one
would have been the wiser.
Except that probably wasn’t true, either. Their families were too closely connected. Everyone knew George and Alethea were going to Greece. In any other family, George could have just said he was having his staff take care of things during his absence, but that wasn’t how things were done in their family. When someone had to temporarily step down, either because of travel, or illness, or a new baby, whatever the case, someone from the family stepped in. There was never a time when a Dimitriou or Castellanos wasn’t at least overseeing things for any property they owned. Not due to a lack of trust in their employees—most of them were like family, too—but because it was their responsibility to look after their own, no one else’s.
None of that explained why George had taken off as he had, leaving the place to Caleb’s care, knowing full well what his nephew would be walking into. Whether it was pride, or fear, or just plain stubbornness that had caused George to handle things as he had, Caleb couldn’t be sure, but until he and Cass figured out more of the story, George’s secret was safe with them.
The first thing Caleb had done was try to contact the staff, many of whom had worked for George for most of Caleb’s lifetime. Whether it was out of loyalty, or from frustration, or they simply had no interest in being part of whatever was going on, Caleb didn’t know. He hadn’t been able to get a single one of them to return his calls. He’d debated just showing up on a doorstep or two, and that was still an option, but there was still too much he didn’t know. Before he involved anyone outside the family, even long-term employees, he needed to be armed with more information. That not one of those employees had reached out to anyone in the family to sound the alarm said a lot, too, and none of it good. They were protecting their current or former boss, even though he hadn’t been able to pay them full wages for the work they’d done. But what are they protecting him from?
In the meantime, Castellanos remained dark for yet another night. Caleb shouldn’t feel personally responsible for that. It had nothing to do with him. Yet, while he was in charge, he carried the mantle of the family name. He was responsible for keeping that name in good standing. He also had no idea where things stood between George and Alethea and their neighbors, fellow business owners, friends, and other folks in the town. Caleb had been overwhelmed just trying to get the paperwork sorted and stacked, so as yet, his only contact had been with Abriana and Sofia. Sofia was the only one who knew his aunt and uncle well, and she hadn’t given him any reason to believe George was held in anything but the highest esteem, and she’d spoken quite fondly of Alethea.
The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice Page 6