A Diamond in Her Stocking
Kandy Shepherd
Everyone loves a Christmas wedding! Chef and single mom Lizzie Dumont is moving on. Returning to Dolphin Bay to make her new restaurant a success, she has no time at all for jaw-droppingly handsome Jesse Morgan—even if she can’t forget that incredible kiss they once shared! Jesse can’t forget their kiss, either. But the betrayal in Lizzie’s past has made her wary of him, and he hates the fact that she can’t see past his reputation as a heartbreaker. Now he’s on a mission to change her mind—and luckily it’s the most romantic season of the year: Christmas!
Jesse still held her hand, and when she made no effort to free it he tightened his grip—now he had her so close he couldn’t bear to let her go.
She closed her eyes with a flutter of long fair lashes and he could feel her tremble beneath his touch as his fingers traced down her cheek towards her mouth.
Her lips parted just enough for her to breathe out a slow sigh and she opened her eyes. In them were both wariness and want.
“Jesse, I …”
He dropped his hand and used it to take her other hand and pull her closer to him—so close he could feel the heat from her sun-warmed body. He pressed his mouth to hers in a soft, questioning kiss—she gave him the answer he wanted with the pressure of her lips back on his. As he deepened the kiss he felt the same fierce surge of possessive joy he’d felt the first time he’d kissed her. He had kissed her and then lost her through a stupid misunderstanding.
She tasted the same. Felt the same. And he wanted her just as much—more.
A Diamond in Her Stocking
Kandy Shepherd
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
KANDY SHEPHERD swapped a fast-paced career as a magazine editor for a life writing romance. She lives on a small farm in the Blue Mountains near Sydney, Australia, with her husband, daughter, and a menagerie of animal friends. Kandy believes in love at first sight and real-life romance—they worked for her!
Kandy loves to hear from her readers. Visit her website at: www.kandyshepherd.com (http://www.kandyshepherd.com).
To the A-team,
Cathleen Ross, Elizabeth Lhuede and Keziah Hill, with heartfelt thanks for the friendship and support!
Contents
Cover (#ub6db6d70-1361-5b3b-a1bc-85616d9e2101)
Introduction (#u050e67de-256a-51a5-9645-4adf1d73729f)
Title Page (#u534b9672-4fc2-5494-9c8d-19c28f6c1e6d)
About the Author (#uff876f84-211d-5403-a476-14d3ca3c8d0d)
Dedication (#u63eade93-2645-5da0-b4a9-446d207d25d0)
CHAPTER ONE (#u4b0e2d33-98f2-5156-ae54-f83b2046e9f3)
CHAPTER TWO (#u4a63da0f-ee1b-5399-b522-6c9b40cb2a20)
CHAPTER THREE (#ubb8f60d4-2c45-5c0c-9110-89cebe063b71)
CHAPTER FOUR (#u80f037b4-d8ac-56f0-984b-540be58bc847)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_073e41e4-658f-5571-b1fc-067767da16bd)
AS LIZZIE DUMONT looked around at the soon-to-open Bay Bites café, her new place of employment, she vowed she would never reveal how she really felt about the way her high-flying career as a chef had crash-landed into a culinary backwater like Dolphin Bay. Not when people here had been so kind to her.
She would put behind her the adrenalin rush of working at star-rated restaurants in the gastronomic capitals of Paris and Lyon. Give up the buzz of being part of the thriving restaurant scene in Sydney. Embrace the comparatively lowly life of a café cook.
Her sigh echoed around the empty café. Who was she kidding? That heady time in France had been the pinnacle of her career. But she’d been sinking in Sydney. Working shift after shift until past midnight in restaurant kitchens—no matter how fashionable the venues—had hardly been compatible with being a good parent to her five-year-old daughter, Amy.
With no family in Sydney to fall back on, and few friends because she’d lived in France for so long before her divorce, she’d struggled to give Amy a reasonable life. Drowning in debt, swimming against the current of erratic babysitter schedules and unreasonable rosters, after less than a year she’d been going under.
By the time her sister Sandy had approached her to manage the new café adjacent to Sandy’s bookshop, Lizzie had been on the edge of despair. She’d even been contemplating the unthinkable—letting Amy live permanently with her ex-husband Philippe in France.
Gratefully, she’d grabbed the lifeline Sandy had thrown her.
And here she was. Dolphin Bay was a rapidly growing resort town on the south coast of New South Wales, with a heritage-listed harbour and beautiful beaches. It was also, in her experience, a gastronomic wasteland—the only memorable meal she could ever remember eating was fish and chips straight from the vinegar-soaked wrapping.
But Sandy had offered her sanctuary and a new life with Amy. In return, Lizzie would throw herself wholeheartedly into making Bay Bites the best café on the south coast. Heck, why stop there? She would use her skills and expertise to make Bay Bites the best café in the country.
She let herself get the teeniest bit excited at the thought. After all, she would be in charge. No cranky head chef screaming insults at her. No gritting her teeth at an ill-chosen item on the menu she’d been forced to cook whether she’d liked it or not.
She continued her inspection, her spirits rising by the second. Sandy had done a wonderful job of the fit-out. The décor was sleek and contemporary but with welcome touches of whimsy. In particular, she loved the way the dolphin theme had been incorporated. Hand-painted tiles backed the service area. Carved wooden dolphins supported the wooden countertop and framed the large blackboard on the wall behind it where she would chalk up the daily specials.
There was still work to be done. Lots of it. Boxes were stacked around the perimeter of the café waiting for her to unpack. Large flat packages, wrapped in brown paper, were propped against the walls. She itched to get started.
But someone had started the unpacking. Outsized glass jars were already lined up at the other end of the counter to the cash register, their polished chrome lids glinting in the late afternoon sun that filtered through the plate glass windows that faced the view of the harbour.
She could envisage the jars already filled with her secret recipe cookies. Nearby was the old-fashioned glass-fronted rotating cabinet for cakes and pies she’d asked Sandy to order. The equipment in the kitchen was brand new. It was perfect. She would make this work.
Lizzie ran her hand along the wooden countertop, marvelling at the intricacy of the carved dolphins, breathing in the smell of fresh varnish and new beginnings.
‘Those dolphins are kinda cool, aren’t they?’ The deep masculine voice from behind her made her spin around. She recognised it immediately.
But the shock of seeing Jesse Morgan stride through the connecting doorway from Bay Books next door expelled all the breath from her lungs. Her heart started to hammer so hard she had to clutch her hands to her chest to still it.
Jesse Morgan. All six foot three of him: black-haired, blue-eyed, movie-star handsome. Jesse Morgan of the broad shoulders and lean hips; of honed muscles accentuated by white T-shirt and denim jeans. Jesse Morgan, who was meant to be somewhere far, far away from Dolphin Bay.
Why hadn’t someone warned her he was in town?
Lizzie’s sister was married to Jesse’s brother Ben. Six months ago, Jesse had been the best man and she the chief bridesmaid at Ben and Sandy’s wedding. Lizzie hoped against hope Jesse might have forgotten what had happened between them at the wedding reception.
One look at the expression in his deep blue eyes told her he had not.
She cringed all the way down to her sneaker-clad feet.
‘What are you doing here?’ she managed to choke out once she had regained use of her voice. She was aiming for nonchalance but it came out as a wobbly attempt at bravado.
‘Hello to you, too, Lizzie,’ he said with a Jesse-brand charming smile, standing there in her café as confident and sure of himself as ever. A confidence surely bred from an awareness that since he’d been a teenager he would always be the best-looking man in the room. But she noticed the smile didn’t quite warm his eyes.
She tried to backtrack to a more polite greeting. But she didn’t know what to say. Not when the last time they’d met she’d been passionately kissing him, wanting him so badly she’d been tempted to throw away all caution and common sense and go much further than kissing.
‘You gave me a fright coming in behind me like that,’ she said with a rising note of defensiveness to her voice. Darn it. That was a dumb thing to say. She didn’t want him to think he had any effect on her at all.
Which, in spite of everything, would be a total lie. Jesse Morgan exuded raw masculine appeal. It triggered a sudden rush of awareness that tingled right through her. Any red-blooded woman would feel it. Lots of red-blooded women had felt it, by all accounts, she thought, her lips thinning.
‘I didn’t mean to scare you,’ he said. ‘But Sandy told me you were in here. She sent me to give you a hand with the unpacking. I’ve made a start, as you can see.’
He took a step towards her. She scuttled backwards, right up against the countertop, cursing herself for her total lack of cool. She was so anxious to keep a distance between them she didn’t register the discomfort of the dorsal fin of the wooden dolphin pressing into her back.
It wasn’t fair a man could be so outrageously handsome. The Black Irish looks he’d inherited from his mother’s side gave him the currency he could have chosen to trade for a career as an actor or model. But he’d laughed that off in a self-deprecating way when she’d teased him with it.
Which had only made him seem even more appealing.
How very wrong could she have been about a man?
‘I only just got here from Sydney, after a four-hour drive,’ she said. ‘I...I haven’t really thought where to start.’
‘Can I get you a drink—some water, a coffee?’ he asked.
He sounded so sincere. All part of the act.
‘No, thank you,’ she said, regaining some of her manners now the shock of seeing him had passed. After all, he was her sister’s brother-in-law. She couldn’t just ask him to leave, the way she’d like to. ‘I stopped for a bite to eat on the way down.’
Despite herself she couldn’t help scanning his face to see what change six months had brought him. Heaven knew what change he saw in her. She felt all the stress of the last months had aged her way more than her twenty-nine years.
He, about the same age, looked as though a care had never caused his brow to furrow. His tan was deeper than when she’d last seen him, making his eyes seem even bluer. A day away from a shave, dark growth shadowed his jaw. His black hair was longer and curled around his ears. She remembered the way she had fisted her hand in his hair to pull him closer as she’d kissed him.
How could she have been so taken in by him?
She squirmed with regret. She’d known of his reputation. But one champagne had led to one champagne too many and all the tightly held resolutions she’d made after her divorce about having nothing to do with too-handsome, too-charming men had dissolved in the laughter and fun she’d shared with Jesse.
Was he remembering that night? How they’d found the same exhilarating rhythm dancing with each other? How, when the band had taken a break, they’d gone outside on the balcony?
She’d been warned that Jesse was a heartbreaker, a womaniser. But he’d been fun and there hadn’t been much fun in her life for a long time. It had seemed the most natural thing in the world to slip into his arms when he had kissed her in a private corner of the balcony lit only by the faintest beams of moonlight. His kiss had been magical—slow, sensuous, thrilling. It had evoked needs and desires long buried and she had given herself to the moment, not caring about consequences.
Then a group of other guests had pushed through the doors to the balcony with a burst of loud chatter, and broken the spell.
It had been the classic wedding cliché—the chief bridesmaid and the best man getting caught in a passionate clinch.
Lizzie cringed at the memory of those moments. The hoots and catcalls of the other guests as they’d discovered them kissing. ‘Jesse’s at it again,’ someone had called, laughing.
She’d never felt more humiliated. Not because of being caught kissing. They were both single adults who could kiss whomever they darn well pleased. She’d laughed that off. No. The humiliation was caused by the painful awareness she’d been seen as just another in a long line of Jesse’s girls. Girls he had kissed and discarded when the next pretty face had come along.
But, despite knowing that, it hadn’t stopped her from going back for more with Jesse that night. Why had she imagined he’d be any different with her?
What an idiot she’d been.
Now she cleared her throat, determined to make normal—if stilted—conversation; not to let Jesse know how shaken she was at seeing him again. How compellingly attractive she still found him.
‘Aren’t you meant to be gallivanting around the world doing good works? I thought you were in India,’ she asked. Jesse worked for an international aid organisation that built housing for the victims of natural disasters.
Jesse shook his head. ‘The Philippines this time. Rebuilding villages in the aftermath of a gigantic mudslide. Thousands of houses were destroyed.’
‘That must have been dangerous,’ she said. Jesse was a party guy personified, and yet his job took him to developing countries where he used his skills as an engineer to help strangers in need. She’d found that contradiction fascinating.
Just another way she’d been sucked into his game.
‘Dangerous and dirty,’ he said simply. ‘But that’s what we do.’
She shouldn’t feel a surge of relief that he had escaped that danger without harm. But she did. Though she told herself that was just because he was part of the extended family now. The black sheep, as far as she was concerned.
‘So you’re back here because...?’
‘The “good works” led to an injured shoulder,’ he said. He raised his broad right shoulder to demonstrate and in doing so winced. His so-handsome face contorted in pain and the blood drained, leaving him pale under his tan.
Her first reaction was to rush over and comfort him. To stroke his shoulder to help ease the pain. Or offer to kiss it better...
No! She forced her thoughts away from Crazyville. Gripped her hands tightly together so she wouldn’t be tempted. She was furious with herself. Wasn’t she meant to now be immune to his appeal?
Getting together with Jesse Morgan at the wedding had been like nibbling on just one square of a bar of fine Belgian dark chocolate and denying herself the rest even though she knew it would be utterly delicious. Quite possibly the best chocolate she had ever tasted.
But she prided herself on her willpower when it came to chocolate. And men who offered her nothing more than a fleeting physical thrill.
Her aim was to build a new life for her and Amy. She didn’t want a man around to complicate things. Not now. Maybe not ever. And if she did decide to date again it wouldn’t be with someone like Jesse Morgan. She’d been there, done that, with her good-looking charmer of an ex-husband who had let her down so badly.
The next man for her—if she decided to go there—would be steady, reliable, living in the same country as her and average-looking. She wanted a man who only had eyes for her.
Jesse was a player and Lizzie didn’t want to play. Her party-girl days were far behind her. It would be work, work, work for her in Dolphin Bay. And being the best mother she could possibly be to her precious daughter.
Not that Jesse was giving her any indication that he had a real interest in her. Not now. Not then. It still stung. How could she have believed in him?
After they’d been interrupted on the balcony, she’d rushed away to look in on Amy. When she’d returned, out of breath from her hurry to get back to Jesse, she had found him dancing with a beautiful dark-haired woman, his head too close to hers, his laughter ringing out over the noise of the band. Had he taken her out onto the balcony and kissed her too? Lizzie hadn’t hung around to find out. She’d avoided him for the rest of the evening.
‘I’m sorry to hear you’ve been hurt,’ she said stiffly.
Boy, had she wanted to hurt him back then.
‘All in the line of duty,’ he said. ‘My own fault for grappling with a too-large concrete beam without help.’
‘So you’ve come home to recuperate?’ she asked. She became aware of the carving pressing into her back and moved from the countertop, being careful not to take a step closer to him. Her reaction to him had unnerved her. She didn’t know that she could trust herself not to reach out to him if she got too near.
‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘But I’m bored with all the physiotherapy and “taking it easy”. I’ve been helping Ben and Sandy finish off the café.’ He looked around him with a proprietorial air that she found disconcerting. ‘Impressive, isn’t it?’
‘Very,’ she said. ‘I love the dolphin carvings. Every business in this town has to display some kind of dolphin motif, if I remember correctly. These are works of art.’
She kept her tone neutral but inside she was seething. In all their phone calls and Skype discussions about the progress of the café, Sandy had never once mentioned that Jesse was back in town. Her sister, along with everyone else in this gossip-ridden small town, knew she and Jesse had been caught making out on the balcony.
It wouldn’t have been a huge deal anywhere else but here it was big news. Jesse was the kind of guy the locals kept odds on. The big bets were on that he would never settle down with one woman.
She found herself nervously glancing out of the plate glass windows that led to the street for fear people walking by might notice her and Jesse alone together.
She didn’t want to become part of the Jesse mythology. Be a butt of local jokes. But her indiscretion on the night of the wedding meant, most likely, she’d been added to the list of his conquests. Why hadn’t Sandy warned her Jesse had made an unscheduled visit home? That he’d be working on the café? It would be almost impossible to avoid him.
As Jesse reached out to touch the dolphin carvings, she jerked away from him to avoid any possible contact. He raised a dark eyebrow but didn’t say anything. Which made her feel even more ill at ease.
‘They’re by the same Balinese carvers as the fittings next door in Bay Books,’ he said, stroking the dolphin. She couldn’t look, couldn’t let herself remember how good his hands had felt on the bare skin of her back in her strapless bridesmaid dress. ‘Sandy had the countertop custom-made and then imported it. I only finished installing it yesterday.’
‘So you’ve completed work on the fit-out now?’ She spoke through gritted teeth. Please, please, please let him be on his way back to his job in the Philippines.
‘Just about.’
She sighed with too-obvious relief. ‘So you won’t be around much longer.’
Only a tightening of his beautifully chiselled lips betrayed he’d noticed her tone.
‘There’s the unpacking to do. And I still have to finish off some tiling upstairs in your apartment,’ he said.
‘You’ve been working up there?’ She regretted the squawk of alarm as soon as it had escaped from her mouth. Jesse in her bathroom; maybe in her bedroom? The thought was disconcerting, to say the least.
But she couldn’t let him know she was worried he would invade her private thoughts when she was alone in those rooms. She mustn’t let that happen.
‘Sandy wanted the bathroom remodelled to be as comfortable as possible for you and your little girl,’ he said.
‘Thank you for your help,’ she managed politely. ‘It was a big order to get it ready in time for us to move in.’
Her real gratitude was to Sandy. How many other down-on-their-luck chefs had a sister who had offered not only a job but also a place to live, rent-free?
But having Jesse Morgan around hadn’t been part of the deal. She didn’t want to be reminded of her lack of judgement on the night of the wedding. Of the folly of being in his arms. She should have known better than to fall for that kind of guy again.
Because, no matter how many times over the last six months she’d told herself that Jesse was bad news, seeing him again made her aware she’d be lying if she thought she was immune to him. He was still out-and-out the most attractive man she’d ever met. She would have to fight that attraction every moment she found herself in his company. Dear heaven, let there not be too many of those moments.
She looked purposefully around her again. ‘I’d hate for the building work here to delay your recuperation.’
Jesse’s deep blue eyes narrowed. ‘So I can get the hell out of Dolphin Bay, you mean?’
She struggled to meet his gaze. ‘I...I didn’t mean it like that,’ she lied.
His face set in grim lines. ‘You might not like it but you’d better get used to me being around. I’m going to be here for at least another month while my shoulder heals.’
She couldn’t help her little gasp of horror. ‘What?’
Only the twist of his mouth indicated he’d heard. ‘Sandy needs help to get this venture up and running and I intend to give it to her. The Morgan family is grateful to Sandy. Heaven knows where Ben would be if she hadn’t come back into his life after all those years.’
‘Of course,’ she said, suddenly feeling shamefaced that all she was thinking about was herself.
Lizzie and Sandy had first visited Dolphin Bay on a family vacation as teenagers. They’d stayed in the Morgan family’s character-filled old guest house. Lizzie remembered Jesse from that time as an arrogant show-off, flexing his well-developed teenage muscles at any opportunity. But Sandy had fallen in love with Ben. They hadn’t met again until twelve years later, after Ben had lost his first wife and baby son in the fire that had destroyed the guest house. Together they’d taken a second chance on love.
‘I want to make this café a success for Sandy as well,’ Lizzie continued. ‘And for Ben, too—he’s a marvellous brother-in-law. They’ve both been very good to me.’
Sandy was the only person she felt she could really trust. They’d been allies in the battleground that had been their family, led by their bully of a father. Her older sister had always watched out for her. Just like she was watching out for her and Amy now. Lizzie owed her.
‘Then we’re on the same page,’ Jesse said.
‘Right,’ she said, unable to keep the anxiety from her voice.
‘Bay Bites opens in a week’s time. We don’t have time to waste bickering,’ Jesse said.
He took a few steps towards her until she was back up against that dolphin fin again and she couldn’t back away from him any further. She felt breathless at his proximity, the memories of how good it had felt to be in his arms treacherously near the surface.
But this wasn’t the fun, charming Jesse she’d known at the wedding bearing down on her. This Jesse looked tough, implacable and she didn’t think it was her imagination that he seemed suddenly contemptuous of her.
‘So better grit your teeth and bear being in my company for as long as it takes,’ he said.
She’d had no idea his voice could sound so harsh.
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_fd4cb7df-c497-56cc-9dbf-e50d273f038d)
JESSE NEARLY LAUGHED out loud at the expression of dismay on Lizzie’s face. She so obviously didn’t want to work with him any more than he wanted to work with her. Not after her behaviour at Ben and Sandy’s wedding.
He could brush off his reputation as a player—but that wasn’t to say he liked it. And he hadn’t liked being made a fool of by Lizzie in the public arena of his brother’s wedding reception. He hadn’t appreciated having to make so many gritted teeth responses to his Dolphin Bay friends as they’d asked why Lizzie had left him high and dry when they’d so publicly been having a good time together. That had been difficult when he’d had no idea himself. There had been only so many jokes about whether he needed to change his deodorant that he could take. His banter had run dry long before he’d realised Lizzie wasn’t coming back.
He indicated the packages propped up against the wall. ‘Right now I’m here to help you get those artworks up on the walls.’
‘I’m not sure I need help,’ she said, folding her arms in front of her. ‘I’m quite capable of placing the artwork myself.’
Lizzie’s looks were deceptive. Tall and slender with a mass of white blonde, finely curled hair, she gave the initial impression of being frail. But he knew there was steel under that fragile appearance. Her arms might be slim but they were firm with lean muscle. At the wedding she’d explained that hauling heavy cooking pans around a restaurant kitchen was a daily weight training regime.
‘No,’ he said curtly. ‘That’s my job and I’m here to do it.’
‘What about your shoulder? Surely you shouldn’t be lifting stuff.’
‘Canvas artworks? Not a problem. This phase of my rehab calls for some light lifting.’
‘But I need time to sort through them, to decide which paintings I like best.’
Her bottom lip stuck out stubbornly. She was putting up a fight. Tough. He’d promised Sandy he’d help out. For the years Ben had been immersed in grief, Jesse felt he had lost his adored older brother. Sandy’s love had restored Ben to him. He could never thank her enough. If that meant having to spend too much time with her sister, he’d endure it. Lizzie could put up with it too.
He thought into the future and saw a long procession of family occasions where he and Lizzie would be forced into each other’s company, whether they liked it or not. He had to learn to deal with it. So would she. And he would have to forever ignore how attractive he found her.
‘That’s where we read from the same page,’ he said patiently, as if he were talking to a child. ‘You choose. I hammer a nail in the wall and hang the picture. Then the artists want the rejects back ASAP.’
She looked startled. ‘Rejects? I wouldn’t want to offend any artists. Art appreciation is such a personal thing.’
‘The artists have supplied these paintings to be sold on consignment,’ he explained. ‘You sell them through the café and get a commission on each sale. If they don’t get hung this time, maybe they’ll survive your cull next time.’
Lizzie nodded. It was the first time she’d agreed with him, though he sensed it took an effort. ‘True. So I should probably compile an A-list for immediate hanging and a B-list for reserves. The Bs can then be ready to slip into place when the As are sold.’
‘In theory a good idea. But keep the grading system to yourself. This is a small community.’
‘Point taken,’ she said, meeting his gaze square on. ‘I’ll defer to your small-town wisdom. We city people don’t understand such things.’
He didn’t miss the subtle edge of sarcasm to her words and again he had to fight a smile. He’d liked that tough core to her.
In fact when he’d met Lizzie at the pre-wedding party in Sydney for Ben and Sandy, he’d been immediately drawn to her. And not just for her good looks.
With her slender body, light blonde hair and cool grey eyes set in the pale oval of her face, she’d seemed ethereally lovely. But when she’d smiled, her eyes had lit up with a warmth and vivacity that had surprised him.
‘Let’s celebrate these long-lost lovers getting together in style,’ she’d said with a big earthy laugh that had been a wholehearted invitation to fun. From then on, the evening had turned out a whole lot better than he’d expected.
Lizzie had made him laugh with her tales of life in the stressful, volatile world of commercial kitchens. That night had been memorable. So had the wedding reception a few days later. She’d kept him entertained with a game where she made amusing whispered predictions about the favourite foods of the other guests. All based on years of personal research into restaurant guests’ tastes, she’d assured him with a straight face.
He hadn’t been sure whether she was serious or not. Thing was, she’d been right more often than she’d been wrong. She’d had him watching the wedding guests as they made their choices at the buffet. He’d whooped with her when she’d got it right—his father heading straight for the fillet of beef—and commiserated with her when she’d got it wrong—an ultra-thin friend of the bride loading her plate with desserts. The game was silly, childish even, but he had thoroughly enjoyed every moment of her company. Those moments out on the balcony where she’d come so willingly into his arms had been a bonus.
At that time, he’d been in dire need of some levity and laughter, having just unexpectedly encountered the woman who had broken his heart years before. He’d first met the older, more worldly-wise Camilla when he’d been twenty-five; she’d been a photojournalist documenting his team’s rebuilding of a flood-damaged community in Sri Lanka. He’d thought he’d never see her again after their disastrous break-up that had left him shattered and cynical about love, loyalty and trust.
At the wedding, lovely, spirited Lizzie had been both a distraction and a reminder that there could be life after treacherous Camilla.
Until Lizzie had walked out on him at the wedding without warning.
And now he was facing a completely different Lizzie. A Lizzie where it seemed as if the spark had fizzled right out of her. She was chilly. Standoffish. Hostile, even.
It made him wonder why he had found her appealing. He’d been so wrong about Camilla; seemed as if he’d misjudged Lizzie too.
He hadn’t been on top of his game at that time; that was for sure.
And now, by the mere fact her sister was married to his brother, he was stuck with her. Trouble was, he still found her every bit as beautiful as when he’d first met her.
The sooner they got the paintings hung and the boxes unpacked, the sooner he could get out of here and away from her prickly presence. He’d endured some difficult situations in his time. But it looked as if putting up with Lizzie was going to be one of the most difficult of all. Even twenty minutes with her was stretching his patience. But there was work to be done and he’d made a commitment to Sandy.
He’d break his time working with Lizzie into manageable blocks. He reckoned he could endure two hours of forced politeness in her company; manage to ignore how lovely she was. He’d make a strict schedule and stick to it. He looked at his watch. One hour and forty minutes to go. ‘Let’s get cracking on sorting those paintings. There’s an amazing one of dolphins surfing I think you might want to look at first.’
* * *
Under her breath, Lizzie let off a string of curse words. She swore fluently in both English and French—it was difficult not to pick up some very colourful language working in the pressure cooker atmosphere of commercial kitchens.
But these days she kept a guard on her tongue. No way did she want Amy picking up any undesirable phrases. So she kept the curse words rolling only in her mind. This particular stream was directed—non-verbally of course—towards her sister. What had Sandy been thinking to trap her in such close confines with Jesse Morgan?
He was insufferable. Talking to her as if she was an idiot. Well, she had been an idiot to have fancied him so much at the wedding. To have let physical attraction overrule good sense. But that was then and this was now.
Like many chefs, during the years she had worked in other peoples’ restaurants, she had entertained the idea of running a restaurant of her own. In fact she and Philippe had been working towards just that until she’d unexpectedly fallen pregnant and everything had changed.
For sure, her dream of running her own show hadn’t centred on a café in a place like Dolphin Bay but she could make the most of her downgraded dream. She knew what it took to make customers want to come to a restaurant—and to keep them coming. She didn’t need Mr Know-It-All Jesse Morgan telling her how to choose the art for the walls. For heaven’s sake, was he going to tell her what dishes to put on the menu?
She made a point of looking at her watch too. Two could play at this game. ‘Okay, let’s unwrap the paintings one at a time and then I’ll compare them and decide which ones I like best. Without being so insensitive as to grade them, of course.’
For a moment she thought she saw a smile lurk around the corners of his grimly set mouth. It passed so quickly she could have imagined it. But for a second—just that second—she’d seen again that Jesse from the wedding who had appealed to her so much. Boy, had she got him wrong.
She walked across to the stacks of paintings. ‘Shall we start with the largest one first?’ she said.
Jesse nodded as he followed her over. ‘That’s the surfing dolphins one.’
She immediately wished she’d decided to open the smallest ones first. But she couldn’t backtrack now.
The painting was bracketed with sheets of cardboard and then wrapped with thick brown paper. She started to open it but the paper was too tough to tear. Silently, Jesse reached into his pocket and pulled out a retractable-blade utility knife. Again without saying a word, he clicked it free of its safety cover and handed it to her.
‘Thanks,’ she muttered, biting down on the urge to tell him not to keep such a dangerous tool in his pocket. She knew she was being unreasonable, but Jesse seemed to have that effect on her. As much as she hated to admit it, she’d been hurt by his behaviour at the wedding, and she would do whatever it took to protect herself from feeling that way again.
She crouched down and carefully slit the paper across the top of the wrapping. As she went to cut down the side, Jesse reached out a hand to stop her.
She flinched. Don’t touch me, she wanted to snarl. But that would sound irrational. She gritted her teeth.
‘Leave that,’ he said. ‘If you don’t cut the sides the painting will be easier to get back in the wrapping.’
She stilled for the long moment his hand stayed on her wrist. Of course he had beautiful hands, just like the rest of him—she couldn’t fail to register that. His fingers were warm and immediately familiar on her bare skin. She closed her eyes tight. She couldn’t deal with this. But she was just about to shake off his hand when he removed it. She realised she was holding her breath and she let it out in a controlled sigh that she prayed he didn’t register.
‘Good idea,’ she managed to choke out. Why did he have to stand so close beside her?
‘I’ll give you a hand to slide the painting out. It’s too heavy for one person.’
She had to acknowledge the truth in that. It would seem churlish not to. ‘Thanks,’ she said.
She stood at one end of the painting and he at the other and they lifted it free of its wrappings. As the image emerged, she could not help a gasp. The artist had perfectly captured in acrylic, on the underside of a breaking aquamarine wave, a pod of dolphins joyfully surfing towards the beach. ‘It’s wonderful. No. More than wonderful. Breathtaking.’
Jesse would have been justified in an I-told-you-so smirk. Instead he nodded. ‘I thought so too,’ he said.
Lizzie reached out a hand to touch the painting then drew it back. ‘This artist is so talented. It looks like Big Ray beach, is it?’ Big Ray was the local surf beach. It had a different name on the maps. The locals called it Big Ray because of the two enormous dark manta rays that periodically glided their way from one headland to the other. As a kid, visiting Dolphin Bay, she had been both fascinated by and frightened of them.
‘Yep. One of the smaller paintings is of the rays.’
‘Let’s open that one next.’ She couldn’t keep the excitement from her voice.
‘So the big one passes muster?’
‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘It gets a triple A. You were absolutely right. It’s perfect.’ She indicated a central spot on the wall. ‘It would look fabulous right there.’
‘I agree,’ he said. ‘The artist will be delighted. She was really hoping you’d choose one of her paintings.’
‘She?’ The word slipped out of her mouth.
Jesse’s eyes darkened to the colour of the sea on a stormy day. ‘Yes. She. Is that a problem?’
‘Of course not. It’s just—’
‘It’s just that you’ve jumped to the immediate wrong conclusion. The artist is a friend of my mother. A retired art teacher. I know her because she taught me at high school. Not because she’s one of the infamous “Jesse’s girls”.’
‘I...I didn’t think that for one moment. Of course I didn’t.’ Of course she had.
At the wedding, she had wanted to be with Jesse so much, she had refused to acknowledge his reputation. Until he himself had shown her the truth of it.
She took a step away from him. His physical presence was so powerful she was uncomfortably aware of him. His muscular arms, tan against the white of his T-shirt. The strength of his chest. His flawless face. Stand too close and she could sense his body heat, breathe the spice of his scent that immediately evoked memories she was desperately trying to suppress.
She thought quickly. ‘I...I just thought the artist might have been a man because of the sheer size and scale of the painting.’
‘Fair enough,’ he conceded, though to her eye he didn’t look convinced. In fact she had the impression he was struggling to contain a retort. ‘If you’re sure you want this painting as the hero, let’s get it up first so we can then balance the others around it.’
‘That could work,’ she said. He was right, of course he was right. And she could not let her memories of how he had hurt her hinder her from giving him the courtesy she owed him for his help.
He stood in front of the wall and narrowed his eyes. After a long pause he pointed. ‘If we centre it there, I reckon we’ll be able to achieve a balanced display.’
‘Okay,’ she said.
It wasn’t a good idea to stand behind him. His rear view was even more appealing than she had remembered. Those broad shoulders, the butt that could sell a million pairs of jeans. She stepped forward so she was beside him. Darn, her shoulders were practically nudging his. Stand in front of him and she’d remember too well how he’d slid his arms around her and nuzzled her neck out on that balcony. How she’d ached for so much more. She settled for taking a few steps sidewards, so quickly she nearly tripped.
As it happened, she needn’t have bothered with evasive tactics. He headed for a toolbox she hadn’t noticed tucked away behind the counter and took out an electric drill, a hammer, a spirit level, a handful of plastic wall plugs and a jar of nails. ‘It’s a double brick wall with no electrics in the way so we can hang the picture exactly where we want it.’
‘I can’t wait to see it up,’ she said.
She found his continual use of the word ‘we’ disconcerting. No way did she want to be thought as part of a team with Jesse Morgan. But, she had to admit, she was totally lacking in drilling skills. Sandy knew that. And why pay a handyman when Jesse was volunteering his time?
He pulled a pencil from out of his pocket, marked a spot on the wall and proceeded to drill. It seemed an awkward angle for someone with a shoulder injury but who was she to question him? But he easily drilled a neat hole, with only the finest spray of masonry dust to mar the freshly painted wall. ‘Done,’ he said in a satisfied tone.
He put down the drill, picked up the hammer and the wall plug. He positioned the wall plug with his left hand and took aim with the hammer in his right. His sudden curse curdled the air and the hammer thudded to the floor.
‘Jesse! Are you okay?’
‘Just my shoulder,’ he groaned, gripping it and doubling over. ‘Not a good angle for it.’
‘How can I help?’ She felt useless in the face of his pain. Disconcerted by her immediate urge to touch him, to comfort him.
He straightened up, wincing. ‘You hold the nail and I’ll wield the hammer using both hands, it’ll take the strain off the shoulder.’
‘Or you could let me use the hammer.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’ll do it.’
Was it masculine pride? Or did he honestly think she couldn’t use a hammer? Whatever, she had no intention of getting into an argument over it. ‘Okay,’ she said.
He handed her the nail and, using her left hand, she positioned it against the wall plug. She was tall, but Jesse was taller. To reach the nail he had to manoeuvre himself around her. Her shoulders were pressed against the solid wall of his chest. He was too close. Her heart started to thud so fast she felt giddy; her knees went wobbly. She dropped the nail, twisted to get away from him and found herself staring directly up into his face. For a long, long moment their eyes connected.
‘I...I can’t do this, Jesse,’ she finally stuttered as she pushed away from him.
Three of his large strides took him well away from her before he turned to face her again. He cleared his throat. ‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘We can’t just continue to ignore what happened between us at the wedding. Or why you ran away the next day without saying goodbye.’
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_36c551ae-5cb4-5bf3-a6a5-d2638b0d018c)
THE LIZZIE JESSE had known six months ago hadn’t been short of a quick retort or a comment that bordered on the acerbic. Now she struggled to make a response. But he didn’t prompt her. He’d waited six months for her excuse. He could wait minutes more.
Instead he tilted back on the heels of his boots, stuck his thumbs into the belt of his jeans and watched her, schooling his face to be free of expression.
She opened her mouth to speak then shut it again. She twisted a flyaway piece of her pale blonde hair that had worked itself free from the plait that fell between her shoulder blades.
‘Not ignore. Forget,’ she said at last.
‘Forget us getting together ever happened?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It was a lapse of judgement on my part.’
He snorted. ‘I’ve been insulted before but to be called a “lapse of judgement” is a first.’
She clapped her hand over her mouth. ‘I didn’t mean it to come out quite like that.’
‘I’m tough; I can take it,’ he said. He went to shrug his shoulders but it hurt. In spite of his bravado, so had her words.
‘But I meant it,’ she said. ‘It should never have happened. The...the episode on the balcony was a mistake.’ She had a soft, sweet mouth but her words twisted it into something bordering on bitter.
‘I remember it as being a whole lot of fun,’ he said slowly.
She tilted her chin in a movement that was surprisingly combative. ‘Seems like our memories of that night are very different.’
‘I remember lots of laughter and a warm, beautiful woman by my side,’ he said.
By now she had braced herself against the back of the counter as if she wanted to push herself away from him as far as she possibly could. ‘You mean you’ve forgotten the way a rowdy group of your friends came out and...and caught us—’
‘Caught us kissing. Yeah. I remember. I’ve known those people all my life. They were teasing. You didn’t seem to be bothered by it at the time.’
‘It was embarrassing.’
‘You were laughing.’
That piece of hair was getting a workout now between her slender fingers. ‘To hide how I really felt.’
He paused. ‘Do you often do that?’
She stilled. ‘Laugh, you mean?’
He searched her face. ‘Hide how you really feel.’
She met his gaze full on with a challenging tilt to her head. ‘Doesn’t everyone?’
‘You laughed it off. Said you had to go check on Amy.’
Her gaze slid away so it didn’t meet his. ‘Yes.’
‘You never came back.’
‘I did but...but you were otherwise engaged.’
‘Huh? I don’t get it. I was waiting for you.’ He’d checked his watch time and time again, but she still hadn’t shown up. Finally he’d asked someone if they’d seen Lizzie. They’d pointed her out on the other side of the room in conversation with a group of the most gossipy girls in Dolphin Bay. She hadn’t come near him again.
Now she met his eyes again, hers direct and shadowed with accusation. ‘You were dancing with another woman. When you’d told me all dances for the evening were reserved for me.’
He remembered the running joke they had shared—Jesse with a ‘Reserved for Lizzie’ sign on his back, Lizzie with a ‘Reserved for Jesse’ sign. The possessiveness had been in jest but he had meant it.
He frowned. ‘After the duty dances for the wedding—including with your delightful little daughter—the only woman I danced with that evening was you. Refresh my memory about the other one?’
She turned her head to the side. Her body language told him loud and clear she’d rather be anywhere else than here with him. In spite of the café and Sandy and family obligations.
‘It was nothing,’ she said, tight-lipped. ‘You had every right to dance with another woman.’
He reached out and cupped her chin to pull her back to face him. ‘Let’s get this straight. I only wanted to dance with you that night.’
For a long moment he looked deep into her eyes until she tried to wiggle away from him and he released her. ‘So describe this mystery woman to me,’ he said.
‘Black hair, tall, beautiful, wearing a red dress.’ It sounded as if the words were being dragged out of her.
He frowned.
‘You seemed very happy to be with her,’ she prompted.
Realisation dawned. ‘Red dress? It was my cousin. I was with my cousin Marie. She’d just told me she was pregnant. She and her husband had been trying for years to start a family. I was talking with her while I waited for you to come back.’
‘Oh,’ Lizzie said in a very small voice, her head bowed.
‘I wasn’t dancing with her. More like whirling her around in a dance of joy. A baby is everything she’s always wanted.’
‘I...I’m glad for her,’ Lizzie said in an even more diminished voice.
He couldn’t keep the edge of anger from his voice. ‘You thought I’d moved on to someone else? That I’d kissed you out on the balcony—in front of an audience—and then found another woman while you were out of the room for ten minutes?’
She looked up at him. ‘That’s what it seemed like from where I was standing. I’ve never felt so foolish.’
‘So why didn’t you come over and slap me on the face or whack me with your purse or do whatever jealous women do in such circumstances?’
‘I wasn’t jealous. Just...disappointed.’ Her gaze slid away again.
‘I was disappointed when you didn’t come back. When you took off to Sydney the next day without saying goodbye. When you didn’t return my phone calls.’
‘I...I...misunderstood. I’m sorry.’
She turned her back on him and walked around the countertop so it formed a physical barrier between them. When she got to the glass jars she picked one up and put it down. He noticed her hands weren’t quite steady.
Even with the counter between them, it would be easy to lean over and touch her again. Even kiss her. He fought the impulse. She so obviously didn’t want to be touched. And he didn’t want to start anything he had no intention of continuing. He wanted to clear up a misunderstanding that had festered for six months. That was all. He took a step back to further increase the distance between them.
‘I get what happened. You believed my bad publicity,’ he said.
‘Publicity? I don’t know what you mean.’ But the flickering of her eyelashes told him she probably had a fair idea of what he meant.
‘My reputation. Don’t tell me you weren’t warned about me. That I’m a player. A ladies’ man. That you’d be one of “Jesse’s girls” until I tired of you.’
How he’d grown to hate that old song from the nineteen-eighties where the singer wailed over and over that he wanted ‘Jessie’s girl’. Apparently his parents had played it at his christening party and it had followed him ever since; had become his signature song.
She flushed high on her cheeks. ‘No. Of course not.’
‘You should know—reports of my love life are greatly exaggerated.’
He used to get a kick out of his reputation for being a guaranteed girl magnet—what free-wheeling guy in his teens and early twenties wouldn’t?—though he’d never taken it seriously. But now, as thirty loomed, he was well and truly over living up to the Jesse legend. A legend that had always been more urban myth than fact.
But he’d done nothing to dispel it. In fact it had been a convenient shield against ever having to explain why he’d closed his heart off against a committed relationship. Why he dated fun-for-now, unchallenging girls and always stayed in control of where the relationship went.
Camilla’s words haunted him. ‘You won’t miss me for a minute; a guy as good-looking as you can get any woman you want just by snapping your fingers—there’ll always be another one waiting in line.’ It wasn’t true, as she herself had proven. He had wanted her. Badly. And she had gutted and filleted his heart as surely as his father did the fish he caught. He would never expose himself to that kind of pain again.
‘I didn’t need to be warned,’ Lizzie said. ‘I figured it out for myself. You and Kate Parker, Sandy’s other bridesmaid, were the talk of the wedding. How you’d come back from your travels and hooked up with her. How Kate wouldn’t have more luck with getting you to commit than any other of the long line of girlfriends before her.’
As he’d suspected, the Dolphin Bay gossips had struck again. Didn’t the women in this town have anything better to do with their time? Though for all their poking their noses into other people’s business, they’d never come close to ferreting out the reasons why he’d stayed so resolutely single.
Kate had been his childhood friend. There’d been a long-standing joke between their families that if they hadn’t met anyone else by the time they were aged thirty they’d settle down with each other.
‘Not true. We kissed. Once. To see if there was anything more than friendship between us. There wasn’t. We were just friends. Still are friends.’
Lizzie shrugged. ‘I realised that. I soon sussed out she only had eyes for the other groomsman, your friend Sam Lancaster.’
‘True. It seemed like one minute Kate was organising Ben and Sandy’s wedding, the next minute she was planning her own.’
‘I heard they eloped and got married at some fabulous Indian palace hotel.’
‘You heard right. I was Sam’s best man. It turned out great for them,’ he said.
He was really happy for his old friends. But if he was honest with himself, there had been an awkward moment when Kate had made it very clear the kiss had been a disaster for her. Coming on top of what had happened with Camilla it had struck a serious blow to his male pride. By the time of the wedding he’d been in a real funk, questioning things about himself he’d never before had cause to question.
Meeting Lizzie had done a lot to help soothe his bruised ego—until she’d walked away without a word of explanation.
But that had been six months ago. He’d moved on. Now his circumstances were very different. He’d come to a real turning point in his career and the path he chose was crucial to his future. The recent encounter with Camilla had made him realise it could be time to move on from his work with the charity. He’d told his boss there was a good chance he wouldn’t return after his shoulder healed. He would not turn his back on it completely but would remain involved as a volunteer and as a fund-raiser.
A new direction had opened with the offer of a fast-track job with a multinational construction company based in Houston, Texas. It would be a challenging, demanding role in a ruthlessly competitive commercial environment. But living in the United States would mean he’d rarely make it home to Dolphin Bay.
As far as Lizzie went, he just wanted to clear up a misunderstanding that had left her resentful of him and him disappointed in her. They’d missed their chance to be any kind of couple, even the most casual. Once the misunderstanding was sorted, they could work together without awkwardness. After all, she was part of the family now and would always be around. They had to come to some sort of mutual good terms.
‘Weddings have a lot to answer for,’ she said. ‘All that romance and emotion floating around makes people do things they really shouldn’t. Fool around when they shouldn’t. Behave in ways they later regret.’
‘Just for the record, I wasn’t just fooling around with you at the wedding,’ he said.
She flushed redder. ‘Maybe I was just fooling around with you.’
‘Maybe you were.’
‘Maybe I’m the player,’ she said. There was a return of that teasing spirit he’d liked so much, a spark that warmed her cool grey eyes. He found himself wanting her to smile.
Jesse only vaguely remembered Lizzie from her first visit to Dolphin Bay. She’d been sixteen, beanpole-thin and flat-chested. He’d been sixteen, too. But testosterone had well and truly kicked in and he’d considered himself a man.
He wasn’t ashamed to admit he hadn’t found her attractive then. He’d been a typical teenage boy who’d looked to the more obvious.
That summer, his brother Ben had been busy falling in love with Sandy. Jesse had been busy trying to decide between three curvaceous older girls who’d made their interest in him more than clear. He hadn’t chosen any of them. Even then he hadn’t valued what came to him too easily.
When he’d met Lizzie again, more than twelve years later, he’d been knocked over at the woman she’d become. Elegant; sensual without being blatantly sexy; classy. Now she wore simple narrow-legged jeans and a plain white shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Her hair was tied back off her face in a plait. She looked sensational without even trying.
‘Are you a player?’ he asked. ‘I somehow doubt that.’
Her eyes dimmed and it was as if that hint of party-girl Lizzie had been extinguished again. ‘No. I’m a divorced single mum with a social life on hold indefinitely. I’m here to work hard at making this café a success and to devote myself to Amy.’
‘I get that,’ he said. ‘Being a lone parent must be one of the toughest gigs around.’
‘Tougher than I could have imagined,’ she said. ‘But it’s worth it. Amy is the best thing that ever happened to me.’
‘You were young when you had her.’
‘Becoming a mother at age twenty-three wasn’t part of my game plan, I can assure you. But I don’t regret it even for a second.’
He frowned. ‘Where is Amy? Didn’t she drive down with you from Sydney?’
Lizzie’s daughter was a cute kid; she’d been the flower girl at the wedding and charmed everyone. He’d been sorry he hadn’t had the chance to say goodbye to her too.
‘She’s spending the school vacation in France with her father and his parents. They love her and want her to grow up French. That’s another reason I have to make a success of this café. Philippe would like sole custody and is just waiting for me to fail.’
Sandy had told Jesse a bit of Lizzie’s background. The domineering father. The early marriage. The break-up with the French husband. She hadn’t had it easy. Just as well nothing more had happened with them at the wedding. He wouldn’t want to have added to her burden of hurt. He knew what that felt like.
‘You’ll have a lot of support here,’ he said. ‘Sandy’s a Morgan now and the Morgans look after their own.’
‘I know that. And I’m grateful. But I’ll still have to work, work, work.’ She took a deep breath, looked directly up at him. ‘I’m truly sorry I misread the situation with your cousin. But what happened between us at the wedding can’t happen again; you know that, don’t you?’
Relief flooded through him that she had no expectations of him. She was lovely, quite possibly the loveliest woman he knew. But right now he didn’t want to date anyone either. Not seriously. And Lizzie was the type of person who would expect serious.
‘Lizzie, I—’ he started, but she spoke over him.
‘I told you my social life is on hold. That means no dating. Not you. Not anyone.’
‘I get that,’ he said.
His life was so far removed from Lizzie’s. His job took him to all the points of the earth for extended periods of time. If he ever committed to a woman it would have to be someone without ties. Camilla would have been ideal—a freelance photojournalist with no kids, feisty, independent. But what had happened with Camilla had soured him against getting close to her type of woman.
‘Good,’ Lizzie said, rather more vehemently than his ego would have liked.
‘I hope you can remember what we had at the wedding as no-strings fun that I certainly don’t regret,’ he said.
She nodded. He didn’t know whether he should be insulted, the way she was so eager to agree.
‘But it—’ he started to say.
‘Can’t happen again,’ she joined in so they chorused the words.
He extended his hand to her over the counter. ‘Friends?’
She hesitated and didn’t take his hand. ‘I’m not sure about “friends”—we hardly know each other. I don’t call someone a friend lightly.’
He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. ‘Yep.’
Her eyes widened at his abrupt reply. ‘I don’t mean to be rude,’ she said. ‘Just honest about what I feel.’
Yeah. She was. But her honesty had a sharp edge. All in all, it made him wonder why he’d want to be friends with her anyway. Especially when he knew she was off-limits to anything more than friendship. It would be difficult to be ‘just friends’ with someone he found so attractive. That two-hour limit he’d set himself on the time he spent with her might just be two hours too much.
‘So “just acquaintances” or “just strangers stuck with each other’s company” might be more to the point?’ he said.
She gasped. ‘That sounds dreadful, doesn’t it?’ Then she disarmed him with a smile—the kind of open, appealing smile that had drawn him to her in the first place. ‘Too honest, even for me. After all, we can try to be friends, can’t we?’
‘We can try to be friends,’ he agreed. Two hours at a time. Any more time than that with her each day and he might find himself wanting more than either of them was prepared to give. And that was dangerous.
‘Okay,’ she said, this time taking his hand in hers in a firm grip, shaking it and letting it go after the minimum contact required to seal the deal.
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_28ef392d-7901-5b98-9926-2d42c2487259)
LIZZIE LEANED BACK from the last of the artworks they’d rewrapped to send back to the artist, kneading with fisted hands the small of her back where it ached. ‘That’s it,’ she said. ‘All done, thank goodness. That was harder work than I’d thought it would be.’
‘But worth it,’ said Jesse from beside her.
‘Absolutely worth it. The paintings add to the atmosphere of the café like nothing else could. I hope the artists come in so I can thank them with a coffee.’
But Lizzie felt exhausted. Not just from the effort of unpacking, holding the paintings up against the wall and then repacking the unwanted pictures. But from the strain of working alongside Jesse.
In theory, learning to be ‘just friends’ with him should have been easy. He was personable, smart, and seemed determined to put their history behind them. Gentlemanly, too—in spite of his shoulder injury he insisted on doing any heavy lifting.
Trouble was, she found it impossible to relax around him. She had to consider every word before she uttered it, which made her sound stilted and awkward. The odd uncharacteristic nervous giggle kept bubbling into her conversation.
Could you ever be just friends with a man you’d kissed, wanted, cried over? Especially when that man was so heart-stoppingly attractive. Could you pretend that time together had never happened?
She would have to try.
If it were up to her, she would choose never to see Jesse Morgan again. Even though they’d cleared up the misunderstanding about his cousin, it was hard to be around someone she’d fancied, kissed, liked...when nothing would—or could—ever happen between them. But with the family situation being the way it was, she had to make a real effort to nurture a friendship with him—be pals, buddies, good mates. Future family occasions could be incredibly awkward if she didn’t.
Right now, Jesse stood beside her as they both surveyed the arrangement of paintings on the wall. He was not so close that their shoulders were in danger of nudging but close enough so she was aware of his scent, an intoxicating blend of spicy sandalwood and fresh male sweat. It was too close. Being anywhere within touching distance of Jesse Morgan was too close. Memories of how wonderful it had felt to be in his arms were resurfacing.
She leaned forward to straighten the small painting of the manta rays and used the movement to edge away, hoping he didn’t notice.
‘They look good,’ Jesse said. ‘You chose well.’
She thought about a friend-type thing to say. ‘To be fair, we both made the final selection.’
‘You exercised your power of veto more often than not.’
‘Is that another way of saying I’m a control freak?’ she said without thinking at all.
‘I didn’t say that,’ he said, a smile lurking at the corners of his mouth. ‘But...’
If he was a real friend, she would have punched him lightly on the arm for that and laughed. She wished it could be that way. But there would be no casual jesting and certainly no touching with Jesse. It was too much of a risk.
Instead she made a show of sighing. ‘The success or failure of Bay Bites rests on my shoulders and I’m only too aware of that.’
‘That’s not true,’ he said. ‘You do have help. Sandy. Ben. The staff she’s hired for you. Me.’
She turned to face him. ‘You?’
‘I can work with you for two hours a day.’
‘Two hours?’ That seemed an arbitrary amount of time to allocate. Maybe it was all he could manage with his shoulder. But she couldn’t help wondering what other commitments Jesse had in Dolphin Bay. And if they were of the female kind.
He nodded. ‘Whatever help you need, I’m there for two hours every day.’
That was the trouble with denying attraction when that attraction was an ever-present tension, underlying every word, every glance. The air seemed thick with words better left unspoken. At a different time, in a different life, she could think of some exciting ways to spend two hours alone with Jesse Morgan in her bedroom. But not now.
She cleared her throat. Think neutral, friend-type chat. ‘I appreciate the help with the paintings. Though I’m the one who will be looking at them all day and—call me a control freak—but I really couldn’t say yes to the one of the bronze whaler sharks, no matter how skilfully it was done.’
He’d argued hard for the sharks and he continued to argue. ‘Sharks are part of the ocean. As a surfer I learned to respect them. They’re magnificent creatures. That painting captured them perfectly.’
She shuddered. ‘They’re predators. And I don’t like predators. Also, remember people will be eating in this place. They don’t want to look up and see pictures of creatures that might eat them.’
Jesse grinned, his perfect teeth white against his tan, those blue, blue eyes glinting with good humour. A woman could forget all caution and common sense to win a smile like that.
Again she found herself wishing things could be different, that they could take up from where they’d left off out on that balcony. She had to suppress a sigh at the memory of how exciting his kisses had been.
‘Good point,’ he said. ‘But I still think there are too many wussy pictures of flowers.’
‘So we agree to disagree,’ she said with an upward tilt of her chin.
‘Wussy versus brave?’ he challenged, still with that grin hovering on his so-sexy mouth.
‘If by brave you mean you want to swim with the sharks, then go for it. I’ll stick with dolphins, thanks.’
‘I’ve always liked a challenge,’ he said.
The challenge of the chase? Was that what he meant? Lizzie really didn’t want to know. Or to think too much about how it would feel to be caught up again in Jesse’s arms. She’d just steer clear of him as much as she could. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust him not to overstep the boundaries of a new friendship—it was herself she didn’t trust.
‘I do love the painting of the dolphins surfing,’ she said. ‘If I could afford the price tag, I’d buy it myself.’
He sobered. ‘You’ll have to make sure you don’t get too attached to any of the paintings. You want to sell as many as you can. It’s an added revenue stream for the café.’
‘You’re right. I’ll just get heartbroken when that particular one goes.’
‘Just think of the commission on the sale,’ he said. ‘The quicker the café gets in the black, the better it will be for all concerned.’
She was surprised at how hard-headed and businesslike he sounded. But of course Jesse would be used to not getting attached to pretty things. And that was when she had to bite down on any smart remarks. Not if they were going to try to be friends.
‘Thanks again for your help,’ she said. ‘I’d offer you some lunch but, as you can see, I’m not set up for food just yet.’
‘I hear you’re still finalising the menu. I’m looking forward to being an official food taster on Saturday.’
Lizzie stared. ‘You’re coming to the taste test?’
‘Sandy rounded up all the family to help you try out the recipes.’
‘Oh,’ she said, disconcerted. If she’d thought she’d only be seeing Jesse occasionally during his time back home in Dolphin Bay, she was obviously mistaken. Talking herself out of her attraction to him was going to get even more difficult.
‘When it comes to taste-testing good food, I’m your man,’ he said.
She remembered the game they’d had such fun playing together at the wedding, predicting the favourite foods of the guests. He’d been such good company she’d forgotten all the worries that plagued her that night. Good company and something more that had had her aching for him to kiss her out on that balcony.
‘Let me guess,’ she said, resting her chin on her hand, making a play of thinking hard. ‘The other volunteers will have to fight you for the slow-roasted lamb with beetroot relish. And maybe the caramelised apple pie with vanilla bean ice cream?’
He folded his arms in front of his chest. ‘I’m not going to tell you if you’re right or wrong about what I like. You’ll have to wait for the taste night to see.’
‘Tease,’ she said.
‘You don’t like being made to wait, do you?’ he said, that slow smile still playing at the corners of his mouth.
‘There are some things that are worth waiting for,’ she said, unable to resist a slow smile of her own in return.
For a long moment her eyes met his until she dropped her gaze. She had to stop this. It would be only too easy to flirt with Jesse, to fall back into his arms and that way could lead to disaster. She had to keep their conversations purely on a business level.
She glanced through the connecting doorway and into the bookshop. Sandy was due to see her at any time and there was only a small moment of opportunity left with Jesse.
She lowered her voice. ‘Can I ask you something in confidence?’
His dark brows rose. ‘Sure. Ask away.’
‘I’m concerned about the food I’ve got to work with.’
‘Concerned?’
‘It...it might not be up to scratch.’
He frowned. ‘I’m not sure what you mean. Aren’t the food supplies being ordered through the Hotel Harbourside restaurant? Ben’s hotel is one of the best places to eat in town.’
Ben had built the modern hotel on the site of the old guest house. Alongside, he’d built a row of shops, including Bay Books and Bay Bites.
She winced at Jesse’s understandably defensive tone. But who else could she ask? ‘That’s the problem. I have to tread carefully. But I have to be blunt. The Harbourside is good pub grub. Nothing more. Nothing less. And it’s not up to the standard I want. Not for Bay Bites.’
* * *
Lizzie did tend to be blunt. Jesse had noticed that six months ago. Personally, he appreciated her straightforward manner. But not everyone in Dolphin Bay would. No way could the café succeed if Lizzie was going to look down her straight, narrow little nose at the locals. Could she really fit in here?
‘But isn’t it just a café?’ he said.
‘Just a café? How can you say that?’ Her voice rose with indignation. ‘Because it’s a café doesn’t mean it can’t serve the best food I can possibly offer. Whether I’m cooking in a high-end restaurant or a café, my food will be the best.’ She gave a proud toss to her head that he doubted she even realised she’d made.
There was a passion and an energy to her that he couldn’t help but admire. But he also feared for her. Small country towns could be brutal on newcomers they thought were too big for their boots.
‘You’re not in France now, Lizzie.’
‘More small town wisdom for me?’ Her half-smile took the snarkiness out of the comment.
‘Some advice—you don’t want to make things too fancy. Not a good idea around here to give the impression you think everything is better in France. Or in Sydney.’
Her response was somewhere between a laugh and a snort. ‘You seriously think I’m going to transplant fancy French dining to a south coast café and expect it to work? I might have lived in France for years, but I’m still an Aussie girl and I think I’ve got a good idea of what my customers will like.’
He knew she had a reputation as a talented chef who had established her credentials at a very young age—he wasn’t sure she had the business sense to go with them.
‘And that would be?’ he asked.
‘The very best ingredients served simply.’ She gave another toss of her head that sent her blonde plait swishing across her back. ‘That’s what I learned in France. Not necessarily at the fine-dining establishments in Paris but in the cafés and markets of Lyon and from the home cooking of Amy’s French grandparents. You know they say the heart of France is Paris, but its stomach is Lyon?’
‘I didn’t know that.’ He’d raced through a see-Europe-in-two-weeks type backpacker tour when he was a student that had included Paris and Versailles but that was as far as his knowledge of the country went. ‘My journeys have mainly been of the have-disaster-will-travel type. And the food...well, you wouldn’t want to know about the food.’
‘Of course,’ she said, nodding. ‘I remember now you told me about some of the out-of-the-way places you’ve been sent to.’
She’d seemed so genuinely interested in the work he was doing to rebuild communities. Not once had she voiced concern that he had veered off the career track to big bucks and business success. Other girls had been more vocal. He hadn’t seen the need to explain to them that he’d been fortunate in the land he’d inherited from his grandparents and the investments he’d made. He could afford to work for a charity for as long as it suited him and not have to justify it to anyone.
Though that might be about to change. The Houston company wanted his expertise and their offer came with a salary that had stunned him with the amount of zeroes.
‘So what’s your problem with ordering through the hotel?’ he asked.
‘Their suppliers will be fine for the basics and the hotel gives us better buying power. It’s the organic and artisan produce I worked with in Sydney I need to source. Farm to plate stuff. I don’t know where to get it here.’
‘Farm to plate? That sounds expensive. Do you really want expensive for the café?’ He looked around at the fresh white décor, the round tables and bentwood chairs, the way the layout had been designed for customers to wander in from the bookshop. It said casual and relaxed to him.
‘Actually, farm to plate can be less expensive because you cut out the middle man.’
‘That’s a point,’ he said.
‘I know ridiculously high prices would be the kiss of death to a café serving breakfast and lunch,’ she said with that combative tilt to her chin that was starting to get familiar in an endearing kind of way.
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