Where Dreams Reside E-Book

M. L. Buchman

• Herausgeber: Buchman Bookworks, Inc.
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

-a Where Dreams romance- When a life’s passion and a Life Plan collide, things can quickly come to a boil. Jo Thompson escaped small-town Alaska through her brains and willpower. Now a top-notch environmental lawyer in the Pacific Northwest, the fairy tale of a cozy family has no place in her busy schedule. Angelo Parrano cooks with all his heart. He seeks a new culinary truth in Seattle’s Pike Place Market. His success sends him scrambling and definitely leaves no time for a personal life. Right until the moment Jo Thompson comes to dine at Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth. Then they both must confront that hidden place in their hearts Where Dreams Reside.

Leseprobe

Where Dreams Reside

a Seattle romance

M. L. Buchman

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Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

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About the Author

Also by M. L. Buchman

Chapter 1

Jo Thompson brushed at her eyes, again. She wasn’t the weepy sort. Even a sip of the exceptional champagne that sparkled across her tongue, the taste of spring, only helped a little. She focused on the laughter and bright music of the wedding reception to distract herself.

The setting was so beautiful, a broad white canopy over the vibrant-green lawn. Through its open sides the Mukilteo lighthouse and the large green-and-white Whidbey Island ferry plying the waters of Puget Sound made such an ideal setting. So romantic that even contemplating it choked Jo up all over again. She turned back to the goings-on under the canopy.

Her best friend looked so beautiful and so happy as a bride that it actually made Jo’s heart hurt. Cassidy wore a cream-and-ivory lace sheath wedding dress that clung to her shape like a caress. Every time she even breathed, hidden threads of metallic silver glinted and sparkled. On a more provocative woman, or even a lesser one, it would have been indecent. On Cassidy all it did was smolder, which was clearly giving her new husband something to think about.

The first dance hadn’t been a tango, but she and Russell had certainly danced it like one, as if they were the only ones present. The reception might be winding down now, but they still moved together, constantly teetering on the edge of a tangle of hot passion.

Jo searched out her other best friend. She was innocently flirting with the father of the groom, who was almost as handsome as his son. And Perrin was doing so despite the wife happily draped on his arm. Julia Morgan took Jo’s arrival as an opportunity to get her husband back on the dance floor.

It was clear from their moves that they’d been dancing together for years. Jo had never really learned, but they made it look so intimate and fun that maybe she’d have to find the time. Someday, in her copious spare minutes between lawsuits. Okay, perhaps not. She only really managed to carve out time with Cassidy this week because she was in between cases. A situation that would be ending on Monday morning.

The large tent graced lightly over the lawn, lanterns warmed the scene as the summer evening slowly faded in the background. A live duo were knocking out songs that you couldn’t help tapping your foot to. Above them, the Mukilteo lighthouse spun and cast its beam upon the June waters.

“We done good!” Perrin jarred Jo’s shoulder with a friendly nudge of her own.

“No, you did. The dress you designed for her is a marvel.”

“Does make her look pretty marvelous, not that she doesn’t normally. Still wish Russell had let me do something with his outfit.” They both looked to where he stood with his best man taking a momentary breather from the dance floor.

Jo arched an eyebrow at her, “Do you think you could make him look even better than that?”

Perrin offered her a bit of a grimace. “Probably not. He’s sooo hunky in that tux, but it would have been fun to try.”

“He doesn’t just look hunky,” Cassidy slammed into them from behind and draped her arms over Perrin and Jo’s shoulders, the sweet peas laced into her hair scenting the June-summer air with spring. “He is! I can’t wait to rip that tux off him.” Then she blushed bright red and grinned at the same time.

Jo pulled her in, “You done good, Cassie. Exactly what you’re supposed to be doing, and who with.”

Cassidy laughed. A laugh she’d lost since they were college roommates over a decade before, but had rediscovered with Russell Morgan.

“When do you fly out?”

Cassidy grabbed a piece of prosciutto-wrapped shrimp from a passing waiter. She tried to eat it, speak, and chortle all at the same time and nearly choked herself.

Jo handed over her glass of champagne from which Cassidy took several swallows and then released a loud hiccup.

“Tomorrow morning.”

“Wellll,” Perrin drawled out the word. “I’m sure he’ll let you finally sleep on the flight, unless you’re going for an entry in the mile-high club.”

Cassidy’s smile and blush definitely grew. “Russell might have mentioned something about that.”

“Damn,” Perrin stamped her foot. “I am so jealous. I want reports. Perrin wants reports.” She began counting on her fingers. “Is married sex better than single sex? Does high altitude make it, well, better somehow? Pluses and minuses of doing it in four-star hotels, Italian villas, and sailboats on the Mediterranean. Take notes. You’ll be graded afterward.”

“Yes, Perrin. I promise a report. When I get back from three weeks of sailing the Amalfi coast with the man of my dreams, we’ll all go out, get drunk, and I’ll tell you every little sordid detail about my most private sex life.”

“Good.” Perrin nodded emphatically. Her hair, presently dyed as black as Jo’s, swirled about her thin face. As usual, she’d missed the sarcasm in Cassidy’s voice.

Jo also knew from experience that Perrin would indeed be wheedling at least some of the juicier details out of their friend in due time. This allowed Jo to, without parsimony, both share Cassidy’s present amusement at Perrin’s expense and later enjoy the results of Perrin’s somewhat voyeuristic but highly effective curiosity.

Cassidy hugged them both close, “Best friends ever.”

“Best friends ever,” she and Perrin repeated.

While Perrin was both more tipsy and much more emphatic, Jo could feel the truth of it once more bringing tears to her eyes.

“Where’s my goddamn camera?”

“Let it go, mio amico. You’re the best man, Russell. No, wait. You’re the groom, I’m the best man, though with how Cassidy is looking in that dress, the groom really oughta be someone handsome and Italian like me.” Angelo Parrano slapped Russell on the back hard enough that the groom almost snorted his beer.

“But just look at them.” Russell insisted.

There was no question who “them” was.

Angelo took in the scene. Russell had friends from the dock where his sailboat was moored in Seattle at Shilshole Marina. They were mostly dressed for the Northwest in slacks and a clean shirt. They clustered together by the buffet table Angelo had spent most of last night putting together, eating the gourmet food with as much attention as they’d eat a bucket of chicken. He’d bet money they were talking about sailing. It was a topic they never tired of.

A bunch of his and Russell’s New York friends had flown out. They were dressed far more fashionably, looking dark, edgy, and wholly out of place at a Northwest wedding reception, outdoors at that, held beside a picturesque lighthouse. Clearly, in their opinions, the wedding of one of America’s wealthiest bachelors and an internationally known food-and-wine critic who was starting a cooperative of Pacific Northwest vineyards shouldn’t be in a setting more rustic than the ballroom at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan.

Cassidy’s friends were a daunting slice of the restaurant world, chefs and food critics. A dozen or so of the Northwest’s top vintners from Cassidy’s new Northwest Wines venture were also in attendance. It shouldn’t be surprising who Cassidy’s friends were. Still, it was his restaurant, Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth, where they’d held the rehearsal dinner and it was his buffet they were presently tasting and judging. He looked away because he couldn’t stand to watch.

No, there was no question which “them” Russell was referring to or why, as a professional photographer, he was desperate for his camera. The three women laughing together made an amazing picture.

Cassidy was right out of a magazine shoot. As a matter of fact, she soon would be. Angelo knew Russell was planning to use her in that dress for the next ad campaign for Perrin’s Glorious Garb. Not just edgy clothes, but now astonishing wedding dresses as well.

Actually he’d be an idiot if he didn’t use all three of them in exactly those getups. Perrin had also done one of her fashion-design numbers on herself and Jo Thompson. Courtesy of a dye job, Perrin’s hair matched Jo’s, a straight fall almost as black as night to the middle of their backs. Their dresses were cut from the same cloth, but that’s where the similarity ended.

Perrin’s pale skin and blue eyes were offset against the light celery-green fabric by severe lines in the dress’ tailoring that accented the slender lines of her body and revealed unexpected flashes of that creamy skin. She looked long and dangerous, like a racing sailboat or a really fine chef’s knife.

Jo’s darker skin, revealing her part-Alaskan heritage, was kissed by the gentle green curves of her dress. Each swoop and swirl accented her generous figure and the fitness he knew she earned through hard sweat at the gym. A man could become lost while navigating among those curves until there was no hope for his return.

The three women had their foreheads together and their arms around each other’s waists.

“Beauty, truth, and joy.” Josh Harper observed over Angelo’s shoulder even as Perrin burst forth with one of her bubbling laughs. The reviewer from Gourmet Week had come up between Angelo and Russell. He knew Josh from a couple of good reviews of Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth and his habit of eating at Angelo’s when he was in town, even when he wasn’t researching for a review.

“Guess it wasn’t hard to tell what was grabbing our attention.” Russell noted. “You’re good with words, Josh. Maybe you should write for a living or something.”

“Or something.” Josh sighed as he watched the three women. “There are moments when being happily married really sucks.”

“And moments when it’s damn good.” Russell took a swallow from his bottle of beer. “So what’s your excuse, Angelo?”

He tried to speak, he really did. But Jo Thompson had raised her head and was looking at him from between the other two women. Her dark eyes inspected him as only a top corporate lawyer could, slowly taking him apart like a fine chiffonade, one sliver-thin slice at a time.

Russell’s punch on his arm sent him staggering to the side. His wine, thankfully a white Oregon Viognier, spilled down the leg of his gray suit pants, and perfumed him with its warm floral components.

“Shit, Russell!”

“Sorry buddy. I’d feel bad, but I have to go dance with the most beautiful woman here.” He finished his beer, handed Angelo the empty before going to fetch his wife. Having his hands full was the only thing that kept him from smacking the groom a good one.

Angelo stood there, empty wine glass in one hand, a drained beer bottle in the other, and a stain down his tuxedo pant that made it look as if he’d just peed himself. Like a lush on display. He shook his leg to try and shake loose the wet pant leg clinging to his skin like cold clam sauce. It didn’t work.

Then he looked up and saw that Jo was still watching him. A soft smile, the kind that came the instant before a laugh, lit her face.

Josh clapped Angelo on the shoulder as Russell and Cassidy hit the dance floor, appearing to float several feet above it in their happiness.

“Yep! Happily married has its points.” Josh was watching the newly-married couple sizzle across the dance floor.

But Angelo couldn’t stop watching Jo Thompson.

Chapter 2

“You’ve got a special at table seven,” Graziella called out as she breezed through the swinging doors into the kitchen at Angelo’s restaurant. She dumped a stack of empty bowls with a clatter in front of Marko the dishwasher.

“What kind of special?” Angelo didn’t even bother to look up from the Veal Florentine he was plating. An almost invisible shaving of truffle, followed by a fistful of fresh mozzarella and shove it under the broiler to finish.

“Wants the chef on the floor,” she had to shout a little to be heard over the typical kitchen mayhem of orders rattling back and forth and pans clattering against the stove as Manuel, the sous chef caramelized some onions in Marsala wine adding a brightness to the richer tomato overtones that generally permeated the air.

“I’m busy.” ‘Chef on the floor’ was a stupid New York thing anyway, not Seattle. Angelo grabbed the plate as his grillardin slid a medium-rare pan-seared duck breast into a nest of slivered porcini. The dark, fatty duck and the earthy umami of the butter-sautéed mushrooms filled his senses. It was one of his favorite new dishes, because of its richness in all the senses. A sprinkle of bright green chives and deeply yellow lemon zest, as much for the color as the tang. He slid it across to Graziella.

“Told her you were, but she seemed confident you wouldn’t mind,” She dressed the duck with a side of steamed baby asparagus as he pulled out the veal and then she took both out with her. “She’s a looker, if that helps.”

Angelo tossed the latest batch of pasta with tongs, and drizzled on cold-pressed olive oil. Now he had to let number seven wait. Because if he didn’t, Graziella would assume being pretty was all that was needed to get him out of his kitchen. Definitely, let her wait.

But he couldn’t. He’d been side-tracked, knocked out of the groove. The second time his garde manger had a salad ready before Angelo had prepared the plate, he gave it up and called Manuel to take his spot. Manuel might be Mexican rather than Italian, but he could turn out a hundred complex dishes each exactly to Angelo’s recipes and repeat it night after night. The perfect sous chef.

Wiping his hands on the towel dangling from his apron’s waistband and checking that there were no flour stains on his charcoal shirt, Angelo pushed through the door into the restaurant. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust from the stark white and steel of his bright kitchen to the soft ambiance of Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth.

He and Russell had redesigned the dining area like a traditional Italian kitchen. A large central fireplace. Tables in small clusters scattered about the room. No booths, but comfortable chairs, tasteful paintings and photos of Italy on the walls.

On their last trip, Russell and Cassidy had taken a number of photographs of the old Italian villages that Angelo’s mother had left before Angelo’s birth. But it lent an authentic feel to the room, photos of home. It was cozy and Angelo forced himself to slow down enough to share a friendly moment or two with some of the diners he recognized as repeats, and a few that he didn’t.

“Yes, that’s fresh basil,” as if he’d use anything else.

“I used the Pacific salmon in this Cioppino, it’s a gentler flavor than the Atlantic salmon,” and it was more popular here in Seattle even if it was a bit less authentic. It gave patrons a chance to feel slightly superior for living out here on the “wilder” west coast.

“And what can I do…” his words trailed off as he reached table seven.

Jo Thompson sat there wearing a deep yellow blouse the same tone as the wall paint, but richer, more intense. Her black hair was back in a ponytail, leaving her face and neck exposed. Her skin and eyes were lustrous in the restaurant’s soft candlelight. Her cleavage, not deeply exposed, was accented by a small dangle of gold in the shape of an orca whale on a hair-thin chain. The subtle adornment made her absolutely stunning.

“Yuri and I were hoping that you could choose dinner for us tonight.”

Angelo glanced at Yuri. He was a big man, tall and broad-shouldered. Angelo wasn’t that short, but he might not even reach this guy’s shoulder. His face was square and rugged in a way that he supposed women would find handsome, but he could never be sure with guys.

His hands were big and rough, a working man’s hands. Angelo’s animal brain flashed an image of those callused hands groping Jo’s beautiful skin and he felt the blood drain out of his soul.

“Of course,” his voice nearly broke, it had suddenly gone so dry. “It would be my pleasure Miss Thompson. Do the lady or the gentleman have any preferences?”

The man waved one of those hands dismissively. “Whatever you make will be fine.” His voice was deep and smooth, accented lightly with Russian heritage making it even richer.

“Jo says that your taste is impeccable and that’s good enough for me.” He rested an elbow on the table as he leaned across toward Jo. “Must say that my taste is pretty impeccable too.”

Clearly dismissed, Angelo turned for the kitchen. Once back in the world of white and noise, back where the sizzling of the deep fryer battled the dish boy for sonic ambiance, and oregano and garlic scented the air along with the undertones of port reductions, he let his hands fall to his sides.

Cook for them? Non possibile! Twice he went to step forward, but he had no idea what to make. So, he’d just make…something.

After his third attempt at a Roasted Artichoke and Venison Carpaccio Bruschetta, he had Marco send out a simple Antipasto-su-baguette. From there it went downhill. Working beside a flustered Angelo, his grillardin slid out of the groove. He ruined the last duck breast, then burned a sirloin so badly that they’d had to open the back doors and turn the fans up to full roar to avoid the charred scent reaching the dining room.

The disaster rippled through the kitchen. The friturier dropped plastic tongs into the deep-fryer, which melted and permanently merged with the fry basket before he was able to recover them. They’d be throwing that basket away. The potager grabbed the salt instead of the sugar and then knocked the last of the asparagus soup across the patissier’s station taking out a whole tray of Torte della Nonna.

Angelo considered going to apologize to the patrons at large, but couldn’t face Jo’s disappointment. Clearly she’d been intending a romantic dinner to show off her savvy in choosing his restaurant. Instead, Angelo took the coward’s way out and stayed hidden in the kitchen. Tonight, he knew, he was going to be drinking far too much wine. And with Russell in goddamn Italy, he was going to have to face tomorrow’s hangover on his own.

Jo knew she’d made a miscalculation the moment she saw Angelo’s face. Not only that, but his hands, normally so expressive, had dropped to his sides and hung there. But she didn’t know how to take it back. She should have taken Yuri anywhere in Seattle but Angelo’s restaurant.

Yuri had called, saying that he’d be in town and he’d love to take her out to dinner. She’d suggested Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth without even thinking. The food was exquisite and the atmosphere quiet but cozy. It didn’t force absolute isolation like in an American steakhouse with booths so deep and tall that you could be the only couple there. Nor the merry mayhem of the Moroccan place they gone to for Cassidy’s bachelorette party. Jo still wasn’t sure quite how Perrin had gotten Cassidy and Jo up with her to join the belly dancer, much to the entertainment of other customers.

Angelo’s offered quiet tables, the gentle strains of fine Italian singers sounding from a discrete sound system rather than an uncomfortable trio traveling from table to table. Tasteful. She liked that about his choices, his restaurant was immensely tasteful. It had seemed the perfect place to bring Yuri, especially as fine Italian dining wasn’t something easily found in Alaska.

Jo had spent a lot of time with Yuri Andreevich over the last two years working on the Alaskan fisheries lawsuit. He was one of the Russians who had immigrated to the Alaskan coast seeking the rich American life. Unlike most, he had found it. Many of his countrymen had simply traded one fishing boat for another. Yuri had used the lawsuit to leverage himself into position as a “voice of the fishermen” and proven himself to be capable and successful as such. He sounded as if he were the hero of the two-brother boats eking out a family tradition, rather than in the pay of the conglomerates launching hundreds of craft and being sued for price control by the state on behalf of the fishermen.

She hadn’t much enjoyed the ethics of the whole thing, but she’d ultimately justified it to herself that the individual fishermen’s claims were even more unfair than the conglomerates’ practices. And the fees had been astonishing which had paid off her condo and left her little excuse to complain. She’d spent two years ignoring the sharp pinch and it was now past time where she could change anything.

Yuri’s big voice was romantic, and his heavily-accented English caused several heads to turn at other tables when he first spoke. It wasn’t a booming voice, but it carried, and attracted attention. It had also worked well in interviews and, she had to admit, on the phone with her. Jo liked Yuri, and there had been a connection there. Or at least she’d thought so.

She’d been feeling lonely after the wedding. With Cassidy out of town and Perrin immersed in another of her design frenzies from which she might not emerge for days or weeks, Jo was discovering quite how pitiful her social life had become. She couldn’t even throw herself into the next lawsuit, it was only starting to trickle in. Dinner had sounded like a fun and easy answer to an otherwise quiet Thursday evening alone.

But when Angelo saw them, he had looked as if he’d been shot. She’d known he was attracted to her. It was plain to see, but his feelings had left him awkward in her presence. And, she had to admit, it had left her awkward as well. They’d danced together a few times at the wedding last weekend but he’d said little and she’d said less.

If it had been purely physical, that might have been fun as he was very nice to look at. But it wasn’t her body that he was always watching, but rather her eyes. Not a good sign. She didn’t need any attachments right now. Especially not one that would be complicated by being her best friend’s husband’s best friend.

Russell was good for Cassidy. If it had been Jo, she would have killed the man inside the first week, but he was good for Cassidy. His carefree attitude forced his wife to loosen up and relax, something she did only a tiny bit better than Jo. Jo had never “gotten the hang” of letting go. Didn’t have time for it, truth be told.

Russell’s ease, mixed with his ramrod forthrightness, made Cassidy face decisions head-on rather than sliding by them. It did make him the perfect man for her.

Angelo unbalanced Jo and so she determined it was best to simply not consider him at all. But she hadn’t meant to wound him by flaunting Yuri in his face. She was always fumbling in Angelo’s presence and it was a feeling she wasn’t used to. And one that the confident counselor in her didn’t like at all.

“This is the Earth calling to the Jo Thompson,” Yuri sounded like a Russian flight controller with his gentle destruction of proper English syntax. “Where did you go off flying to just now?”

Jo shook her head.

He was about to press when the appetizer arrived. She took one of the tiny antipasto sandwiches to stall, not one of her usual tactics.

It was good, but nothing exceptional. She’d been here a couple of times with Cassidy and knew this was merely one of Angelo’s standard, albeit wonderful, dishes. Clearly not the exceptional food he made for friends.

She had hurt him and he was being petty and spiteful. Yet another reason not to be attracted to him. Spiteful men always became worse with time. She’d focus on Yuri, he was her date after all.

“I was just thinking about the next case I’m taking. It will be bringing me back to Alaska.” Now why had she said that? During the fisheries lawsuit, Yuri had been one of their main spokesmen. They had worked long hours together honing both the public talking points and the court messages. Jo had been very careful to make sure the relationship had remained professional. This was the first time they’d seen each other since she’d won that case.

She’d also only recently emerged from a rather intense, even by her standards, lawsuit regarding the crabbing practices along the U.S.-Canadian border, again on behalf of the larger fishing corporations. That particular suit had bankrolled her a very comfortable savings account.

As she’d dressed for dinner, Jo had been uncertain of her own feelings. So, she’d chosen attractive but conservative attire, her yellow St. John blouse buttoned fairly high, with black Donna Karan slacks and sensible heels, that sent a clear message. “I will make myself pretty, but the verdict is still out on whether or not we will be spending the night together.”

“Good. Alaska is very good,” Yuri sounded very pleased and leaned in a little closer.

No, Alaska really sucked, but she wasn’t going to say that aloud.

“You are a woman who it would be a pleasure to see more of, Jo.” The momentary dip of his eyes without lingering and his smile might have been charming under different conditions. Had they been sharing sushi at the Old Power House in Kodiak, it probably would have worked.

Sitting in Angelo’s, he struck her as not quite coarse. That was the wrong word. Perhaps as a touch crass.

“The case will take me more North Slope than southern coastal,” she did her best to backpedal. As if anywhere in Alaska was better than any other. She’d escaped at sixteen—her career constantly forcing her to return was not one of life’s little ironies—it was one of life’s monster-sized ironies.

“It’s about the Arctic’s continental shelf rights. Who gets to drill how deep and just where do international waters begin when we’re talking about the mineral rights beneath the sea bed where everything converges toward the pole. The state, after losing to me so badly last year, wants me to protect their interests. They’ve learned that if the corporations don’t get what they want, the state won’t get their tax revenue.”

“That is still good. You will fly through Juneau and I will meet you there. It will be good to see you more often and away from the laws, Jo.” And he sounded sincere.

Jo knew what she was looking for in a man. The criteria would change in another three to five years. But for now, she was focused on her career and could afford to dally a bit here and there. When she was ready to settle down more permanently, then she’d pick a quiet, intelligent man. He’d be well-educated and have already passed through whatever crises men passed through. Then she’d think about family.

Each thing in its order. It was a safe maxim, one she’d always liked. There was still plenty of time. She wouldn’t “settle” when she was making that final choice, not one little bit.

That’s when she knew that Yuri would be sleeping alone tonight. Despite the romance that Cassidy’s wedding had briefly awakened in Jo’s heart, she wouldn’t settle even during the dating phase of her plan, and that’s what sleeping with Yuri would be. Not only wasn’t he Mister Right for the future, he wasn’t even Mister Right for the present.

Thankfully, before she had to respond, the soup arrived. The aroma was rich, the fish broth revealing a depth that even her childhood-in-Alaska trained senses couldn’t fault. It was a cheerful mixture of clams, mussels, and salmon.

Yuri took a spoonful first and nodded his head as if saying, “Good enough.”

Jo felt a heat rise. Angelo’s cooking deserved more than a “good enough.” His ingredients were always the finest. The proteins were always finished impeccably and his seasoning balance was exquisite. He had been written up by so many critics that he was causing some embarrassment to the city’s other restaurateurs. For six months his write-ups had commanded as much print and blog presence as all of the others competing for the high-end market combined.

She allowed herself a moment more to appreciate the scents and presentation of the soup. Even the dark blue stoneware bowl, that just happened to match the room’s paint accent, against the soft yellow tablecloths promised a depth that a white bowl would not have.

The broth delivered its richness to her tongue as her nose had promised. Living through college with Cassidy, even before she became such a renowned food-and-wine critic, had trained Jo’s palate well. She could appreciate the interplay of the basil and oregano and the way they complemented the clam-based broth.

Then it hit her. Square in the center of the tongue, the impossible-to-miss bright sweetness of sugar. It broke the broth. The dusky clam and the subtle salmon were washed beneath it like an ocean wave. Another spoonful from elsewhere in the bowl had the same issue.

It was good. Would have been fine in some spaghetti-house type of restaurant, but it didn’t belong in Angelo’s.

She barely paid attention once Yuri began creating a fantasy weekend of small fishing cabins along the Sitka shore during a Pacific winter storm. She’d always paid meticulous attention to not revealing her past. As far as anyone other than Cassidy and Perrin knew, Jo Thompson had been born the day she arrived at college.

Yuri would have no way of knowing that she’d dedicated her younger existence to escape exactly such a place that he thought so charming. Since she escaped to college at sixteen after busting her ass to skip two grades, she had never been back. She occasionally met her father in a restaurant in Ketchikan when she was flying through, but she never went back to the hovel filled with too much fish and too much alcohol. At least he’d been a quiet drunk, albeit a morose one.

If Yuri thought he was painting a romantic scenario, he couldn’t be more completely wrong. He might have risen to a fishing consultant sought out by corporations and the media as an expert in the field. But at his core, he was still a fisherman who would be happiest out on his boat with the wheel in one hand and a bottle of vodka in the other.

After the soup, a tiny entremets arrived. Angelo had taken to adding little dishes between courses as accent marks, a common enough action in modern French cuisine, but he was perhaps the first to apply it to traditional Italian dining. Definitely the first to do it so successfully. The between-course dishes typically completed the last flavor of the prior course or hinted at the next. Occasionally, they stepped wholly out of the bounds of the meal and were brightly amusing which somehow heightened her awareness of the dishes to either side.

This appeared to fall into the last category. Two delicate shrimp tempura on a single plate, set curve-to-curve so that they nestled together like a yin and yang symbol. They rested upon the sheerest smear of what might be a blackberry sauce set off by the perfectly white plate. The dish might be Japanese in form, but Jo would wager it had some Italian twist to the flavoring.

She took hers, refusing to be embarrassed that Angelo had sent a lover’s dish to her table. The first taste pleased her, she’d been right about the blackberry sauce. The second almost made her gag. A sharp bite of plastic rolled along the edge of her tongue and even a swallow of the red wine did nothing to cut the acrid bitterness.

Jo was going to kill him. This wasn’t only rude, it was downright nasty.

An exclamation from the next table over drew her attention. A fork clattered down in disgust and a plate was shoved aside, though the others at the table continued to eat. The protesting patron had a different dish from the her own. Something wasn’t right.

She looked about the room. Most people were continuing to eat, but here and there, plates were returning to the kitchen, their purported delicacies abandoned.

That just didn’t happen here. At Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth, people mopped their plates clean with their bread so as not to lose the least drop of sauce. Working here as a dishwasher had to be one of the easiest jobs in the kitchen.

Not tonight.

But if it wasn’t personal… Jo began to worry.

Something had definitely gone wrong in the kitchen.

Chapter 3

Muriel, Jo’s legal assistant for over five years, carried the towering woven-wicker basket into Jo’s office and set it on the corner of her broad oak-wood desk with a thud.

“Shit!”

Muriel stopped and stared at her, “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you curse.”

“Sorry. You can just take that right back out.” The thing was huge, brimming with flowers and sausages, bags of coffee and wedges of cheese. It was monstrous enough that there could be an entire ham hiding beneath the cheery multicolored cloth. It was late morning, only a little before lunch, and the waft of fresh-baked bread made her stomach growl. That woke up her whole system which then insisted on its desire for a deeply fatty and high-caloric lunch that it certainly was not going to receive, even if it filed a motion for summary judgment in state court.

Jo tried to look back down at the benthic map of the Arctic continental shelf that showed all of the undersea topographic ridges and valleys she’d been studying. The wicker basket’s base covered from Ivvavik Park in the Yukon clear over to Prudhoe Bay and well out to sea.

“Don’t you even want to know who it’s from?”

“An arrogant Russian who does not know the meaning of ‘just get on the plane and go home’.” Suddenly Jo had far more of her assistant’s attention than she wanted. Suddenly her personal life was spinning out of her control and she was in over her head as if she were being pulled down a whirlpool. This was a not-familiar and highly-uncomfortable feeling. Normally it remained in the same perfect control as her career and her workout schedule.

“Sorry,” Jo rubbed at her eyes. “Bad date last night. What part of ‘No!’ don’t men understand?”

“Oh, they understand it just fine, except for its meaning and how to spell it.”

Muriel Mendenbaum, despite her name, was sassy and youthful. Only a year younger, she somehow embodied a vitality that Jo kept committed to her career. The woman was also a gift in Jo’s life, they’d been through hell and back over their years together.

Jo wished she was more like Muriel, so confident in all aspects of her life. Muriel talked easily about men and boundaries and good dates and bad. Jo merely felt awkward and so made a point of moving slowly. That had labeled her as overly choosy or, at times, arrogant. Neither was right at all, except perhaps for the choosy part.

She’d hit college at sixteen and been lost in all of the flirting and sexual confidence of the eighteen-year-old’s world. She’d found a decent guy and latched onto him for safety. Latched on so hard that she hadn’t figured out how to let go of him except by graduating four years later and moving across the country. Richard had been decent, but not exciting, definitely not a keeper. A decade gone and he still e-mailed her occasionally, especially after a bad breakup, which she studiously ignored.

Muriel stood now with her short, dark hair tucked behind her ears, a pink cotton sleeveless blouse with lace shoulders, and a smart black skirt with a flirty hem. She also had her hands fisted on her hips. Jo knew her assistant well enough to know that Muriel would plant herself by Jo’s desk until she had the whole story, or at least enough to satisfy.

“Whereas I see you have a date tonight.” Jo tried to turn the subject with the compliment to her nice clothes.

Muriel just shook her head no. Not no to the date, but no to Jo’s lame evasion.

One of the newbie associates rushed in. She’d hoped for a reprieve, but all he needed was a signature on one of the smaller research matters she’d subbed out to him. He was gone almost before he arrived.

Jo would like to claim she had to get back to work, but Muriel knew Jo’s workload better than anyone, frequently even Jo. They both understood that the large map spread across her desk only meant that the first files hadn’t started arriving yet. She needed to get the lay of the land, but there was no rush.

Even looking out the corner office windows over Elliot Bay and the Seattle waterfront didn’t offer any nice distracting topics. Where was a blizzard when you needed one, who cared if this was June?

“Let me simply say that the meal was not good. Then I almost had to deliver a slap to force him to back off at the front door of my condo.”

“Maybe you should have taken him to that place you like so much. The Italian one.”

“Yeah, maybe.” She wasn’t going to mention that she had. The entrée at least had been marvelous, almost as good as the meals she’d had with Cassidy attending. And dessert had finally swept Yuri’s attention from her to his food, he couldn’t stop saying how deep and rich the chocolate torte was and how the brandy was the perfect match.

Her espresso had been scorched to sludge and the Sweet Ricotta and Meyer Lemon over Amaretti had been so sour she could still feel the dry pucker at the back of her throat. She’d have liked to taste Yuri’s dish just to be sure it was okay, but by that time she hadn’t wanted the implied intimacy and begged off as being full.

When she didn’t eat even a second spoonful of her own dessert, he teased her about it. She’d considered digging out a bit of the amaretti cookie, but they were too soggy to make it worth eating one to shut him up. He’d put the final nail in his own coffin with some remark about her girlish figure. She knew she was a full-figured gal, he didn’t need to hammer on the point.

“It was Yuri, from Ketchikan.”

“Ooo, good-looking Russian.” Muriel almost chortled then caught herself. “But you didn’t drag him into your lair.”

Jo actually laughed at the image. She’d never “dragged a man into her lair.” But the way Muriel said it, perhaps she should try it someday. She made it sound fun.

“No, I didn’t. I sent him to his hotel and wished him good travels. He was deeply shocked. Why do men assume that a pleasant meal is always a coquettish invitation to crawl into a woman’s bed?”

“Sure, guys are like that. They go from having a sure-thing-with-an-incredibly-hot-and-voluptuous-high-powered-attorney fantasy one moment, to boring-sexless-night-all-alone-and-not-understanding-or-willing-to-admit-why reality the next. For some reason, it’s always a shock to their system.”

“Anyway,” Jo glared at the basket towering above her. “The last thing I want from him is a gift basket.”

“Well, how convenient that it isn’t from him.”

Jo held out her hand and Muriel dropped the card into her palm.

“PPM.” Calligraphied on heavy ivory stock. The paper looked like one of those artisanal, handmade cards. “Nothing else?”

Muriel shook her head, though clearly she knew something more, she wasn’t going to give it over that easily.

Jo puzzled at the card for a long moment. “I’m assuming that the Presidential Pet Museum is not soliciting my services.”

“Nor the Progressive Party of the Maldives,” was Muriel’s comeback.

Jo wondered if she’d Googled that just to have it ready, or if the woman had already known about it, or made it up. Jo decided it was better not to know. Muriel’s smile said she was clearly enjoying her boss’ confusion.

But even as Muriel opened her mouth, Jo made the connection. She stood up and looked down into the basket. Whoever had assembled the basket had raided every shop in Pike Place Market. Okay, there were something on the order of two hundred of them, so they’d raided a quarter of the shops, still the bounty was amazing. The cloth covering the gifts wasn’t just a remnant of fabric, it was a splendid piece of local weaving. A pound of Market Tea. A salami from the meat merchant, traditional cookies from the Italian grocery. The treats kept going as they probed the contents.

She hoped there wasn’t a dead fish somewhere in the depths. She pulled back the corner of the cloth. Actually, there was a dead fish, but it was a teriyaki-and-ginger smoked salmon which sounded delicious. Fresh bread from the French baker’s stall had been the cause of her stomach’s growling.

It was a bounty on a glorious scale. Even splitting it fifty-fifty with Muriel, this was going to last a while. Maybe they should bonus some of it to the junior lawyers she’d be chewing up on the Alaska case to ease their upcoming pain.

“No other note?”

Muriel shook her head. She reached down and pulled out a local artisanal chocolate bar, seventy-percent dark with Bing cherry and marzipan filling.

“It’s never too early for chocolate,” Jo nodded for her to open it. They broke off squares and tapped them together like champagne flutes. They shared a moment of respectful silence as the flavors bloomed in their mouths.

“Damn!”

Muriel’s soft exclamation echoed Jo’s feelings exactly.

“Now, what the hell do they want?” Jo noted her own curse and ignored Muriel’s pretend shock.

“Maybe the Market’s administrators are just being freakishly nice?” Muriel dug around some more and held up a coupon from the Parrot Store for a free parakeet. “After all, you redid their lease agreements for them.”

“That was months ago.”

They uncovered several more stunning delicacies and a really nice pair of earrings that they joked about arm wrestling for, which Jo resolved by putting them on. But no further information.

When Jo’s phone rang, Muriel answered it. After listening for a moment, she handed it across the desk.

Jo met Renée Linden at the Maximilien French Restaurant for lunch. The Executive Director of the Pike Place Market had deftly avoided Jo’s queries on the phone as to the lunch’s purpose with a skill that was easy for a trial attorney to appreciate.