so far I thought he’d never come back. What kind of animals are out there?”
“Nothing lethal unless you’re a cat, in which case your life expectancy is a total of twenty minutes, so do not ever let either of my cats out of this house,” I said, but distractedly. Liam’s hands held my potholders, which held a pie plate with a circle of golden crust and a dappled top. A fruit compote simmered on the stove. Something green sat on plates. “Wow.” I slid onto a stool. “Did you go out early, or did you actually find all this here?”
“Here. I like the challenge. Kitchen Dregs for the Gourmand. Could be a book.”
“Could be. You should think about that. I’ll bet you have other cookbooks in you, too. Chef cookbooks are all the rage. You could take up residency in a writers’ colony in New Mexico or wherever, and write.”
Having set down the pie plate, he reached for the compote. “Nice try, but no dice. I signed a contract, remember? I got my guarantee, but so did Edward.” Skillfully, he ladled compote on the plates shaping each mound just so with the flick of his wrist. “Restaurants in places like this have a hard time keeping chefs. Spring, summer, and fall are great, but winter they want to be somewhere warm. Me, I just want dry. Does it rain like this a lot?”
“In March? All the time. And it stays cold,” I added, looking him over, “so your clothes are all wrong.” Thin socks. Thin shirt. Jeans were jeans, but even the rain jacket on the back of the chair wasn’t lined. “You need clothes. Start at Stoner’s. It’s the general store in town.”
“Do you have an account there?”
“They take credit cards.” When he frowned, I said, “Liam, you’re thirty-three. You can pay for your own clothes.” When he still seemed annoyed, I reminded him, “I’m not Mom.”
“Are the prices sky high?”
“Some, but a local family owns it, so you’d be doing good for them and helping yourself if you want them to know who you are. Introduce yourself as the new chef at … at … does the restaurant have a name?”
“La Bisque. I actually wanted to call it Chocolat Noir,” he added with a perfect accent, “but two syllables work better than four, and I mean, this town may be upscale, but ce n’est pas Paris. And anyway, the name is still a work in progress. So what do I tell the people at Stoner’s?”
“That you’re opening a French bistro here in town.”
“Will they give me a break then?”
“No. If you want lower prices, there’s an L.L. Bean in West Lebanon.”
“Good,” he said and cut into the quiche. “We can go there today.”
“Not me. I’m working.” I had no idea if I was. It seemed like an eternity since I had last left the Spa. Actually, yes. Now that I thought of it, I did have two bookings, though I would be done in plenty of time for a shopping trip with Liam. But I was not getting into that. Give Liam an inch, and he would take a mile, as Mom always said, and if that made me like Mom, so be it.
“You’re working today?” he asked. “But today’s Sunday.”
“And you never work on Sunday? Will your bistro be closed on Sunday? Absolutely not. Devon is a tourist town, and tourists are here seven days a week. Will your restaurant be closed any day?”
“Mondays,” he said and, frowning, set a plate in front of me. “Maybe. That’s still TBD.”
“This looks amazing,” I had to say.
“I told you. I’m good.”
Overeager, I took a bite of the quiche, then bobbled it in my mouth until it cooled enough to properly eat. The wait was worth it. “You’re right. You’re good.”
Lifting a plate for himself, he straddled his stool sideways to face me. “What work do you have today?”
His blankness gave me pause. Given his closeness to Mom, who had wiped me clean of her life, he might be clueless. “Do you know what I do?”
“You sell makeup.”
“I don’t sell it. I apply it. I’m a makeup artist.”
“So you put it on.”
I glanced at our breakfast spread. “Like you sling hash? There’s more to it, Liam. An artist is an artist, whether she’s working with food or makeup. I studied to do this. I apprenticed, and I’m certified. I work at the Spa at the Inn.” I added a dry, “You know, that Inn from which your restaurant will get