Hungry For You - Argeneau Series - Book 14 Page 0,3

watched her cross the room.

Cale shrugged. “I am not humoring her so much as Marguerite.”

“Marguerite?” Sam stopped abruptly in the kitchen doorway and spun around, her already large eyes appearing even larger in her startled face.

Cale’s eyebrows lifted. The woman was almost vibrating with an emotion he couldn’t quite identify. He was about to read her mind when Mortimer captured his attention by echoing her exclamation in a deeper, though no less startled, voice.

“Marguerite?”

Cale glanced to the man, and then to Bricker, both of whom were now peering at him with intense interest. Grimacing, he admitted, “Marguerite seems to have a bee in her bonnet about me meeting Sam’s sister, Alex.”

“She does?” Sam breathed, taking several steps toward them.

Cale found himself shifting uncomfortably as he admitted, “Yes. She seems to think we might suit each other … I expect she’s wrong, but it can’t hurt to humor her and meet your sister to see one way or the other.”

“I’ll have Alex come over at once!” Sam spun away again, this time making it out of the room before anyone spoke.

A snort of amusement brought Cale’s glance to Bricker as the younger immortal asked, “You’re kidding right?”

“About what?” Cale asked, scowling. He didn’t like being laughed at, and the younger man was definitely laughing. He was also eyeing him with a combination of pity and, strangely, what appeared to be envy.

“About not expecting Marguerite to be right,” Bricker explained, and then slapped him on the back. “Buddy, if Marguerite is having one of her ‘feelings’ that you and Alex will suit, you’re as good as mated. It’s what Marguerite does. She finds life mates for anyone and everyone she can. She’s hooked up every single couple who have found each other the last few years.”

“Every Argeneau couple,” Mortimer corrected firmly. “She was not responsible for Sam and me.”

“Yeah, well I wouldn’t be too sure about that,” Bricker said dryly. “She probably suggested Lucian send us to that job in cottage country in the hopes that one of us would suit one of the sisters.”

Mortimer rolled his eyes at the suggestion. “She couldn’t have known about Sam and her sisters. I don’t think she’s even been to Decker’s cottage.”

“Oh, he didn’t tell you?” Bricker asked with amusement.

“Tell me what?” Mortimer asked, suddenly wary.

“Marguerite helped him find the place. Since he was always so busy on the job, she vetted the available properties and suggested the one next to Sam and her sisters was the nicest.”

“Christ,” Mortimer muttered.

Bricker laughed, but Cale simply peered from one man to the other curiously. “Is she really that good at finding mates for immortals?”

“Oh yeah,” Bricker assured him. “So, if Marguerite thinks Alex is the one for you, it’s in the bag. It looks like your bachelor days are done, my friend. Bet you can’t wait.”

Cale found himself frowning at the suggestion, and said a bit stiffly, “Not all of us are lonely and in need of a life mate. Some of us manage to live relatively happy, busy lives without one.”

“Yeah right,” Bricker said with disbelief.

Cale scowled, but didn’t argue the point further. Why bother? It wasn’t really true anyway.

“You have to be kidding me.” Alex Willan stared at the man standing on the other side of her desk. Peter Cunningham, or Pierre as he preferred to be called, was her head cook. He was also short, bearded, and had beady little eyes. She’d always thought he resembled aweasel, but never so much as she did at that moment. “You can’t quit just like that. The new restaurant opens in two weeks.”

“Yes I know.” He gave her a sad little moue. “But really Alexandra, he is offering a king’s ransom for me to—”

“Of course he is. He’s trying to ruin me,” she snapped.

Peter shrugged. “Well, if you were to beat their offer …”

Alex’s eyes narrowed. She couldn’t help noticing that he’d said “beat” rather than “match” or even “come close.” The little creep really was a weasel with no loyalty at all … but she needed him.

“How much?” she asked sharply, and barely managed to keep from hyperventilating at the amount he murmured. Dear God, that was three times what she was paying him and twice what she could afford … which he knew, of course.

It was a ridiculous sum. No chef earned that, and he wasn’t worth it. Peter was good, but not that good. It didn’t make any sense that Jacques Tournier, the owner of Chez Joie, would offer him that much. But then