The Lost Recipe for Happiness - By Barbara O'Neal Page 0,105
kitchen counter, looking slightly disheveled and ordinary with his black horn-rimmed glasses and a heathery blue long-sleeved T-shirt. He looked both ordinary and not quite—like a record executive maybe, or the publisher of some alternative, hip publication, or maybe a hotshot doctor that all the nurses lusted for secretly. He looked like a husband, with his flat wrists brushed with black hair, and his focus so intently on the screen, and a cup of coffee sitting at his elbow.
Fuck, she thought, emphatically. I cannot stay here. I cannot start wanting this.
Tossing her hair out of her eyes, she marched across the room and made a show of sipping her coffee. “I’m going to head over to the apartment and see if they’ll let me get some of my kitchen stuff,” she said. “I guess I’ll see you at the restaurant later, right?”
He looked at her without speaking for a moment, his jaw newly shaved. “Have you eaten?”
She waved a hand. “Too nervous about the grand opening. I’m sure I’ll be nibbling all day.”
“Are you sure you’re all right?”
It was at least the twelfth time he’d asked her. Annoyance snapped at the back of her neck. “Yes,” she growled. “I’m pissed off at losing my home and worried about finding a new place on the opening day of ski season and nervous that we’re surely going to attract some reviewers tonight, but I’m fine over the fucking accident, okay?”
He didn’t wince. “Do you know how many times you’ve said ‘fuck’ this morning?”
She rolled her eyes, picked up her keys. “I’ll see you later.”
He clamped a hand over her wrist. “You can stay here, you know.”
Elena bowed her head, suddenly afraid she might cry and he would see it, and she just couldn’t stand that right now. “Thank you, but no.” As gently and firmly as she could, she yanked her hand away and headed for the door. Sitting on the top step, pale and thin as smoke, was Isobel, her eyes wide and solemn. Elena ignored her and headed into the cold winter morning. She had work to do, and she’d left her knives at the apartment.
At the condo, there was still a lot of commotion, of course. The car had been hauled out, and a construction crew was stacking and organizing the debris. “I just need to get to my kitchen,” she said to a burly man who seemed to be in charge. “I’m a chef, and my knives are in there.”
He lifted a finger, signaling her to wait, and listened to a walkie-talkie. “How many?” he barked, his Irish eyes the color of the mountains over cheeks that were red from anger or cold or both. “When did it happen?”
He listened and swore. “Ah, goddamn it. Who do these guys think they’re kidding? This whole goddamned county is going to go to hell. It’s the first goddamned day of the season!” He acted as if he was going to lob the device toward the ditch, and halted just in time. “Right, Walter. Get back to me when you get the numbers.” Shaking his head, he clicked it off and looked at her. “Sorry, sweetheart. What did you say?”
“I live here—lived here. I’m a chef and need to get some things from the kitchen.”
“What a deal, huh?” He looked at the yawning hole in the condo. “That was one lucky kid. Let me get somebody to go inside with you.” With a burly arm, he gestured at a worker in a hard hat. “Harry!”
Harry loped over. “Take her inside to the kitchen through the back so she can get her stuff. And who do you know who can come to work tomorrow? We got labor troubles.”
“I’ll give it some thought.”
The back of the condo was fine. Elena pushed open the gate and went in through the patio door. Her knives were in a bundle on the counter, and she picked them up protectively, and quickly filled a small box with a few other things—her stained notebook of recipes, her favorite bowl. Glancing over her shoulder, she didn’t see Harry anywhere, and rushed over to the living room to see if she could grab her grandmother’s geranium. It had lived through a dozen moves, being neglected by Mia and ignored by others, and being smuggled into three countries. Surely a little car wreck couldn’t do any damage. If she had so much as a leaf, she could propagate it.
But it wasn’t there. It had sat in front of the picture window,