he decides to come. He’ll be in the dining room, I’ll stay in the kitchen, there’ll be walls and doors between us. A beautiful start to what’s destined to be a rocky relationship.” Laughing, she tossed a bag of Sarah’s toys at the twins. “Are you sure you want to do this? I mean, I could take Sarah down to Catie’s with me. You know how she loves watching her, and she does have the office set up.”
“No, Aunt Angela!” the twins cried in unison.
“They’ve been waiting all day for this. They want to play dress-up with Sarah. I think they also have big plans to decorate the crib as a castle for a fairy princess. And to be honest, I need some baby time. It’s nice just… just holding her. And she’s not going to tolerate that for too much longer.”
“Are you.?” Angela indicated a swollen belly, so not to say the word pregnant where the twins would hear.
“Not yet,” Dinah said wistfully. “So I think it’s the time. If Eric ever has time to slow down a little. That’s one of the reasons he brought Mark here, to take up some of the slack while he and Neil spend more family time.”
One of the reasons. Gabby had hinted at something else, too, and she wondered if her sister knew. Now wasn’t the time to ask, though. Not while the twins were within earshot and Catie was expecting her any minute. “Well, when you do, you know you can count on me for anything.”
“For what?” Paige piped up. “What can my mom count on you for?”
“A nice fruit tart I intend to make tonight.”
“Me too,” the twins cried together.
“You too,” Angela said, then gave each of her nieces kisses and hugs. Her nieces. Dinah was a lucky woman, married to a man like Eric who had two such great little girls. They were a good family and she did envy them their family structure. It’s what she’d thought… deluded herself into thinking she’d have with Brad, but that hadn’t turnd out to be the case. “Fruit tart for everyone. And now I’ve really got to run.”
She paused long enough to give Sarah a kiss. “I’ll be back tomorrow, sweetie,” she said. “Aunt Dinah is going to take good care of you and I think your cousins have a lot of plans for the evening.” She’d spent nights away from her daughter before, but it was never easy. Not even when it was her own sister taking care of Sarah. One more kiss sufficed, though, before the trickle of tears started, then Angela scooted out the door and hurried to her car.
She was already well into her recipe prep, almost two hours now, and as far as she knew Mark hadn’t come into the restaurant. Two more hours of work at the hospital after she’d dropped Sarah off and she hadn’t seen him there. Now she’d caught herself craning to have a quick look through the pass-through more than she should have, then being oddly disappointed when she didn’t see him. But what did she expect? He didn’t like her, and while she wouldn’t go quite so far as to say she didn’t like him, she did recognize that their relationship was strained. Actually, it wasn’t even a relationship. More like a walking, breathing case of antagonism that crept up on them whenever the two of them happened to be in the same place at the same time.
He fascinated her, though. She didn’t know why, couldn’t explain it, and maybe didn’t want to. But, yes, he did fascinate her. Which was why, deep down, she’d hoped he would come tonight. No date intended, of course.
“Who would you be looking for?” Catie asked.
“No one.”
“Which is why you’ve been glancing longingly through the pass-through every five minutes for the past hour and a half.”
“I invited someone to taste my sea bass, but I haven’t been glancing longingly,” she snapped.
Catie laughed. “Must be a man, the way you’re all riled up.”
“A colleague from the hospital.”
“Tall, dark and handsome? Likes two eggs over easy, dry wheat toast, a bowl of fruit and black coffee for breakfast every morning?”
“Every morning?” Angela asked.
“Every morning. No variations on a breakfast theme. Not ever.”
“Sounds boring.”
“Sounds like you’re trying to dodge my question,” Catie countered, chuckling. “But that’s OK. Everybody’s entitled to some privacy.”
“There’s nothing to be private about. He said he has dinner here quite often, and I offered him my Chilean sea bass puttanesca if he happened to stop by tonight. Which he hasn’t.”
“Actually, he has. He’s sitting in the alcove. You can’t see it from the pass-through. And he did ask for your sea bass, as a matter of fact.”
Angela’s pulse sped up a blip. Then she took a deep breath to calm herself down. “I’ll have it ready for him in seven minutes.”
“You could make that a dinner for two, and join him. I mean, it’s almost closing time, there aren’t many people left in the dining room, and there’s really no reason for you being in the kitchen the rest of the evening, since we’ll be starting our closing prep in the next half hour. So, cook your meal for him, then join him.”
“I can’t,” she whispered, feeling the heat rising in her cheeks. And it wasn’t a heat coming from the kitchen.
“Why not?”
“We don’t get along. Not even a little bit. I think that if I were even in the same room with him while he was eating I’d ruin his digestion.”
“Yet he specifically wants your sea bass?” Catie shook her head. “If he thought you’d ruin his digestion, he’d have gone somewhere else for dinner. But he didn’t. And I think you’re being too hard on yourself.”
“I don’t have time for… for anything. Especially not for… well, you know. I’ve got Sarah, and my life is pretty hectic. Even if I didn’t ruin his digestion, I still couldn’t… have dinner with him. Bad timing. Other priorities.”
“Suit yourself. But in my experience, there’s always time, if you want it badly enough. And if you do want it badly enough, surprising things can happen, but only if you give them a chance. Personally, I think Chilean sea bass puttanesca for two is a good chance to take.”
Angela glanced over to the back door, to the great hulk of a man loitering there. Walt Graham, her new medical advisor in her camp program. He was a newly diagnosed diabetic himself, and under the close eye of Catie and her healthy cooking. Also the surprise of Catie’s life. Two widowed people, old friends from way back now with one reason to keep them together. No one had seen it coming, but everybody was happy for them. “Maybe for someone else, but I can’t take that chance,” Angela said, turning to the stove. Seven minutes to fix the meal, then she was going home. Out the back door, not through the dining room.
“I’ll admit, it was the best Chilean sea bass puttanesca I’ve ever had,” Mark said. The snow was coming down hard for early March. For White Elk that was good as it extended the ski season. And maybe, just maybe, he’d finally find some time to hit the slopes. He’d been intending to for the three months he’d been here, but so far it hadn’t happened.
Angela
