but who could explain dreams, really? The subconscious was a strange place.
And hers had apparently had a nervous breakdown.
“If this is a typical afternoon around here, you’re in more trouble than I thought.” Stuart arched a brow and waved at the chaos. Most of the diners were huddled at the maitre d’s station, clamoring for refunds. Willie and Helen were arguing over the best way to clean up the remains of the chandelier, and in the kitchen, Rick and Josef were apparently still arguing, oblivious to the newest disaster.
For a dream, it was uncomfortably realistic.
“This isn’t a typical afternoon,” Olivia said, and realized she was actually wringing her hands. That was bad. No more hand wringing, she admonished herself. It was a dead giveaway. “Not at all.”
Stuart’s response to that was a snort, and Olivia took a deep breath. She wasn’t going to panic. Or cry. Even if she really, really wanted to.
Most afternoons at the Coach and Four were lovely. Dinnertime, too. It was never too crowded, for one thing, and it was…friendly. Comfortable. A bit like family, really. Which wasn’t what Stuart seemed to think a hotel restaurant should be, but Olivia liked it that way. Some nights the hotel’s permanent residents ate together, taking one of the big tables in the corner, and on really quiet evenings Frankie Garson sometimes played the old baby grand piano and everyone gathered around to sing show tunes and old standards.
When she was a child, her father used to play that piano the same way.
All right, she was wringing her hands again. She had to somehow move from this spot, and more importantly move Uncle Stuart from this spot. To Siberia, preferably.
“I’m so sorry about this,” she said after another deep breath. Wow. The man had eyebrows like a villain out of a silent movie, she noticed. Black and bushy and somehow malicious. “Can I take you to lunch somewhere? My treat.”
“I highly doubt you have the funds to take me anywhere but the corner deli.” He rolled his eyes and folded his arms over the neat gray pinstripes of his suit jacket. “I’m not particularly interested in lunch, in any case.”
“Well, we can talk in my office,” she said. Pretending the idea didn’t make her want to run screaming from the room. “It’s quiet in there.”
“Yes, I’ve been there,” he said with something uncomfortably close to venom in his voice. “It was your father’s office, too, as well as your grandfather’s.”
There wasn’t really an answer to that, since it was true. It didn’t explain why he seemed so angry about it, of course, so instead of answering she simply swallowed hard. Any minute she would be back to wringing her hands. Or very possibly hiding under the piano.
“Well?” Stuart demanded, spreading his hands in impatience. “Let’s go on with it, shall we?”
Oh, there were no words for how much Olivia didn’t want to do that. Nothing Stuart could say now would be good. How could it be? No one looked that frightening when they were about to tell you they’d bought you a pony, after all.
So she sucked in another deep breath, aware that she was probably overdosing on oxygen, and said, “Yes, let’s go into my office. I’ll have the kitchen send in some tea.”
But when she turned to head for the door, she saw something so strange it took her a moment to process it. It was Rhys, gorgeous, funny, rock star Rhys from this morning, with Yelena on his arm. Her pulse gave a startled little kick and she heard, as if from far away, her own gasp of surprise.
That couldn’t be right. It couldn’t be him, could it? With Yelena? Maybe this really was a dream. A bad one, yes, but a dream nevertheless. Only in a dream would Yelena flutter her fingers at Olivia while Rhys winked, slouched in the door with the tiny little ex-ballerina hanging onto his arm.
She didn’t have time to consider it any further, though. Just then Josef came storming out of the kitchen, bellowing, “I quit! Yes, quit! Is lunacy, this place! Wahnsinn!”
For an instant, there was complete silence as every head turned to look at him, standing in the chaos of the dining room, broken crystal at his feet. His chef’s hat was bunched in his hands, his coat was smeared with chocolate frosting—and then he was making a beeline for Olivia.
Beside her Stuart took a step backward as Josef huffed to a halt in front of them, but it was too late. Because Rick was pushing through the swinging door behind Josef, doing his own ranting. His hat was gone, too, and his face was the color of an overripe tomato. And in his hands was the disputed cake.
“I’m crazy? You’re crazy,” he shouted. A woman at the closest table dropped her fork in surprise, and it clattered against her plate. “It’s just a cake! A bad one!”
Josef whirled around to face him, which Olivia guessed Rick had been counting on. Because in the next moment the remains of the cake were sailing through the air—and smacking Uncle Stuart in the face with a wet, heavy splat as Josef ducked.
Olivia desperately wanted the next noise she heard to be her alarm clock’s horrible shriek, but instead it was an outraged grunt from her uncle.
“You see, yes?” Josef barked to the room at large, spreading his arms wide. Despite the fact that an innocent bystander was covered with German chocolate cake, and his sous chef had fled into the kitchen—probably for some rotten eggs, Olivia thought with another vague stab of alarm—the chef was positively triumphant. “A lunatic!”
Well, yes. Apparently it was going around.
Even further than she’d thought, too. Because as Uncle Stuart managed a muffled “Mmmppff!” she felt an arm slide around her waist, and looked up to see Rhys beside her.
Her mouth fell open, but nothing more coherent than Stuart’s outburst emerged.
“Here you are, sir,” Rhys said to her uncle, pressing a clean linen napkin into his hand. “So sorry about that, really. We were supposed to have the run-through for the dinner theatre later. Mixed signals, yeah? What can you do?”
Those dark gray eyes of his were wide and busy, she noticed as she stared up at Rhys in amazement. They were darting around the room, in fact. Probably because it was difficult to make up an enormous lie like the one he’d just told off the top of his head.
“Dinner theater, yeah,” Rhys continued, as if he weren’t facing a furious man with chocolate frosting all over his face and his suit. “Hasn’t Olivia told you about it? Interactive, we’re thinking.” He grinned, a bright flash of amusement that lit up his whole face. “Maybe not so interactive as this, you see, but with the customers participating. It’s all the rage in …in the West End. Of…Manchester.”
Olivia bit her bottom lip as Stuart raised his sticky eyebrows. As liars went, Rhys was pretty awful. But the fact that he was doing it at all was…well, confusing, for one thing, but sweet. So very sweet.
The feel of his strong arm around her was something different, though. Not sweet. Hot was the word for that. Tempting.
And dangerous. Very, very dangerous.
“You expect me to believe that this…this pandemonium,” Stuart sputtered, “is going to be a regular feature here?” He wiped another glob of icing from his chin and
