Cowboy in the Kitchen (14 page)

They’d decorated a huge spruce in the entry for the press event but the colorfully wrapped boxes were empty, all for show.

“I’d love to do some shopping! I want to get something special for my folks to thank them for their help. Do you exchange gifts with your brothers?”

“We do, but our presents for each other always seem to have stupid jokes associated with them. Not so with our gifts for Alma and Felix, though. There’s a pretty stiff competition in that category.”

“Well, since your brothers don’t have the help of a lifelong female shopper, I can safely say you’ll win the gift wars this year. Let me grab my coat.”

He watched Gillian leave the room, and as she put even that brief distance between the two of them, he began to ache for her return.

Yes siree, Bob. The Cowboy Chef’s unattached status is in a heap of trouble
.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

T
HE
MALL
WAS
packed with holiday shoppers, so Hunt opted for a string of independently owned boutiques instead. He offered to drop Gillian at the sidewalk, but she insisted on traipsing through the maze of parked cars with him. He took her hand and tugged her close as they crossed a busy street. She returned the tight squeeze of his hand and gave him a wink, leaving Hunt to wonder whether it was his touch or Christmas bargains that had her grinning with excitement.

“I hear these shops carry merchandise so trendy that you can’t even find them at the big retail stores. We should be able to get something great for Alma and maybe even some one-of-a-kind gift items for our spa shop.”

“But why would you buy merchandise now when you’re not going to start the construction on your spa for months?”

For some reason, Gillian was caught off guard by the question, and she stumbled.

She pitched forward and landed hard on one knee. Hunt was glad he’d had a firm hold on her left hand or else she might have gone down face-first into the brick pavers. He squatted close to check her for injuries while she glanced about.

“Please tell me nobody saw that,” she begged.

“No such luck,” he teased to cover his concern. “But you were smart to fall among the Audis and Jags, so only a few extremely wealthy shoppers would spot your fall. Way to minimize your embarrassment.”

“Help me up.” She swatted away his hands as he tried to straighten her leg. “I must look like a fool down here.”

“Why don’t you sit still for a minute and let me call an ambulance?”

“An ambulance?” Gillian squeaked. “You can’t be serious. I just want to get up and walk it off.”

But when she tried to push to her feet, the injured knee collapsed beneath her. He was sure she’d have bit through her lip before she cried, but Gillian’s grimace assured him the pain was severe.

“You’re obviously not going to simply walk this off. If you won’t let me call an ambulance, will you at least let me carry you back to the Jeep?”

As he wrapped her in his arms, her lovely eyes flew wide and alarm creased the smooth skin between her brows.

“What? Are you opposed to somebody mistaking me carrying you in my arms for a public display of affection?”

“No, I’m opposed to missing our shopping trip.” She pouted, and Hunt sunk more deeply in love with her.

“Now I’m
sure
you’re not badly hurt.” He scooped Gillian close and held her tightly as he stood. “But just to be safe we’re going to make a stop by the medical center for an X-ray of that knee. They’ll give you something for the pain.”

“Hunt, it’s Saturday. We’ll have to wait for hours.”

“Maybe not. Daddy was chief of surgery when our parents were killed. It was a lot of years ago, but my brothers and I still get treated like family by the medical staff. I’ll be shocked if there isn’t at least one person in there who calls me Doc Temple’s youngest boy and not the Cowboy Chef.”

* * *

H
ER
KNEE
WAS
throbbing so badly that Gillian had lost any inclination to argue against going to the E.R. At this point she was just silently hoping there were no ligament tears or bone breaks. And to add insult to injury, the fall had been entirely her fault.

She’d stumbled at Hunt’s mention of the time line for building the spa. At least he was none the wiser as to the reason for her clumsy reaction.
Guilty reaction,
to be truthful. She couldn’t help feeling that she was betraying him by keeping her plans from him. But she’d confess everything once the well was gone, and it wouldn’t be the big deal Karl expected.

Hunt would be okay with it.

Yeah, right.

The woman in the E.R. admissions office greeted Hunt with a motherly hug. Gillian was wheeled toward the X-ray department within the hour. And within another hour she’d been discharged with her leg in a gosh-awful gray knee brace and a pair of crutches.

“This is not exactly the
pop of color
I was hoping to pair with my secondhand Jimmy Choo pumps on New Year’s Eve.”

“Just be thankful your knee is encased in Velcro and not plaster.” Hunt lifted Gillian, settled her into the Wrangler’s passenger’s seat and handed the safety belt across her lap.

“Oh, I am,” she insisted as she tightened the belt. “From what the orthopedic surgeon said, it could have been much worse, so it’s minor in the big picture. Still, this is a setback I could do without. How am I ever going to manage?”

Hunt climbed behind the wheel and waved away her melodrama. “That brace may slow you down a bit, but that’s probably a good thing.”

“How can you say that? You know who’s about to descend on Kilgore and how much is at stake. Everything’s got to go perfectly, and I can’t imagine how that’s going to happen with me in this straitjacket.”

There were a myriad of decorative displays and personal touches still to be added to the hotel. At least three pages in her notebook were filled with important bullet points still to be checked off, and a call with Rachel was scheduled for Monday to discuss the ceremony.

“You’ve been reminding me all morning how much help your parents have been. They’ll stand in wherever they have to, and I’m available to do the same. Between us and the staff we’ve hired, all the details will get covered, and the wedding will go off without a hitch. As soon as we get you home, you can start making each of us a list of chores, and we’ll get right on them.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Though her brain was already foggy from pain medication, she began to churn through a mental to-do list. “There are thousands of white lights that have to be strung about the grounds and hung from the trees, the perfect project for Dad and Felix. Mom will be happy to help Alma with the petit fours we’d planned to bake and freeze.”

She leveled a sheepish look his way.

“What?”

“I’ve been meaning to ask if you’d take over the menu discussions with Rachel. I wanted to keep my hand in it, but that’s your bailiwick. I should probably get out of the way and let a professional finish the job. Would you mind?”

“Of course I wouldn’t mind.” He sounded relieved, as if he’d feared she’d never come to that conclusion.

“I’ve already shared my notes with you, but she’s supposed to call on Monday, and I’m not sure how much good I’ll be once the drugs kick in.”

“No problem. I’ll take the call on speakerphone so you can hear the whole thing and still be informed. You won’t have any issues directing those projects from your rooms on the second floor for a few days,” he assured her.

“Thank goodness for the elevator or I’d have to move into the laundry room downstairs.”

“Cullen’s also got two more guest rooms at his place. I’m sure we could relocate some boxes of books to make a comfortable spot for you, if necessary.”

She reached across the space between them to rest her hand on his shoulder and was reminded once again that the man beneath the jacket was solid, dependable and oh-so masculine.

“You’ve been too good to me, Hunt. How can I show my appreciation?”

“You’ve already shown me in a dozen ways.” He put his left palm atop her hand and gave it a firm squeeze before placing it back on the steering wheel.

“Really?” She exaggerated the one-word question. “How so?”

He smiled, his eyes wide in amusement at her shameless request for an attagirl.

“Not that I’m fishing for kudos,” she feigned innocence.

“Neither of us ever would.” He returned her insistence with a shake of his head. “Well, let me see. First there’s the way you’ve brought Alma and Felix into your business, and then how you’ve treated my brothers as if they’re old friends. Next there’s the fact that you’ve given me complete control of the kitchen and my own staff.”

She was surprised by that last comment. “Didn’t you expect that I’d do that, Hunt?”

“Not at first, no. You were pretty adamant about calling all the shots, but then most owners are, even when they hire an accomplished chef to run the show. I figured for sure we’d knock heads a lot during the build out, but you surprised me.”

“I’m glad to hear that, Hunt. But it was you who showed me I had to take a step away and let my experts do the job I’d hired them to do. Otherwise I might have been in this knee brace even sooner.”

“Or handcuffs,” he teased. “I was afraid the city permit office might sic the law on you, after the way you harassed them. You’re lucky Mac was able to get his commissioner buddy to smooth things over with them.”

“That was a valuable lesson in small-town living. Don’t go scratching in somebody else’s sandbox, and if you do, be sure you have a friend with a shovel at City Hall.”

She shook her head at her own stubbornness. He’d been right to tell her to ease off, and she’d been foolish not to follow his guidance.

“But, Gillian, the most important way you’ve shown your appreciation was by being open-minded about the history of Temple Territory. You’ve kept the most well-known points of interest in place, and not only is that important to the integrity of the property, it’s important to my family.”

He turned into the winding drive and drove up the hill to the empty parking lot at the rear of the mansion.

Gillian chose her words carefully, shifting in her seat. “Hunt, I haven’t agreed with you on all those
points of interest.
But when something makes sense, adds to the allure of the hotel and doesn’t stray too far from my vision, I’ve tried to be flexible. Just look how well your Pap’s saloon bar cleaned up.”

“I couldn’t believe you had that scarred piece of junk refinished, and moved front and center.”

“That piece of junk is a fabulous example of Western Americana, and I recognized its value the moment I laid eyes on it out in the barn. If there hadn’t already been a good story to go with it, I’d have made one up!”

“I doubt that Pap had many reasons for pride in the last years of his life. That beat-up old bar being transformed into a focal point for your hotel would make him very proud indeed.” Hunt nodded with a smile. “You warm my heart every time you rescue something of his, so don’t feel as if you have to do anything special to make the message official.”

Gillian silently hoped that what she had up her sleeve would be enough to honor the old man who’d once called this place his home, and enough to make up for her deception. She was not a rule breaker. She’d lived her life asking permission in advance, but in this case, she’d have to ask for forgiveness after the fact.

“Now that I’ve got this bum knee, how will I thank my parents? There won’t be any holiday gift shopping for me.”

“You can always order something off the internet or from one of those cable shopping networks. There’s still time for UPS to get it here.”

“That’s an option. But they deserve more than the cheesecake-of-the-month club.”

“We’ll worry about gifts tomorrow. For now let’s get you upstairs to your rooms, where we can elevate and ice that knee.”

“You don’t have to go to all that trouble. If you’ll dump me in the lobby, I’ll be fine until Mom and Dad get home from the lake.”

“Just leave everything to me,” he insisted.

Hunt scooped her out of the seat and carried her inside. He continued past the sofa she pointed to, easily mounted the staircase worthy of Scarlett O’Hara’s Atlanta home, and lowered Gillian onto the chaise longue in her sitting room. He put a pillow beneath her knees, grabbed the Sherpa throw from the foot of the four-poster bed and draped it over her lap.

“I’ll be up in a few minutes,” he called from the door. She counted as his boots thumped down twenty-four steps and then fell silent, as he probably crossed the mesquite floor in the direction of the kitchen that was his domain.

The spirit of Hunt Temple would forever be etched on her property and her heart. And she wanted it to remain that way. It was right. It was fitting. It was perfect.

It was love.

“Oh, my goodness,” Gillian muttered to herself, daring to say the words out loud.

“I love him,” she whispered. Tears stung her eyes. “I love Hunt.”

She pressed her fingertips to her lips as if to stop any further leaks of the admission that could never be recalled. Gillian shuddered over the revelation, even though it was a truth she’d known for weeks but had refused to recognize.

She loved Hunt Temple.

But the timing was all wrong. The throbbing in her head began to match the throbbing in her knee. Gillian leaned her forehead against the heels of both hands and closed her eyes. Nothing serious with Hunt could work out.

They were star-crossed, doomed from the get-go. Weren’t they?

She and Hunt wanted different things. She considered how often he’d paralleled their roles in the hospitality industry, the reasons why they were well matched, if only for the short term.

Well, maybe they shared a passion for serving guests, but at this point, the logistics of their relationship were unstable at best. Her home was here in Kilgore, and would be for many years to come if she was blessed with success. As Hunt had proven over and over, his employment and his home could be anywhere. His talent was mobile and in demand. He had traveled half the world and didn’t seem inclined to settle for this small East Texas town again.

But Kilgore was Hunt’s home.

His family and friends were here. His roots were here. He always came back. Didn’t that mean this was where his heart wanted to be?

Hope surged past the emotional roadblocks Gillian was putting up as fast as she could. Maybe there was a chance for the two of them to be together. Maybe.

Gillian laid her head against the chaise, closed her eyes and let the medication do its work.

* * *

“H
OW
’
D
THE
HOUSE
hunting go?” Hunt asked James and Meredith when they arrived at Moore House just before sunset.

“We found several rentals that we can afford, and Cooper was in hog heaven,” James reported.

The big poodle raced gracefully from room to room on the main floor, as if he were running the bases in a ball park. The dog’s ability to turn on a dime without disturbing his surroundings was amazing. He definitely deserved a space to call his own, and the inside of a manor house was not the ideal location.