Menu for Romance (13 page)

Forbes’s words took a few moments to filter through Major’s brain. “Benefits of a city that still has a small-town mentality?”

Forbes laughed. “Something like that. Hey, speaking of small-town mentality, what are you doing for supper?”

“Figured I’d just throw something together at home.”

“Not tonight. You ever been to my sister Jenn’s restaurant down in Comeaux?”

“The Fishin’ Shack? A couple of times. I don’t make it down to Comeaux very often.”

Forbes removed his tie and reached in his top desk drawer, withdrawing keys and his PDA. “Come on, then. I’m meeting some of my siblings and cousins for our standing Thursday night dinner.”

“Okay ... sure, I’d love to. How about I follow you down there?” Major had heard about this Thursday night family dinner tradition through Anne a few years ago. She’d invited him many times in the beginning, but back then he’d spent almost every evening with his mother. Eventually, the invitations stopped coming; then his mother insisted she didn’t want to see him every day.

And if he went, he’d be able to find out if Meredith had foregone bumping up her date with Ward Breaux in favor of her family without having to try to find some way to wheedle it out of her subtly tomorrow.

“You did all this work yourself?”

Meredith leaned against the pillar in the opening between the living room and front foyer while Ward inspected the refinishing she’d done on the built-in cabinets flanking the fireplace.

“I did.” She held her breath and followed him around the room with her gaze, praying he wouldn’t find fault with any of her work.

He turned and gave her a winsome smile. “Ever considered quitting your job and becoming a subcontractor?”

Only in her dreams. “You can see how much needs to be done if the house is going to be ready for me to move in three months from now.”

The toe of his shoe scraped along the row of carpet tacks still stuck in the hardwood near the wall. “For one person, yes, it would be impossible.” He continued around the room until he leaned his shoulder against the pillar opposite her. “I’d be very interested in submitting a bid to complete your remodel.”

Meredith’s face grew hot under Ward’s intense gaze. “What will you need me to do so that you can do that?”

“I need to come by some time with my apprentice so we can measure all the rooms and so you can tell me exactly what you want done.”

“I’ll have to check my schedule at work. With the Valentine’s banquet coming up so soon, I’m not sure what my days are going to look like.”

His lopsided grin was rather disarming. “That’s fine. It means I don’t have to make up an excuse to call you tomorrow.”

Oh, she shouldn’t have skipped lunch today. Her empty stomach knotted and twisted with the rush of pleased embarrassment that blasted through her. Never before had a good-looking, eligible man flirted with her like this.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to embarrass you, Meredith. But I just can’t seem to help myself whenever I’m around you.”

The chirping of his phone saved her from having to think of a response.

He cringed when he looked at the device. “Ooh, I really need to take this. Forgive me?”

“Sure. No problem.” She escaped the living room and headed upstairs to make sure the almost constant rain since Christmas hadn’t generated any problems.

A few minutes later, footsteps announced Ward’s presence on the stairs.

“Meredith?”

“In the guest bathroom.” She balanced herself on the edge of the claw-foot tub and ran her hand along the top edge of the wall and around the window casing to check for dampness.

“What are you—”

Her left foot slipped off the narrow edge of the tub. She pitched backward—straight into Ward. He swung her up easily into his muscular arms. Mortification burned every inch of her skin.

“Yes, now I see why you shouldn’t be trying to do this renovation all by yourself. What in the world were you trying to do, besides break your neck?”

“There was some damage to the roof in the last big storm. It’s been patched, and I was just checking to make sure the patch is holding.”

“Well, if you approach everything that way, it’s a wonder you haven’t broken something—like your neck.”

“Speaking of, could you put me down?”

He took a few steps away from the tub and gently set her on the floor, not removing his hands from her waist until she assured him she had gained her balance. He moved around her, bent over, and leaned his weight on the edge of the tub, which promptly began to tip toward him.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought: so old the bolts securing it to the floor are either missing or rusted through.” He rotated around to face her, returning to his full height. With crossed arms and a frown crinkling his forehead, he could have passed for an avenging angel. “One thing I want you to promise me, whether I get the contract or not.”

The back of her neck began to ache from looking up at him in such close quarters. “What’s that?”

“You’ll follow some basic work site safety guidelines—and you’ll make everyone who sets foot on the property do the same. I’d hate for you to get sued because a worker breaks something when he falls off the edge of the tub that isn’t secured.”

Impressed by his concern not just for her safety, but for anyone else’s, she nodded. “I will. And I don’t usually do that. It was just expedient tonight.”

He grimaced. “And that’s how most on-the-job injuries occur. You don’t want to start your life in a new home with a huge claim on your insurance, do you?”

Laughter bubbled up and escaped.

“Meredith, I’m serious.”

She patted his folded arms. “I know. And I do take safety seriously. I was laughing because you reminded me of my older brother and our mom just then. That’s the same lecture either of them would have given me in the same circumstance. When all else fails, appeal to the financial aspect of the situation.”

His expression eased, his dark eyes no longer stern, but amused once again. “They sound like very smart people.”

“Come on, let me show you the rest of the upstairs.”

“Hey, Major!”

At Forbes’s younger brother’s greeting, the handful of people sitting at the ten-top table turned and greeted Major with the same warmth. Why did he always assume they would see him as an interloper—as an intruder? They’d never treated him with anything but affection and friendship. Most of those present were too young to remember the couple of years that Major worked for Aunt Maggie two decades ago, yet they still acted as if he were a member of the extended family.

“Oh, mercy!” Jennifer Guidry came out of the kitchen. “Now I’m going to feel self-conscious. Forbes, did you have to bring a professional chef to my restaurant?” She winked at him. “Hey, Major.”

“Hi, yourself.” He looked around with interest at the interior design. “I don’t know what you’re worried about. I think everything is fantastic. The pirogue is new since the last time I was here.” He pointed at the flat-bottomed, pointy-ended boat suspended upside down from the beamed ceiling overhead.

“One of my suppliers down in Jeanerette thought I needed that for some authenticity. So he built it and put it up there a couple of months ago.”

Major watched Jenn as she talked with a couple of her siblings or cousins—he could never keep all the relations straight in this clan. He hadn’t seen her in at least a year. He used to think that she and Meredith were nearly identical—in fact, when he’d first met them as teenagers, he’d thought they were twins. But Jenn had cool, blue-gray eyes like Forbes’s, not wide, nutmeg brown eyes that glowed with an emberlike intensity. Jenn’s hair was a little redder, too. She flitted from person to person like a hummingbird. Meredith would have just found a place to sit and observe those around her.

“Chef, we need you in the kitchen.”

Major turned along with Jenn—and shook his head at the gut reaction.

“I’ll be right back,” Jenn called over her shoulder as she followed her employee around the fishing tackle–decorated wall that buffered the dining room from the kitchen. The snap and bustle of working in a restaurant—he missed it.

Sitting beside Forbes, Major found he had a good view of the front door across the large room, because he saw Anne as soon as she entered.

She paused in her confident stride toward the table when she noticed Major. “What—my invitations weren’t good enough for you? You had to wait until Forbes invited you to come to family dinner?”

Major stood and greeted her with a handshake. “He’s a lawyer—trying to argue with him would just be a losing battle.” He held the chair to his right for her.

She glanced around, a frown forming between her brows. “Where’s Meredith?”

Finally, someone had voiced the question that had been bouncing around in Major’s brain for the last fifteen minutes.

“She’s going to try to come later,” Forbes said. “She called as I was driving down here to say that something came up, and she made other plans for dinner.”

Major’s guts melted into a disappointed puddle.

“What do you mean, ‘other plans for dinner’?” Anne asked.

Major assisted Anne with the chair and waited to hear how Forbes would answer her question. Jenn returned with a couple of baskets of hush puppies and took the seat on the other side of Anne.

Forbes refilled his glass from the pitcher of tea on the table. “I don’t know. I guess something came up at work.” He glanced askance at Major.

Major lowered himself into his chair and shrugged. It would serve her right if he told her somewhat meddlesome kin that she wasn’t working but was on a date ... but that would be petty. “I don’t know. It could be any of a million things that sidetracked her.”

“Well, hopefully she’ll be able to get here soon.” Anne glanced at the printed list of the day’s specials then placed her order. “It would be a shame for her to miss such a historical event as Major O’Hara attending a Guidry family function after so many years.”

And to think, if he’d been paying attention and hadn’t been so wrapped up in his own little life, he might have recognized his feelings for Meredith soon enough to have actually become part of the Guidry family.

He hardly knew what he was ordering when the waiter came around to him. He could almost hear a game show announcer in his head:
All of this could have been yours, but the price wasn’t right.

As dinner progressed, Major was slowly able to set his thoughts aside, though the self-recrimination remained. But no one could be around this crew for very long and spend any time inside his own skull. Conversations flew fast and furious around the large, round table, ranging from the bizarre case police officer Jason had just worked to the latest plans for Anne’s wedding.

On that point, Major could contribute to the discussion, teasing Anne about the lack of extravagance in her menu choices.

“That’s our Annie—always suggesting all the frills and froufrou for everyone else, but never indulging in them for herself.” Jenn rolled her eyes.

“I blame it on George—since he’s not here to defend himself.” Anne’s blue eyes twinkled.

“Oh, please.” Jenn stood and went to the wait station to refill their pitcher of iced tea. “George would let you do anything you want.”

“Well, as brother of the bride, I have to say that I’m glad it’s not one of those really over-the-top kind of weddings,” Jason Babineaux said.

“Yeah?” Forbes challenged him. “All you have to do is usher. You don’t have to stand in front of the hordes of gawkers who are going to be sitting there just waiting for someone to flub up.”

“You could always be removed from the list of attendants, Forbes, if the idea bothers you so much.” Anne’s eyebrows arched up, her expression stern, though she couldn’t wipe the smile from her eyes.

“And leave George with only his brother up there with him for moral support? I couldn’t do that to the poor sap. Someone’s got to commiserate with him on his life as he knows it being over.”

Anne turned to Major. “I’m so happy that you could finally come and witness for yourself just how much everyone in this family loves each other.” She winked.

Melancholy wrapped around Major’s chest. Did the people sitting at this table have any idea just how blessed they were to be part of a family at all? To have what Major had dreamed of his whole life, had imagined when he was a kid?

After everyone had overindulged in Jenn’s peach cobbler, people exchanged places at the table as if at a signal. It happened before Major realized it, and suddenly, he found himself not between Anne and Forbes, but next to their young cousin Jodi.

“I’m so glad I was able to get over here to you. I’ve been hoping to see you again for a while now.” Jodi flipped her long, brown hair over her shoulder and gazed at him with wide, dark eyes.

Major straightened and cleared his throat, uncomfortable with what felt like flirtatiousness in the young woman’s demeanor. He was certain he was just flattering himself by thinking she was actually interested in him. But when she leaned closer and rested her hand on his arm, a sense of foreboding stole through him.

“What can I do for you, Jodi?”

“Oh, I don’t want you to do anything
for
me.” She batted long lashes. “It’s what I think we can do together.”

Meredith leaned against the side of the SUV, her neck starting to ache slightly from looking up at Ward. The in-and-out flow of people from the gourmet deli marked the passing of time as they stood chatting. And while she enjoyed his company and getting to know him better, she couldn’t help but think about the fact that, right now, her siblings and cousins were all down at Jenn’s restaurant.

When she’d agreed to grab a quick sandwich with Ward, she’d been proud of herself for the ease with which she’d called Forbes to tell him she wouldn’t be there for dinner. But over the past hour, the idea that they were all down there having fun without her kept intruding on her thoughts.

Ward reached out and took her hand. She pressed against the back door of her SUV. He was quite handsome; she couldn’t deny it. But the thought that she’d rather be here with Major kept her from enjoying the moment.

“Ward, I hope it won’t offend you that I’m going to have at least one other contractor bid the house.”

The corners of his eyes crinkled. “I’d think you a fool if you didn’t.” He rubbed the palm of her hand with his thumb. “But I hope that even if you don’t accept my bid, you’ll still go out with me.”

Come on, heart, flutter!
“Of course.”

“Good.” He looked down when his phone buzzed. “That’s my cue to say good night and let you get back to your previous plans.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek. “G’night, Meredith.”

She blinked twice, stunned that the kiss had been so quick—and so chaste. “Good night, Ward.”

He held her door and shut it once she was in with her seat belt fastened. She waited until he’d started the engine of his massive, four-door pickup before pulling out of the lot and heading toward Comeaux.

Though she hated doing it while driving, she pulled out her phone and speed-dialed Anne’s cell phone number.

“Hey, Mere.” Loud music nearly drowned out Anne’s greeting.

“Y’all going to be there awhile longer?”

“Oh, yeah. Karaoke just started, in case you can’t tell. Jason just did ‘Mack the Knife,’ and Forbes and Major are about to get up there and sing ‘My Favorite Things.’”