Tempting Donovan Ford (8 page)

Her heart didn’t feel quite as heavy when she slipped into the back door of the restaurant. She expected to be greeted by cool silence, the kind that floated over her and soothed her irritations. The kind she could bask in for a couple of hours or longer since La Petite Bouchée was closed on Mondays. Instead, she heard voices coming from the dining room.

Someone was here? Her heart thumped once and then calmed. There was no need to worry. Although she hadn’t expected company, the restaurant was a busy place and she wasn’t the only person with keys. Sasha had a set, as did her floor manager, and the Fords would have a set. And whoever was inside certainly wasn’t making any attempt to be quiet. She thought she recognized the low timbre of Donovan’s voice.

Julia pushed open the swinging doors and found Donovan in gorgeous black wool pants, a blue dress shirt and a charcoal sweater, standing with a trio of strangers. The trio were nodding and draping bolts of fabric over everything that stood still. The designers.

She felt a small niggle of apprehension. Donovan hadn’t mentioned anything about the designers coming in this morning. And he’d been here after closing last night. Of course, he didn’t have to tell her everything.

He must have heard the doors because he looked up when she walked into the dining room and smiled. Julia felt a low thrum run through her. “Julia. Come in. Meet the design team.”

The team of three, two men and one woman, all looked the same. Three variations on tall and skinny, with sable hair and blue eyes, clad in black with one single focal point, or as they would probably phrase it, “a pop of color.” One of the men had a striped purple tie, the other wore sapphire-colored cuff links with matching shoes, and the woman, who seemed to be in charge of the trio, had a gorgeous scarf in red, pink and orange, as if the sunset had been swirled onto the fabric before being draped around her neck.

They each greeted Julia politely if a bit indifferently. She wasn’t sure if that was because they didn’t like anyone who might have an opinion on their style selections joining them or they were simply going for that mannequin effect. There wasn’t a wrinkle or a hair out of place on any of them. By comparison, she and Donovan both looked as though they’d just rolled out of bed after some hot and sweaty sex.

Julia felt her cheeks heat and pushed the thought away. Donovan and her bed were two things that didn’t mix outside her fantasy life.

“Are we picking colors?” she asked when she reached the group.

“No. We’re merely getting a feel for the space.” The woman started talking while the two men began gathering up the bolts. Her words were full of terms like “flow” and “maximizing table space.” Whether the new bar should be in dove gray or champagne and questions on whether the accents should be silver or gold. It sounded beautiful but cold and a clear imitation of the Fords’ other bars.

Julia listened, gathering information and context. When the designers finished extolling their grandiose plans and gathering their materials, they left. Julia waited until the door clicked shut behind them before she looked at Donovan. “I thought we agreed that I would be a part of the design discussions.”

Donovan pulled out a chair that had been draped with a burnt orange—no, just no—and sat down. Julia sat down, too. “It was unplanned. The designer called this morning with a free block of time, and I took her up on it so we could get things moving.”

“Why didn’t you call me?”

“You said last night that you were looking forward to sleeping in today.” He reached out to touch the back of her hand. “Nothing has been decided yet. It was only an initial meeting to get a scope of time and cost. I didn’t think you needed or wanted to be involved in those aspects.”

“Well, I do.” She wanted to have a say in everything. “The space has to reflect the menu and service. Those are my domains.”

Donovan nodded. “How do you picture the space?”

She looked around, picturing her favorite spaces in her mind and superimposing them on the room around her. “Pretty much the same. Just fresher. Maybe some new chairs and stools for the bar, a softer color on the walls.” The white was a bit bland with no other design to highlight, but it was a lot better than burnt orange. “Some updated light fixtures.” She glanced up at the chandelier, which was the one piece she wouldn’t change. It was huge and gorgeous, all crystal and platinum swoops of sparkle. “Maybe a ceiling medallion to highlight the chandelier.”

“And what about the floors? The bar? The poor use of space?” He squeezed her hand and heat shot through her. “Julia. We have to make changes.” His dark eyes seemed to tilt down at the corners. “We can’t leave it as it is and expect anything else to change.”

“We could. With the marketing campaign, we’ll gain new business.” All they really needed was for people to remember they were there, to walk through the door and taste the food for themselves.

“But they won’t come back.” He let go of her hand and sat back. “They’ll take one look at this place and decide it’s not cool or hip or whatever.”

“This isn’t about being cool or hip or whatever.” La Petite Bouchée was classic and would stand the test of time.

Donovan ran a hand through his hair. “Actually, it is. We need the social scene to give it the stamp of approval. Once we’ve got that—”

“But we’re not a bar,” Julia interrupted. She understood where he was coming from. The part of the industry that relied on the young and pretty to fill their tables and their coffers. But a restaurant was different. And she felt as if everything was changing so fast. As if her life was once again in upheaval. “We need the foodies.”

“Julia, the foodies
are
the social scene. And right now, you and your food are being wasted.”

She sat up straighter, stinging from the implication that her food, her staff wouldn’t be good enough on their own. “I think my food speaks for itself.”

He reached out and caught her hand when she started to stand. “The decor, the layout, even the menu is working against you right now. I want to bring everything in line to work together.”

His hand was large and strong but held her fingers loosely enough that she could break free if she wanted to. She should want to. His eyes drilled into hers, searching. “Why are you so afraid of change?”

“I’m not afraid.” But her pulse pounded in her ears and made her vision shimmer for a second. “I just don’t think we need to change for the sake of change.”

It felt as if her whole life had been nothing but change for the past two years. A sick mother, taking over the restaurant, dealing with Alain’s death and then the nightmare that had been Jean-Paul’s reign. And now the Fords also wanted to do things their way.

Was it so wrong to want a little stability? A little time-out so she could get her legs under her and figure out what to do next?

She studied his hand as it curled over hers. They looked good together. Strong and supportive. “I just don’t want to see this place turned into a replica of every other restaurant out there. I don’t want us to lose what makes us different, special.”

The parts that reminded Julia of her mother and the traditions she’d built during her ten-year tenure as executive chef in the kitchen.

Suzanne Laurent had been part of the heyday of La Petite Bouchée
as a junior kitchen slave, and she’d always believed that with hard work and a concerted effort it could be a top-tier restaurant again. Given a little more time and money, maybe she’d have been able to get it there. Now it was up to Julia.

“And you think that’s what I want?” His voice was low and serious. Sexy.

Julia looked up from their hands. It wasn’t a connection she could pursue anyway. Even if they did look like something sculpted by Michelangelo. She tugged free and put her hands in her lap. “I don’t know what you want, Donovan. You say you want to sell the restaurant and know that I’m an interested buyer. Yet you don’t include me on the decisions that will affect the future of the restaurant. Wouldn’t it make more sense to get my opinion?”

There was a pause, a long, silent pause. She could hear the rumble of voices outside, tourists braving the February weather to visit the popular market next door, and the whoosh of cars and wind. He nodded slowly. “Of course. You’re right.” He stood. “Come and look.”

He led her to another table to a trio of poster-board mock-ups. “These are just some ideas based on my suggestions and work the designer has done for us in the past.” His arm brushed hers as he pointed, and his scent filled her head. That spicy, clean scent that made her think of the windowsill herb garden she’d had in Paris.

Julia prepared herself for shiny white and lots of cold, oversize mirrors. A restaurant version of Elephants. Instead, she saw something more beautiful than she’d imagined.

Louis XVI oval-back chairs in dark wood and a silky ivory moiré. The golden parquet floor replaced with light gray wood. The walls were no longer slabs of plain white decorated only with scattered pictures, but had strips of white wood installed as panels, and the walls themselves were a foggy gray with mirrors and other objets d’art. The bar was longer, stretching to fill up that awkward corner that was too small for a table and too big for a plant.

It looked like her restaurant, only better. So much better.

She inhaled, sucking in wonder, excitement and eau de Donovan. God, he smelled good. She shoved that discomforting realization out of her head. No matter what she might personally think of Donovan Ford, he was off-limits.

How could she grow her own name, increase her cachet in a city full of world-class chefs if she allowed herself to be waylaid by the first amazing-smelling man to cross her path?

Julia concentrated on the mock-ups in front of her, on the impersonal wall displays, and her gaze skittered up to the photos that were hung there now. The walls of La Petite Bouchée were currently covered in personal photographs taken by current and former staff that displayed a French life in stunning black-and-white imagery. They were part of the restaurant’s tradition.

“I want to keep the photos on the walls,” she told Donovan, turning her face from the pictures to look up at him. He leaned over her, one hand planted on the table as he, too, reviewed the papers on the table.

He glanced down, a lock of hair falling over his forehead. “Why?”

Julia swallowed, told herself she should really break this eye lock or at least shift in her chair so their bodies weren’t so close to touching. “They’re part of the restaurant’s history. Of all the people who worked here.” At his furrowed brow, she explained. “They’re
our
pictures. Alain’s photos of his childhood home, a picture I took of the Tuileries Garden my first winter in Paris, one that my mom took of me the first time she took me to France, one that Sasha took when she went to the French Alps last year.”

He glanced behind him at the closest wall and the photos displayed there. “I didn’t know.”

“And now you do.”

He straightened up. “Show me.” He started toward the wall she’d been staring at only a minute earlier. “Which ones are yours?”

Julia stood, too, slowly, trying not to drag her feet and wanting to all the same. There was no reason to think this was anything more than polite interest, and it provided her an excellent opportunity to sway him to her side. The photos weren’t just displayed at La Petite Bouchée; they were part of the restaurant. “This one.”

She pointed to the garden photo she’d taken when she’d first moved to Paris. She could still remember the day she’d taken it. A bad day when she’d been feeling lonely and lost, still working hard to be fluent in the language, and had just been thrown out of her first kitchen among extremely loud and spittle-laden cursing.

She knew it was a rite of passage, one that all young chefs experienced in this particular kitchen, but it was still difficult, and she’d promised herself that when she ran her own kitchen, she’d never do the same to anyone else.

“It’s beautiful.” Donovan stepped closer, really looking at the picture then back at her. And even though she hadn’t told him about the day she took it, she felt exposed, as if she’d just bared a piece of herself to him without realizing it. “Where’s the one your mom took? I’d like to see it.”

She felt her heart hiccup. She shouldn’t. She really shouldn’t. She pointed it out anyway. “It’s one of my favorites.”

He was quiet as he studied the picture. “You can see the love.” And Julia felt her heart hiccup again. “The way you’re looking at her. You love her.”

“I do.” She swallowed the sudden lump in her throat. “It was hard when she died.”

He only nodded and opened his arm, offering support if she wanted to take it. She did; she so did. But she was afraid to move.

“I was living in Paris when she got sick,” she told him. “But I haven’t gone back.” Hadn’t been able to. Not yet. “We had six months together.” To say those goodbyes that so many people never got the chance to say.

Julia knew she should consider herself lucky, but sometimes she was infuriated. She’d had only one parent. One lone family member. And that person had been stolen away. While other people had piles of family—aunts and uncles, parents and stepparents, brothers and sisters, and all sorts of second cousins and cousins once removed that they needed a spreadsheet to keep track of all of them. It wasn’t fair.

“And I don’t know why I’m unloading all of this on you.”

“I want to hear. Tell me about her.”

Julia clasped her hands together and looked at the picture of herself in the fountain as a little girl. Donovan was right; there was love in every aspect of the photo. The splash of the water. The way the sun shimmered on the water. The gleam in her eye. She knew her mother would have been looking at her with the same gleam. She drew in a deep shuddering breath and started talking.

She had Sasha to talk to, but she was conscientious about not dwelling on her loss, not bringing every conversation back to her mother. And she had the staff at work, but Julia had been careful not to exploit those relationships. She needed to seem in charge, and crying all over the dishwasher’s shoulder about the way her mother used to make beef stock wasn’t likely to inspire the kind of respect an executive chef needed.