Page 53 of Sexy as Sin
Ben gazed at her for a long, long moment, then stood up abruptly, shoving the chair back with a scraping noise, and said, “In a bin in my mushroom shed. Yeah. Take them and see for yourself. Take them all.”
Pity Katherine hadn’t fallen through the chair.
Not the easiest of days. Katherine dropped Willow off back at Nourish, saying only, ominously, “We’ll be in touch,” and Willow nodded numbly, climbed out of the car, and headed in to help finish the prep and load the van. After that, it was a short journey to the Yoga Center, where the reception would be held.
Ice blocks were definitely right, she thought as she moved like an automaton between van and kitchen, telling Amanda and the three-person wait staff, “I’ll do setup, pour water and champagne when it’s time, and fix the coffee and tea. No food service.” The rest of the alcohol was being provided by another vendor this time, which was fortunate. “This is too public, and I don’t want anybody remembering me plating meals, or even carrying them out, if they hear about what happened.”
Amanda sighed, and Jamie shot Willow a hard look. He’d been doing that all day. She ignored it, but four hours later, when she was slotting dirty glasses into a divided carton as fast as her hands could move, and he bumped into her on his way past with barely a word, making her juggle a glass and nearly drop it, she’d had enough. “Is there a problem?” she asked him.
“No problem,” he said. “Except that I was sick as a dog last night. Thought you were meant to be trained.”
She straightened. “Take care.”
“I’m not sure I’m the one who needs to,” he said.
Crystal, who was scraping the remains of dinner plates into a bin, said, “Jamie. No. Poor Willow. She was in hospital herself, and imagine how much responsibility she feels for poisoning everybody.”
Geez, thanks,Willow thought. There was no benefit in pursuing this now, though, and besides, she had no answer to give. The fatigue was slowing her, making her move as stiffly as a robot, and thinking was beyond her. She turned away instead, kept loading up glasses and plates with pure muscle memory, and ignored both of them.
Another two hours, and the van was unloaded, the cleanup done, and she was home. Six o’clock. She took another shower and did her best to let it perk her up, the way it had done at two this morning with Brett, but all it did was make her want to lie down.
She should have gone directly from Nourish to the organic market, and then on to his place. It was always a mistake to give yourself a chance to stop, and she’d been trained in restaurant kitchens and was used to working long hours in heat, noise, and endless rush. A chef had stamina, or she didn’t get to be a chef.
She was blotting her hair dry, and Azra had come to the door and was hovering there, opening her mouth to ask something Willow probably didn’t want to answer, when her phone rang.
Please, not bad news,she thought, and picked it up.
Brett.
“Hi,” she said, putting some cheerfulness into her tone. “I’m just on my way to the shops. Be with you in an hour. You’re going to get that burger tonight. I could do it on the barbecue, and add some sweet potato wedges and a green salad. How does that sound?”
“Like too much work,” he said. “That’s why I’m calling. I’ve got a refrigerator full of leftovers, and my only problem is going to be what to eat first. You could at least have taken half the cake with you.”
“Nah.” She kept it breezy, because giving into weakness was much too dangerous. “Not our agreement. Besides, there’s your breakfast and lunch for tomorrow. I need to be at work too early to come by and start them in the morning.”
“Again,” he said. “Leftovers, and I’m perfectly capable of making eggs for breakfast. I’m not exactly keeping up my gym routine right now, and I don’t need to eat French toast every day.”
Oh.She’d been cooking him meals too high in calories, and he hadn’t corrected her. She should have asked.
She hesitated too long, because he sighed and said, “Willow. I didn’t want to say it, but I have a lot of work to catch up on. It’ll be better to have the evening.”
Ouch.“All right, then,” she said, and turned away from the sting. “See you tomorrow evening.”
She rang off, and Azra asked, “Is everything OK? You don’t look well. Was that Brett? It didn’t go well after all last night, then? I thought, when you didn’t come home...”
“No,” Willow said. “It was good. I’m tired, though, and he’s working tonight and doesn’t want dinner or company, so I’m just going to go to bed.” She managed to be brisk. It wasn’t easy.
Azra hesitated. “Cup of tea? Bowl of soup? Of course, you made the soup, so... I could do a boiled egg for you, though.” About the limit of Azra’s cooking ability.
“No, thanks,” Willow said again. “I’ll just go to bed.”
Brett didn’t hear from Willow again that night, which he told himself was good. He hoped she’d gone to bed early. She’d looked paper-thin in the morning, like you could see straight through her, and she’d sounded worse on the phone. Strained tight, as if she were holding herself together, but it was taking everything she had to do it. He knew the feeling, although he’d had more practice concealing it. He couldn’t stand to be one more thing she had to take care of before she could rest.
He ate leftover stew for dinner, which was even more flavorful than the night before—damn, she was good—cooked scrambled eggs and vegetables for breakfast, doing a pretty fine job on one leg, if he did say so himself, though Willow’s version would have been better in some mysterious way, missed her presence as if the sun hadn’t come out, and refocused. More than once. When he still hadn’t heard from her by five o’clock in the afternoon, though, he started wondering, and when six rolled around, he started worrying.
He’d texted her once in the morning.Any more news?And again in the afternoon.That hamburger sounds good tonight.And... nothing.
She could have pushed too hard and gotten sick again. Sounded entirely plausible. Had the woman ever had a fallback position in her life? He was thinking “no.” She had a roommate, but he suspected Azra had her own world and her own friends. She might not even be home.
