Page 62 of Sexy as Sin
It’s one day, mate,she told herself when they’d left, pulling out the vacuum.One incident, and one set of related problems. It will all pass.Not this second, though, because her phone began vibrating and the Imperial March ringtone fromStar Warsmade its commanding presence known.
She picked up. “Hi, Aunt Fiona.”
“Hello, darling.” Her aunt sounded matter-of-fact as always, thank goodness. Willow didn’t have room for one more drama today. “Just checking how you’re going.”
“Going well. Busy, though.”
“Too busy to talk?” No accusation, at least. Another thing she’d had enough of.
“No. Cleaning the kitchen at Nourish, that’s all.” She got out the stainless-steel brushes, put the phone on speaker, and went to work scouring the stovetop.
A moment of hesitation, then, “I heard you had a bit of an issue with a meal. Do you need anything? A kind word? A bracing chat? Hot soup? Though you’ll have that one covered.”
Willow stopped scrubbing, then put her back into it again. “Tell me my dodgy mushrooms didn’t make the papers all the way up in Brisbane.”
“No, why?” Fiona sounded surprised, at least. “Should they have? Was it that bad? Rafe mentioned it, that’s all.”
Willow sighed. “Of course he did. How can he know about it from so far away? I thought he was still learning to be a soldier, getting put in his place by Jace. His film starts in a couple weeks, doesn’t it?”
“Oh, you know, darling. I expect it was Martin. It generally is.”
“At least Rafe didn’t ring me this time,” Willow muttered. “Though I expect he will. And no. I’m fine.”
“I hate telephones,” her aunt complained, startling a laugh out of her. “How am I meant to know what ‘this time’ means? Or what look you have on your face right now? Do you want me to drive down? We talked about you having a mum, remember? This sounds like a mum job.”
“No,”Willow said with more force than she ever used. “I wish...” She had to stop scrubbing again and take a breath. “I don’t ring Rafe every time I see him on a tabloid to make sure he’s all right, do I?”
“Ah. You think it’s because he doesn’t believe you can handle it yourself. It’s not. Men hate to see a woman they love struggling, that’s all. They want to jump in andfixit, and if they can’t—they still want to help. And so do mothers. If I had a magic wand, I’d wave it. I don’t, but I have an ear.”
This was comfort she couldn’t afford to sink into. She needed tohandleit, and to do that, she had to stay upright, and not to feel that she’d fallen short once again. “Unfortunately, this one isn’t easily fixed. It was sabotage, maybe, but I haven’t sorted out why, and meanwhile, it looks like my mistake, though I’ll swear it isn’t. It’ll be all right, though. There’s nothing Rafe or anyone else can do.” She wished people would quit asking her about it. She wished she could quit thinking about it, for that matter.
More silence, and then, “One last thing, and I’ll stop. Are you all right for money? Are you needing to... defend yourself, or anything? And before you explode at me—do you never help anyone yourself? I know you better than that. I can’t believe this is about Rafe, this reaction, or me being a Nosy Parker, or even your work troubles, or not only that. I think it’s something else. What else has happened?”
“Nothing permanent,” Willow said, and started working again.
“I’m only going on through all these prickles,” her aunt said, “because of what you said the other week. Is it the firm, the new partner? Or that man, the one you wanted? How is he reacting to this? Rafe told me to ask you, ‘What does Brett say? What’s he doing about it?’ Why did he ask that, I wonder? How did he know his name?”
It wasn’t enjoyable to feel like a sulky teenager again. Time to try another way.She wasn’t going to talk about the partnership. It was too raw right now. “Because Rafe knows him, and Lily knows him as well. He’s American, he’s above my touch and unavailable to me in every realistic way possible, and he’s reacting in the same way Rafe is, or more so. He nearly does have a magic wand, and he’s doing his best to wave it.”
“Really.” The word was filled with satisfaction. “Bring him up here, then, darling, when you get a chance, will you? I’d like to meet him. And your uncle willdefinitelywant to meet him.”
“He’ll be terrified,” Willow said, the smile coming out again despite herself.
“If he is,” Fiona said cheerily, “the question will be asked and answered, won’t it? I’ll let you get on with it, then, darling. Talk soon.”
Two more long days of being left behind. Two more cancellations, too. Two weddings whose food she’d planned with so much anticipation, that she wasn’t going to get to cook anymore. And she was so tired of lying low, of letting Amanda go out and be the public face of the company. So far, she’d garnered five positive reviews to go with the negative ones, but it wasn’t enough. Amber Hawkins had written a lovely, funny one about the “Kicking Cancer’s Bum” party, and Amber was a popular woman. That would help with the locals. With the wedding planners? Maybe not.
“I paid Amanda eighty thousand dollars,” she’d finally admitted to Brett last night, when she’d been lying in his bed, her head on his shoulder, listening to the steady beat of his heart. “Everything I had left from my parents, and everything I’d saved since. By the time I’d moved here and paid Azra to move in, I had less than a thousand dollars left in the bank. In theworld.I had the next month’s rent, and not much more, but that was all right, I thought. I was risking. I was investing in my future. And instead, I can feel everything I’ve worked for slipping through my fingers like beach sand. You try to grab hold, and it’s gone. And I feel like...” Her throat had closed around the words. “Like a fool.”
His hand had stroked over her shoulder, slow and methodical, and he hadn’t said anything for a minute. She’d thought,How can I have confessed this to somebody who’s achieved so much? Why do I keep making myself this vulnerable?And had known the answer.Because you love him, and because he’s a good man who’s never going to hurt you on purpose.
But you know he’ll hurt you anyway.
When the alarm went off at five-thirty Friday morning, she didn’t want to get out of bed, and not just because she’d come home from Brett’s after eleven last night.
She’d worked so many years for this, and she’d made the wrong choice anyway. Time to look it square in the face. She was going to pay for that choice.
What if Nourish couldn’t recover, and she had to start all over again? How was she going to do it? What she’d told Brett was true. Even if she got some of it back, it wasn’t just the money she had tied up in the firm. It was all her ambition, too. She’d still be able to cook, but the thought of going back to working for somebody else, of not being allowed to have her hands make what her mind came up with... ithurt.
