This was ridiculous. She was already involved with someone – and even though he had no idea who the man was, Tad felt a surge of jealousy. Hard though it might be, it was clear Amy didn’t see him in that way, and he had other things to concentrate on – his career, for example, and Clare’s imminent arrival.
In an attempt to gain control of his thoughts, Tad allowed himself to slip back in time. Back to that winter in Base de Nuages. Alongside losing himself in his work, the opportunity to kamikaze his way down slopes with next to zero concern about his safety had been one of the many coping mechanisms he’d used to deal with a life without Honor. His lack of concern if he ended up being brought down the mountain in a box had slowly waned, finally disappearing entirely when he met Clare. At the time, he remembered thinking it impossible to believe anyone could be suffering more than he had, until he discovered Clare had not only lost her husband in a horrific car smash, but also her two-year-old daughter.
The rawness of her pain had prompted Tad to open up about his own grief, and for the first time since Honor’s death he had no longer felt alone.
Since that time, Tad and Clare had been in regular contact. They met up frequently, and even though Tad continued his nomadic ways while Clare stayed put in the UK, the bond they had forged was as strong as any he’d known. They’d promised to be one another’s support system for as long as they needed one another. Which was why he couldn’t wait to see her and find out her latest news. Clare had been coy about the reason she’d chosen to visit Casa del Cibo, and Tad had a feeling whatever it was, it was going to be big.
He watched Amy as she stirred the tomato sauce, found it hard to look anywhere else. It was strange to think they might have been in the same place before, might have met two years previously if the sliding doors of life had worked in a different pattern. Maybe back then Amy had been looking for someone to fall in love with, whereas for him at that time, a thought like that couldn’t have been further from his mind. And now it seemed the tables were turning, for Tad, at least.
With the individual dishes ofparmigianeassembled and bubbling in the oven, and the resting focaccia filling the entire space with a rosemary-infused fresh baked smell, Amy threaded onto skewers the last of the harissa-coated king prawns and mini chorizo sausages they’d already grilled. To accompany them for the starter, Tad mixed a garlic mayonnaise dip and checked his watch.
‘How are we doing for time?’ Amy said, laying the final skewer on the serving platter.
‘All good,’ he said. ‘I think we should try one, don’t you?’
Tad picked up a skewer, oil tricking onto his fingers as he held it out to her. Their fingers brushed together as she took it from him, and he found himself transfixed as she pulled off one of the prawns.
‘Try both together,’ he suggested, and she freed a piece of sausage, popping both in her mouth.
Her expression as she chewed did something to the very base of Tad’s stomach – well, that’s where the sensation started, before it travelled farther south. He’d never realised watching someone eat could be so damn sexy. What the hell was he doing to himself?
‘That’s so tasty,’ she said, then licked at her oily fingers, which did nothing to help cool Tad’s jets, and handed back the skewer. ‘Your turn.’
With the skewer emptied, he binned the oily wooden stick as Amy pressed an index finger to her lips.
‘I won’t tell if you don’t.’ Then a frown pinched at the soft skin of her forehead. ‘I’ve really enjoyed myself – thank you.’
‘Always happy for any of our attendees to help out – any opportunity to learn is worth taking,’ he said. It sounded off-hand, as though he wouldn’t have cared who had spent the last couple of hours with him, as though he was simply reciting a passage from the cookery school’s glossy brochure.
What he should have said was that while he would always do his best to accommodate any of the guests’ wishes to experience the workings of a professional kitchen, her skills were obvious and had made prepping for the meal a breeze.
No, that wasn’t what he really wanted to say. What he should have said was that it was a damn shame she was hoping to make something work with someone back home, because in Tad’s opinion she shouldn’t have to be working that hard to fan the flames of love, or desire, or whatever it was she wanted from the bloke. That Tad wouldn’t make her work at all, if only she’d look in his direction.
‘Where do you call home?’ he asked, the question sounding clumsy.
‘Um, I’m not sure these days. I spend a lot of time at Billie’s place when we’re not travelling – she’s got a big apartment in Knightsbridge, very swanky. But that’s not my home. I suppose I would have to say home is North Wiltshire. Devizes. That’s where I grew up, anyway. And that’s where I head for when I have time off. Which isn’t often – certainly not for the last few years.’ She frowned as she dried her hands. ‘But my family is proud of what I do, so I suppose that’s good.’
She sucked in a breath, then smiled. Tad recognised the action. There was more she could say, more to the story than she was prepared to share, certainly with him. And why should she? There was no reason she should view him as a confidant.
‘That’s great,’ he said, glossing over the unspoken.
‘You?’ she asked.
‘Originally from a little town in Fife – Scotland, obviously?—’
‘Obviously…’
She grinned, unfiltered for the first time that evening, in Tad’s opinion.
‘Now I’m an official nomad. I go where the wind blows me.’
‘You never wanted to settle down?’ she said.
It was Tad’s turn to suck in an unexpected breath, while he tried to recalibrate. ‘Maybe, once.’ It was as much as he could say, but it was more than he’d been able to admit to a stranger ever before. ‘Right now, I’m happy here. Happier than I’ve been in a long while, actually, so maybe I’ll stick around here a bit longer.’
‘Well, from my initial impressions of this place, I would suggest you could do a lot, lot worse,’ she said.
‘I agree.’
