“Memo to self—stop giving Remy advice if you want to win this competition,” she said with a rue grin.
He laughed as she’d hoped he would but it didn’t lessen the tension inside of her. Somehow she knew it was the mere mention of her lover in Paris that cast a damper over her spirits. She’d thought that almost six years would be long enough to dull not only his memory but his hold over her but she was realizing it wasn’t.
She guessed there were some wounds that cut too deep. But she also knew that there were so many elements in this very situation with Remy that were similar to how she’d fallen for Jean-Luc. The food, the passion for cooking...that very Gallic outlook on life that they both shared.
“I think you’ll do just fine. You have some of the best cooking instincts I’ve ever seen. My grandfather would have loved to have you apprentice in his kitchen.”
“Who is your grandfather?”
Remy bit his lip and looked away from her and down at his plate for a minute. “No one really, just an old chef who said to me that cooking comes from the soul but until I heard you talk about it I never got what he meant.”
“So you’re saying I remind you of your grandpa?” she asked.
“Not in the slightest. But you do have the same gut instincts he does. I think he’d be very impressed by you,” Remy said.
“Are you impressed?” she asked. She wanted to groan after she said it but she also really wanted him to like her. To see all of her talents and none of her flaws. Dammit, she thought. She was already starting to hope that he could be the man she saw tonight. A man who had the same goals, the same soul as she did. It was something that she really needed to work on ifshe was going to have any chance of protecting herself from falling for Remy.
“Chère, you’ve done nothing but wow me since the moment you fell into my arms,” he said.
They both finished up their dinner and then Remy stowed the dishes back into the cooler. She noticed that he kept everything as neat and tidy as he did his mis en place when they were cooking. “You are very neat.”
“That’s a good thing in a chef,” he said.
“Yes, but even away from the kitchen. Why is that?” she asked. It might be nothing but then again it could be the key to figuring out Remy.
“My father said a man who lacks the discipline to keep himself tidy lacks the discipline to run a kitchen.”
“And that was your goal?” she asked.
“It was my heritage,” he said.
There was gravitas in his voice and she wondered what kind of expectations his family must have put on him. The disappointment they’d feel that he was out of work now. He needed this win, she thought, almost as much as she did.
“From your Creole family?”
“Most definitely,” he replied.
She took his hand in hers. “You’re a great chef, Remy. No one can take that from you and no matter if you are the head chef in New Orleans most famous restaurant or the purveyor of street food in New York you’re still honoring your talent.”
REMY WASFLATTEREDBYwhat she said and it was a sentiment his grandmother would have echoed but his father, his grandfather and his uncles they had a different plan for Remy and his future. They wanted him to take up the mantle of Chef Patron and continue the tradition of thekitchen that had won three Michelin stars. And for the first time, Remy understood that he might not want that path.
He’d come here with seemingly one goal, one objective, yet from the second he’d met Staci all of that had changed. It didn’t matter what he’d told himself in the past, there was something in this moment that felt like truth. It felt like his life was changing and he hadn’t experienced that outside of the kitchen before.
He moved around on the blanket until he was positioned behind Staci and drew her into his arms so that her back was pressed to his chest. She sat stiffly at first. So all the seducing he’d done with his food hadn’t made her relax with him. Sex, he thought, might have created more barriers between them than he’d thought.
For all her tough-girl attitude there was a soft inner core to Staci that she protected like a fierce warrior. His intuition told him it was because she’d been hurt before...disappointed by people in general. But more than that. He remembered what she’d said about no man in her life having stayed. No father or grandfather. No boyfriend.
And though he knew his intentions were honorable there was a part of him that knew he had to be very careful. He had no idea if this attraction was just the excitement of being in a new place and meeting a type of woman he’d never encountered before. He was old enough at thirty to know himself and what he wanted but he had no idea if he could tame Staci and convince her he was a staying kind of man.
Or if he wanted to. The fact was he was lying to her by not telling her his real name and background. And a part of him knew he should say something to let her know but he couldn’t risk anyone else knowing who he was. And the secret was his burden. If at some point his true heritage in cooking became known he didn’t want her to have to pay the price for not coming forward sooner.
His reasons all sounded good to him but another part of him knew that as long as he kept his secret this life, this idyllic time with Staci could continue. He didn’t have to try to figure out the logistics of falling for a woman who lived on the West coast. He didn’t have to face the fact that his life was always going to be in New Orleans and she was as deeply entrenched here. He kind of enjoyed the freedom of being Remy Stephens instead of Remy Cruzel. Remy Stephens could stay.
“Do you see that constellation?” he asked.
“Yes. Orion, right?”
“Yes, the hunter. It’s the most visible of all the constellations, you can see it anywhere in the world. When I was young, my father had to travel for a few years and every night he’d tell me to look up at this constellation and know that he was doing the same. That we were together even though we were miles apart.”
