A Home by the Sea (11 page)

“You'll do it, honey.” Noah's voice was utterly calm. “Practice your pitch on me while we drive. And don't worry, I'll get you there in time.” His mouth curved. “I know the back routes.”

 

S
HE FINISHED DRYING
her hair while her cell phone and computer charged. Her best black suit steamed in the bathroom while the shower ran. As Noah made a pot of strong coffee, Grace added her final makeup.

“Don't I get to see the panty hose?” he murmured. “Lingerie would be nice, too.”

“Out.” Laughing, Grace shooed him from the sunny bedroom of the apartment she was renting
during her D.C. stay. She stepped into discreet black pumps and eyed her reflection in the mirror.

Slowly, her confidence began to return.
The White House Cooking Series
was a huge project, but she had prepped for almost a year. She had researched all the major French cookbooks and followed every important French cooking blog. She had researched historic state dinners back to the American Revolution. She knew five of the seven chefs in France who would be interviewed for the project.

The project would be a key cultural collaboration.

She straightened the small strand of pearls at her neck and opened the door.

Noah let out a low breath. “Nice before, but now you're amazing. You look calm and smart and absolutely gorgeous.” He glanced at his watch. “Finish your coffee. I've got your computer at the door. It's charged and packed.”

“Thank you for this, Noah.” Just seeing him grin gave her a new wave of confidence.

He held open the door. “Better move.”

 

H
E SPED HER DOWN BACK ALLEYS
and across warehouse lots that Grace didn't know existed. He cut through parks and around a university loading dock. They made it to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with ten minutes to spare.

Noah parked and held open her door, radiating pride. “Go knock them dead, honey.”

Three hours later

G
RACE STOOD ON THE STREET
corner.

Dazed, she watched traffic stream past. Her hands shook. She took a hard breath, pulled out her cell phone and dialed Noah.

He answered on the first ring. “All done?”

She felt dizzy. Truck horns blasted and she tried to focus.

“Grace? Talk to me. How did the meeting go?”

She couldn't answer, watching the unending snarl of traffic but not really seeing any of it. The interviews had been long and grueling, details upon details. They had probed her training, career background and personal goals, even her private life. She hadn't realized exactly how high-profile this project was going to be.

She rubbed her face, jittery from too many questions and too much coffee. Jittery from having her life poked and analyzed for three long hours. “Intense. Very intense.”

“Where are you?”

“Near 18th Street.”

“I'll come pick you up.”

She cleared her throat. “I—I can't, Noah.”

“Why? I'll just be ten minutes. Wait for me.”

“No.” She said the word slowly. A taxi slammed on its brakes and Grace winced. “I can't because… I got it.” She whispered the words, still not able to process the news. “Noah?”

“I couldn't hear you, Grace. Say that again.”

“I—I got it. I'll be working on the series!”

“That's great! Congratulations. I knew you were brilliant and this seals it. So when do we celebrate?”

“Tonight. My place. I'll supply the champagne and you supply…the heat.”

She wanted to shout. She wanted to cry and dance a crazy jig in the snow. Most of all she wanted to grab Noah and kiss him speechless. But she didn't have time for any of it.

“Noah, they want to start immediately. The hours will be killing, and now I have to leave for France in five days. I want to go see my grandfather first and then visit two libraries while I'm back in Oregon. I'm not sure when I'll be back after that.”

This time it was Noah who didn't answer.

“Noah, are you there?”

“I'm here, Grace. This sounds like a huge project. An opportunity like this doesn't come every day. I completely get that. But we can still find time somehow. Hold on.” Grace heard muffled sounds, and then he was back. “What time tonight?”

“Seven. No, make it seven-thirty.”

“Got it.”

Another car horn sounded, just to her right. Grace looked over and caught a breath when Noah stopped in front of her. She ran to the car and slid inside. “How did you get here so fast?”

“I was doing an errand around the corner.” He leaned across the seat, kissed her hard, then pulled back into traffic. “I'm pretty damned proud of you, Grace Lindstrom. Just for the record.”

She sat back with a sigh. For long seconds she simply squeezed Noah's hand. It was a massive project and there would be at least a dozen people looking over her shoulder, checking details and questioning her recipes every step of the way. The time frame was a killer, but it would be the most exciting thing she had ever done. She had to carry it off—not because of money or ego, but because she could really showcase the rich history of cooking here at the White House—and even before the country's formal founding. She couldn't
wait
to start.

Grace leaned over and kissed Noah's cheek, then smoothed away the lipstick mark. “Just for the record, big guy? I highly doubt that you were ‘doing an errand around the corner.' But we'll let that pass because I'm so glad to see you.” She looked down and smiled. “I'm still jittery. But it's going to be amazing, Noah. They have access to all kinds of archives, both here and in France. There will be complete digital footage made of every recipe, with
great tips and techniques that will be posted online, available exclusively to those who buy the book and DVD. We're going back as far as General Lafayette and the American Revolution, including the first contacts between our countries. The research is going to be fascinating. Nothing watered down, either.”

He nodded, his eyes on the snarled traffic. “Just the kind of thing you can do in your sleep. They chose the right person.”

“But it's scary.” Grace pressed a hand to her chest. “I keep telling myself that I can handle all this. Book, DVD and audio. It's the new world, a cooking revolution. I can't believe I'm going to be watching it happen.”

“Not watching.
Making
it happen,” Noah said. You're going to knock this one out of the park. Mark my words.” He reached over and pulled her hand to his mouth, kissing her palm. “And I am going to tell everyone that I knew you when.”

“Don't talk that way. This won't change me or my life beyond making for a crazy twelve months. And…we'll find time, if you can just be flexible.” It took courage for Grace to ask, to open herself to rejection. “My life is going to be crazy when this gets rolling. Will you wait for me? Not for a week, but months while I travel.”

He bit the soft skin at the base of her thumb. “I can wait,” he murmured. “Not forever, but a few
months should be fine.” His beeper chimed as he eased his car into a parking spot.

Grace looked up, surprised to see that she was back at her apartment. How did he do that so well? She had never liked to drive in city traffic, and D.C. was known to drive grown men to tears at rush hour. “I—I don't know what to say, Noah. Thank you. Just—thank you.”

“Thanks not needed or wanted. Now get going. You've got important work to do.
Vive la Révolution,
” he quipped. He walked around the car and held open her door. “But remember we've got a date tonight.” He skimmed one finger along her cheek, waited a moment and pulled her into his arms. “I'm bending our rules,” he murmured, kissing her slowly with a focused intensity that sent little warnings through her body. “Tonight, I'm bringing all the heat we can handle. We'll see where it takes us and then reconsider your rules.”

He would always affect her this way, Grace thought. He would make her feel beautiful and desirable, but he didn't pressure her for a response. He didn't need to push because he took her as she was, not as an extension of some image he wanted to project about himself. He didn't need that kind of shallow ego boost.

He was strong, not like James. Never like James.

At her door, Grace looked back. Noah gave her a nod and a little wave.

Some instinct made Grace turn back and reach
through the open window. She pulled him down, kissing him with sudden urgency, struck with a harsh sense of passing time. In a second everything could change. She didn't let go, not even when her heart began to pound and his breath thickened. “Noah, be careful. Whatever you do, please be careful. And I'll be thinking about tonight,” she whispered.

“So will I. Now get moving. The food revolution is about to start, and you don't want to be late.”

 

F
IVE O'CLOCK CAME AND WENT
.

Six, too.

When Grace glanced at her watch, she was stunned to see that it was almost seven. She closed her research folders with a snap and stretched. Her muscles ached from sitting too long and a headache hammered from too much coffee. As a further complication, she had dropped her cell phone in the snow that afternoon, and by the time she dug it out, it was ruined. Tomorrow she had to get a replacement. Grace didn't know how she'd fit that errand into her jammed schedule.

Meanwhile, she had twenty-two new emails waiting, all of them connected to the new project. She had met the two editors and had a rough outline of the variety of dishes to be included. In a stroke of luck she had located a handwritten note from George Washington praising General Lafayette's chef.

She needed a break.

Rubbing the tense muscles at her neck, she went to check her refrigerator.

Baby organic lettuce. Sundried tomatoes. Two grapefruits.

Hardly fare to feed a hungry man. Where was Alton Brown when you needed him? Gnawing at her lip, she checked her pantry and made some quick calculations. There was a small Greek grocery at the corner, where she could buy what she needed for a rich, chipotle-flavored chili. While that was simmering, she would make double chocolate brownies with Grand Marnier icing. Definitely whipped cream for the top.

Feeling better, she skimmed her emails and signed off.

Twenty minutes to go. Time to switch gears.

Grace ran a hand through her tumbled hair and grabbed her coat. Cowboy chili to the rescue. What red-blooded man didn't like steamy layers of chipotle and roasted tomatoes, with a hint of espresso at the base?

 

I
T WAS A RACE
,
BUT THE CHILI
was nearly done and the brownies were just going into the oven when her doorbell chimed. Grace took a step back and pressed a hand to her chest at the sight of Noah, lean and dangerous in thigh-hugging worn blue jeans and a black turtleneck that fit his muscular chest like a dream.

Her heart turned over as he handed her a bunch
of scarlet roses and then a bunch of white ones. “I couldn't decide so I got both.” He leaned down to nibble the curve of her ear. “You look wonderful.”

“Actually, I look tired. And I've got food in the oven. Don't distract me, you hunk.”

“I can smell it. Something smoky and hot. It almost smells like…” He sniffed. “Is that coffee?”

“Chili simmered with coffee, chocolate and three kinds of beans. An old family recipe. Not exactly Swedish, but it was my grandmother's best creation. Chocolate brownies for desert.”

“How did you manage all of that?”

“Lindstrom's rules—always have a Plan B. Thank heavens there's a little grocery around the corner, and I knew they stocked just what I needed.” She took his coat and found a glass pitcher for the roses.

“That smells incredible.” He walked to the kitchen, watching her stir the chili. “I guess it won't make your White House series.”

“Not too much cowboy chili at the Cordon Bleu,” she murmured.

“They don't know what they're missing. So what does your family think of this new job?”

“There's just me and my grandfather now. My grandmother died six years ago. Lupus complications. I called him earlier, but he was out. I'll try again later.”

“And your mother?” Noah asked quietly.

It was the first time he'd asked for details about her family. Grace sensed the reason—that they were
moving to something deeper. He wanted her to know that. He was giving her a chance to agree to the implications.

Or not.

“My mother is dead. She died in a car accident a long time ago.” Grace took a deep breath, methodically arranging the roses in a vase. She thought of the flowers at the church that rainy winter day so many years before.

The roses she had tossed into her mother's grave.

She had been dry-eyed, not filled with sorrow or loss. Just relieved that her mother was gone. There would be no more drunken phone calls, no pleas for money or angry shouting at her grandparents.

Grace took a sudden wrenching breath. “The truth is, I hated her. Even the day she was buried, I hated her. That makes me a very twisted daughter,” she whispered.

Noah touched her shoulder. “I'm sorry, Grace. We don't have to discuss this.”

“Yes, we do. It's time I told you the things I never mention. Whatever happens, I want this thing between us to be real and strong, Noah. That means with warts and shadows included.” Her shoulders hunched and she looked him straight in the eyes. “My parents were both alcoholics. My father left when I was seven. My mother wasn't so bad then, but after he left she fell apart. By the time I was eleven she'd been in and out of rehab half a dozen times. My grandparents kept hoping it would stick,
but it never did. Then one day she left. Just walked out for coffee and cigarettes and never came back. I was alone in Portland and I had no money or food. I called my grandfather and he came for me. He didn't say a word against her and didn't ask any questions, just took me out to the car. We went straight to a restaurant and I remember how good my sandwich tasted. Ketchup was a miracle. Onions were a prayer. I…I hadn't eaten in three days. She hadn't left any money.” Grace rubbed her eyes slowly. “He told me to pack what I wanted and then he drove me home to Summer Island. I never went back to her.” She paced the room restlessly. “Summer Island was the first place I'd lived where I didn't have to worry that she'd come out to the school bus with a can of beer in her hand or answer the door with her blouse all unbuttoned and nothing on underneath. I didn't have to worry where she was drinking or who she was with.”

“And in spite of all that, you still loved her,” Noah said quietly.

“What makes you say that?”

“It's what children do. It's what makes us human. It's the warts and the shadows, honey. Like it or not, family's in the blood.”

After a long time Grace sighed. “I did love her. I still have faint memories of her laughing as she pulled me in some kind of red wagon. We had a little dog then, called Buster. I loved that dog, but never knew what happened to him. Maybe he went
to a friend or maybe he ran away. All I knew is that I cried every night for weeks, asking God for an other dog, but I never got one. I asked for a different mother, too.” Grace rubbed her eyes. “Why am I telling you all this? We're supposed to be having a romantic dinner.”

“It's important. Family is always with us. While we breathe, we remember.”

“I guess you're right.” Grace frowned at the bleak memories. “But my real life began on Summer Island. For the first time I had friends and a room of my own. My grandparents helped me start over, and I can't ever repay them for that. They always told me that whatever I wanted to do, I would succeed. I never heard the word
no
growing up with them. I love them so much.”