Taste: A Love Story (33 page)

Kara left Logan’s house and drove straight to Malibu. She cried all the way up Highway 1, so by the time she pulled into the driveway of the familiar blue beach cottage, she was only left with one question. What the hell was she doing? He was clearly not going to make a life with her. When had she turned into such a blithering, “love me, please,” softy idiot? Her protective shell was long gone and Kara found herself left with nothing but a mushy middle.

The moment Logan closed up and she realized she wasn’t going to reach him, the air grew so thick she felt like she was suffocating. All she thought about was running, saving herself, and getting to her beach house. She turned off the car and stepped out into the cold ocean air. The moon was full and she already felt better. Slightly.

She opened the door to the cottage Nana had left her a little over five years ago and started to cry again. She’d brought all of this on herself, she thought. She had asked to be found, wanted to feel, but now as the pain washed over her again, Kara would have given anything to go back into hiding. Being at Nana’s was a start. She would hide out for a while, work on her glass, and finish the last of her articles. No Logan.

I’ll find my way back
, Kara thought, as she fell asleep on the couch listening to the crash of the ocean tide. She would survive, she always did.

The next morning, Kara almost fell off the couch reaching for her phone that was vibrating across the coffee table.

“Hello.” She didn’t fully open her eyes.

“Well good morning. Where are you, my favorite sister?”

“I’m your only sister.” Kara sat up on the couch and cursed her scratchy, tear-swollen eyes. “Why are you calling me, Grady?”

“Let’s go to dinner.”

“No. I’m spending some time at Nana’s beach house. I needed to get away. Alone.” She hoped he would get the message.

“Great, a little relaxation is a good idea. Let’s meet at The Rusty Nail—it’s close to you and I’ll drive up. Kate’s coming too.”

“Grady, I—”

“I’ll text you the address. See you at five.” He hung up before Kara could register what happened. Her brother was good at getting what he wanted.

Kara pulled into the gravel parking lot of The Rusty Nail. As she got out of her car and walked toward the onslaught of neon beer signs, she smiled because it was exactly her brother’s type of place. She pushed on the door handle, which was, in fact, a large rusty nail.

Clever
, she thought and was immediately hit by the smell of stale cigarette smoke and grease.

The cigarette smoke was most likely a lingering reminder of The Rusty Nail’s heyday when shag carpeting and smoking indoors were still considered cool. Most of the floors were now covered in tile or linoleum or some combination of the two. Kara approached the dark wood hostess station and saw Grady and Kate already sitting in a booth in the corner. Grady stood as she approached.

Kara shook her head. “I’m sure they’re famous for something, but I’m not even going to guess.” She kissed him on the cheek.

“Chicken fried steak and they have the best mashed potatoes you’ve ever tasted.” He sat back down and handed Kara her menu.

“And you’re marrying this man?” Kara said.

“I am.” Kate laughed. “Someone had to take him off the market. But, they do have pretty great mashed potatoes.”

“Wait, he’s taken you here before?”

Kate nodded.

“Hey, I’ll have you know this place has an A-plus from the health department—it’s just old. Old isn’t always bad.”

“I know, Grade, but you realize people don’t eat chicken fried steak and mashed potatoes anymore, right? They’re practically illegal.” Kara laughed.

“That’s ridiculous. Where’s that boyfriend of yours, he’ll set the record straight.” Grady glanced at Kate when Kara’s face fell. He seemed to be looking to his fiancée for help.

“Did something happen?” Grady asked, as a waitress, with something like a tiara in her hair, came and took their order.

Kara looked up at her brother and then to Kate, their hands clasped on the table. They were silly happy and Kara was not about to “piss on that parade,” as her Nana would say.

“Nothing happened, I’m fine. It’s just that Logan is not my boyfriend, so I was a little thrown by the title,” Kara told them after they had ordered.

“Oh, so something did happen. Because you two seemed—”

“Yeah, well things change. Let’s talk about you guys.”

“Okay.” Kate jumped in to save her. “Well, I would like you to be a bridesmaid in our wedding.”

Kara set her menu down and started to cry.

“Shit, well done Galloway, now she’s crying.”

Kate reached across the table and held Kara’s hand.

“She just needs a good cry,” Kate said.

“What? Does your kind send signals to each other? How did you know she needed to cry?”

“Because any time a woman says she’s fine, that means she’s as far from fine as she can get.”

“Right, note to self.” Grady looked confused.

Kara started laughing toward the end of their conversation.

“Are you better now?” Grady seemed desperate to help.

“I am much better.” Kara wiped her eyes. “I would love to be a bridesmaid. Thank you, Kate.”

“I promise the dresses won’t be hideous,” Kate said as their food arrived.

“You can dress me up in anything, just please make sure it’s not raspberry, I’m allergic.”

They all laughed and while Kara didn’t go into detail, she was pretty sure they’d both figured out she and Logan were finished, which they were. There were obviously parts of himself Logan was not willing to share. That may have been fine when they barely knew each other, but she wanted more now.

“Listen.” Kara felt like she was going to burst if she ate one more bite of mashed potatoes. “I know I haven’t always been the nicest person, but I want you both to know that I’m working on that.”

“Great, you can start by telling me that I was right. This place is awesome, isn’t it?”

Kara laughed. “It’s not bad. I won’t be back, but it isn’t bad.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

L
ogan hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep since Kara left three days ago. His mind was spinning with her and his mother and how he’d managed to let any of this shit back into his life. He had put his mother and what she did in a compartment in the very back of his mind. That was where he kept her so the mess of her didn’t define his life.

When Kara asked him and he realized that compartment was about to be opened again, something snapped and he couldn’t let her in. He didn’t want her there, didn’t want anyone there. The fact that she now knew he was a complete hypocrite and the biggest liar of them all, was what got him into the shower and into work before the sun. Work was the only thing that made sense anymore. Yet since he’d arrived it had not been the rhythmic meditation that he loved, but instead one screwup after another.

“Table three just sent this back,” one of the servers said in a flurry, sliding past Logan and putting down a plate of what appeared to be their cavatelli porchetta with no more than a couple bites taken. “The lady claims it’s way too salty.”

Logan grabbed a fork out of the bin and dipped into the pasta. He nearly saw spots the moment it hit his tongue.

“Travis!”

At his name, Travis looked up from the back room where he was prepping spinach and saw Logan’s face through the opening that separated the back and front kitchens.

“How the hell did this get served?” Logan asked as he brought the plate back toward Travis.

Travis dried his hands as he approached. Logan threw his fork in one of the dishwashing bins and handed the plate to Travis who quickly took a bite.

“Holy shit. Who made . . .” His question fell as both of them turned to the young man swirling a pan over a flame. Todd did not notice either of them because his earphones were in and he was performing for whatever was in the pan that would probably send some poor customer into cardiac arrest.

“Comp this,” Logan told the server who was still standing by the window waiting. “Apologize profusely and then tell them I am remaking it personally. I will be out to deliver it and talk to them ASAP.” Logan plucked the earphones from Todd’s ears and turned off the flame under his pan. The server nodded and hurried off.

“What the hell, man?” Todd turned on Logan and simultaneously pushed his bangs out of his face while grabbing at the waistband of his eternally sagging skinny jeans.

“‘Man’?” Logan raised an eyebrow.

“Huh, sorry dude, but I was in my groove there.” His smile revealed a glimpse at the gap in his bottom teeth.

Logan could feel the table waiting for him to rectify Todd’s screwup. He didn’t have time to argue; he needed the stove.

“Travis needs you in the back.” Logan pulled an apron on and took the pan.

Todd said something about this new “righteous ragu” he saw on the Food Network and Logan almost punched him. With the table still waiting, he instead bumped him aside and pointed him toward Travis. Logan couldn’t say he was sad to see him go.

He was a fair owner who recognized that everyone contributed something to the team, but Todd wasn’t getting it and probably never would. Three weeks ago it was spinach salads that were stopped before they went out on the floor because they were drenched in dressing. That time, Todd explained it was because the new Linkin Park album had him all “amped up.” Logan shook his head thinking about it now as he added olive oil to his pan and then the pasta. Besides, if the kid called him “dude” or “bro” or “man” one more time Logan was going to publicly lose it.

It was for the best that Travis was sending him home. And that was one of the great things about working alongside Travis—he knew exactly what had to be done at the same time Logan did. They were completely in sync. There’s no way he’d be able to run this restaurant so well without him.

Logan turned out his version of cavatelli porchetta onto the waiting plate. He grated some Parmigiano-Reggiano on top, rimmed the plate with a damp rag to make sure it was perfect, and placed it in the window. He pulled the apron over his head and put it back on the hook as he entered the floor and grabbed the plate down from service window.

It turned out that the husband of the woman who returned her order had read Kara’s feature on Logan and the restaurant. The day just kept getting better. Once Logan replaced her meal and she told him it was delicious, she spent at least another twenty minutes talking about the great picture of him and Kara. The whole damn table raved about her articles and asked about where Kara was.

Right when he felt like his head was going to explode, the woman turned to him and said, “You better lock that girl down with a ring before she gets away. You know what Beyoncé says: if you like it put a ring on it.”

Logan smiled, it was part of his job to smile, and walked away both grateful that he’d cleaned up Todd’s mistake and mystified that a woman old enough to be his mother was quoting Beyoncé.

The day continued on from there with the dishwasher breaking an entire basket of bar glasses, two of the burners going out on his cooktop, and a little boy who slipped while running out the door after his parents. Logan saw visions of the lovely family of three suing him for everything he was worth, but they were very nice and sort of blamed it on their son, which was fine with Logan. He’d had all he could take at that point and handed the last hour off to Travis.

“I’m going home. Can you handle closing?”

“Sure, it’s slowing down out there. You okay?”

“No.” Logan grabbed his keys off his desk.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No. I want to go home, go to bed, and not have to do something or take care of something for a week. I want to go somewhere tropical where I can swim in blue water and fall asleep on the beach. I want someone else to make decisions. I want someone else to cook.”

“Okay, well my pool is really blue right now since I got a new pool guy. So, if you want to come over and sleep in the guest room, you’re more than welcome. I’ll cook for you and make all the decisions. You might regret giving me that freedom, but I’ll take it for you, man.”

Logan laughed and for a minute wished he was like Travis, carefree and pretty damn happy where he was in life. Travis wasn’t always trying to prove something. He wasn’t a rescuer, he was just a man and right then, Logan would have given anything to be the same.

“I’m fine”—Logan patted him on the shoulder—“but thanks for the offer. I just need to get some sleep.”

“Tomorrow’s Sunday and even the Lord rested on that day. Get some sleep and I’ll shut ’er down tonight.”

“Make me proud.” Logan didn’t even bother to say goodnight to everyone else.

“Will do. ’Night.” Travis returned to the front.

Logan pushed through the door into the dark parking lot. He was out of control and he hated the feeling. He’d replayed those moments with Kara a hundred times and every time, he came out the asshole, but there was no way to fix it. She needed more from him and he wasn’t going there. Ever. So, that was it. It was over and after a very long sleep, he would pick things up and get back to normal. He just hoped he could remember what that was.