Taste: A Love Story (9 page)

Logan shifted and Kara could hear the creak of the stair below him. “I was almost eight in that picture. She was gone by then.”

“Oh,” Kara whispered at the realization and then felt her stomach turn. “I’m sorry. You were so young. How did I not ask that question when we were in Paris?”

He laughed, of all things, and Kara was suddenly uncomfortable.

“What?” she asked.

“There were a lot of things we probably should have asked in Paris, don’t you think?”

She nodded. “I guess the details didn’t seem important then.” She stepped back down the stairs, deciding she’d had enough for one morning.

“Don’t you want to see the upstairs?” he asked.

“I need to get going, but I would like to see your kitchen. Did you change it when you moved in?” Kara knew bringing the conversation back to food or his kitchen would rescue her from what felt far too intimate.

“I did, so I guess I lied before when I mentioned that I hadn’t changed anything. It wasn’t a complete remodel because I have the kitchen at The Yard, but,” he paused as they walked into the kitchen and he turned on the lights, “I changed out the appliances and the countertops.”

“More wood,” tumbled out of Kara’s mouth as she walked further into the small kitchen and noticed the well-used surface, one section still coated with flour. She touched it with the tips of her fingers.

“Yeah, sorry about that. I didn’t have time to clean up when the pipe broke and I had a geyser in the yard.”

“What were you making?”

“Bread, we don’t seem to ever have enough of it at the restaurant. I never realized when we decided to put bread on the tables, but holy shit, people can pack it away.”

They both laughed.

“Your kitchen is smaller than I imagined, but I like that you kept with the design of the house.”

“Size doesn’t really matter.”

Kara looked up to find him standing in the small entry of the kitchen, his hands overhead, gripping the molding, and a wicked smile on his face that promised trouble.

“Very funny.” She hoped she wasn’t blushing.

“I thought so.” He smiled and dropped his hands from the molding. “But seriously, it’s true. As long as I have counter space and there’s a place for everything, I’m good.”

“Well, it’s a great place, Logan.” She turned to take in the feel of his home one more time. “I think I have enough for the first piece and anything else I need, I’ll get online.”

His gaze traveled over her as if he saw something new, or old, Kara couldn’t tell. “Can I make you lunch before you go?” His voice was a little raspy.

“No, thank you. I’m not hungry and I don’t think that’s a good idea. Things are almost pleasant between us,” she joked. “Let’s leave it there.”

“Are you ever hungry, Kara?”

Their eyes met and she felt the weight of his question.
What does that mean?
She wasn’t going to answer him because something shifted in his eyes and things were suddenly about her—not a topic she liked to discuss. Kara put her notebook in her purse, and Logan walked her to the door.

“Thanks for the tour,” she said, not able to meet his eyes.

“You’re welcome. Make me look good, princess.”

“I’ll do my best.” Kara was now certain she was blushing again.

She got into her car, drove around the corner, and pulled over. Then she took a deep breath and tried to collect her thoughts. The few months she’d spent with him in France had taught her so many things. What she wanted, and eventually, what she wasn’t allowed. He was playing with her, and that was all. The house, the stories, those were in his world, not hers. She needed to remember that.

Chapter Seven

T
he annual Halloween craft cocktail contest was a bit of a tradition in Pasadena. Local bartenders and some from Los Angeles competed for the coveted onyx shaker. Sage Jeffries, lead bartender for The Yard, had competed last year and lost to “some guy who made a damn milkshake in a martini glass,” as she put it. That explained why nearly two weeks before Halloween and shortly after they opened for lunch, Logan was sitting at the end of the bar, taste testing drinks while trying to remain sober.

“I’ve narrowed it down to two drinks. This first one”—Sage pushed an orange drink across the bar to him—“is a Zombie. I used the juice we froze from those blood oranges you brought me back in July. Even though it’s frozen juice, I think that’s what sets it apart.”

Logan sipped and tasted apricots, rum—lots of rum—and the orange juice. “It’s good, strong, and I can taste everything. It all goes well together. I get the rum, and is that apricot brandy?”

Sage nodded, surveying him with her odd bartender sense. He wasn’t sure what she was looking for, but he must not have given it to her because she reached over with her silver spoon straw thing, took a sample of the drink, and shook her head.

“Too much apricot and shoot, I can’t get the grenadine right.” With that she swiftly removed the glass, as bartenders do, and dumped it.

“Hey, that was good. Why can’t you just—”

“This one,” she cut him off, “is ambitious. I’m calling it Mrs. Hyde.” Sage moved a purple drink toward him that was smoking. It was beautiful, but he was almost afraid to drink it.

“How do you get it to—”

“Just a sliver of dry ice,” she cut him off again.

Sage did that a lot and Logan was used to it. Sometimes when he was with her he found himself pausing and waiting for her to finish his thought for him. He turned the drink by the stem of the glass; it was a work of art. Sage was staring at it and Logan pointed to the purple crystals that rimmed the martini glass.

“Purple sanding sugar.”

He nodded and then pointed to the sprig carefully placed in the drink. He recognized it. “Lavender from our garden?”

She nodded, still looking at the drink, assessing her creation.

Logan sipped and just as he was about to tell her it was an herbal explosion that he loved, his brother sat down next to him.

“What are we playing here?” Garrett asked, putting a pair of work gloves on the bar.

Sage glared at him like he had just come into her perfect, lovely bathroom and left the seat up.

Logan set the glass down carefully.

“What’s with all the tension? Sage, can I get a beer?” he asked almost dismissively and then turned his barstool to Logan. “I dropped three boxes in the kitchen: more tomatoes and some avocados. The brussels are small. I’m not sure what happened this time, but maybe they’ll taste good. That’s your department. Let me know, and if they’re shit we won’t put them out at the market this weekend.”

Sage threw down a square cocktail napkin, placed one of the mugs they used for kids on the bar, and proceeded to pour Garrett a root beer. She threw out the bottle with a loud clink and turned to help another customer who sat down.

Garrett looked at Logan who was already laughing.

“Is . . . there something I’m missing here? What’s crawled up her ass?”

“We were going over her entry for the cocktail contest when you—”

“Barged in.” Sage whirled back to them after making what appeared to be a modified gin and tonic for the new guy at the bar whose wife had just joined him. “That’s what you did, Garrett, oh clueless one. I served you a root beer because you’re like a child.” She turned back to the wife with a big smile and poured her a Coke from the guns at her waist. She was then back at Garrett, smile gone. “Does it ever occur to you that people are doing things when you make your entrance?”

“Wow, I’m . . . sorry?” Garrett was less than sincere.

“Do you at least have my lemons?” She pointed toward her fruit bins behind the bar.

Garrett smiled and Logan remembered why his older brother always got the girls when they were growing up. He had a confidence that had nothing to do with how much his watch cost or even how much he could bench press. Garrett Rye worked hard and that sort of radiated from him. He wasn’t there to impress anyone, didn’t need to.

“Oh, sweetheart, now that’s a loaded question,” his voice hummed as smooth as any liquor Sage had behind the bar.

She was flustered, having walked into a game Logan was certain she didn’t know how to play. Sage was a bartender, but she hadn’t been on long enough to get that edge a lot of them collected. She was one of the sweetest people he knew, but she wasn’t a pushover and didn’t like being embarrassed. She met Garrett’s eyes and said nothing about the lemons. Smart girl.

“Isn’t this a public place? I made a delivery and came to talk to my brother. I’m sorry you were playing”—he gestured to her drink still sitting on the bar—“girly cocktail time, but some of us have work to do.”

“You’re going to want to try this before you say that.” Logan slid Sage’s creation over to his brother.

Garrett inspected it. “The damn thing is purple and is that a little flower? Yeah, I’ll pass.”

Sage reached over, took his gloves off the bar, held them up, and waited.

“Oh, come on. Those are my favorite pair.”

She picked up scissors in her other hand and smiled. Logan’s sides hurt from laughing.

“Shit.” Garrett pulled the lavender from the drink and downed it in one gulp.

Logan saw it in his eyes before Garrett even opened his mouth.

Garrett blinked up at Sage. “What the hell was that?”

She smiled, handed him his gloves back, and walked away.

Logan put his arm around his brother. “That, dear brother, is a Mrs. Hyde.”

“She sure as hell is.” He gawked at Sage, clearly stunned that a little “girly drink” packed such a punch.

Garrett left a little while later after Logan made him a sandwich for the road.

Logan fixed a stopped-up sink in the ladies’ room himself because the online maintenance service they used said it would be about two hours before they could get out there. He’d need to look at that contract; two hours might as well have been six with a packed restaurant. Finally, after calming Travis down because a customer sent back his spinach salad, saying the bacon pieces were too big and she preferred bacon bits, Logan made his way back to the bar.

Sage had pulled her short dark hair to the side with a clip and was talking with two guys about last night’s final game of the World Series. Logan sat at the end of the bar again and she made her way over.

“Shall we resume our testing?” Logan asked, even though he already knew the answer.

“Nah, I’ve decided.”

“Mrs. Hyde?”

She nodded.

Logan smiled. “Good choice.”

“It’s a pain in the ass to make, but I think it’s worth it.” She smiled and turned back to her customers.

Logan headed to the kitchen and had to wonder whether Sage was talking about the drink or his brother. He wasn’t sure how long it would take Garrett to figure out Sage was in love with him.

Kara could feel fall in the air and, more importantly, she’d begun counting the eighteen days until Election Day, or as she and Grady like to call it, Independence Day. She had agreed to be with her parents on the big night and at the celebration that same evening, or if it was a close race, the following evening or possibly two. Two or three elections ago, there was a runoff and maybe even a recount. It lasted forever and the celebration wasn’t until the following January. Grady likened that year to being on parole. Their life wasn’t that bad; sure they fed off each other and made it worse than it really was, but they both knew it wasn’t any worse than other family obligations.

Of course, the press rarely covered normal family get-togethers and adult children were not often instructed what to wear. There were certainly worse things in life, but election years were rough. Grady drew the short straw this year and was much more active in the campaign, so Kara had to take Thanksgiving at the local shelter. It was after Election Day, but it would be the last event she would need to attend until her parents’ annual open house in February. She would have time to enjoy her holiday out of the spotlight. Now if her father lost, that would be a different story and not one Kara wanted to think about on such a beautiful day. She closed the calendar on her computer and pulled up the review she’d been working on.

Noodle houses, or more specifically, ramen houses, had been around for a long time, but they had experienced a huge renaissance in the last five years. Kara reviewed two places in LA last year that were awful. Mushy-noodled, overcooked-pork, runny-egg awful. She wrote her reviews and told the truth. Maybe the second one was a little mean because she’d poked fun at the name: it was called Silly Noodles. How could she not comment on a name like that? But after today’s lunch, those two harsh reviews were distant memories.

Kara spent a half hour at Kanpekina Ramen, which she learned meant Perfect Ramen. A bold statement she thought at the time, but now that she’d been there, she had to agree. The place was small, only a handful of tables and a few seats at the ramen bar, but it was clean, streamlined, and the people could not have been nicer. They served Hakata-style noodles that were perfectly cooked—they were just the right degree of chewy and sat in a milky broth. Noodles and broth were equally important in ramen dishes, because one without the other ruined the whole experience. She ordered hers with egg. It was perfectly done and the presentation was excellent. They even placed pickled ginger and some mustard greens on the side.