The Baby Truce (5 page)

“There was extra pasta and bread. I saw it.” Not much. Reggie was about to explain about the leftover policy when Mrs. Bremerton added, “I was a bit embarrassed at the size of the desserts you served.”

“It couldn't be helped,” Reggie said as tactfully as possible. Finesse was part of the game. But this was
the time to be blunt. “I had a final count of twelve. We served sixteen.”
And worked our butts off to do that.

“I called as soon as I found out my friend and her family would be able to make the dinner, after all,” the hostess said, taking hold of her long string of definitely not fake pearls and running them through her fingers.

“The call came a little late.” As in while they were driving to the Bremerton house high on the hill overlooking Reno.

“It seems to me that caterers should be prepared for this type of emergency.”

“Yes—as long as you don't mind paying for the extra food.”

“Which you refuse to leave. Very unreasonable.”

“I'm sorry you feel that way. Perhaps we can get together and discuss ways to avoid this in the future?”

Mrs. Bremerton sniffed. “I don't foresee a future.”

“Well, good night, then.”

Reggie made one final visual sweep of the spotless kitchen, nodded at the hostess, then left through the back door, a smile frozen on her face until the door closed behind her.

“Not a happy hostess,” Reggie said as she got into the van, where Eden and Patty were waiting for her.

“I don't see why not,” Patty said stiffly. “It was a lovely dinner.”

“Because we couldn't read her mind and guess that she had extra people coming.” Eden put the van in gear. “I'll do some damage control tomorrow.”

“Good luck with that.” Reggie leaned her head against the window.

She was so very tired. More tired than a catering event and disagreement with a host should have made her.

Pregnancy, coupled with the unfinished business with her baby's father, was wiping her out.

Reggie hoped Tom got this job so their personal negotiations could begin.

 

I
T WAS RAINING
. O
F COURSE
. H
E
comes to Nevada, one of the driest states in the union, and it rains on him. And not just a little. It rolled down his cheeks, into the corners of his mouth, collected on his lashes and got into his eyes when he blinked.

And Reggie wasn't answering her door. Finally, he heard a shuffling noise and then the peephole went dark. The door swung open.

“How did you find me?” she demanded.

“Could you please change that to ‘Come on in. It's wet out there?'” And it had been easy to find her, thanks to the internet.

Reggie looked past him at the cab idling on the wet street, then stepped back so he could come inside. “Why are you here?”

She wasn't any more welcoming now that he was under her roof, but he was going to be a damned sight warmer.

“Did you get the job?” she added with a frown, since they'd met less than two days ago.

“Do you mind if I take my coat off?” he asked, buying time.

Reggie gave him a pained look, but nodded. He
couldn't help but glance at her abdomen under the form-fitting T-shirt she wore. There was no sign of pregnancy.

“I've gained four pounds,” she said, interpreting the look. “But I probably won't start showing until next month. Why are you here?”

“We did well together once.” Reggie stiffened at his opening words, delivered as if they were part of a memorized speech. That's what he got for not practicing.

She casually folded her arms, shutting him out. “Agreed. Then one of us changed.”

“I want another chance.”

Reggie took a half step back, bringing her hand up to the base of her neck in a way that totally pissed him off. “With me?”

“Don't look so horrified.”
Plan B, Plan B.
“I didn't get the job in Seattle.”

“I'm sorry,” she said without too much surprise, which kind of stung.

This was the tricky part, the part where he was feeling his way along, since he wasn't used to making requests so much as giving orders.

“I need to disappear for a while. I'll go insane if I kick around my apartment. I can't see taking some lower-level job.” He'd probably blow up and destroy what he was working for—an uneventful six-month stretch of employment. “You and I have to develop a relationship to plot a future for the baby.”

If anything Reggie looked even more horrified as he laid the groundwork for his proposal. He surged on anyway. “Could I work in your kitchen?”

Reggie's mouth fell open. He didn't know what she'd been expecting, but it obviously hadn't been a request for employment.

“You're delusional.”

Tom shoved his hands into his back pockets and forced himself to wait until Reggie processed, thankful that she was a quick study, since his patience level was never very high. Her expression slowly shifted from horror to caution.

“Forgive me,” she said, “but this is not normal. Guys like you do not go to work in a catering kitchen.” She leaned forward and took a small sniff.

“No, I haven't been imbibing or smoking or anything else,” he said impatiently. “It's like this. If I maintain an even keel for six months, prove I can control myself, my business manager
might
take me back and help me rebuild my career. It's like chef rehab,” he said, echoing Pete's assessment of the situation.

“Who is this pod person in front of me?” Reggie asked. “I can't believe you're kowtowing to…”

“Pete Chavez.”

“Oh.” She pressed her lips together. “Gotcha.” Pete was the best in the business, and even Reggie knew it. She shook her head. “What happened to you, Tom?”

It sounded like a question she'd been aching to ask for a long time, and he didn't like the way she was looking at him, as if she felt sorry for him. “I don't know what happened to me!” he snapped, and then he paused and took a deep breath. “Sorry.” It was as if everything had caught up to him at once. He really hadn't changed. The way people reacted to him had.

He pushed his hands even deeper into his pockets, gritted his teeth, then came clean. “I have another reason for being here.” He indicated her belly with a movement of his chin, and Reggie automatically covered it with her hand. Shutting him out again.

“The baby?” Now she looked defensive.

“I…” Tom closed his mouth, then started again. “We've got to work something out.”

Reggie was trying to hide it—trying to look nonchalant, as if they were discussing the most mundane of topics. She swallowed. “Yes,” she allowed.

“I don't know much about kids.”

“They need stability.”

“I think we've been over that,” he said evenly, fighting the instant flare of anger. Who said he couldn't control himself? “I don't know what my role will be…how we'll handle being parents…but this isn't something we can put off. Obviously.”

Reggie eyed him for a long silent moment. Her mouth tightened for a second before she again said, “Yes.”

A meeting of the minds. That was a start.

“We can work all this out with lawyers, but that's probably not going to be best for the kid,” he said. She didn't answer. “I think Pete is right. I need a few months off to rethink some things. I may as well spend it here. In Reno. By the time I get a job, maybe we'll have hammered out some kind of a truce that works for all of us.”

Reggie reached down to scoop up that chubby, yellow-eyed cat that was rubbing its head on her ankles,
and held it against her chest, stroking its ears. “That makes sense…I guess.”

She didn't trust him. Although he wasn't sure why. He'd been thinking about that a lot lately, since he'd never been anything but truthful to her.

Now the next step—to get back into a kitchen. In a way that could help both of them out, but keep him out of the public eye while he reassessed.

“We're both cooks, Reg. The kitchen is where we met, and it's where we can…I don't know…get used to each other again. Figure out some stuff about the baby. Develop a working relationship.”

She set the cat down and took a step closer. But not too close. “Only one problem there, Tom. You run kitchens. But this is
my
kitchen.”

“I understand.”

“Do you? If I wanted things done a certain way, and you didn't agree, would you do them my way?”

“I understand the hierarchy, Reg. Your kitchen, your way.”

She put a hand to her forehead as if fighting a headache. “I've got to think about this, Tom. Talk to Eden and Justin.”

“I've got to catch a flight back to New York tomorrow morning. Early.”

“I'll call you in New York.” She shifted her weight, crossed her arms, defensive in a different, more militant way now. “Is your cab still waiting?”

Even though he wanted to press his case, he kept his
mouth shut. Instinct told him that more was not better in this case. “Yes,” he said simply.

“Great.” She walked to the door and put her hand on the knob. “I'll give you a call in a day or two.”

“Y
OU WANT TO HIRE
T
OM
.” J
USTIN
leaned against the stainless steel counter and folded his arms over his chest. Not the receptive body language Reggie had hoped for when she'd asked for a council in the pastry room, out of Patty's hearing.

“Damn. Reggie.” Eden stared at her as if she'd gone bonkers.

Maybe she had.

“We have to hammer out some kind of working relationship, before the baby is born. This is a way to do it.”

“But why does it have to be in our kitchen?” Justin unfolded his arms, picked up the spatula on the counter beside him and began to tap it rhythmically against his palm. “I mean, I'm all for you and Tom working things out. In fact, I'm highly in favor, but—”

Eden reached out to snatch the utensil away from her brother, stopping the incessant tapping. “It'd be on Reggie's home turf,” she said. “We're here for backup.” But Eden didn't sound all that convinced, either.

“What if it affects the business?” Justin asked, taking the spatula back. “The two of you hammering?”

Reggie forced herself to relax her fingers, release the death grip she had on the counter on either side of her
hips. “The second the business is affected, he's out.” She couldn't afford to let business be hurt in any way. Not when Tremont Catering had to provide for both her and her child.

“So he'll probably be here for what? One day? Maybe two?” Justin muttered, tapping his palm again. Eden sent him a warning glare and he tossed the spatula into the sink.

“What will he do?” Eden asked. “I mean, a chef of his caliber—”

“Prep work.”

Justin's eyebrows rose. “Does he know that?”

“I told him.”

“But does he believe you?” her brother asked reasonably.

“If he doesn't now, he soon will.”

“And this won't affect business,” he said. “Somehow I don't see Tom happily doing prep work. I do see disaster, though.”

Reggie shrugged. “There may be a few blips the first day or two, but after that, either he'll leave or we'll settle in.”

Justin glanced up at the clock. He was on a close deadline, as always. “If there's trouble, I'm bouncing his ass outta here and you guys will have to work this out in another venue. Like I said, I want you to come to an agreement, but…”

This has failure written all over it.
He didn't need to say it out loud.

“Eden?” Reggie asked.

“I'm okay with it.”

“I can't believe I'm saying this,” Reggie said, not certain she even meant it, “but…thanks.”

 

I
T HAD TAKEN
T
OM TWO WEEKS TO
tie up loose ends, sublet his apartment to a friend of a friend and fly back to Reno, during which time he kept hoping for that magical phone call from Pete telling him a great job offer had come in and all was forgiven. No need for penance.

Didn't happen.

Even if it had, he still had a situation with Reggie, but he couldn't help feeling he'd be in a better position to deal with it if he was employed instead of floundering. Floundering was not his normal state of being and he hated it. A lot.

There was one car in the parking lot when Tom arrived at the Tremont Catering kitchen the morning after flying in, and although the interior lights were off, the front door was unlocked. He let himself in.

Reggie had said to show up at eight-thirty, but, still being on eastern standard time, and eaten alive by nerves, he'd been up early and couldn't see hanging around the hotel for hours. He wanted to check out the Tremont kitchen, see where he'd be working.

The instant he stepped into the front reception area, with its cool green walls, bright artwork and granite counter, his stomach knotted. An alien cooking environment for sure. No front of house. No brigade.

He hadn't let himself dwell over the past two weeks on what he was getting himself into, because if he had, he would have spent most of his waking hours raging at the fates. And lately anger didn't feel cathartic. Instead
it made him feel as if he was wasting one hell of a lot of energy and accomplishing nothing. Probably because he was.

He was going to be a dad and didn't know the first thing about fatherhood.

All he could do at this point was focus on the game. On what he was good at—cooking. Running a kitchen.

Behind the reception counter was a metal door, propped open with a rubber wedge. Tom walked around the counter and stepped through.

“Hello?”

The kitchen was larger than he'd expected—larger than many he'd worked in—and well designed, with lots of counter space, a walk-in, decent stoves, double convection ovens. In fact, it was almost exactly the kitchen Tom and Reggie had designed together when they'd talked about opening a catering business. Reggie had stuck to the plan.

As she stuck to all plans.

She'd always intended to bring Eden into the business once her sister graduated culinary school, but Justin had been a wild ski bum, freshly dropped out of college. How had he gone from Reggie bailing him out of jail to being a chef? And a pastry chef at that?

Tom didn't do pastry. The thought of concocting desserts in general made him uncomfortable. Give him his knives and a nice piece of meat to butcher. Or pasta. Anything but phyllo dough.

“Hello,” he called again, setting his knife case on the nearest counter.

A door opened on the opposite side of the room and
a roundish woman with a head of grayish-brown curls came out. She stood taller when she saw him, which brought her height up to about five foot even. Maybe five-one.

“May I help you?” she asked, smoothing the sides of her apron over her sturdy hips.

“Is Reggie here?”

“No, she's not.” The woman's gaze traveled over his loose, dark gray cargos and white T-shirt, then settled on the small gym bag he carried. Her eyebrows went up. “Do you have an appointment?”

“I think I'm supposed to start work today. I'm Tom.”

“I wasn't informed.” She didn't seem to recognize him, which was good. His only concern in this deal was having to explain why he was in a catering kitchen.
I need to build a relationship with my pregnant ex, who wants to see me in hell
would be tabloid fodder for sure. He'd do his best to avoid making that quote.

“Perhaps there was no reason to inform you,” he suggested.

The woman's chin snapped up. “Reggie and Eden should be here shortly. Perhaps you'd like to go back out front and wait there.
If
you're starting work today, then you probably have papers to fill out.”

“I don't need to fill out papers.” Tom opened his knife case.

“W-2 forms are required.”

“Perhaps I'm in the country illegally.” He heard her rapid intake of breath. A bona fide sniff of indignation.

The back door of the kitchen, hidden behind a half
wall, opened and closed. A few seconds later Justin came in, yawning. He stopped when he saw Tom.

“This…man says he starts work today,” Patty announced.

“Yeah, I think he does.” Justin started moving again. The kid had changed. For one thing, he was no longer a kid. The scrawny towhead was now as tall as Tom and only a few pounds lighter. “Tom.” He held out his hand.

“Justin,” he replied as they shook. He had the distinct feeling from the strength of Justin's grip that Reggie wasn't the only Tremont he'd be contending with. “I'm looking forward to helping you guys out.”

Justin's blue eyes, which Tom remembered as being full of laughter, even when he was in hot water, were nothing short of cold.

“This is Patty, our prep cook,” Justin said, nodding at the woman, who appeared to have just swallowed something sour, and was making a mental note to keep an eye on the good china.

“Patty,” Tom said. She nodded curtly, and even though she'd been studying him, he still saw no sign of recognition.

“Reggie will be here in a few minutes. She had an early doctor's appointment today.” Justin subtly motioned his head toward Patty, and Tom understood that the prep cook didn't know about the pregnancy.

“Great. Do you have a place where I can store my stuff?”

“Lockers in the back beside the door.”

Tom picked up his bag and headed through the kitchen toward the door Justin had come in through.
He nodded at Patty, who sniffed again and did an about-face. The territorial type. Well, she'd better get used to sharing her territory. As long as she did her job well, he didn't have a problem with jealousy. A normal thing in his world.

Tom found the lone empty locker in the row of five, and stuffed his bag inside after pulling out an old chef's coat, which he shrugged into and buttoned as he walked back into the kitchen. Justin came out of a side room, where layers of a cake sat on a marble-topped table.

“Why don't you wait in the reception area for Reggie?” he suggested, disappearing inside again and closing the door.

Patty, who was clearly visible in the dry storage area, where she was counting supplies, smiled to herself.

Fine. He'd wait in the reception area. He couldn't really blame Justin for being cold. If the positions were reversed, if Justin had knocked up his sister, he'd probably feel the same.

He left his knives where they lay, went into the reception area and busied himself reading brochures and sample menus.

The menus weren't bad. In fact they were pretty good, but he could see where they could benefit from a few tweaks. A touch of Gerard.

He and Reggie were on an even footing…he'd talk to her about it.

 

“H
E'S HERE
,” J
USTIN SAID AS
soon as Reggie answered her phone, and he proceeded to fill her in. The traffic
on 395 was practically at a standstill, so she could talk safely as she inched toward her exit.

“He's early?” Tom was never early. Damn. She'd hoped to get there first and establish ground. “I'm ten minutes away.” If she was lucky. She could have walked from the doctor's office faster. Next time she was taking side streets. Today she'd wanted to get there fast, so she'd braved the freeway. Ha!

“I don't think Patty likes him.”

“Did she recognize him?” Reggie asked.

“Doesn't appear so, but how she could miss, I don't know. It's like Tabloid Tom in the flesh. Black ponytail, Vandyke. The whole bit.” Justin paused before adding, “This is not a humbled man, Reg.”

Reggie could so picture him striding in—with his knives, no doubt—looking every inch the master chef. No sign of the damp, slightly desperate guy who'd stood in her living room less than a week ago.

“You know,” Justin mused, “I'm thinking of copying that Vandyke. It seems to attract women. Except Patty, of course.”

“Good plan, Justin. Why don't you go with that? I'm in traffic. I'll see you in a few.”

She hung up and inched the car forward. Twenty minutes later, Reggie pulled into the alley behind the kitchen and parked next to the Tremont van.

Anticipating this first meeting with Tom while stuck in traffic had not put her in the best of moods, but at least she wasn't nauseous. And her checkup had gone well, which had given her something else to think about while fighting Tom-induced nerves.

She'd heard the heartbeat. The wonderful whispering rhythm of her child's heart. The doctor hadn't expected to pick it up with the Doppler that early, but surprise, surprise—he had, and the child was no longer a shadowy figment in Reggie's mind. It had a heartbeat. She was going to be a mom, and now it was time to come to terms with the dad.

She entered the kitchen through the rear door, quickly scanned the room—no Tom—and then went into the office, hanging her purse on the hook next to her computer and booting up both her machine and Eden's. A second later she turned her sister's computer back off again. Eden had a full schedule out of the kitchen, which was why Justin was working in the morning.

Reggie tucked the medical receipt into a folder in the file cabinet, nearly slamming her fingers in the drawer as she shut it. Then she put on a clean apron, fumbling with the knot. She cursed under her breath.

Since Tom was not in the kitchen, Justin probably had him cooling his heels in the reception area. A good place for them to have a short but meaningful talk before work began. It would be a full day, and Reggie didn't want to waste time with misunderstandings. They were catering an anniversary party the next day and there was still a lot of prep, plus site decorating, which Eden would handle, while Reggie manned the kitchen. Justin would hopefully have the desserts made and in the cooler before he had to drive up to Lake Tahoe for his shift at the hotel.

“Good morning, Patty,” Reggie said as the woman stepped out of dry storage, clipboard in hand. Patty
liked to do inventory if she wasn't busy with other tasks—or if she came in early, as she always did. Reggie wasn't going to fight her.

“Good morning,” she replied, her voice stiffer than usual. “I'll start on the cooler now.” Her eyes cut to the door to the reception area and back again.

“You met Tom?”

“Briefly.” Her mouth tightened, puckering her lips.

Tom…if you've already upset my prep cook, so help me…
Reggie gave her a reassuring smile. “He'll be helping with prep during the next month or two, and it'll free us up to prepare for the Reno Cuisine.”

“I see.”

Reggie thought not. “As soon as you get done with the cooler, I want you to start a batch of tomato sauce.” That should mollify her.

“I'm making the sauce?” Patty's face lit up, even though she tried to appear matter-of-fact.

“We'll work on it together.” That evening's dinner was an Italian buffet, and Reggie had to make one more batch of sauce for the manicotti the host had asked for at the last minute. Sometimes she said no to such requests, but whenever possible she said yes. One of the beauties of running a small business was that she could be flexible and creative. If the host had heard great things about the manicotti and she had time to fix it, then she'd oblige.