Meredith turned on her back and stared at the shadowy ceiling. Though she’d told her family her goals about the house, a new, more important goal begged to be made, to be spoken aloud.

“Lord, my real New Year’s resolution is that I won’t still be single by this time next year.”

Chapter 6

“Great spread this morning, Major. I meant to tell you earlier.”

Major accepted Lawson Guidry’s proffered hand, his stomach twisting. “Thank you, sir.” He hadn’t slept much this week, visions of and plans for the restaurant running constantly through his mind. This morning he’d given up on sleep around three o’clock and been at work at four, half an hour early, to prepare breakfast for Mr. Guidry’s weekly prayer breakfast.

“What brings you down here at this time of the afternoon?” the older man asked.

Major looked beyond Mr. Guidry toward the offices at the end of the hallway. “I came down to bring Meredith’s takeaway box for her dinner, but she’s not in her office. I need to talk to her.” At her father’s raised-brow look, Major quickly added, “About my part of the financial report on the New Year’s event.” Which was sort of true, though what he needed to ask her about could be done over the phone.

Maybe he read too much into Mr. Guidry’s expression, but he was pretty sure Meredith’s dad didn’t believe him. “She had to go out to meet clients at Lafitte’s Landing—probably won’t be back for a while.”

“Oh. Okay. I’ll catch her later, then.”

“Don’t you have an interview scheduled for this afternoon anyway?”

Major checked his watch. “Yes, sir. I guess I’d better get back up to the kitchen, since that’s where I told them to meet me.”

“You’ll have to let us know how it goes.” Lawson raised his hand palm forward, his own unique good-bye wave. “I’d wish you luck, but you don’t need it.”

“Thank you, sir.” Major nodded his farewell, then booked it back to the elevator and returned to the twenty-third floor.

Several kitchen and service staff stood facing him when the doors opened.

“Bye, Chef.”

“Have a great afternoon, Mr. O’Hara.”

“See ya tomorrow, Chef.”

He tossed a good-bye over his shoulder as he exchanged places with them, then headed across the expanse of Vue de Ceil to the kitchen on the opposite side. Vacuums’ whines filled the cavernous space, run by two of the waiters, both of whom had changed from their black pants and white button-downs into droopy jeans and sweatshirts.

In the kitchen, only Steven and the sauté chef and two dishwashers remained. Steven and his second-in-command hovered over the whiteboard, which they’d taken down and laid on the long prep table in the middle of the room, discussing tomorrow’s lunch menu and assigning components to the various staff who would be here.

Major stepped into his office and closed the door. He opened the wardrobe behind his desk, planning to wear his white chef ’s jacket for the interview—but it wasn’t there. He smacked his forehead. He’d dropped it off at the dry cleaner Tuesday and had meant to pick it up after the prayer breakfast this morning.

He swapped his navy polo for the burgundy tunic and watched himself in the mirror on the back of the armoire’s door as he buttoned the double-breasted placket. Hmm. Must have shrunk when he had it cleaned. At least, he didn’t remember the buttons around his gut pulling like that last time he’d worn it.

He sat down at the desk to write a note reminding himself to go to the cleaners tomorrow. The computer dinged, indicating a new e-mail received. Meredith usually checked her e-mail regularly when offsite, so maybe she’d finally decided to respond to him.

But the message was from Anne Hawthorne to set up a time to discuss the menu for her rehearsal dinner and wedding reception. He flagged it for follow-up later, then scanned the rest of the unread messages in his inbox. None from Guidry, Meredith.

If he didn’t know better, he’d think she was avoiding him.

The five-minute warning of the time scheduled for the interview popped up on the screen. He quickly straightened up his desk, though that consisted of making sure the stapler and tape dispenser were at a perfect right-angle to the desk blotter and that the blotter lay exactly one inch—as measured by the tip of his thumb—from the edge of the desk.

Back out in the kitchen, the dish sanitizers had stopped rumbling, and a solitary Steven was hanging the whiteboard back on the wall.

“Everyone else gone?” Major paused to glance over tomorrow’s menu.

“Yes, Chef. I’m about to call it a day, too, unless you need me for something.” He glanced pointedly at Major’s attire.

Have Steven hanging around for the interview? “No. It’s already after four o’clock. Go on home.”

“Thanks. I’ll see you tomorrow.” Steven slung his denim chef ’s jacket over his shoulder, tucked his knife case under his arm, and swaggered from the kitchen.

Major gave him half a minute’s head start then stepped out into the warehouse-sized, sky-view room. Just as one set of elevator doors closed behind Steven, another set opened.

Though he thought he’d prepared for it, the sight of Alaine Delacroix once again disarmed him. No woman had the right to be so distractingly beautiful. She held the door while the burly guy with her muscled out a large duffel bag and a couple of equipment cases.

Major jogged over. “Can I help with any of that?”

The guy looked up at him, apparently offended. “Naw, man. I can get it.”

“Chef O’Hara, it’s good to see you again.” Alaine extended her hand.

Heat rushed into Major’s face when he took her hand in his enormous paw and tried not to hurt her. “Ms. Delacroix. Welcome to Vue de Ceil.” He swept his arm toward the room.

Alaine strolled past him. “It looks so different. I’ve only been here at night—and with five or six hundred other people, like at New Year’s.”

More like eight or nine hundred, but who was counting? He followed her. Alaine Delacroix was the kind of woman who could be admired from afar but not someone Major had any interest in getting to know better on a personal level.

Not like Meredith. He didn’t have to worry about hurting Meredith on the rare occasion that called for him taking her hand in his—which he wished happened more often. He also didn’t feel like a prepubescent boy at his first school dance around Meredith the way he did right now. And to put final nails in the coffin in which he would bury his reaction to Alaine, he decided he much preferred strawberry blonds with nutmeg-colored eyes to brunettes with eyes so dark he couldn’t distinguish the pupil from the iris.

“...your office?” Alaine stopped in the middle of the room and turned to face him, those dark brown eyes gazing at him askance.

What about his office? Oh, the interview. “Right through here.”

He led her down the service corridor and pushed open the Enter Only door into the kitchen, motioning for her to pass through ahead of him—and for the overloaded cameraman to do the same.

“Wow. I’ve seen some professional kitchens on TV before, but this one takes the cake.” Alaine ran her hand along the stainless-steel countertops. “Nelson, we’ll want to get some footage of this kitchen. In fact—” She whirled around to look at both men. “I know we discussed filming the cooking segments in the executive kitchen downstairs, but I wonder now if maybe we should do it up here.”

Nelson thunked the equipment cases down on the floor and crossed his arms. “I’d have to see the other space to find out which one’ll be easier to light.”

Alaine returned to her perusal of the kitchen. “Mrs. Guidry said they’ll help us out with getting some new lights installed if our portables won’t be sufficient.”

Major felt as if he’d walked into the middle of a movie. “Cooking segments? I wasn’t supposed to have prepared a cooking exhibition for today, was I?”

“No, no. Your weekly guest spot for my show.”

“Oh.” Now he really needed to talk to Meredith. It wasn’t like her not to tell him when she made decisions that impacted his work. And even if the decision had come from farther up the food chain, the least Meredith could have done was to give him a heads-up. She was his boss after all.

“After we finish the interview, can you show us the other kitchen?”

“Sure.” That would give him a good excuse to see if Meredith was back yet and talk to her. He had to talk through this restaurant thing with someone. He couldn’t talk to Forbes—Forbes was representing his parents in the business deal. Meredith was the only other person he trusted.

Then why can’t I bring myself to tell her about Ma?

He pushed the wayward thoughts aside and led Alaine and Nelson into his office. He’d think about his relationship issues with Meredith later. Much, much later.

* * *

“Hey, kiddo. Good meeting this afternoon?”

Meredith looked up from her computer at her dad’s voice. “Yeah. I think we’ve got that wedding reception in the bag.”

“How much are they wanting to spend?”

“At least six figures.”

“That’s my girl.”

Yep. That’s when her parents were proud of her: whenever she brought more money into the company coffers. “It’s not signed yet.”

“I’ll put the pressure on the father of the bride—I’m playing golf with him Saturday morning. You hooked the fish; I’ll just reel it in.” He leaned his shoulder against the doorjamb. “Major was down here a little while ago looking for you. Said he needed to talk to you.”

Meredith’s insides cringed, but she kept her expression neutral. “Yeah, I’ve got a couple of e-mails from him that I haven’t gotten around to yet—it’s been such a busy week.”