Kitabı oku: «The Cook's Secret Ingredient»

Chapter One

Olivia Mack added a generous sprinkle of powdered sugar to the chocolate-dipped cannoli and then handed it through Hurley’s Homestyle Kitchen’s food-truck window to the waiting customer. Would the confection work its magic? Of course it would. Olivia’s food—from blueberry pancakes to fried chicken to lemon chiffon pie—had been lifting spirits for as long as Olivia had been cooking, which was since girlhood. According to her mother, Olivia had a gift. Supposedly her food changed moods, healed hearts, restored hope.

Come on. Olivia hardly believed that. Comfort food comforted; it was right there in the name. If you were feeling down, a plate of macaroni and cheese did its job. And a chocolate-dipped cannoli with a sprinkling of powdered sugar? How could it not bring about a smile? Nothing magic about that.

Sorry if you don’t like it, but you have a gift, same as I do, same as all the women on my side of the family, her mother had always said. Miranda Mack passed away just over a month ago, and Olivia still couldn’t believe her larger-than-life mother was gone.

“Did you add chocolate chips to one end and crushed pistachios to the other like I asked?” Penny Jergen snapped from the other side of the food-truck window as she inspected the cannoli, her expression holding warring emotions. Olivia could see anger, pain, humiliation and plenty of heartbreak in Penny’s green eyes.

Which had Olivia refraining from rolling her own eyes at Penny’s usual rudeness. “Sure did.” As you can clearly see.

Barely mustering a thank-you, Penny carried the cannoli in its serving wedge over to the wrought iron tables and chairs dotting the town green just steps from the food truck. Olivia watched Penny stare down the young couple at the next table who were darting glances at her, then sit, her shoulders slumping. Olivia felt for Penny. The snooty twenty-six-year-old local beauty pageant champ wasn’t exactly the nicest person in Blue Gulch, but Olivia knew what heartbreak felt like.

Everyone in town had heard through the grapevine that Penny had caught her brand-new fiancé of just one week in bed with her frenemy, who’d apparently wanted to prove she could tempt the guy away from Miss Blue Gulch County. Ever since, Penny had walked around town on the verge of tears, head cast down. A barista at the coffee shop, Penny had handed Olivia her iced mocha that morning with red-rimmed eyes, her usually meticulously made-up face bare and crumpling. Olivia had been hoping Penny would stop by the food truck so Olivia could help a little. This afternoon she had.

As Olivia worked on a pulled-pork po’boy with barbecue sauce for her next customer, a young man with a nervous energy, as though he was waiting for news of some kind, she eyed Penny through the truck’s front window. Penny bit into the cannoli, a satisfied ah emanating from her. She took another bite. As expected, Penny sat up straighter. She took another bite and her teary eyes brightened. Color came back to her cheeks. She slowly ate the rest of the cannoli, sipped from a bottle of water, then stood up, head held high, chin up in the air.

“You know what?” Penny announced to no one in particular, flipping her long blond beachy waves behind her shoulders. “Screw him! I’m Penny Jergen. I mean, look at me.” She ran her hand down her tall, willowy, big-chested frame. “That’s it. Penny Jergen is done moping around over some cheating jerk who didn’t deserve her.” With that she left her balled-up, chocolate-dotted napkin on the table and marched off in her high-heeled sandals.

Olivia smiled. Penny Jergen, like her or not, was back to her old self. Presto-chango—whether Olivia liked her ability or not. The moment Penny had ordered the cannoli, chocolate chips on one end, crushed pistachios on the other, Olivia had instinctively known the extra ingredient the dessert had needed: a dash of “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair.” A person couldn’t get over heartbreak so fast—Olivia knew that from personal experience. But Olivia’s customers’ moods and facial expressions and stories told her what they needed and that telling infused the ingredients of their orders with...not magic, exactly, but something Olivia couldn’t explain.

Her mother used to argue with her over the word magic all the time, going on and on about how there was magic in the world, miracles that couldn’t be explained away, and Olivia would be stumped. All she knew for sure was that she believed in paying attention: watching faces, reading moods, giving a hoot. If you really looked at someone, you could tell so much about them and what they needed. And so Olivia put all her hopes for the person in her food and the power of positive thinking did its thing.

This was how Olivia tried to rationalize it, anyway. Special abilities, gifts, whatever you wanted to call it—she just wasn’t sure she believed in that. Even if sometimes she stayed up late at night, trying to explain to herself her mother’s obvious ability to predict the future. Olivia’s obvious ability to restore through her food. It was one thing for Olivia to fill a chocolate cannoli shell with cream and sprinkle it with powdered sugar while thinking positively about female empowerment and getting over a rotten fiancé. It was another for those thoughts to actually have such a specific effect on the person eating that cannoli.

You have a gift, Olivia’s mother had repeated the day she passed away. My hope is that one day you’ll accept it. Don’t deny who you are. Denial is why—

Her mom had stopped talking then, turning away with a sigh. Olivia knew she’d been thinking about her sister, Olivia’s aunt, who’d estranged herself from Miranda and Olivia five years earlier. If her aunt had a gift, Olivia had never heard mention of it.

She forced thoughts of her family from her mind; she couldn’t risk infusing her current customer’s order with her own worries. She had to focus on him. She turned around and glanced at the guy, early twenties, biting his lower lip. He was waiting for a job offer, Olivia thought. Her fingers filling with good-luck vibes, she added the delicious-smelling barbecue sauce to his pulled-pork po’boy, wrapped it up and handed it to him through the window. She loved knowing that in about fifteen minutes, he’d have a little boost of confidence—whether or not he got the job.

And she wasn’t in denial of who she was. Gift or no gift, Olivia knew exactly who she was: twenty-six, single and struggling to find her place now that her world had shifted. Until a week ago she’d been a caterer and personal chef, making Weight Watchers points-friendly meals for a few clients, gluten-free dishes for two other clients, and creating replicas of favorites that Mr. Crenshaw’s late wife used to cook for him. She would never quit on her clients; she knew the effect her food had on them, but spending so much time alone in the kitchen of her tiny house, after having her heart broken and losing her mother, she’d needed something, something new, something that would get her outside and interacting with people instead of just with her stove.

And then Essie Hurley, who owned the popular restaurant Hurley’s Homestyle Kitchen, had called, asking if Olivia, who she often hired to help out in the kitchen for big events, had any interest in running Hurley’s Homestyle Kitchen’s new business venture—the food truck. Olivia hadn’t hesitated. Two other cooks at Hurley’s would split the shifts, so Olivia was on three days a week from 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., and two days from 3:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. That left lots of time for her to cook at home for her clients and make her deliveries. The Hurley’s Homestyle Kitchen food truck was parked several blocks down from the restaurant and business was bustling, the residents of Blue Gulch coming back time and again. Because—if she said so herself—she was a good cook. She really would like to think that was all there was to it. Good food, comforting food, delicious food, made people happy. End of story.

Olivia glanced out the window, grateful there was no one waiting and that she could take a break and have a po’boy herself. She was deciding between roast beef and grilled chicken when she realized that the stranger who’d been standing across the sidewalk in front of the coffee shop was still there, still watching her. At first she’d thought he was reading the chalkboard of menu items hanging from the outside of the food truck. But for twenty minutes?

And he didn’t look particularly happy. Every time she caught his eye, which was every time she looked at him, he seemed to be glaring at her. But why? Who was he? Blue Gulch was a small town and if a six-two, very attractive man had moved in, Olivia would have heard about it from the grapevine. People chatted at the food-truck window as they passed the time until their orders were ready. Sometimes they talked out loud to her, sometimes she just heard snippets of conversation.

Olivia couldn’t remember ever seeing the guy before. He stood to the side of the door of Blue Gulch Coffee in his dark brown leather jacket and jeans and cowboy boots, his thick brown hair lit by the sun, a large cup of coffee in his hand.

Just as she decided on grilled chicken with pesto-dill sauce, he walked up to the food truck. Whoa, he was good-looking. All that wavy chestnut-brown hair, green-hazel eyes, a strong nose and jawline and one dimple in his left cheek that softened up his serious expression a bit. Late twenties, she thought, unable to stop staring.

“May I help you?” Olivia asked, her Spidey senses going on red alert. This guy was seriously pissed off at something—and that something was her. Could you be angry at someone you’d never met? She tried to read him, to feel something, but her usual ability failed her.

He glared at her. “I’ll have a sautéed-shrimp po’boy. Please.”

She could tell that he’d struggled to add the please. “Coming right up.”

He waited a beat, his eyes narrowed, then he glanced inside the truck, clearly trying to look around. For what?

She got to work, adding the shrimp, coated with her homemade Cajun seasoning, into the frying pan, and realized she was getting absolutely nothing from him. No vibe, other than his anger. But suddenly, a feeling came over Olivia, a feeling she usually didn’t have to think so hard about. He was worried about someone, she realized. She had no idea who or why or what. She only knew the anger was masking worry.

She dared a peek at him. He stood to the side of the window, staring at her, his expression unchanged. Is he worried about a relative? The thought flitted out of her head as quickly as it had come in. She wasn’t psychic. She couldn’t read minds. But sometimes a thought would drift inside her like smoke, sometimes so fleetingly she couldn’t grasp it.

She slathered each side of the French roll with the rémoulade of mustard and mayonnaise and horseradish sauce, then layered the sautéed shrimp and added tomato slices and onion. She could feel “it’ll be okay” sparking from her fingers, infusing the po’boy.

She handed him the yellow cardboard tray holding his sandwich. He nodded and thanked her, then moved a few feet over to a pub table that lined the edge of the grass.

He shot another glare her way, then glanced left and right, up and down Blue Gulch Street. Was he waiting for someone? Watching for something? He’d been eyeing the truck for at least twenty minutes. He took a bite of the po’boy and she could tell, at least, that he liked the sandwich. He took another bite. No change in his expression. Then another. Still no change.

He appeared at the window. Same expression. Same glare.

The sautéed-shrimp po’boy hadn’t worked on him. According to the man’s face, it most certainly was not going to be okay.

Huh. That was weird. And a first, really.

“Are you the daughter of Miranda Mack?” he asked.

She stiffened. “Yes,” she said, wondering what this was about.

He looked around the inside of the narrow truck before his hazel eyes settled back on her. “So you just serve po’boys and cannoli out of the truck? Not fortunes, too?”

Did he want his fortune told? Olivia didn’t get that sense from him at all. “I’m not a fortune-teller. Just a cook.”

He stared at her. “Look, I’d appreciate it if you could settle a family problem your mother caused.”

Uh-oh. She’d been here a time or two or three or four over the years. Sometimes her mother’s predictions upset her clients or their families, and when pleading with Miranda hadn’t helped, they’d come to Olivia, asking her to intervene, hoping she could convince her mother to change the fortune or “see” something else.

He stepped closer. “Your mother told my father a bunch of nonsense about the second great love of his life, and now he’s traveling all over Texas to find this woman. I’d appreciate it if you could put an end to this...ridiculousness.”

Oh, boy.

“Mr....” she began, stalling.

“My name is Carson Ford.”

Olivia knew that name. Well, not Carson, but Ford. Her mother had mentioned a Ford. Edward or something like that.

“My father is Edmund Ford,” he said, lowering his voice. “Suffice it to say he’s a bigwig at Texas Trust here in Blue Gulch. He’s also a vulnerable widower. Your mother told him that his second great love is a hairstylist named Sarah with green eyes. He’s now racing around to every hair salon in the county asking for Sarahs with green eyes. People are going to think he’s nuts. He’s had seven haircuts in the past two weeks.”

Oliva froze. Hair salon. Sarah. Green eyes. That could only be one person.

He narrowed his eyes at her. “She filled you in on this scam?”

Olivia bit her lip. Her aunt, her mother’s sister who’d gotten into a terrible argument with Miranda five years ago and hadn’t been seen or heard from since, was named Sarah. And a hairstylist. With green eyes.

What the heck was this? Oh, Mom, what did you do?

He waited for her to respond, but when she didn’t, he said, “Look, will you please talk some sense into my father? Explain that your mother ran a good game, a scam, fed people what they wanted to hear for lots of money. My father can go back to his normal life and I can focus on my own. This is interfering with my job and people are counting on me.”

She felt herself bristle at the word scam, but she ignored it. For now. “What is your job?” She hadn’t meant to ask that, but it came tumbling out of her mouth.

“I’m a private investigator. I specialize in finding people who don’t want to be found—mostly of the criminal and/or fraudulent variety,” he added with emphasis.

She stepped back, not expecting that. She didn’t know what she’d expected him to say he did for a living, but private investigator wasn’t it. Actually, she’d been thinking lawyer. Shark, at that.

She herself had thought about hiring a private investigator to find her aunt when her own online searches had led nowhere. Suffice it to say, to use his own phrase, that Carson Ford would not be interested in helping to locate this particular Sarah. “My mother is not a criminal or a fraud.” And she’s gone, she thought, her heart pinching.

He didn’t respond. He just continued to stare at her as if waiting for her to give something away with her expression, catch her in a lie. This man clearly also paid attention to people; it was his job to do so. She would have to be careful around him.

Wait a minute. No, she did not. Her mother’s business was her mother’s business. Olivia had no secrets, nothing to hide about Miranda Mack.

Her mother’s face, her dark hair wound into an elegant topknot affixed with two rhinestone-dotted sticks, her fair complexion, her long, elegant nose, her penchant for iridescent silver jewelry and long filmy scarves all came to mind. Olivia ached for the sight of Miranda. What she would give for one more day with her mother, another hug.

Despite their differences, Olivia missed her mother so much that tears crept up on her constantly. In the middle of the night. When she was brushing her teeth. While she was making her mother’s favorite meal, pasta carbonara with its cream and pancetta, the only thing that could comfort Olivia lately when grief seized her. And guilt. For how Olivia had always dismissed her mother’s surety that Olivia had a gift. Or that Miranda, the most sought-after fortune-teller in town—in the county—had had a gift, either. A crystal ball and some floaty scarves and deep red lipstick and suddenly her mother turned into Madam Miranda behind garnet velvet curtains. People liked the shtick, her mother had insisted. Olivia would say that three quarters of the town’s residents believed that Miranda had been the real deal. A quarter had rolled their eyes. Olivia was mostly in the latter camp with a pinkie toe in the former. How to make sense of all her mother’s predictions coming true?

Like the one about Olivia’s own broken heart. A proposal that would never come from her long-term boyfriend. He’s not the one, Miranda had insisted time and again, shaking her head.

“My mother passed away six weeks ago,” Olivia said, her own blindness, her losses and this man’s criticism all ganging up on her. “I won’t stand for you to disparage her.”

His expression softened. “I did hear about her death. I am very sorry for your loss.”

She could tell that part was sincere, at least.

And she’d been right, she thought as she glanced at him. He was worried about a relative. His father.

He cleared his throat. “My father is expecting me for dinner tonight at his house. If you could come and talk some sense into him, I’d appreciate it.”

What? No. No. No. He was inviting her to dinner at his father’s house? To talk the man out of looking for this second great love? Who, according to Miranda, was very likely Olivia’s aunt.

A woman her mother had been estranged from for five years. Had her mother “known” that this prediction would lead the man’s son, a private investigator, to get huffy and intervene? That it would bring Sarah Mack home? If it brought Aunt Sarah home.

Olivia had never known her mother to do anything for her own gain. Never. If Miranda had told Edmund Ford that his second true love was a hairstylist named Sarah with green eyes, then her mother absolutely believed that to be true. Aunt Sarah or no Aunt Sarah.

“I—I...” She had no idea how to get out of this, or what she could possibly say anything to his father about his fortune. “My mother believed in her gift. Her fortunes came true eighty-five percent of the time.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yes, I know all about the power of suggestion.”

So did Olivia. And she also knew how badly her mother wanted Olivia to find Aunt Sarah. On the day of her death, Miranda had told Olivia she’d written a letter to her sister and that it was her dying wish that Olivia give it to Sarah along with a family heirloom, a bracelet passed down from their mother. Over the past six weeks, Olivia had tried to find Sarah by doing internet searches, but all her leads were for the wrong Sarah Mack. She’d even searched for Sarah Macks in hair salons in the surrounding counties and had come up empty, too. No wonder Edmund Ford hadn’t been able to find her. No one could.

Maybe she should tell Carson Ford he didn’t have to worry, that it was doubtful his father would ever find his “second great love.”

“I’m surprised your father hasn’t asked you to find her,” Olivia said, wiping down the window counter. “I mean, there must be hundreds of green-eyed hairstylists named Sarah in the state of Texas. No last name, nothing else to go on?” she asked, fishing. It was possible that Edmund Ford’s second great love wasn’t Sarah Mack. There likely were hundreds of green-eyed hairstylists named Sarah in Texas.

He stepped closer to the window, bracing his hands on the sides of the wooden counter. “First of all, my father did ask me to help. But come on. How would trying to find this woman actually help my father? It’s a wild-goose chase and nonsense. Second of all—” He stopped, as if realizing he was about to disclose personal family business to a stranger. He cleared his throat again. “There was one more thing,” he added. “My father asked your mother how he’d know for sure which green-eyed hairstylist named Sarah was his predicted love. Your mother said he would know her instantly, but that she would have a small tattoo of a hairbrush and blow-dryer on her ankle.”

So much for the possibility that Miranda hadn’t been talking about Sarah Mack. Olivia was twelve when her aunt had gotten that tattoo. The brush was silver and the blow-dryer hot pink, Aunt Sarah’s favorite color.

“I’m not sure what I could possibly do or say to help you, Carson. I’m not a fortune-teller. I don’t know how my mother’s ability worked. If she said that his great love was this green-eyed tattooed hairstylist named Sarah, then she truly believed it. And like I said, her predictions were right most of the time.”

He grimaced. “Oh, please. I don’t believe that. I don’t believe any of it.”

Olivia didn’t want to, either. But evidence was walking around all over town in the form of couples her mother had brought together or people who’d changed their lives because of what Miranda had predicted. “She was responsible for over three hundred marriages. She directed people to their passions, stopped them from making mistakes. Sometimes they listened, sometimes the heart wants what it wants even when a fortune-teller says it won’t happen.”

He scowled, then pulled out a checkbook from an inside pocket. “I’ll pay you for your time. One hour, two tops, for you to talk some sense into my father. Five thousand ought to do it.”

Five thousand dollars. Man, she could use that money. And she felt for Carson, she really did. “It’s not about the money, Carson. It wasn’t for my mother, either. I know that’s hard for you to believe, but it’s true.”

He put away the checkbook. He tilted his head back, frustration and worry etched on his handsome face. She could feel it all over him, swirling in the air between them. “Please,” he said. “My father hasn’t been the same since my mother died five years ago. He’s so...vulnerable. I know he’s terribly lonely. I don’t know what made him seek out your mother—if he sought out your mother—”

“My mom didn’t lure clients to her,” Olivia said gently. “She didn’t need to. She had an excellent reputation. People came to her.”

He scowled. “Edmund Ford would not go walking into some fortune-teller’s little velvet-curtained room. He must have been led by something or fed some lies. Your mother ensnared him and then filled his head with nonsense. I can only imagine how much he paid her. My father, as I’m sure you know, is a very wealthy man. Making fraudulent claims, taking money from vulnerable people—that is against the law.”

Anger boiled in Olivia’s belly. “My mother was not a criminal! How dare you imply—”

“Dada!”

Olivia stuck her head farther out the window at the sound of the little voice. She watched a toddler, no older than two, run to Carson, who kneeled down, his arms wide, a big smile suddenly on the man’s face. All traces of his anger were gone.

He wrapped the child in his arms and scooped him up. The little boy pointed at a picture on the food truck’s menu, probably one of the cannoli.

“I have cookies for you at home,” Carson said, giving him a kiss on his cheek.

A woman in her fifties, who Olivia recognized from around town, approached wheeling a stroller, and Carson smiled at her. “I’ll take him from here,” he told her. “Thanks for taking such good care of him, as always.”

“My pleasure, Carson,” she said. “I’m happy to babysit for as long as you’re in town. See you tomorrow, sweetie,” she added to the little boy, ruffling his hair before turning to walk away.

“Bye!” the boy called and waved.

“Your son?” Olivia asked, noting that Carson wasn’t wearing a wedding ring. She smiled at the adorable child. “He looks just like you.”

He nodded. “He’s eighteen months old. Daniel is his name. Danny for short.”

She wondered where Danny’s mother was. Was Carson divorced? Widowed? Never married the little one’s mother? It was possible. Olivia’s mother hadn’t married Olivia’s father or anyone else. Her aunt Sarah had never married. Now Olivia was following in the family tradition.

Danny tilted his head, his big hazel eyes on his father. “Chih-chih tates?”

Carson smiled and pulled an insulated snack bag from the stroller basket. He unzipped it and handed the boy a cheddar cheese stick. “How about some cheese for now and then yes, in just a couple of hours we’ll be going to Granddaddy’s house for your favorite—roast chicken and potatoes with gravy.” He glanced at Olivia. “Chih-chih tates is toddler speak for chicken and potatoes.”

Danny grinned and munched his cheese stick. The boy was so cute that Olivia wanted to sweetly pinch his big cheeks.

Carson put the snack bag away and shifted the toddler in his arm. “One hundred Thornton Lane,” he said to Olivia. “Six thirty. Please come. Please,” he added, his eyes a combination of intensity, pleading, worry and hope.

Yes, please come and talk my father out of finding the woman he’s meant to be with, the very woman Olivia had been searching for six weeks so she could fulfill her promise to her mother.

Oh, heck, she thought. What was she supposed to do? She wasn’t about to tell the Fords that the woman in question was her aunt. But how could she not? And she certainly did understand Carson’s concern for his dad. But what if her mother was right about Edmund and Sarah?

What if, what if, what if. The story of Olivia’s life.