by Stacy Finz
Gina stared down at the menu. “Not this. What are we making for the luncheon?”
“Everything in there.” Laney nudged her head at the menu.
Gina blinked her eyes a few times, trying to understand. “Are you saying this isn’t prix fixe?”
“Now why would we do that? Not everybody likes the same thing.”
“So these thirty-eight guests can order anything in here?” She shook the menu, which easily weighed two pounds, in Laney’s face.
Laney put her hands on her hips and stared down her nose at Gina. “Just like everyone else in the restaurant.”
“Oh my God.” Gina rushed to the order window and peeked into the dining room. There were a few diners mopping up the last of their eggs. “Who cooked for them?”
“Jimmy Ray did. But I sent him home before he collapsed and made everyone else sick.”
Just to make sure she wasn’t mistaken, Gina’s eyes moved to the front door where the sign still said open. “You’re not closing for this lunch, are you?”
“Pfft, you may be a high-ass rich girl from the city, but I’ve got bills to pay. Hell no, we’re not closing for lunch.”
Gina squeezed the bridge of her nose. “Laney, do you expect me to pick up where Jimmy Ray left off?” Again she waved the menu in Laney’s face. “I don’t even know his recipes.”
“JoJo and I will help you.”
Gina pivoted around to find a guy missing his front tooth who had more tattoos than all the inmates in San Quentin put together. He was in a white apron, grinning. She assumed he was JoJo.
What had she gotten herself into?
She took off her ridiculous disguise, found another apron hanging from a pegboard near the deep fryers, and quickly put it on. She scooped her hair up and twisted it on top of her head in a knot.
Laney handed her a hairnet. When Gina balked, Laney sent her a disapproving glare. “You want the health department to write me up?”
She complied.
“JoJo, you start the mise en place.” He stared at her blankly. “Ah, for Christ’s sake! Chop and peel the vegetables, get out the spices, set up the ingredients, and put them all”—Gina glanced around until she landed on a steel prep table—“there.”
“You talking about the fixin’s?” He went to the large side-by-side refrigerator and started pulling out an assortment of ingredient bins.
“Yes. Thank you, JoJo.”
He continued to organize and Laney poured fresh peanut oil into the fryers. The front door chimed, signaling that the lunch crowd had begun streaming in.
Time to get busy.
She worked for an hour, covered in a layer of sweat, filling orders. Mostly sandwiches, burgers, and melts with the occasional salad. Nothing terribly complicated.
When she tried to garnish each plate, Laney swept them away and tsked. “This ain’t the Four Seasons.”
Gina had been doubtful about JoJo but he manned the fry station like a champ while she dredged pieces of chicken through her own batter. If anyone had noticed that it wasn’t Jimmy Ray’s secret recipe they hadn’t complained. At least there were vats of his waffle batter in the fridge.
A little before one o’clock, Laney pushed ten four-tops together and taped a piece of notebook paper in the center that said reserved. Soon after, members of Tiffany’s party began trickling in with colorful gift bags. Every so often, Gina discreetly popped her head in the dining room to gauge the crowd size.
Full house.
Dry Creek needed another damn restaurant. She used her arm to wipe the sweat from her face and went to work on four “Jaspers,” steak sandwiches with sides of fries and frosty mugs of homemade sarsaparilla. According to Laney, the special was named for Sawyer’s grandfather.
“We need more fries, JoJo.” Only one hour working together and already they were like a well-oiled machine.
She threw four steaks on the grill and caramelized rings of onions, going on instinct. Until someone cried foul, she was winging it. To take the time to go through Jimmy Ray’s recipes would back them up at least an hour.
She flipped a tuna melt, let it turn to a golden brown, plated it with a scoop of Laney’s potato salad, and called “order up.”
Laney bustled into the kitchen with her notepad in hand. “Whoo-wee!” She pressed a hand against her lower back. “We’re busy today. Ten chicken and waffles, eight chicken-fried steaks, six Caesar salads with chicken, four Cobbs, three patty melts, three tuna melts, two soups, and two Jaspers for the Tiffany party.” She hung the order from a clip on the wall behind the griddle.
“Shit.” Getting everything out at the same time was going to be a bitch. “You hear that, JoJo?”
“Yep.” JoJo wasn’t much for words, but he could fry like nobody’s business.
“How we doing on the rest of the crowd?”
“So far, so good.” Laney grabbed up two of the Jaspers, settled them into the crook of her arm, and went for the other two. “Maria’s got us covered at the front of the house. I’ll come back and help y’all with Tiff’s order.”
Gina made up more batter for the chicken-fried steak and went back to dredging chicken. While those were on the skillet, she’d work on the salads, which would take a little time.
When Laney returned, Gina was putting the finishing touches on the Cobbs.
“Oh, hell no.” Laney stood over the salads, disgusted. “That looks like a museum exhibit, not like a lunch entrée. Put some more food on that plate, girl. Last I looked lettuce didn’t cost that much.”
“It’s a deconstructed Cobb.” Gina let out a huff.
“More like anemic.” Laney scooped up handfuls of romaine and dumped them on the plate, ruining Gina’s presentation. “You want to starve my customers?”
“For damn’s sake, at least put a little care into it.” Gina rearranged the lettuce leaves, added more boiled eggs, grilled chicken, bacon, and blue cheese. “That enough for you? Finish here while I grill the steaks for the Jaspers.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Gina saw Laney retrieve two store-bought salad dressing bottles from the cooler and yelled, “Don’t you dare.” She swiped the bottles out of Laney’s hands. “Watch the steaks. I’ll make dressing. Where do you keep the anchovies?”
Laney sniffed. “At the Whole Foods in Roseville.”
“Seriously?” Gina threw her arms up in the air. “How do you have Caesar salad on the menu and no anchovies?”
“This is cattle country. We don’t do surf, just turf.”
“Whatever.” Gina rolled her eyes and found a blender on the appliance shelf. Within minutes, she’d gathered up the ingredients to make a mustard shallot vinaigrette for the Cobb and a classic Caesar dressing, sans the anchovies.
As soon as the dressings were done, she diced up some sourdough bread to make croutons for the Caesar.
“How are the steaks doing?”
“Done.” Laney took the meat off the grill and sandwiched them inside toasted French rolls slathered with Jimmy Ray’s secret sauce. Probably A1 and Worcestershire, if Gina had to guess.
“JoJo, how’s things at the fryer?”
“Good,” he grunted, filling a basket with frozen potato slices.
“We’ve got to pick up the pace, people.” Gina would be damned if everything didn’t go out to Tiffany’s table at the same time.
She went into overdrive, first filling the waffle makers with batter, then slapping a couple of burger patties onto the skillet. Meanwhile, Laney focused on the tuna melts and ladled creamy tomato soup that Jimmy Ray had made the night before from a giant pot on the stove. Within minutes, Gina loaded Laney and Maria up with plates and everyone in Tiffany’s party got their food on time.
Another rush of diners came through the door and Gina started the process all over again. Finally, at three, business let up. JoJo went outside to s
moke a cigarette while Gina set up a new mise en place for the dinner service.
The time went by so quickly that Gina didn’t even notice the change in light outside as the afternoon turned to dusk. She’d been so pumped full of adrenaline that she’d barely taken a break, let alone looked out the window.
It was madness but addictive.
“We did it!” She high-fived JoJo, Laney, and Maria, who’d stayed for a second shift.
Laney and Jimmy Ray ran a skeleton crew. Most of the time, Laney handled the front of the house by herself.
“You did it.” Laney took off her apron, balled it up, and threw it in a hamper near the back door. Then she reached up and grabbed a bottle of whiskey off the top shelf of the appliance rack and poured them each a shot. “What Jimmy Ray don’t know won’t hurt him.” Apparently it was his private stash.
“Salute.” Gina threw back the brown liquid and shuddered as it burned her throat.
After the others left, she stayed to help Laney put the dining room back into some semblance of order for the next day. “You think Jimmy Ray will be better by tomorrow? If not…I could help out again.”
“Nah, if he’s not up to it I’m closing the restaurant. It’ll be the first time since Jimmy Ray had his bypass surgery. To be honest, I could use the break.” Laney sagged onto a stool behind the counter, kicked off her clogs, and rubbed her feet.
“You done good, skinny girl.” Laney opened the cash register, pulled out a wad of bills, and stuffed them into Gina’s hand.
“What’re you doing?” Gina tried to give the money back but Laney wouldn’t take it.
“You work, you get paid, child.”
“I did it as a favor, not for money.” This time, Gina attempted to shove the bills into the pocket of Laney’s dress, but the woman slapped her hand away. “Oh for goodness sake, I’m rich, Laney.”
“Makes no difference to me. Like I said, you work, you get paid.”
“Fine, I’ll just throw the money on the floor. Good night.” She placed the bills next to the cash register and this time used the front door.
She was halfway to the ranch when she remembered that she’d left her floppy hat and sunglasses at the coffee shop. Oh well, it was time to get a new disguise.
Chapter 20
That evening, Sawyer was sitting on Jace’s front porch, drinking a beer, when they saw a yellow Lamborghini coming up the road.
“Who the hell’s that?” Jace looked at his watch. “Too late to be one of Charlie’s customers. Besides, she’s at a Chamber of Commerce meeting. And Aubrey’s still in San Francisco with Cash.”
Sawyer took another swig from his bottle. “Sweet ride.”
Jace hitched his shoulders. “Kind of douchey, if you ask me.”
Yeah, Sawyer could see that. The car was a little loud. And the driver was stirring up enough dust to choke every living thing on the ranch.
Jace got to his feet and stood at the railing, shielding his eyes against the sun. “We should probably start locking the gate in the evening.”
Sawyer nodded and finished his beer as they both watched the sports car wend its way up the road to the ranch house. Brakes screeched when the driver spotted them and the passenger-side window came down.
“You lost?” Jace hollered.
“Not sure. I’m looking for Gina DeRose. She’s staying on the Dry Creek Ranch. That’s what the gate said off Dry Creek Road. Is there a resort around here by the same name?”
Sawyer and Jace exchanged glances, then Jace said, “Nope.”
The guy sat there, waiting for Jace to say more, but he didn’t. Sawyer smothered a laugh. His cousin could be a real son of a gun.
“Then this is the only Dry Creek Ranch?” the driver finally said.
“Yep.”
When it was clear it was all he was going to get, the man got out of his car and approached the porch. That’s when Sawyer got a good look and instantly recognized him. Medium height, medium build, medium shoe size.
It had probably not been his dick in the picture.
“Is this where Gina DeRose is staying?” Danny Clay flipped up his designer sunglasses.
Jace started to respond but Sawyer stuck out his arm.
“Why do you want to know?” Sawyer asked.
That seemed to throw their uninvited guest off. “I have business with her.”
“No, you don’t. Want to try again?”
Danny appeared flummoxed. “Are you a friend of Gina’s?”
“Yes, and you’re on private property.”
“I need to talk to her. It’s imperative.”
“Okay. Tell me what you’ve got to say and I’ll pass the information along.”
“It’s of a personal nature.” Danny squinted up at Sawyer with the sun in his eyes.
“Sorry, that’s the best I can do.”
Danny took a look around, first at the house. Then he turned in a circle, taking in the pasture, the horse barn, and the mountain range in the distance. “What is this place?”
“Cattle ranch.”
“Is there a hotel around here?”
“A few,” Sawyer said. “Want directions?”
“Not until I talk to Gina.”
“We already went over that.” Sawyer leaned against the rail, crossing his arms over his chest. “Who told you she was here?”
Danny contemplated the question, giving Sawyer the sense he was deliberating on how much information to disclose. “A tabloid photographer. He said he’d been here and that a couple of cowboys roughed him up. At the time I thought he was using the term cowboy figuratively.”
“Nope,” Jace said.
“Are you friends with this photographer?”
Danny gave a mirthless laugh. “No, my wife—soon to be ex-wife—is.”
That caught Sawyer’s attention. “And she sent him here to take pictures of Gina?”
“That’s what I need to talk to her about.”
Sawyer had absolutely no reason to believe him. If the rumors were correct, Danny was a vindictive son of a bitch, who’d had no qualms destroying Gina’s career just so he could get even with his wife. But something about the defeated way he was standing there, like a boy who’d just lost his dog, made Sawyer willing to listen to the man’s story. Then he could kick Danny’s ass all the way back to Los Angeles.
“Why don’t you come up on the porch, have a cold one, and tell me what this business is you have with Gina?”
“You’re not going to tell me where she is, are you?”
“Not in this lifetime, buddy.”
Jace went inside the house, brought out a couple more beers, and pulled over one of the rocking chairs. “Take a load off,” he told Danny, using his sheriff’s voice, which pretty much translated to “Sit your ass down.”
Danny hesitated at first, pacing in front of his car. But when the realization finally sunk in that this was his best—and only—option, he reluctantly climbed the stairs. “I would really rather say what I have to say to Gina herself.”
“We got that, Danny.”
Danny hadn’t registered even an iota of surprise that Sawyer had used his name.
Fucking famous people.
If he’d come to confess and apologize, it was best that it went through Sawyer. He would only beat Danny up. Gina would kill him.
Jace handed him one of the brews and motioned to the rocker. Danny kept looking around as if he’d driven to the ends of the earth and now it was about to swallow him whole. He had trouble getting the cap off his beer. Jace took the bottle from him, placed the edge of the cap on the top of the porch railing, held the neck, and slammed the bottle down until it popped off.
“Here you go.”
The Daltons weren’t anything if they weren’t hospitable.
Sawyer didn’t push. He’d lear
ned from being a reporter that silence was the best way to get someone to talk. Long spells of quiet made people uncomfortable so much so that they filled the gaps by spilling their guts.
So the three of them just sat there for a while, staring off into the distance. It was a beautiful evening. Warm, but not hot. Jace had lit one of those bug candles from Charlie’s shop to keep the mosquitos away. The sun was still another few hours away from setting, leaving the sky a cloudless dark blue and the fields bathed in sunlight.
“You mind if I use your bathroom? The last time I stopped was Harris Ranch.”
“Sure,” Jace said. “Inside, through the hallway to the right.”
“You want me to take a walk?” Jace asked when Danny was gone.
“You can stick around. The asshole’s going to confess to making up the whole bullshit story about him and Gina as part of a warped plot to get back at his wife for divorcing him.”
“And you know this how?”
“I don’t for sure, but that’s what I suspect is going to happen. If he does, I’d like you to be here. You’ll make a good witness when my mom takes it public.”
Jace leaned back in his chair, propping his boots on the railing. “Then Gina will be able to go home…resume her life.” He looked at Sawyer and bobbed his chin. “You going to be okay with that?”
“Yep.”
“Liar.”
“Of the worse kind.”
Jace chuckled. “You try asking her to stay?”
“In a roundabout way.” He blew out a breath.
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I told her she should open a restaurant on the ranch…be our anchor.”
Jace let out a whistle and shook his head. “That sounds like a business proposition to me. Real romantic, asshole.”
Sawyer didn’t bother coming clean with Jace about telling Gina that he was falling for her. Why belabor his humiliation? “She can’t be Gina DeRose in Dry Creek Ranch, Jace. Her life is in Los Angeles. Her life is being on television.”
“So? Your life is traveling to the ends of the earth and writing stories about it. If you want her bad enough, you make it work.”
“That’s the thing, Jace. She’s a one-woman rodeo.”
