Endless Summer

by Nora Roberts

  Neither of them knew who took the next step. Perhaps they took it together. His mouth wasn’t so light on hers any longer, nor was hers so passive. They met, triumphantly, and clung.

  Her fingers weren’t wrapped around the cart now, but gripping his shoulders, holding him closer. Their bodies fit. Perfectly. It should have warned her. Giving without thought was something she never did, until now. In giving, she took, but she never thought to balance the ledger.

  His mouth was warm, full. His hands never left her face, but they were firm now. She couldn’t have walked away so easily. She wouldn’t have walked away at all.

  He’d thought he had known everything there was to expect from a woman—fire, ice, temptation. But a lesson was being taught to both. Had he ever felt this warmth before? This kind of sweetness? No, because if he had, he’d remember. No tastes, no sensations ever experienced were forgotten.

  He knew what it was to desire a woman—many women—but he hadn’t known what it was to crave. For a moment, he filled himself with the sensation. He wouldn’t forget.

  But he knew that a cautious man takes a step back and a second breath before he steps off a cliff. With a murmur in his own language, he did.

  Shaken, Juliet gripped the cart again for balance. Cursing herself for an idiot, she waited for her breath to even out.

  “Very nice,” Carlo said quietly and ran a finger along her cheek. “Very nice, Juliet.”

  An eighties woman, she reminded herself as her heart thudded. Strong, independent, sophisticated. “I’m so glad you approve.”

  He took her hand before she could slam the cart down the aisle. Her skin was still warm, he noted, her pulse still unsteady. If they’d been alone… Perhaps it was best this way. For now. “It isn’t a matter of approval, cara mia, but of appreciation.”

  “From now on, just appreciate me for my work, okay?” A jerk, and she freed herself of him and shoved the cart away. Without regard for the care he’d taken in selecting them, Juliet began to drop the contents of the cart on the conveyor belt at checkout.

  “You didn’t object,” he reminded her. He’d needed to find his balance as well, he realized. Now he leaned against the cart and gave her a cocky grin.

  “I didn’t want a scene.”

  He took the peppers from the basket himself before she could wound them. “Ah, you’re learning about lies.”

  When her head came up, he was surprised her eyes didn’t bore right through him. “You wouldn’t know truth if you fell into it.”

  “Darling, mind the mushrooms,” he warned her as she swung the package onto the belt. “We don’t want them bruised. I’ve a special affection for them now.”

  She swore at him, loudly enough that the checker’s eyes widened. Carlo continued to grin and thought about lesson two.

  He thought they should have it soon. Very soon.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  There were times when you knew everything could go wrong, should go wrong, and probably would go wrong, but somehow it didn’t. Then there were the other times.

  Perhaps Juliet was grouchy because she’d spent another restless night when she couldn’t afford to lose any sleep. That little annoyance she could lay smack at Carlo’s door, even though it didn’t bring any satisfaction. But even if she’d been rested and cheerful, the ordeal at Gallegher’s Department Store would have had her steaming. With a good eight hours’ sleep, she might have kept things from boiling over.

  First, Carlo insisted on coming with her two hours before he was needed. Or wanted. Juliet didn’t care to spend the first two hours of what was bound to be a long, hectic day with a smug, self-assured, egocentric chef who looked as though he’d just come back from two sun-washed weeks on the Riviera.

  Obviously, he didn’t need any sleep, she mused as they took the quick, damp cab ride from hotel to mall.

  Whatever the tourist bureau had to say about sunny California, it was raining—big, steady drops of it that immediately made the few minutes she’d taken to fuss with her hair worthless.

  Prepared to enjoy the ride, Carlo looked out the window. He liked the way the rain plopped in puddles. It didn’t matter to him that he’d heard it start that morning, just past four. “It’s a nice sound,” he decided. “It makes things more quiet, more…subtle, don’t you think?”

  Breaking away from her own gloomy view of the rain, Juliet turned to him. “What?”

  “The rain.” Carlo noted she looked a bit hollow-eyed. Good. She hadn’t been unaffected. “Rain changes the look of things.”

  Normally, she would have agreed. Juliet never minded dashing for the subway in a storm or strolling along Fifth Avenue in a drizzle. Today, she considered it her right to look on the dark side. “This one might lower the attendance in your little demonstration by ten percent.”

  “So?” He gave an easy shrug as the driver swung into the parking lot of the mall.

  What she didn’t need at that moment was careless acceptance. “Carlo, the purpose of all this is exposure.”

  He patted her hand. “You’re only thinking of numbers. You should think instead of my pasta con pesto. In a few hours, everyone else will.”

  “I don’t think about food the way you do,” she muttered. It still amazed her that he’d lovingly prepared the first linguini at 6:00 A.M., then the second two hours later for the camera. Both dishes had been an exquisite example of Italian cooking at its finest. He’d looked more like a film star on holiday than a working chef, which was precisely the image Juliet had wanted to project. His spot on the morning show had been perfect. That only made Juliet more pessimistic about the rest of the day. “It’s hard to think about food at all on this kind of a schedule.”

  “That’s because you didn’t eat anything this morning.”

  “Linguini for breakfast doesn’t suit me.”

  “My linguini is always suitable.”

  Juliet gave a mild snort as she stepped from the cab into the rain. Though she made a dash for the doors, Carlo was there ahead of her, opening one. “Thanks.” Inside, she ran a hand through her hair and wondered how soon she could come by another cup of coffee. “You don’t need to do anything for another two hours.” And he’d definitely be in the way while things were being set up on the third floor.

  “So, I’ll wander.” With his hands in his pockets, he looked around. As luck would have it, they’d entered straight into the lingerie department. “I find your American malls fascinating.”

  “I’m sure.” Her voice was dry as he fingered the border of lace on a slinky camisole. “You can come upstairs with me first, if you like.”

  “No, no.” A saleswoman with a face that demanded a second look adjusted two negligees and beamed at him. “I think I’ll just roam around and see what your shops have to offer.” He beamed back. “So far, I’m charmed.”

  She watched the exchange and tried not to clench her teeth. “All right, then, if you’ll just be sure to—”

  “Be in Special Events on the third floor at eleven-forty-five,” he finished. In his friendly, casual way, he kissed her forehead. She wondered why he could touch her like a cousin and make her think of a lover. “Believe me, Juliet, nothing you say to me is forgotten.” He took her hand, running his thumb over her knuckles. That was definitely not the touch of a cousin. “I’ll buy you a present.”

  “It isn’t necessary.”

  “A pleasure. Things that are necessary are rarely a pleasure.”

  Juliet disengaged her hand while trying not to dwell on the pleasure he could offer. “Please, don’t be later than eleven-forty-five, Carlo.”

  “Timing, mi amore, is something I excel in.”

  I’ll bet, she thought as she started toward the escalator. She’d have bet a week’s pay he was already flirting with the lingerie clerk.

  It only took ten minutes in Special Events for Juliet to forget Carlo’s penchant for romancing anything feminine.

  The little assistant with the squeaky voice was still in charge as her
boss continued his battle with the flu. She was young, cheerleader pretty and just as pert. She was also in completely over her head.

  “Elise,” Juliet began because it was still early on enough for her to have some optimism. “Mr. Franconi’s going to need a working area in the kitchen department. Is everything set?”

  “Oh, yes.” Elise gave Juliet a toothy, amiable grin. “I’m getting a nice folding table from Sporting Goods.”

  Diplomacy, Juliet reminded herself, was one of the primary rules of PR. “I’m afraid we’ll need something a bit sturdier. Perhaps one of the islands where Mr. Franconi could prepare the dish and still face the audience. Your supervisor and I had discussed it.”

  “Oh, is that what he meant?” Elise looked blank for a moment, then brightened. Juliet began to think dark thoughts about mellow California. “Well, why not?”

  “Why not,” Juliet agreed. “We’ve kept the dish Mr. Franconi is to prepare as simple as possible. You do have all the ingredients listed?”

  “Oh, yes. It sounds just delicious. I’m a vegetarian, you know.”

  Of course she was, Juliet thought. Yogurt was probably the high point of her day. “Elise, I’m sorry if it seems I’m rushing you along, but I really need to work out the setup as soon as possible.”

  “Oh, sure.” All cooperation, Elise flashed her straight-toothed smile. “What do you want to know?”

  Juliet offered up a prayer. “How sick is Mr. Francis?” she asked, thinking of the levelheaded, businesslike man she had dealt with before.

  “Just miserable.” Elise swung back her straight California-blond hair. “He’ll be out the rest of the week.”

  No help there. Accepting the inevitable, Juliet gave Elise her straight, no-nonsense look. “All right, what have you got so far?”

  “Well, we’ve taken a new blender and some really lovely bowls from Housewares.”

  Juliet nearly relaxed. “That’s fine. And the range?”

  Elise smiled. “Range?”

  “The range Mr. Franconi needs to cook the spaghetti for this dish. It’s on the list.”

  “Oh. We’d need elecricity for that, wouldn’t we?”

  “Yes.” Juliet folded her hands to keep them from clenching. “We would. For the blender, too.”

  “I guess I’d better check with maintenance.”

  “I guess you’d better.” Diplomacy, tact, Juliet reminded herself as her fingers itched for Elise’s neck. “Maybe I’ll just go over to the kitchen layouts and see which one would suit Mr. Franconi best.”

  “Terrific. He might want to do his interview right there.”

  Juliet had taken two steps before she stopped and turned back. “Interview?”

  “With the food editor of the Sun. She’ll be here at eleven-thirty.”

  Calm, controlled, Juliet pulled out her itinerary of the San Diego stop. She skimmed it, though she knew every word by heart. “I don’t seem to have anything listed here.”

  “It came up at the last minute. I called your hotel at nine, but you’d already checked out.”

  “I see.” Should she have expected Elise to phone the television studio and leave a message? Juliet looked into the personality-plus smile. No, she supposed not. Resigned, she checked her watch. The setup could be dealt with in time if she started immediately. Carlo would just have to be paged. “How do I call mall management?”

  “Oh, you can call from my office. Can I do anything?”

  Juliet thought of and rejected several things, none of which were kind. “I’d like some coffee, two sugars.”

  She rolled up her sleeves and went to work.

  By eleven, Juliet had the range, the island and the ingredients Carlo had specified neatly arranged. It had taken only one call, and some finesse, to acquire two vivid flower arrangements from a shop in the mall.

  She was on her third coffee and considering a fourth when Carlo wandered over. “Thank God.” She drained the last from the styrofoam cup. “I thought I was going to have to send out a search party.”

  “Search party?” Idly he began looking around the kitchen set. “I came when I heard the page.”

  “You’ve been paged five times in the last hour.”

  “Yes?” He smiled as he looked back at her. Her hair was beginning to stray out of her neat bun. He might have stepped off the cover of Gentlemen’s Quarterly. “I only just heard. But then, I spent some time in the most fantastic record store. Such speakers. Quadraphonic.”

  “That’s nice.” Juliet dragged a hand through her already frazzled hair.

  “There’s a problem?”

  “Her name’s Elise. I’ve come very close to murdering her half a dozen times. If she smiles at me again, I just might.” Juliet gestured with her hand to brush it off. This was no time for fantasies, no matter how satisfying. “It seems things were a bit disorganized here.”

  “But you’ve seen to that.” He bent over to examine the range as a driver might a car before Le Mans. “Excellent.”

  “You can be glad you’ve got electricity rather than your imagination,” she muttered. “You have an interview at eleven-thirty with a food editor, Marjorie Ballister, from the Sun.”

  He only moved his shoulders and examined the blender. “All right.”

  “If I’d known it was coming up, I’d have bought a paper so we could have seen her column and gauged her style. As it is—”

  “Non importante. You worry too much, Juliet.”

  She could have kissed him. Strictly in gratitude, but she could have kissed him. Considering that unwise, she smiled instead. “I appreciate your attitude, Carlo. After the last hour of dealing with the inept, the insane and the unbearable, it’s a relief to have someone take things in stride.”

  “Franconi always takes things in stride.” Juliet started to sink into a chair for a five-minute break.

  “Dio! What joke is this?” She was standing again and looking down at the little can he held in his hand. “Who would sabotage my pasta?”

  “Sabotage?” Had he found a bomb in the can? “What are you talking about?”

  “This!” He shook the can at her. “What do you call this?”

  “It’s basil,” she began, a bit unsteady when she lifted her gaze and caught the dark, furious look in his eyes. “It’s on your list.”

  “Basil!” He went off in a stream of Italian. “You dare call this basil?”

  Soothe, Juliet reminded herself. It was part of the job. “Carlo, it says basil right on the can.”

  “On the can.” He said something short and rude as he dropped it into her hand. “Where in your clever notes does it say Franconi uses basil from a can?”

  “It just says basil,” she said between clenched teeth. “B-a-s-i-l.”

  “Fresh. On your famous list you’ll see fresh. Accidenti! Only a philistine uses basil from a can for pasta con pesto. Do I look like a philistine?”

  She wouldn’t tell him what he looked like. Later, she might privately admit that temper was spectacular on him. Dark and unreasonable, but spectacular. “Carlo, I realize things aren’t quite as perfect here as both of us would like, but—”

  “I don’t need perfect,” he tossed at her. “I can cook in a sewer if I have to, but not without the proper ingredients.”

  She swallowed—though it went down hard—pride, temper and opinion. She only had fifteen minutes left until the interview. “I’m sorry, Carlo. If we could just compromise on this—”

  “Compromise?” When the word came out like an obscenity, she knew she’d lost the battle. “Would you ask Picasso to compromise on a painting?”

  Juliet stuck the can into her pocket. “How much fresh basil do you need?”

  “Three ounces.”

  “You’ll have it. Anything else?”

  “A mortar and pestle, marble.”

  Juliet checked her watch. She had forty-five minutes to handle it. “Okay. If you’ll do the interview right here, I’ll take care of this and we’ll be ready for the demonstr
ation at noon.” She sent up a quick prayer that there was a gourmet shop within ten miles. “Remember to get in the book title and the next stop on the tour. We’ll be hitting another Gallegher’s in Portland, so it’s a good tie-in. Here.” Digging into her bag she brought out an eight-by-ten glossy. “Take the extra publicity shot for her in case I don’t get back. Elise didn’t mention a photographer.”

  “You’d like to chop and dice that bouncy little woman,” Carlo observed, noting that Juliet was swearing very unprofessionally under her breath.

  “You bet I would.” She dug in again. “Take a copy of the book. The reporter can keep it if necessary.”

  “I can handle the reporter,” he told her calmly enough. “You handle the basil.”

  It seemed luck was with her when Juliet only had to make three calls before she found a shop that carried what she needed. The frenzied trip in the rain didn’t improve her disposition, nor did the price of a marble pestle. Another glance at her watch reminded her she didn’t have time for temperament. Carrying what she considered Carlo’s eccentricities, she ran back to the waiting cab.

  At exactly ten minutes to twelve, dripping wet, Juliet rode up to the third floor of Gallegher’s. The first thing she saw was Carlo, leaning back in a cozy wicker dinette chair laughing with a plump, pretty middle-aged woman with a pad and pencil. He looked dashing, amiable and most of all, dry. She wondered how it would feel to grind the pestle into his ear.

  “Ah, Juliet.” All good humor, Carlo rose as she walked up to the table. “You must meet Marjorie. She tells me she’s eaten my pasta in my restaurant in Rome.”

  “Loved every sinful bite. How do you do? You must be the Juliet Trent Carlo bragged about.”

  Bragged about? No, she wouldn’t be pleased. But Juliet set her bag on the table and offered her hand. “It’s nice to meet you. I hope you can stay for the demonstration.”

  “Wouldn’t miss it.” She twinkled at Carlo. “Or a sample of Franconi’s pasta.”

  Juliet felt a little wave of relief. Something would be salvaged out of the disaster. Unless she was way off the mark, Carlo was about to be given a glowing write-up.