by Coleen Kwan
“My goodness, is that really you, Harriet?” Erin’s voice purred as she insinuated herself between Adam and Harriet. “I hardly recognised you. You must have lost—what? twenty, thirty kilos?”
Adam’s wince corkscrewed through Harriet. She could handle Erin’s comments no problem, but his reaction scorched her. It was almost a relief to turn her attention to Erin.
“Hello, Erin,” she said. “I see you haven’t changed a bit.”
Erin’s thinly plucked eyebrows rose at the pointed ambiguity in Harriet’s reply. “I’ve won you,” she said baldly.
For a moment Harriet thought the pounding inside her head had made her mishear. “Excuse me?”
“The silent auction. I put in the top bid for you. You’ll be cooking for my dinner party.”
Fan-bloody-tastic. Harriet plastered a grim smile on her lips. “Great. Give me a ring and we’ll arrange a suitable date.”
Erin coiled her fingers around Adam’s arm and slanted him an arch look. “I’ve already got a suitable date.”
Adam hadn’t stopped staring at Harriet. She felt his scrutiny on her cheeks like sunburn. A dancing couple jostled past her, and she seized the opportunity to back away a few more steps.
“I must get back. Enjoy the rest of the evening.”
Adam’s eyes darkened. Something flashed across his face, an expression of anger, frustration maybe. She didn’t stop to work it out. She turned and ran as if her heels were on fire.
Chapter Nine
“Harriet, you haven’t heard a word I’ve said.”
Harriet snapped her attention back to Gemma. Her friend’s expression was a mixture of impatience and concern, and guilt rushed over Harriet as she realised her thoughts had wandered off some time ago.
“Of course I have,” she lied. “You were talking about…um…Nico and his yacht.”
“We’d finished with Nico ten minutes ago,” Gemma tartly replied.
It was Thursday, and they were having lunch at a swish Italian restaurant on the waters’ edge of Sydney Harbour. Bright autumn sunshine glinted off the blue waters and the sleek white yachts moored in front of them. Both the wharf and the restaurant were a flurry of well-heeled tourists and locals enjoying the views, the weather and the cosmopolitan atmosphere.
“This is good coffee.” Harriet took a sip of her perfect macchiato.
Gemma wagged her finger. “Don’t change the subject.”
“What was the subject again?”
Gemma pushed aside her coffee cup and leaned her elbows on the tablecloth. “The real subject is, why have you been so miserable these past few weeks?”
Harriet chewed her lower lip as she glanced around the restaurant. They had just finished an excellent lunch and were about to wander up to the NSW Art Gallery to catch an exhibition on Japanese woodblock prints. Over the coming weekend she had two catering jobs with favourite clients, and her appointment book was bulging with future bookings. She’d just been to the hair salon, and she was wearing a new dress that was the perfect shade of moss-green. She looked her best, and she was enjoying an afternoon off with her best friend sampling the delights of city life. So why did she feel so empty?
“I’m not miserable,” she lied for the second time.
“Oh, you’re not miserable, are you? So why have you left most of your lunch untouched, and why have you been ignoring that cute guy in the corner who keeps staring at you?”
“What guy?”
Gemma lifted her hands. “I rest my case. Ever since you returned from Wilmot you’ve been acting weird. I’ve never seen you like this. Did your parents give you a hard time when you left? Laid on the old guilt trip on you?”
“No, they’ve been really good.”
Even though she’d rushed out of Wilmot like she was running from the law. The morning after the Harvest Ball she had flung her things into her car and made her escape. Her parents had been bewildered. They had planned a leisurely farewell lunch for her, thinking there was plenty of time. She’d made up a weak excuse for leaving early and kissed them a hasty goodbye.
“If it’s not your parents, then there’s only one explanation for your behaviour.” Gemma lowered her voice dramatically. “You’re in love.”
Harriet laced her fingers together on the tablecloth and took several deep breaths. “Okay,” she finally said, struggling to keep her lips from quivering. “I admit it. I’m in love, but it’s totally hopeless, so I don’t even want to discuss it. Not yet. It’s too soon.” She clamped her lips together as she felt herself teetering on the edge of losing it.
“Totally hopeless, huh?”
“Yes.” This was what Harriet told herself a million times over ever since she’d returned to Sydney. Ducking out of Wilmot like a thief had been a little childish, but that was how she felt whenever she thought of Adam. Now that she was so aware of her feelings for him, he reduced her to nothing more than a clumsy juvenile, and she couldn’t face him anymore.
“You want to give that cutie over there a smile,” Gemma said. “He’ll come over and ask for your number and arrange a date with you. That will cheer you up.”
Harriet grimaced. “A date?”
“Sure. We could set up a double date. You, me, Nico and your cutie. We could go to that new restaurant everyone’s raving about, or that play over at the Opera House, or we could even go out on Nico’s yacht.”
None of that appealed to Harriet anymore. Adam had ruined everything for her. She couldn’t return to Wilmot for fear of running into him. Yet he had spoiled Sydney for her too.
“I don’t know…”
A nearby ferry blasted its horn. A constant stream of people tramped up and down along the wooden wharf. Mobile phones warbled, voices chattered, waiters bustled. The restaurant was packed, yet aside from Gemma she didn’t know a single soul in this room. When she got up and left, no one would notice, no one would care, not even—she suspected—the cutie in the corner. Easy come, easy go. She’d remade herself in this city, but now she’d never felt more lost.
“Revisiting your old hometown is a bad idea.” She screwed up her napkin. “It just reminds you of all the mistakes you made in the past.”
Gemma touched her arm, her expression softening with commiseration. “I take it you’re not going to up sticks and move back to Wilmot?”
Harriet forced a hollow laugh. “That hasn’t changed. The last thing I want is to go back to Wilmot.”
But returning to Wilmot was precisely what she had to do a week later. Erin Grayson had claimed her auction prize, and Harriet was scheduled to cook and serve a dinner party for ten people at the Graysons’ horse stud just outside Wilmot on Saturday night. They had discussed the menu over the phone, and to Harriet it seemed that Erin had deliberately chosen a complicated menu. To extract the maximum pound of flesh, Harriet thought, not because she possessed a sophisticated palate.
Harriet planned to drive from Sydney straight to the Graysons’ place, cook the dinner, spend the night at her parents’ house then return to Sydney on the Sunday morning. She didn’t intend to hang around Wilmot any longer than necessary. She couldn’t avoid Adam, she knew. Much as she wished for that. He would be at Erin’s dinner party—Erin made the announcement with a feigned casualness that didn’t fool Harriet in the slightest. The message was clear: Stay away from him.
Harriet didn’t have any qualms about that. She would gladly stay away from Adam.
She arrived at the Graysons’ place at four-thirty in the afternoon. She’d never visited the famous horse stud before, and despite herself was impressed by the well-kept paddocks and the manicured gardens surrounding the sprawling homestead. Mrs Carson, the housekeeper, came out to greet her before leading her inside. The interior of the house was opulently furnished, the Grayson wealth displayed in all the antiques, chandeliers and pricey artworks. The affable housekeeper showed Harriet where everything was in the kitchen, helped to unload her car and fixed her a cup of tea.
The senior Graysons were ove
rseas, Mrs Carson told her, and all the guests at tonight’s dinner party would be “Miss Erin’s young friends.” Some were locals, while others were up from Sydney for the weekend, and were currently out playing golf or tennis at the country club. Harriet didn’t mind being treated like a lowly staff member by Erin. The less she saw of Erin the better.
At six-thirty, half an hour before the dinner was scheduled to begin, Erin swanned into the kitchen with a flute of champagne in her hand, her body squeezed into a figure-hugging red dress, her designer stilettos clicking on the tiled floor.
“Oh, there you are.” She studied Harriet, her eyelashes heavy under several coats of mascara. “Are those canapés of yours ready yet? We’re having drinks out on the terrace, and everyone’s starving.”
Harriet nodded toward the trays perched on the kitchen counter. “They’re all ready to go out.”
Erin arched a haughty eyebrow. “Hel-lo? Do I look like a waiter?”
Harriet set down the bowl of cream she had been whisking. “If you want these soufflés to be on time, you’ll have to get someone else to serve the canapés.”
Erin pinched her carmine lips together. She pivoted on her heels and stalked out of the kitchen. Harriet heard her calling out and snapping her fingers, and a second later Mrs Carson came hurrying into the kitchen.
“Miss Erin’s in one of her moods again,” the housekeeper said as she picked up the trays. “It’s going to be a trying night.”
“What do you mean?” Harriet lifted up a ribbon of cream with her whisk to check its consistency.
Mrs Carson hesitated, lowering her voice as she neared Harriet. “Looks like Miss Erin’s made an early start on the drinking this afternoon, and once she starts she finds it difficult to stop.” The housekeeper shook her head, looking concerned. “I wouldn’t normally gossip like this, but I thought it best to warn you. Just so you know what to expect.’
The housekeeper bore the canapés away, leaving Harriet feeling bushwhacked. She had no idea Erin had a drinking problem. It didn’t make her any more likeable, but it did explain some of her behaviour. Mrs Carson seemed unfazed, though, and Harriet hoped the housekeeper was being paid a handsome salary by Erin’s parents.
At seven o’clock she drew the tray of cheese soufflés out of the oven.
“Oh, they look wonderful,” Mrs Carson said.
Harriet had to admit her golden-brown, perfectly risen soufflés looked impressive. She transferred the ramekins onto two serving trays, one for her, one for Mrs Carson, and readied herself to carry the first course into the dining room. She crossed the short hallway from the kitchen, telling herself she was a professional and she would behave like a professional no matter what. Even so, her nerves, which had been thrumming all afternoon, began to rattle as she entered the dining room.
The cavernous room was dominated by a large oak table surrounded by ornately carved chairs. A vast chandelier suspended from the ceiling cast a shimmering light on the diners and the crystal and silverware. The guests were already seated, with Erin lounging at the head of the table. Harriet glanced toward her, and the air left her lungs.
Adam sat to the right of his hostess. After four weeks of absence, her eyes sought him out unerringly. Their gazes collided. Something deep flickered through his inscrutable eyes, freezing her for a couple of seconds. In that quick-as-lightning glance, she drank in every last detail of his appearance. He sat upright, with one hand clasped around a wine glass, his athletic figure poised yet not fully at ease, dressed in black tailored trousers and a charcoal shirt unbuttoned at the neck. Her arms trembled. She wanted to smooth her hands across the material stretching across his shoulders and stroke her fingers against the vee of bronze skin at his neck. Every hair on her nape quivered at his nearness. Terrified of dropping her tray, she averted her head and concentrated on serving the soufflés.
“Harriet is our chef for tonight,” Erin announced in her lazy drawl. “Harriet, why don’t you tell us about the entrées you’re serving?”
All eyes swivelled toward her. She had wrangled it so that Mrs Carson served Adam, but now, as she stood at the opposite end of the table, she was all too aware of his eyes on her. Glancing around the table, she noticed Adam’s cousins, Portia and Tristan, were also present. The rest of the dinner guests were strangers to her, but judging from their patrician looks and fashionable clothes, they were obviously from the same upper-class milieu as Erin’s.
Harriet cleared her throat. “This is a twice-baked goat’s cheese soufflé with fennel and calendula.”
Everyone nodded. “It looks very pretty with these flower petals,” one of the female guests commented.
Harriet’s gaze drifted back to Adam. He gave her a quick smile. She almost dropped her tray.
“Thank you, Harriet,” Erin said, her tone indicating that Harriet was dismissed and should return to her proper place in the kitchen at once.
Harriet was only too happy to oblige. She didn’t like the way one smile from Adam had left her shaking. Even now her hands were still trembling, her nerves still jarring. She found herself trying to dissect that brief smile of his. Had it been teasing, sympathetic or just mildly friendly? Had he seemed glad to see her again after four weeks? Had he thought about her, missed her?
Of course he hadn’t, dunderhead. Scowling at her illusions, she busied herself with the main course. The poached ocean trout needed to be carefully timed to avoid overcooking, and she was determined not to give Erin any cause for criticism. The ten main-course plates she assembled couldn’t be faulted, and when she and Mrs Carson delivered the plates to the dining room, she was gratified by the buzz of appreciation around the table.
“Your entrée was wonderful.” It was the same woman who had liked the flower petals. “And this looks equally amazing.”
“It’s poached ocean trout with asparagus and saffron aioli,” Harriet replied, pleased by the woman’s compliment.
The woman shook her head in admiration. “I’ve never been able to cook fish like this.”
“It’s important to time the trout, but otherwise it’s a fairly easy dish to cook.”
“For you maybe, but I’m a dunce in the kitchen.” The woman laughed.
“I’ve seen Harriet cook,” Adam said from the other side of the table. “She makes it look easy.”
“Oh, you two know each other?” The woman sat up, face perking with interest. “Adam, you didn’t tell.”
Adam studied Harriet as he addressed his dining companion. “Harriet grew up in Wilmot, just like I did, but she’s based in Sydney now. She runs a really successful catering business. She did the catering for our Harvest Ball the other month, and everyone raved about the food.”
Harriet felt her ears grow hot. “Adam’s laying it on a bit thick,” she said.
“I heard about the Harvest Ball,” the woman said. “I believe it was a roaring success.”
“People want it to be an annual event,” Tristan chipped in. He turned to Adam. “And I heard you’re being drafted on to the Business Council.”
“Nothing’s been confirmed.” Adam was noncommittal.
The woman turned back to Harriet. “I must get your phone number. My husband—” she waved toward a man sitting farther down the table, “—and I live in Sydney too. I’d love to have you do a dinner party for us. Do you have a business card?”
“Uh, I might have some in my purse.” What was wrong with her? One glance from Adam and she went to pieces. She collected herself, sending the woman a confident smile. “I’ll get one for you before you leave.”
“Harriet.” Erin’s voice cut through the air like a chainsaw. Her speech was still crisp, but there was a glassiness to her eyes, and her lipstick looked smudged, as though they’d come into contact with too many wineglasses. “Do you mind not conducting business at my table? Some of us haven’t got our trout yet.”
“It’s my fault,” Adam broke in as Harriet hurried away. “I’ve been singing Harriet’s praises to Joanne.”
Harriet dived back into the kitchen, her ears still burning.
Adam rolled his shoulders and flexed his legs as Harriet retreated. He was dying to leap up and follow Harriet out of the room, but instead he had to sit and make pretence of eating even while his left knee wouldn’t stop jiggling up and down.
For Christ’s sake, he wasn’t some tame poodle. Why didn’t he just go with his instincts and leave the table? It wasn’t as if he cared about anyone’s opinion here. And it wasn’t as if he had come here tonight with any purpose except to see Harriet again.
He scowled down at his plate of fish. When he’d caught his first glimpse of her tonight, his entire body had constricted, and he hadn’t been able to breathe for several seconds. All the days and nights of wondering had culminated in that one dizzying moment.
“Delicious,” Joanne said from across the table. “I have to get Harriet’s business card. She must be in demand back in Sydney.”
A cold breeze blew across the back of Adam’s neck. He knew why he hadn’t followed Harriet into the kitchen. How could he when a few weeks back she’d shot out of Wilmot without saying goodbye? When tonight she’d tried to avoid his eye and practically blanched when he smiled at her?
Adam’s attention had flustered Harriet. She found his praise disheartening. Adam had been so enthused about her catering business in Sydney. Almost as if he wanted to find her as many clients as possible, so that she would stay put in Sydney. He needn’t worry about that, and he needn’t concern himself with building up her business. She’d managed perfectly well on her own; she didn’t need anyone trumpeting her skills.
She worked alongside Mrs Carson cleaning up in the kitchen, all the while listening to the hubbub of conversation which drifted down the hallway from the dining room, every now and then punctuated by bursts of laughter. The sounds of merriment did nothing to lift her spirits. Usually she loved hearing the sounds of a successful party when she was catering, but this time she felt mean-spirited and resentful.
