Cooking with Kandy

by Peggy Jaeger

  She didn’t speak, just continued to stare out the front windshield.

  “Kandy?”

  “I can’t believe you hit him.”

  Josh took a deep breath. He’d figured that’s what had been bothering her. Trying to explain, he said, “The way he grabbed your arm, it looked like he was hurting you. I only thought about getting him off you. Of protecting you.”

  “Of protecting me?”

  “Yeah,” he said, flicking his gaze toward her for a second. “Remember why I’m here? To protect you?”

  When she didn’t respond, he turned again and found her staring at him.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Her color had returned and she didn’t have the haunted, fearful glaze across her eyes any longer, but Josh could tell there was still something not quite right.

  “When I was a teenager,” she began, her voice small but starting to regain its body, “after my father walked out, we got teased a lot about it in school. There were some girls who knew about my mother. How she went a little…crazy after he left. They’d yell things at me in the halls, whisper taunts on the bus. Nasty things about her, about my family.”

  When she stopped, he said, “I think girls can be way crueler than boys. Just plain mean.”

  “Yes. Mean.” She nodded. “That’s what they were. One day a small group of them followed me into the bathroom at school. They circled around me, chanting, teasing. Saying terrible things about my mom. I couldn’t get away. One of them started poking me in the ribs. Another one grabbed my books and stuffed them in the trash bin. One of them pulled at my hair while another kicked me. I wasn’t this height yet. They were taller and bigger. And older.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Grandma told us it was wrong to fight. Wrong to get physical. We had to take the high road. She told me so many times growing up that girls were jealous of me, of all of us, because we were smart and pretty and loved. She tried to make us see it didn’t matter what people said. We had one another. So I just stood there, taking it. Finally, they got bored because I wasn’t fighting back, and left. I got my stuff together, cut the rest of my classes, and went home in tears. Grandma was furious about the ditching school part.”

  She laughed joylessly. “I always felt cheated because I didn’t have anyone to stand with me against them. No one who had my back.”

  Josh stole another glance at her. “I wonder why you weren’t upset with your mother for putting you in that position in the first place.”

  She shook her head. “I’ve never blamed Mom for what she did with her life. I was the oldest. I saw everything my poor excuse for a father did to her. She deserved to live however she wanted to.”

  Silence filled the car.

  “What I’m trying to say,” Kandy continued after a few minutes, “is…well…thank you. Thank you for standing up for me, for defending me. For being on my side. I’ve always had to fight my own battles—or not fight, as the case may be,” she added. “It felt good to have you there when Evan jumped at me.”

  He flicked his eyes toward her and then turned back to the traffic in front of them.

  “I thought you were angry,” he said. “When I tried to take your arm, you pulled back, like you were terrified of me.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know why I reacted that way. I know you’d never hurt me. I know it. It sounds crazy since I’ve known you only a few days, but I trust you. Completely. With my life. I really do.”

  It was his turn to nod. “What did Chandler want?”

  Her laugh had a caustic bite to it. “Money. He needs cash. Fast. He sounded desperate.”

  “He is. Maybe you should reconsider and get a restraining order against him. It would keep him out of your hair.”

  “No. I don’t want the police involved.”

  “Why not?”

  “The publicity, mostly. I can’t afford anything negative right now with the season premiere looming and the book just out. If I had him arrested and charged, it would hit the media in a millisecond. Reva would kill me for the bad press.”

  “First of all,” he said after a few seconds, “Reva is one of the people who want to find out who’s been making your life miserable, so she’s not going to be mad at you. She’s concerned for your safety and well-being. Second, I always thought when you were in the public eye any publicity was good publicity.”

  She shook her head. “Maybe if you’re an actor or a rock star. But in my line of work, anything that creates a pall on the domestic tranquillity image is a big fat, no-no.”

  “Seems like a double standard.”

  Her sigh was heavy. “It is. But regardless, I don’t want the police brought in. You’re enough. Now that you’ve hit him, bloodied his pretty face and not just tossed him out of an event, Evan will back off.”

  Experience told him not to be convinced.

  “You’ll see.” She nodded. “I’m right.”

  * * *

  For the next few hours they talked little as Josh navigated through the crowded summer weekend beach traffic.

  Kandy sat and stared out the window, replaying the scene in the lobby over and over in her head.

  Evan Chandler had scared her to the bone when he’d grabbed her arm. What scared her more, though, was her reaction when Josh pulled him off and bashed him to the ground.

  He thought she’d been mad at him when she recoiled from his touch. Kandy knew it was just the opposite.

  She’d been filled with such a powerful, overwhelming sense of primal bloodlust at seeing Evan sprawled on the lobby floor, that she grew frightened of her response. When Josh reached out to touch her, she was terrified, but not of what he would do to her. It was more what she would to do him.

  Kandy knew the minute he touched her she’d have thrown herself into his arms and let loose all the contained emotions running through her.

  Basic bloodlust, that’s all it was. Blood had been spilled over her, for her, and in her defense. Caveman safeguarding his mate. The only problem with that image was Josh wasn’t a caveman and she wasn’t his mate.

  But it felt awfully good to know he was on her side.

  * * *

  “I need directions from here,” he said a half hour later.

  He turned where she instructed him to and they drove down a long and winding sandy road surrounded on both sides by shoulder-high beach grass. After a few more minutes the top of the house come into view.

  “Nice,” he said, when he stopped the car in her seashell-strewn driveway.

  “It’s a good getaway spot. The beach is private.” She alighted from the car and, arms stretched above her head, closed her eyes and took a deep, full breath. “Heaven,” she said, a few seconds later. When she opened her eyes, she smiled at him.

  They took the bags inside after Kandy disarmed the security alarm.

  “Who knows the code?” Josh asked, watching her do it.

  “Greta, me, Gemma, Stacy.”

  “No one else?”

  “No. I don’t loan the house out when I’m not here. Stacy and Gemma have it because they’re out here a lot of weekends with me and I don’t want them to feel they have to spend every minute at my side. It gives them some freedom to come and go as they please.”

  “How many phone lines do you have?”

  “Just my cell out here.”

  “No landline?”

  With a shrug, she said, “No.”

  “Good. One less worry. Enough people can get in touch with you as it is.”

  He followed her into the house, both their bags in one of his hands. “You didn’t bring much.”

  “This is my second home. I have a complete set of clothes and toiletries here. I come out most weekends in the summer. The fall, too.”

  Josh looked around.

  Kandy wondered, as she had that first day in her office, what he saw when he viewed her surroundings.

&n
bsp; This house truly was her sanctuary. She loved being out here, alone, to relax and forget about everything.

  The foyer was a giant open atrium ascending up to the second level, a winding staircase its only access. Off to the right sat a spacious sunken living room, complete with a fully functional brick fireplace. French terrace doors opened out to a finished, three-level deck with a magnificent, unobstructed beach view. The house was about thirty yards from the shoreline.

  “My bedroom’s up there.” Kandy pointed. “Originally it was a loft, but I had the room enlarged and a full bath installed last year. It runs the length of the back of the house now.”

  “How much square footage?”

  “Seventy-five hundred. It’s small compared to most of the other houses along this strip of beach. This is the first big party I’ve ever hosted here, so pray the weather holds and it’s a beautiful sunny day tomorrow. Otherwise, we’ll be cramped. Guest bedrooms are through there.” She nodded toward a long hallway. “You can take any one. They all have connecting private baths. I’ll give you a quick tour if you want.”

  Josh nodded. “Let me put my bag down first.”

  Kandy went into the kitchen while he did.

  “Greta took in my food delivery,” she told him when he came in a few minutes later. “Everything’s here. I can start the prep work immediately.”

  “How about that tour?”

  She smiled. “Quick one. I’ve got a lot to do.”

  “I’ll help.”

  She showed him the entire bottom-floor layout and the security system installed in the laundry room.

  “Good program,” he told her. “This is quality high-tech equipment.”

  “It came with the house.”

  They walked out to the beach from the kitchen access.

  “Where’s the nearest house?” he asked, staring off into the distance.

  “The Haskells, about a half mile up that way,” she said, pointing.

  “Who’s the other way?”

  “The Cardellinos. Three-quarters of a mile.”

  “I can’t see their houses.”

  “The same goes for them. They can’t see mine. It’s called privacy, Josh. We pay a lot for it in these parts.”

  “Just getting the lay of the land.” After a few seconds, he added, “It’s private. Secluded. Makes the logistics of guarding you a little difficult.”

  “How so?”

  “There are lots of places for someone to hide. In the tall beach grass, for instance. You wouldn’t see them coming until it was too late. The driveway is long and secluded. With the roll of the surf you wouldn’t hear someone approaching or walking up the path. Even the beach access is attainable. If you’re inside the house, there are at least six rooms downstairs where someone could just walk right in. It’s a bit of a defensive problem.”

  Kandy frowned and folded her arms across her chest. “Thanks for that bit of depressing info. You know, I’ve never not felt safe here. Ever. It’s been my retreat, my one escape. Five minutes with you and the feeling’s spoiled. Thanks a lot.”

  He reached out and snatched her hand when she whirled around to go back into the house.

  “Kandy, wait. I’m sorry.”

  She turned back to him, slowly, capturing his gaze with her own.

  “I look at everything from a security viewpoint. It’s my job. It’s why I’m here, remember? But I’m sorry. I wasn’t looking at your house as a house but as an impetus to keeping you safe. I do see it, though, and it’s magnificent. Everything about it, including the fact it’s a refuge for you. I don’t mean to spoil that. I really don’t.”

  She digested his words, the apology steeping into her. “I understand why you need to think the way you do. It’s your job, like you said. I guess you wouldn’t be so good at it if you didn’t.”

  Her gaze traveled down to where his hand still held hers. He removed it and said, “I’m sorry,” again.

  Her lips flattened and she took a few beats to calm down. “So am I,” she said at length. “About this whole situation. Digging into my friends’ and my family’s personal lives. Making them admit things they’d rather keep silent and private. I want it to be over. Now.”

  He nodded. “I’m working on it.”

  They stood on the deck for a few moments, each silent, the sound of the surf crashing in the background.

  It was Kandy who finally broke through the quiet. “I need to get started on the cake.”

  * * *

  “You’re a good chopper,” she said, glancing over at him as he worked on the carrots.

  “It’s easy to follow instructions when you’re told precisely what to do.”

  She raised an eyebrow and countered, “I need them to be a certain length and width for the salad. If they’re not done correctly, they whole package won’t look good.”

  “Kandy, in all honesty, I’m beginning to believe there’s nothing you can whip up that won’t look good and taste even better.”

  She smiled at the compliment and swiped her hand across her cheek to move an errant curl back into place.

  Josh’s tongue went sandpaper dry. A small speck of flour traced across her face, leaving a white powdery trail along her cheek. All he wanted to do was lick it off.

  They’d been working nonstop for hours.

  The four-tiered birthday cake was currently cooling on the table and half the hors d’oeuvres were wrapped and in the storage refrigerator.

  Josh’s nose and taste buds had been assaulted by the various concoctions she’d mixed up. Everything from caviar-filled pastry puffs, toasted almonds over a cracked crab spread, bacon-wrapped baked water chestnuts with brown sugar, to a Mediterranean salad complete with goat cheese. She was rolling phyllo dough for baklava as she supervised his vegetable-chopping technique.

  “How much more are you going to do?” he asked, transferring the last batch of cut carrots to a bowl.

  “I just need to clean and de-vein the shrimp, shuck the corn, make the ice cream, and put the first two layers of frosting on the cake. Tomorrow morning, we can go down to the docks and get the lobsters.”

  Josh shook his head, marveling at how much they still had left. “What do you mean by first two layers? How many layers do you put on a cake?”

  “Three,” she said, swiping at her hair again. “After the first, the cake goes in the fridge to harden up a little. It’s like primer. The second layer goes on about an hour later and then sits overnight. In the morning I do one more thin layer to make sure everything is even and then I decorate it.”

  Josh stared at her, his mouth open.

  “What?”

  “Is that normal?” he asked, then shook his head. “I mean, not normal, but is that how it’s usually done?”

  “No. One or two layers is the norm for most professional bakers. Why?”

  “I can’t believe how much work you do just to make a cake. The last one I had was covered with a thin layer of tub frosting. It wasn’t bad, either.”

  “This isn’t any cake, Josh, and I never use commercial products,” she said, pouting. “Everything’s made from scratch. It’s my sister’s birthday. Her twenty-first birthday. I want it to be perfect.”

  “Believe me, it will be.” He moved to the sink to rinse his hands. “Three layers of frosting,” he said to himself. “Sounds like overkill to me.”

  “Stop mumbling.” She started the mixer to beat the frosting. “It isn’t overkill by any sense of the word.”

  “Fine.” He turned back to her. “Where’s the corn? I’ll get started on that.”

  “On the deck. I saw the bags when we were out there earlier. There’s a garbage can on the side of the grill you can use. I’ll put the husks in the compost later.”

  He nodded and dried his hands on a tea towel.

  When he saw the fifteen bags of freshly picked farm corn, he shook his head again and sighed. “Figures.” He called into the house, “How much
did you order?”

  “A hundred and fifty ears. Why?”

  “Looks like they’re all here.”

  “I’ll be out in a few minutes to help. I want to get the first layer on,” she called over the whir of the mixer.

  Josh pulled a deck chair to the bags and began tackling the shucking.

  The quiet, hypnotic sound of the surf captured his attention as he did The sun was lower in the sky, about two or three hours of daylight left. A pair of seagulls swooped down and stormed into the sea, disappearing into the waves in search of food. In the far distance a speedboat hurriedly made its way across the waves, a thick, white frothy foam in its wake.

  In all, it was life he could easily get used to. Relaxing and enjoying the peace and quiet, the undulating sway of the waves breaking on the shoreline.

  Only he hadn’t relaxed for a single second since arriving. Kandy put him to work the moment they’d come back into the house. Watching how she tirelessly cooked and baked, it bothered him that she didn’t have anyone from her family helping or even someone hired to assist her. Two of her sisters were arriving early in the morning to help decorate the house, but it was something that could be done quickly and without a great deal of thought. Kandy was chained to the kitchen, not in the mood to leave it until every last duty was performed. She was solely responsible for feeding more than one hundred people in less than twenty-four hours, and after she’d worked a full, complete week. Add in the terrorizing incidents, and he couldn’t imagine anyone he knew holding up as well as she was.

  It didn’t seem fair she was doing it all by herself. If he hadn’t been there, he knew she’d be up most of the night finishing the preparations.

  “Forget about that,” he said aloud.

  “Forget about what?” She pulled a chair beside him, materializing from inside the house.

  Embarrassed, his neck heated. “Nothing.”

  “What?” she persisted, taking an ear of corn from one of the bags and shucking it in one brisk move.

  “How’d you do that?” he asked, stunned. “I can’t get it off in less than three, four moves.”