by Con Riley
“I don’t know.” Rob fingered the fabric before Jude could stuff it back where it came from. “They are kind of eye-catching.” He asked quietly, “What would she have done with them? Worn them?”
“More likely, she would have made something from them.”
“Made something?”
“For the pub. To decorate it. To show where they’d been.”
“That sounds… jolly?”
“But not exactly five-star, I know.” It was a good reminder. There were still some last-minute touch-ups he needed to make with his pot of white paint. “Come on.”
He left Rob in the kitchen, but not before double-checking. “You sure you want to be stuck back here when he arrives?” Surely it made more sense to have Rob out front? Charming a critic’s socks off was much more his skillset.
“It’s got to be me who cooks for him.” Rob rolled up the sleeves of his white chef’s jacket as if he meant business. “He was one of the first reviewers when Dad opened in London. He wants to compare what I serve him to the meal that Dad served.”
“Seems a bit mean, pitting you against each other.”
“‘Mean’ sells lots of newspapers.” Rob surveyed the contents of the fridge. “Maybe lightning will strike twice.”
“What do you mean?”
“There are thousands of restaurants in London. That review got a lot of attention.”
“Because Guy Parsons slammed his cooking?”
“No. He loved it, and that happens so rarely that Dad’s first restaurant was sold out from the moment it opened. He was booked solid for months.”
“So that’s why he asked him to come to review us early? He wants to give you the same signal boost all of that early good publicity gave him?” That had to be the reason, but Rob acted like Jude hadn’t spoken.
He wiped down his counter rather than look up, speaking under his breath. “I’ve practised my menu enough times I could cook it with my eyes closed,” he said as if reading a checklist. “Lou’s got the atmosphere in the bar covered. She’s invited Marc and his friends, plus Carl and Susan, who are bringing their family as well, so it should look good and busy, even if the rest of the village is deserted.” He was so different like this; stern and laser-focussed when it turned out that Jude much preferred him soft and sleep rumpled. There was no sign of the clingy octopus he’d woken tangled up with as Rob checked another task off his list. “The bedrooms and bathrooms are shipshape?” he asked Jude, only slightly relaxing at Jude’s nod. “Then as long as what I cook goes exactly to plan, there’s very little that can go wrong.” He sounded sure but the hand he used to pick up a paring knife shook. Jude itched to take it from him.
“Let me prep for you,” Jude urged. He had far more patience for it than Rob, who had cut corners Jude wouldn’t have dreamed of at each stage of the contest.
“Nope,” Rob said, perhaps reading Jude’s mind. “I’m not going to cut a single corner. Besides, too many cooks, and all that.”
“Okay.” Jude mentally ran through his own chore list as he pushed the kitchen door open before Rob called him back.
“Hey. Aren’t you forgetting something?” He pointed to his chest, tip of the knife blade tapping right where it would say kiss-the-cook if he wore Jude’s mum’s apron. His expression cracked for a second, worry showing. “Just one for luck?”
Jude could spare more than one, he thought, as he crossed the kitchen. The knife clattered onto the counter when Jude did much more than peck the cheek Rob offered, his hands coming up to Jude’s nape and shoulder, holding on tight as Jude nudged his mouth open. Jude was the lucky one, he decided, as Rob melted as their kiss deepened. No judgement from some uptight London critic could change his opinion.
“Wow.” Rob was nicely breathless, his smile much more cheerful. “What was that for?”
“For luck, like you said.” Jude took another quick kiss, Lou shouting faintly for him from the upstairs hallway the only reason he didn’t steal more. “Not that you’re going to need it.”
“That’s right.” Rob almost sounded convincing. “Lightning’s definitely going to strike twice, he won’t notice that the village is about as bustling as the Marie Celeste, and who wouldn’t love the smell of wet paint in their hotel bedroom?”
“The only thing he needs to notice is the meal. And that’s going to be prize-winning, like the chef who cooks it.”
“Prize-winning.” Rob put some distance between them, perhaps refocussed now, if the way he stared at the paring knife rather than Jude was an indication. He muttered, “Of course,” like he’d forgotten for a moment that he’d been judged a better chef than all the others in the contest, serving a meal in the final that must have been outstanding.
“Best new chef in Britain,” Jude reminded. “That’s got to count for something.”
“Jude?” Louise’s voice was louder, coming from downstairs now.
“I should go.”
“You two better be decent.” She cracked the door open slightly as if expecting a replay of that morning, her smile small and nervous. “Carl’s here. Wants a word.”
“With me?” Rob asked as he gathered ingredients, lining up his mise en place like an admiral arranging his fleet for battle. “Can it wait?”
“No. He wants you, Jude.” She held the door open for him. “He’s out the front. Says he only needs a minute.”
Carl always came to the back door when he delivered fish to the kitchen. Jude had a momentary flashback of the shift in Carl’s expression when he’d sailed past that morning and had seen him and Rob kissing. The walk down the hallway to the front door took forever, distance seeming to lengthen as if judgement waited at its end. A man of his dad’s generation who also often watched rather than speaking? Maybe what Carl had seen that morning was enough to finally make him break his silence—say what his dad might have as well if he’d been here to witness Jude being honest.
Jude steeled himself to hear it.
It was a shame, that was all, he thought, one hand on the new door lock before he turned it.
A shame for Louise if Carl was here to cancel, refusing to bring his family and friends to make the Anchor seem busy. And a shame for Rob, one that could have been avoided if Jude had only—
No.
No.
There was nothing he’d change about this morning, not when kissing like that meant there couldn’t ever be more hiding.
Jude turned the door handle. “I’m not sorry,” he said, his voice not even shaking as he pulled the door wide open. Carl stood just beyond it, a crate in his arms that he pushed into Jude’s hands.
“I might be,” Carl said, gruff as ever. “With how much I could fetch for that lot if I sold it instead of giving it away to you.” Sea bass so fresh their eyes still gleamed lay on ice surrounded by shellfish that Carl had taken the time to scrape clean.
“We didn’t order—”
“It’s a gift. From me and Susan. For your posh lunch.” Carl backed away a few steps. “For luck,” he added before Jude could tell him that Rob’s menu didn’t call for any of these ingredients. “And Susan said to tell you she’s rounded up a few more friends. They’ll be here before your critic arrives. You need anything else before that—you, your sister, or Rob—then you make sure to ring us,” he said firmly. “Your mum and dad would be proud.”
“Proud?”
“Proud of what you three have done with the pub. Keeping this place in the family? And having you back here so happy?”
The crate Carl left him holding might’ve been heavy, but his parting words left Jude feeling so much lighter.
“Jude, that’s all they ever wanted.”
20
Jude thought about happiness as the clock ticked towards noon, each task he completed bringing Guy Parsons ever closer.
Louise was stressed but clearly took pride in checking tasks off her list, adding to a tally of hard-earned achievement. She deserved it, Jude knew. Rob did too after the effort he’d put into his
menu. Jude watched from the kitchen doorway as he toiled, itching to go and help, so used to creating feasts out of almost nothing while on the Aphrodite. The bar was where Rob would be much happier, a far better fit instead of working alone in the kitchen.
Once the critic was gone, he’d insist they swap roles for the rest of the summer, Jude decided, if that would bring back the smile that was so conspicuous by its absence again, Rob’s resemblance to his father clearer now than ever. Would he have known, Jude wondered, that sending this critic would kill his son’s enjoyment?
Was that really the reason he’d done it, pointing Guy Parsons in their direction like a loaded rifle?
Or had he sent him as a favour because he too wanted his son happy as Carl had insisted about Jude’s parents?
Jude took the stairs up to the bedrooms two at a time, while trying to imagine a world where that might be true. He still couldn’t fathom that ever being an outcome, had things turned out different.
He toured each refurbished bedroom, mentally running his own checklist, just like he had for all of Tom’s clients, making sure the yacht’s staterooms met his standards. In another life where his mum and dad still existed this kind of decor would seem too sterile. The new white bedding, pristine and snowy, would be a blank canvas to his mother, crying out for a splash of vibrant colour.
He straightened the edge of a fluffy, white towel, frowning. She wouldn’t have got too much happiness from this muted palette. Applying rainbow shades would have been her hallmark.
That was a truth that had him slipping through the kitchen, dropping a quick kiss on Rob’s surprised lips as he passed on his way out of the back door. Juvenile seagulls sat in a row atop the boatshed, feathers mottled and ruffled instead of sleek, tumbling clumsily into flight as he ran towards them, their calls to each other like mocking laughter. Rob and Lou might mock him as well for what he pulled from his duffle and carried back to the same bedrooms he just inspected to cast a length of batik fabric across the foot of each bed. He smoothed each strip of printed cotton in memory of a woman he’d never completely say goodbye to as long as the Anchor held some colour.
“Are the bedrooms all done?” Lou asked without looking up from her checklist as Jude came back downstairs.
“Yeah. They’re perfect now.”
“And the snug?”
“Just going to double-check it right now.” It was the work of a moment to add a colourful runner across the snowy linen covering the table set for Guy Parsons. At least having it on display like this meant his mum would be with them all during this make-or-break moment as well.
That tight knot inside him loosened a little.
There.
Now the snug looked more like somewhere she’d still inhabit.
The sound of chatter, sudden and getting louder broke his introspective moment, Susan along with friends and family there to swell Porthperrin’s puny numbers. Now the clock seemed to tick a whole lot faster, Jude serving them drinks with one eye on the window, awaiting an arrival he half dreaded. A crash from the kitchen drew him away from the bar for a moment, Rob red in the face and holding a steaming pan of clear stock surrounded by sharp shards of china. “Fuck,” he spat, more angry with himself than he need be after spending the whole morning toiling. “I didn’t realise the dishes were so close to the edge of the counter.”
“Where’s Lou?”
“Taking a phone call in the office.”
Jude leaned out of the kitchen doorway. “Susan,” he called out, his voice echoing between the bar and the kitchen. “Watch the bar for me for a minute, will you?” He found the broom and swept a clear path for Rob.
“Well, at least if it all goes to shit today,” Rob huffed as he set his pan down, “you could always take up curling.”
“It’s not going to go to shit.”
Rob looked anxious before he busied himself by locating a teaspoon. He dipped it into the pan, focussed on the stock he scooped up. “But if it does, I’ll understand if you blame me.” He blew on it, lips pursed, then held it to Jude’s.
The stock was perfect, if richer than Jude would have chosen, complex where he could have chosen a single key flavour, so perfectly over-the-top and Rob-like that he could hardly swallow. “Delicious,” he finally managed.
“Yeah?”
It wasn’t fair that Rob still sounded so worried, not after everything he’d done here to save their business. And it was theirs now, Jude accepted, Rob’s sweat earning as much of a place in the Anchor’s success as his and Lou’s blood tie.
“Haven’t you tasted it?”
“Yes, but…” Rob shook his head, looking as lost as Jude had felt while away until Tom had given him simple orders.
“Taste it, Rob.”
“I can’t trust myself,” Rob admitted. “Not when it matters—”
Jude kissed him before he could finish, sharing the stock’s rich flavour.
Rob’s teaspoon clattered onto the bench. He wound his arms around Jude’s neck, holding on tight as if the kitchen was a galley aboard a yacht sailing choppy waters. “Oh,” he said. He placed both hands on Jude’s face and took more sip-like kisses. “Yeah,” he finally accepted, saying, “It does taste okay,” right before Jude kissed him deeper.
Behind him, sauces simmered and bubbled and a timer went off, its pings ignored as they locked in an embrace where nothing else mattered. Eventually, they stopped, Rob looking a whole lot better, settling into his skin in a way that seemed less anxious.
“Tell me what you have left to do,” Jude asked.
“Actually,” Rob admitted, sounding surprised, “I’m just about ready.”
Jude backed out of the kitchen, smiling until he overheard the voice of a stranger demanding service.
Guy Parsons had arrived early.
Jude hesitated before crossing the threshold into the bar, taking a moment to process the sight of the critic in person. Online, he’d looked rakish, his goatee and crow’s-wing dark hair, dashing. His expression as he took the glass Susan passed across the bar was almost genial, Jude noticed. Then, it turned calculating as he asked her a quiet question. The chuckle he let out after she answered must have sounded genuine to her rather than forced, but Jude saw his hand stray to his phone maybe as if to record her answer.
“Did you want to make a call?” Susan asked, perhaps not as oblivious as either of them had thought. She tapped the edge of the critic’s phone case. “There’s barely any signal in the village.”
“Really?” he asked. “That’s got to make life tricky.”
“Makes it easier, you mean,” Susan said, certain. “No one bothering you when you’re having a nice time? That’s what makes a good vacation. You’ll have to find another way to keep busy if you’re staying.” She took a sip of her drink. “Are you?” she asked. “Staying? Because you really should after Lou and the boys put so much work in. It’s been a real labour of love for them. Especially for Rob. He’s such a treasure.”
“We’ll see.” Guy Parsons was reserved in the face of Susan’s gushing.
Jude took a small step back into the hallway as the door to the harbour opened. A younger man came in holding a camera, his cheeks ruddy and wind-flushed.
“Caught some fabulous shots of waves from the end of the sea wall, Guy!” He took the stool next to the man whose smile now was so much warmer. “Look!” He held the camera close so they could both see what he’d captured. “Very French Lieutenant’s Woman. Terribly atmospheric.” He scanned the bar tables. “Maybe you could eat outside. Put one of these tables at the far end. Nothing behind you but waves crashing and seagulls soaring.” His voice softened. “With the wind in your hair—” he pushed a chin-length strand back from Guy’s forehead “—you’d look magic.” Some kind of sorcery came into play as he tucked that strand of black hair behind Guy’s ear and leaned in to whisper. Like a storybook character, Guy Parsons thawed in front of Jude’s eyes, becoming sweetly flustered.
It was a good moment to witness,
recognisable from Jude’s hidden perspective.
These two might be new lovers as well.
“Welcome,” Jude said. He held out his hand in greeting. “I’m Jude Anstey. You must be Guy, and…?”
“I’m just the photographer.” He took Jude’s hand after Guy and Jude shook. “No one important. Just pretend I’m not here.”
Guy looked as if that no one important statement rankled, his brow furrowed until Jude said, “I remember you. It’s Ian, isn’t it?”
“That’s right.” Ian’s pleasure added even more pink to his cheeks. “You remember me from the contest?”
“Yes,” Jude nodded, very aware that Guy listened intently. “You made everything I cooked look delicious. Later, I crewed on a yacht and I had to take pictures for the website. They never came out looking anything like yours did.”
“Oh.” Ian beamed. “You’ll have to show me. Maybe I can give you some pointers.”
“Thanks.” Jude glanced Guy’s way, wondering how far to push this tiny advantage. “But I think I’ll stick to cooking. You make photography look easy, but I know it takes real talent.”
Yes, that small smile suggested Jude was on the right track, praise for his man a chink in Guy Parsons’ armour. That seemed even more likely when he said, “Why not take a look at the bedrooms, Ian. Get some shots, for the review, if I write one.” And that was the real kicker: all of this work and Guy still might not write a review, good, bad, or ugly. “I’ll stay here and chat with the lovely Susan. You were saying….”
Jude led the way upstairs with Ian behind him, trying hard not to worry about whatever Susan might share. If anyone was on their side one hundred per cent, it was her. He lifted the latch to the bedroom that used to be his and stood back to let Ian pass him.
