Fortune's Just Desserts

by Marie Ferrarella

  “That,” Marcos repeated, with more than a little self-deprecating defeat woven in through the wonder. Even if she had come up with it—and he wasn’t completely convinced that she had—there was no denying that it was damn good. He had absolutely no doubts that the customers would love it. “Do you have a name for it yet?”

  She grinned then. That grin he’d begun to think of as the visual illustration of an old-fashioned rebel yell. “I don’t name my food, Marcos. Not if I’m going to eat it. Seems kind of cannibal-like, don’tcha think?”

  He didn’t answer her. How could he? He didn’t even know where to begin with that kind of logic.

  So instead, he turned to Enrique. “We’re going to have to call it something if it’s going to be on the menu. What do you think of Heavenly Sin?”

  Enrique slanted a glance in Wendy’s direction, his smile appreciative and approving. “I try to think of it as little as possible.”

  “As a name for the dessert,” Marcos stressed, his impatience approaching critical mass.

  “Oh, I see.” Enrique nodded, as if rolling the name over in his mind. “It works for me.”

  And he was quitting while he was ahead, Marcos thought. The longer he took with the name, the more time that gave to Wendy to throw a wrench into the works, making it grind to a halt.

  “Heavenly Sin it is. I’ll see about having an insert placed in tonight’s menu.” He focused exclusively on his chef. “Do you think you can come up with several dozen of these for tonight?”

  “No problem, right, Wendy?” Enrique asked, deflecting the question to the dessert’s creator.

  “No problem,” she echoed with confidence, her eyes shining.

  “You’re still taking care of the dessert,” he told Enrique. They were temporarily short one dessert chef—theirs had quit last week because her husband had gotten a job in another part of the state. Marcos was still interviewing replacements. He turned his attention to Wendy. “I’m going to want you on the floor,” he informed her.

  He was caught completely off guard when Wendy smiled widely and said, “Why, Marcos, most men usually buy me dinner first.”

  It took him a second to realize what she was saying to him. And longer to get the heat that shot through him under control and compose himself.

  “That’s another thing,” he began when he finally found his tongue. “You haven’t been here long enough to call me Marcos.”

  And my guess is that you never will be.

  “So that’s, like, a milestone?” Wendy asked him.

  “Something like that,” he muttered. All he wanted to do right now was get away from her so that he could effectively regroup. And draw a breath without inhaling her delicate perfume. “So when do I get to call you Marcos?” she asked.

  There was something about the way she said his name that sent ripples through him. High, tidal wave type ripples.

  He definitely didn’t need this.

  “When pigs fly,” he muttered under his breath. Or thought he did.

  It turned out that she’d heard him. “I’ll be watching the skies, then,” she promised.

  Marcos didn’t have to look—he could hear the wide grin in her voice. As he walked off, back to his office, he couldn’t help wondering what he had done so wrong in his life to merit being saddled with her. He also wondered what he’d have to do in order to wipe the image of her sexy smile from his mind.

  Damn, but he’d never been so happy to get the results of a lab test before, Flint thought, as he hung up the phone in his hotel room.

  He’d paid extra to have the results rushed through instead of taking the customary four to six weeks. He knew he wouldn’t be able to stand the tension or put up with the waiting, even though he was fairly certain that he hadn’t fathered the infant causing all the fuss.

  Well, part of the fuss, he amended. The rest of it surrounded his missing uncle, who was also the baby’s uncle—or some such relation, he thought. Of late, the exact delineation of family dynamics were beginning to elude him.

  Not that he allotted a great deal of concern to William’s disappearance. Hell, plenty of men got cold feet and took off right before their wedding—or wished they had the guts. His uncle had just thought better of surrendering his freedom for a wedding band, that was all.

  Uncle William would turn up eventually, relieved or sorry. But either way, the man would be alive and breathing.

  Just like him, Flint thought, heading out of the hotel and out onto the street.

  God, that was a relief, he thought again. He hadn’t realized just how heavily all this had been weighing on him until he’d gotten the word that he was in the clear.

  He might be, Flint thought, but some other male Fortune sure as hell wasn’t. And it was someone close to home.

  The technician who had called him had told him that while he hadn’t fathered the infant, he did have certain markers in common with the baby’s father. When he’d asked the technician just what that meant, the woman had explained to him that most likely a sibling of his had fathered the baby.

  That meant either Ross or Cooper was the father, and Flint really doubted there was a chance in hell that it was Ross. His oldest brother was head over heels in love with his wife, Julie.

  That left Cooper.

  Cooper. His other older brother hadn’t been around for a bit. Cooper had the really annoying habit of just disappearing for whole pockets of time, vanishing as if he was one of those mountain men from two hundred years ago, living off the land and keeping to himself.

  Truth be told, Flint had been pretty surprised to see Cooper at the church. He thought for sure that Cooper would pass on what, by any other name, amounted to a family reunion. One that had ended badly, granted, but nonetheless had been a gathering of the various branches of the clan.

  Could Cooper be the father?

  It seemed to Flint like a lot of things were pointing to that, but right now he didn’t feel like spending his time trying to puzzle that out.

  He just felt like celebrating.

  Flint got into his car and drove around, looking for some place suitable for him to celebrate his relief and joy.

  When he saw Red, he decided it had to be fate. After all, his baby sister was now married to a Mendoza—Roberto—and it looked as if she was finally happy, after all these years and with one disastrous marriage behind her. That meant a lot.

  Red it was, Flint thought, turning his vehicle into the parking lot. He parked the car in the first available space he could find, got out and made his way into the restaurant.

  A warm wall of noise—voices weaving in and out, festive Mexican music in the background and every so often the clatter of dishes and silverware—greeted Flint as he pushed open one of the massive oak doors.

  “Table for two?” the hostess at the reservation table asked him as he crossed to her.

  “One,” he corrected, reveling in the sound of that for the time being.

  “This way, please.” The young woman seated him, then handed over a menu.

  He’d barely started perusing the choices when a vivacious waitress with long, slender legs that made a man’s mouth water approached him with a smile that would have taken the chill out of an arctic blizzard.

  “Hello, my name’s Wendy, and I’ll be serving you tonight,” she informed him, her voice inspiring a melody in his head that he had a hunch was going to stay with him for a long, long time. The waitress leaned forward, her eyes sparkling. And just like that, she seemed to create an intimate air reserved for just the two of them. He found himself lost in admiration.

  “Got your eye on something special?” Wendy asked.

  Flint found himself really tempted to say, “You,” but he’d just gotten out of what could have been one hell of a dilemma. He wasn’t about to jump feet first into a new one.

  So instead, Flint retired his menu and asked, “What would you suggest?”

  “Well, now, that all depends on what you’ve got an appetite for,” Wend
y answered.

  These days, Flint lived in Colorado. There was nothing fresh off the farm about him, and he knew that the waitress’s friendliness just went with the territory, that she meant nothing by it.

  But all that considered, he would have liked just one taste of that pretty little mouth of hers.

  So, to divert himself, he glanced back at the menu, zeroed in on one of the items and said, “This steak dinner sounds pretty good.” He laced his hands together, resting them on top of the menu. “I’ll take the prime rib. Rare,” he said before she could ask.

  Wendy’s smile continued as if it would never end. “Man after my own heart,” she told him, making the notation. “Love a good steak myself.” She looked up at him. “And what would you like to go with that? We’ve got baked potatoes, fries—”

  Wendy continued, reciting the rest of the selections that went with the entrée he’d ordered.

  Flint hardly heard a word she was saying. He was far too busy watching her lips as she gave him his options.

  And he wasn’t the only one.

  From across the room, Marcos was doing his own observing. Just as he had for more than several days now. He told himself that it was part of his job. He was on the lookout to make sure everything was executed properly and that there were no glitches anywhere, no cause for any patron to complain about the service at Red.

  It was the same reason that he took random samples of the food that came out of Red’s kitchen. He had a discerning palate as well as a discriminating eye and it was up to him to keep things operating at top levels. That was what his aunt and uncle were paying him for.

  However, when it came to Wendy, if he was honest with himself, he had to admit that he spent more time than he really should observing her.

  Marcos could feel his temper rising as he watched Wendy leaning over this latest customer of hers, who was practically drooling over her. He frowned. Deeply.

  Agitated, Marcos knew that he should just let the matter go and return to his office. After all, no harm was being done, it wasn’t as if he had nothing else to do. There was payroll to review and inventory to verify before Friday came around. Fridays were when he had to place the new orders for the coming week.

  He knew what he should do, but somehow Marcos found himself striding across the floor toward the table that Wendy was lingering over—and toward the man with the large eyes.

  “Everything all right here?” he asked, struggling to sound cheerful and welcoming.

  The customer looked up and nodded with an appreciative smile. “Couldn’t be better, Marcos.”

  Marcos had actually been looking at Wendy. But now his attention was drawn to the man who had called him by his first name.

  Marcos looked at him closely, then nodded to himself as recognition whispered across his brain.

  “Cooper?” he asked a tad uncertainly.

  “No, it’s Flint.” It was Wendy who corrected him. “Flint Fortune. Seems like we Fortunes just keep turning up everywhere,” she said cheerfully. She tapped the tablet in her hands. “I’ll go see about getting your dinner started,” she told Flint, then sauntered away. Her hips moved rhythmically as she departed.

  “Nice girl,” Flint commented with feeling.

  “So the customers tell me,” was all Marcos trusted himself to say. And then he looked toward Flint. “Let me know if you need anything,” he said just before he took his leave. He had a restaurant to run. And dwelling on one temporary waitress—because he refused to think of her staying on in any kind of permanent capacity—was not going to help him accomplish that.

  Chapter Seven

  When Wendy had first come to work at Red, she’d approached her position as a waitress as if it was all just a lark. If it worked out, fine. If not, so be it.

  Her parents had shipped her out to Red Rock thinking that she’d find both herself and a work ethic. When the first position at the Fortune Foundation hadn’t worked out, the restaurant had suddenly be come the next stop on the Wendy train to nowhere, she’d thought sarcastically.

  But working at Red had turned out to be better than she’d anticipated. She’d made friends here and was even enjoying herself, something that really surprised her.

  The one sticking point for her had been Marcos.

  Funny thing about that. The harder the restaurant manager seemed to lean on her, the more she dug in. Rather than breaking, or throwing in the towel—the way she suspected he wanted her to do—she’d decided to show him that she wasn’t the hopeless little trust-fund baby he obviously thought she was.

  Staying on had become a matter of pride, something she’d discovered, to her surprise, that she actually had in spades.

  Who knew?

  So when Marcos walked into the kitchen the next morning about an hour before they opened for lunch and looked her way, Wendy braced herself to survive yet another round of parrying and thrusting. She was, she silently told herself, getting pretty good at that.

  Nodding a greeting at Enrique, Marcos wasted no time, turning his attention directly to Wendy. She had annoyingly haunted his thoughts throughout last night’s date with Jacinta Juárez, a woman who by all rights should have completely and exclusively dominated his every waking moment with her.

  But she hadn’t.

  Hadn’t because at the most inopportune times, thoughts of Wendy’s smile or hints of that accent of hers would suddenly burst into his brain, distracting him and ruining what should have been a perfect evening with a very desirable woman. He’d wound up taking her home rather than to his bed. And it was all Wendy’s fault.

  “Good morning, Wendy.” Marcos mouthed the greeting automatically to get it out of the way. “I want you working in the kitchen today.”

  This wasn’t the first time he’d ordered her to stay in the kitchen rather than serve out in the dining area. Exchanging a look with Eva, Wendy suppressed a sigh.

  “What am I peeling today?” she wanted to know, raising her eyes to his. “Potatoes or carrots? Or is it both?”

  “It’s neither,” Marcos informed her tersely. He looked impatiently at the rest of the staff and they took the hint, making themselves scarce. All but Enrique, who made it his business to know everyone else’s. The chef waited expectantly.

  Wendy stiffened. She was confident enough in her own skin now not to want any special treatment, but neither did she want to be singled out for all the mind-numbing chores that required absolutely no skills whatsoever.

  For a glimmer of a moment, as a hint of anger flitted across her face, Marcos saw his way out. But then, because right now it served his purposes better to have her stay on than to leave, Marcos let the opportunity pass. Especially since he’d sampled what she could do in the kitchen. And Enrique had assured him that Wendy was capable of more, so much more.

  And, after yesterday, Marcos knew that the man had turned out to be right.

  He was far too good a restaurateur to pass up a talent like hers just because she was incredibly irritating—and alluring—and had taken to haunting his dreams.

  “I’d like you to take charge of desserts,” he said evenly.

  “Desserts?” she asked, incredulous. Her eyes narrowed as she continued looking at Marcos.

  This had to be some kind of a trick.

  Or a cruel joke.

  At her expense.

  But the next words out of the restaurant manager’s mouth proved her fears wrong.

  “Yes, desserts.” Each word seemed to burn on his tongue as he said, “I want you to make some more of that thing you came up with yesterday.”

  He still didn’t actually believe that Wendy was responsible for creating the confection all by herself on the spot, but this was no time to get into a discussion about it. They would be opening the restaurant doors in less than an hour and he needed to have a number of those desserts ready to go the minute an order came in for it.

  “Think you can do that?” he asked pointedly.

  Hot words rose in her throat as the tempt
ation to quit nearly overcame her. But then what Marcos was saying registered.

  The man was actually acknowledging that she’d done something right! It couldn’t have been easy for the Marcos she’d come to know to say that, she thought.

  So she smiled warmly and said, “I think I might be able to manage that for you, Marcos.”

  He started to tell her that she still had no right to be that familiar with him, but then he let it go. He wasn’t about to continue playing games with her.

  Oh, no? What do you call all but begging her to whip up her dessert so that you could list it on the menu again? Whose game is that?

  Marcos pressed his lips together, suppressing yet another sigh, and did his best to ignore the annoying little voice in his head. He still had to get out the rest of this offer.

  “And when we close our doors for the lunch-dinner break—” he began, pushing each word out as if it was an unwieldy, heavy rock.

  And then he stopped. This was really hard for him to say.

  She’d drawn closer to him, as if to coax out the rest of his sentence. “Yes?”

  “Feel free to experiment with anything else that we can put on the menu.”

  Wendy gave him a pleased look. “I’ll see what I can do about that.” Her eyes lit up as she continued talking to him. He could almost see the idea forming in her head. “There’s this thing I’ve been thinking about.” And then she plunged right into the heart of what had captured her imagination. “Chocolate with raspberries and powdered sugar, with just a tiny little pinch of—”

  “Don’t talk,” Marcos interrupted, pointing her toward the pantry. “Do.”

  Wendy snapped to attention and then gave him a smart two-finger salute. “Yes, sir,” she declared.

  The woman was mocking him, Marcos thought, as he turned on his heel and walked back out of the kitchen. He deliberately avoided looking at Enrique, who was pretending to be working.

  Marcos supposed he deserved that for the way he’d treated her. He hoped he wouldn’t live to regret this. Any of this.