She Hates Me Not: A Richer in Love Romance (11 page)

Lou dropped her voice.  “Kip has more experience than some of the temps you’ve hired.”

“He also isn’t working for anything he needs.  People take business more seriously when they have to put their own food on the table.”

Recalling his Cambridge face, Lou smiled.  “He is taking it seriously.  He wants y’all to like him.”

“And why would he care what we think?”

“Maybe he’s figured out that I do.”

Beryl trimmed the stalks off the mushrooms.  “And what will Kip say when you tell him about his mother’s unsavory behavior?”

Lou checked to make sure he couldn’t overhear them.  “I don’t know.  But I’m going to tell him today.  If I wait any longer, he might feel deceived.”

“Losing someone’s trust is like watering the wine.  Once done, it’s irreversible.”

As she tensed, Lou stopped scattering potatoes across the baking sheet.  “So you’re saying I’ve already watered the wine?”

“From the instant you fell in with his mother.”

Lou went from tense to cringing inside.  Kip had said he never, ever lied, and he seemed as trusting as they came.  But his rose-colored perspective might not survive after Lou told him the whole truth.  Would Kip lump her in with women like Catrella Delcombe who craved fame and the cash it delivered?

Even if he forgave her, could he also forget?

Beryl paused long enough to give Lou a swift hug.  “Keep the faith, duck.  It’s a lovely day, if a bit warm.  And you’ll have everything sorted by the end of it, I’m sure.”

Closing her eyes, Lou prayed for it to be so.  God willing, Kip would forgive, forget, and be able to go forward.  Then there’d be another star in the sky – one that they could find together.

A
s he waited for an order at the pass-through, Kip watched Lou dance while she cooked.

It was less of a Waltz, more of a wiggle as she bounced and bobbed her head to music he’d never heard.  Kip wasn’t unfamiliar with jazz, but what poured from the CD player – one that, like Lou’s boat, had seen better days – sounded entirely foreign.  Lou knew all the lyrics.  The harmonies.  The lulls.

Kip wanted to know Lou like she knew that music.  He also wanted to confess that he knew her secret.  Not secret, perhaps, but the truth of her past.  What brought her to Stratford, and why she tried to hide.  If anyone could empathize with a scandalous history, Kip qualified absolutely.

“You’ve got a 2-top.”

Moggie’s voice, which was low in both volume and pitch, yanked Kip from his trance.  He and Moggie had divided the tables, and most of his were now empty.  The predictable lull between lunch and afternoon tea had arrived.

“Sorry.”  He grabbed two menus from the stack beside the till and offered her a sheepish grin.

“Are we tiring you out?”

“Not at all,” he insisted.  “This is brilliant.  It’s the most fun I’ve had in months.”

Moggie smirked at his enthusiasm.  “I don’t really see you in an office.”

“My brother would tell you it’s because I’m never there.”

By the time Kip reached the table, its occupants stared at him with a shrewdness he knew too well.  They were a pair of twentysomething, doll-faced blondes who might be sisters or friends.  Most of the café’s patrons were local and older and disinterested in who delivered their coffee.  All day Kip had enjoyed chatting with them precisely because of that.

These two weren’t so oblivious.  They also had smartphones.  Until now, it had been a near-perfect day, and Kip refused to let his reputation ruin it.  Out of habit he went on the offensive.

“Walcome,” he said a bit too loudly.  “Whit are ye hivin, lassies?”

Other patrons glanced in his direction.  Thankfully, Kip hadn’t interacted with any of them.  Otherwise they might wonder why he’d suddenly become Scottish.

In one blink the two blondes went from shrewd to confused.  The younger turned her attention to the menu.  The older eyed him with suspicion.  She held her mobile at an odd, upright angle, its camera aimed directly at Kip.  He wondered if she was already recording.

“We’ll have a pot of Earl Grey to share, please.”

He scribbled it on the pad.  “Onything else?”

She didn’t lower the phone.  “Forgive me, but you look so familiar.”

“Jings, no’ again!”

Pretending he was annoyed, Kip peeked over his shoulder.  Moggie stood at the front counter, her eyes down and lips curling.  As if he feared he might be sacked, Kip leaned forward and lowered his voice.

“A’m no’ him.”

“Sorry.”  The older blonde let go of her phone.  “I thought you might be someone I already knew.”

“Hits a shame that’s no’ the case.”  Now that any risk of a viral moment was over, Kip grinned like he meant it.  “A’m Clyde.”

With a different sort of interest, she straightened in her chair.  “I’m Emma.”

“Well, Emma, if yer hivin afternoon tea, the scones be no’ bad, and the strawberry tarts be gey tasty.”

Smiling, she held out the menu.  “We’ll have both.”

The younger woman scowled at Emma.  They must be sisters, Kip decided.  Even best mates wouldn’t order for the whole party, and friends wouldn’t glare with such malice.  Instantly sympathetic, Kip shifted toward her.

“And ye, lassie?  Daes what she said please ye?”

“Yes.”  She extended her menu without glancing up.  “But I’ll have jasmine tea instead.”

He made a show of changing what he’d already written.  “Nae problem!”

Pivoting, Kip found the rest of Imogens’ employees watching from the pass-through with amusement and disbelief.  Lou was adorably gobsmacked.  Even Beryl seemed entertained.  Kip decided to bring his performance to a vivid, if cheeky, close.

“Crivvens, ye biddies!  Hae ye nought tae do but staund aboot and haver?”  He slapped the ticket on the ledge.

Lou’s smoky laugh was ecstatic.  “Takes one to know one, Clyde.”

Beryl picked up the ticket.  “Clyde?”

“Clyde MacClanahan was my grandfather,” he whispered.  “My mother’s half Scottish although she’d never let on.  She used to pack Ben and me off to Glasgow for the summer holidays.”

“She didn’t go with you?” Lou asked.

“She stayed in London to work.”

“Why don’t you take your break?” Moggie suggested.  “It’s already half two.  One of us will bring you a plate in the court, and I’ll call out if we get busy again.  Perhaps your admirers will be gone by that time, Clyde.”

Thanking her, Kip hung his apron on its peg in the kitchen and went to hide himself in the alley.  This was no busman’s holiday for Moggie and Beryl.  It was another long day of business as usual, and Kip’s primary goal was not to muck things up.  That, and to see Lou however he might.

Outside he sat down at the metal table nearest the door and pulled out his phone.  No calls.  No texts.  Not even from work.  He’d long thought himself the most expendable member of Richmond Enterprises, and his mobile all but proved it.  Selecting Messages, he composed a text to Ben.

Anything yet?

Kip set down the phone and checked the sky.  Lou’s sunflower-hatted neighbor had mentioned rain, but the clouds remained white-bellied and high.  Maybe tonight he could convince Lou to have dinner.  Or go for a stroll by the river.  Both together would do quite nicely.

Behind him the side door popped open.  He spun in his chair to see Lou holding a tea tray chocker with food.  Kip jumped up to help, unloading the items as fast as he could.  Two plates of food.  Silverware in serviettes.  Two glasses and a pitcher of water.

When the table was set, Kip pulled out Lou’s chair.  “So what are we eating?”

She pointed at her plate with her fork as she explained.  “Shrimp étouffée, which is shrimp stew with a blonde roux for a base.  White rice, of course.  Maque choux – that’s corn, bell peppers, celery, fresh tomatoes, and as much spice as I think y’all can take. Some folks make it creamy or even sweet, but I just stick to butter over here.  And this is my maw-maw’s potato salad minus the boiled eggs because cold eggs give me the
fremeers
.  Even without those, it’s the best you’ll ever have.”

“I’m impressed,” Kip said.

“You haven’t tasted anything yet.”

Accepting the challenge, he tried everything separately and twice.

“Exceptional,” he declared as he reached for his water.  “The étouffée is my favorite.”

“It’s even better with fresh Gulf shrimp.  North Atlantic prawns don’t have quite the same flavor.  Of course neither of those hold a candle to crawfish.”

“Can’t you buy crayfish in the U.K.?”

“Not the same,” Lou said between bites.  “It’s like trying to find authentic scones in the States.  Unless your mama can make them, they don’t taste quite right.”

“And your mum could make them?”

Lou just nodded.

“Do you miss your home?  In Louisiana, that is?”

“I miss everything,” she admitted.  Resting her chin on her left hand, she twirled her fork through her corn with her right.  “My family.  Our house.  Friends and neighbors.  Life on the bayou.  Don’t get me wrong – I love Beryl and Moggie.  I love the Evangeline, too.  Living on the water makes me feel more connected with how I grew up.”  Stopping herself, Lou drained her glass in a few gulps and refilled it.  “What’s your home like?”

Kip thought about it as he chewed.  Most people who cared enough to ask that question already knew the answer because they’d seen it in the papers or on the telly.  More often than not, they were asking about his lifestyle, his fortune, and not his boyhood home.  Kip loved Lou’s genuine interest – that and a hundred other things about her.

“Picture the British Museum,” he said.  “But with more glass cases, velvet ropes, and doors that say ‘No Entry.’”

She laughed above a forkful of potato salad.  “You’re kidding, right?”

“I might be exaggerating.  Or perhaps it’s a metaphor.  The London office is really our home.  That’s where Ben and my mother spend all their time.  The house in Surrey is more like a B&B that we own.  We also happen to be its only guests.”

“What about holidays?” Lou asked.  “Christmas?  New Year’s?  Family birthday parties?  Don’t y’all do anything for those?”

Kip tried to smile.  “We did when my father was alive.  I don’t remember those years, but I’ve seen the photos.  We all look very happy.”

And they had been.  Ben confirmed it each time Kip asked.  Their mother hadn’t been so different back then, but their father’s playful nature balanced her sternness.  They were an unlikely couple who brought out the best in each other.

If his father hadn’t died, how different might their lives have been?  Would his mother be so callous, his brother so remote?  Would his addiction have taken less of a toll if his father had been there to notice?  Kip hated those questions – especially the last one.

He focused on something he loved.  “This meal is gorgeous,” he told Lou.  “Truly.”

“Thanks.  I love to cook.”

“You’re gorgeous, too.  Do you know that?”

Lou refused the complement with a shake of her head.  “Catrella Delcombe is gorgeous.”

“Catrella is well put together.  She’s gorgeous by her own design.  But you’re that way without trying.  I love that about you.”

A soft blush deepened her freckled cheeks.  “Well, if you can love me after a morning in the kitchen, then you can probably love me any old way.”

He could.  Absolutely.  Only common sense kept him from blurting it.  There was more, however, he needed to say while Lou’s gaze was so sweet and yielding.

“There’s something I should tell you –”

Kip stopped when he realized Lou was speaking, too.  And almost the exact same words.  Astonished by the coincidence, he leaned back.

“Ladies first?” he suggested.  “Or do we flip a coin?”

Lou set her fist on the table.  “Thumb wrestle?”

Kip rested his fist against hers.  “How about Rock Paper Scissors?  Best four out of seven?”

The side door opened, and Moggie stepped into the court.  “We’ve been invaded by a group tour.”

“American, Italian, or Japanese?” Lou asked.

“The last one.  They’ve packed the café, and they all want cream teas.  Ready to return to battle?”

While Kip grabbed the tray and stacked plates in its center, Lou arranged the glasses along its edges.

Moggie grabbed the empty pitcher.  “So are you back to Kip, or do we keep calling you Clyde?”

“Clyde will do until closing time.”  As he lifted the tray, Lou propped open the door.  He slowed when he passed by her.  “Can I walk you home after we’re done here?”

She followed him into the kitchen.  “That would be nice.”

“Really?”  Kip reached for his apron.  “Just like that?  Without any fuss?”

Offering a smile that was far from bashful, Lou draped her apron over her head and turned around so Kip could tie it.  It was the simplest of actions, wordless and mundane.  Even so, Kip felt his pulse accelerate as he wound the strings into a bow.  Shamelessly he clasped her shoulders and bent forward to kiss her neck.

Rather than pull away, Lou turned her head toward his.  As their lips met, she spun fully around.

“Health and Safety!” Beryl trilled from beside the fridge.  “Don’t make me get the hose pipe!”

Moggie’s head appeared through the curtain.  “Any time, Clyde.  Your half of the café is bursting.”

“Righto!”  Stealing one more kiss from Lou, he ducked through the curtain.

Moggie hadn’t been kidding, not that she seemed the type.  Every chair in the café was now taken by Japanese teenagers.  Their carrier bags, crammed with souvenirs, consumed as much space as they did. 

As Kip grabbed a stack of menus, he glanced into the kitchen.  Lou had resumed dancing, and Kip wished he could join her.  If not now, then perhaps during Mardi Gras.  He’d always wanted to visit New Orleans.  Later he’d ring his travel concierge at Bon Vivant and ask her to sort out the details.

At the till Moggie made change for the pair of blondes.  Although the Japanese invasion had chased them outside, Kip noticed the older one – Emma – staring at him through the window.  She wasn’t a fan because he didn’t have fans, but too many people viewed him as a gateway to fifteen minutes of fame.

But not Lou.  His family’s money was the last thing on her mind.  His inglorious past hadn’t scared her away, and hers wouldn’t deter him either.  By the time they reached the Evangeline, Kip would assure Lou it didn’t matter and confess how he wanted to help her.

He’d admit to setting things in motion and pray for Lou to understand.