Chapter 4

FOUR

brONWYN LED THE WAY, and they walked the short distance to her office. No one spoke as they walked or when she led them into the conference room. She paused and spoke to her secretary. “Could you bring water and coffee? And then hold all my calls. Thank you.”

They entered the conference room, but Donovan hung back by the door. “Ladies, please understand that I’m just doing my job. But I need to speak to you individually.” He pointed to Cassie. “Would you be willing to wait outside while I speak to Bronwyn?”

A host of emotions flitted across Cassie’s face. He hoped she understood.

“I’ll wait—”

“In my office,” Bronwyn cut in. “With the door closed. I don’t want anyone harassing you.”

Donovan didn’t like the sound of that at all. “Is there a chance she’ll be harassed?”

“It depends on which members of my family show up this morning,” Bronwyn answered. “I’d rather not have a decades-old family feud flare up.”

“Agreed.” Cassie reached for Bronwyn’s hand and squeezed it. “Thank you.”

Donovan watched her until she disappeared behind Bronwyn’s office door. Then he joined Bronwyn in the small conference room, waited for her to sit, and took the chair across from her. He pulled a small notebook and a voice recorder from his pocket. He hit record, stated names and basic information, then turned to Bronwyn. “Why were you and Cassie in the kitchen this morning?”

Bronwyn pointed to the voice recorder. “I understand the need for that, but I would appreciate it if you would let me tell her what I’m about to share with you.”

“I can’t commit to that until I know what it is.”

“Fair enough. Chef Louis called me yesterday. He wants to retire. Well, mostly retire. Sort of retire.” She waved a hand in the air. “It depends on what Cassie says. But if Cassie is willing to work with him, he would like to take a significant step back and turn the kitchen over to her.”

Donovan had to focus on the words he was scribbling in his notebook. Bronwyn was going to offer Cassie a chance to stay in Gossamer Falls? Permanently?

He tried to keep his voice steady. “Interesting.”

“Yes.” She dragged the word out. “I thought you might think so.”

There was something in her voice that set Donovan on edge. “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”

“You know exactly what I mean. Take some advice from someone who knows. You blew it, but I don’t think you’ve done irreparable damage. Beg, plead, grovel, do whatever you have to do. Just fix it.”

Had Cassie told her? That seemed unlikely. Bronwyn was Cassie’s boss, not a confidante. Or she hadn’t been while he and Cassie were dating. “I’ll take that under advisement, but we need to focus on the situation in the kitchen.”

Bronwyn straightened, and when she spoke, she was the CEO again. “My plans for Cassie may or may not be relevant to this. I haven’t spoken to anyone about Chef Louis—not my staff, no members of my family, and not the executive board. When he had his heart attack, I brought her in fast and without consulting anyone. Given the need for immediacy, no one could complain about it at the time. But if I make it permanent? They’ll throw a fit.”

“Really?” He’d thought the feud was dying down.

“Oh yes. There will be a fight with my family, and I will win the fight. In fact, I’m happy to fight them over this. It’s worth it to me. But”—she tapped the table—“I won’t put those cards on the table, or burn the relationship capital it will require, if Cassie isn’t interested.”

Donovan couldn’t blame her for that.

“This morning I planned to make a proposal to her, and then give her a few weeks to consider it. And before you ask, I don’t think Chef Louis spoke to anyone, although you’ll have to confirm that with him. He and I met for coffee in town yesterday. It is possible we were overheard, although he was very discreet. And we were tucked in the back corner.”

There was only one coffee shop in Gossamer Falls, and Donovan knew the back corner she was talking about. It would be difficult to overhear any conversation taking place in that space.

“I didn’t even tell Cassie what I wanted to talk about. And unless Chef Louis called her, she remains unaware.”

“If anyone in your family knew about your plans, would it make sense for them to vandalize the kitchen?” Donovan didn’t think so, but he had to ask.

Bronwyn stared at a point somewhere behind him, and there was so much old pain in her expression, it made him want to pat her hand and tell her everything would be all right. Not that he did either of those things because he didn’t make a habit out of touching people, and the sad truth was that he had no idea if things would be all right or not.

“My family can be devious and underhanded. And a few of my cousins despise the Quinns in a way that simply isn’t healthy and could lead them to make foolish decisions. But the guests that are arriving this afternoon are very high profile, even for us. When the current guests check out at noon, The Haven will be crawling with staff doing everything they can to make this place sparkle even more than usual. There’ve been multiple strategy sessions focused on this weekend’s guests, which makes me think that even the most cantankerous Pierces wouldn’t choose today to cause a scene.”

She huffed out a small chuckle that held no humor. “My family has always done a good job of setting aside petty things like family feuds and personal ethics if it means protecting the bottom line.”

Donovan tapped his lip with his pen. “Given that you’re planning to make Cassie’s position permanent, is it safe to assume that she’s working out well? No one has any beef with her as a chef, or with her personally? Besides those with an aversion to her last name.”

When Donovan moved to Gossamer Falls, one of the first things covered in his orientation briefing was the feud between the Quinns and the Pierces. Both families had been around since the founding of the town. Both families were devoted to Gossamer Falls. Between the two families, they owned almost half of the property in the area.

But somewhere in the early 1900s, there’d been a falling-out. If anyone knew the exact nature of the dispute, they kept it to themselves. From then on, there’d been a low-level tension simmering any time Quinns and Pierces interacted.

They kept it civil. A few of them even went into business together.

All that changed when the Pierces decided to take a large portion of their land and turn it into an exclusive enclave for the wealthy, connected, influential, and famous people who craved a healthy dose of privacy along with their luxury accommodations.

The Quinns had been horrified by the decision. They were convinced that bringing outsiders to their mountain would ruin their way of life and corrupt Gossamer Falls until it became an unrecognizable tourist trap. The resulting arguments took the feud to a whole new level.

It had never been violent. But all ties had been severed. Business partners dissolved their contracts, children were encouraged to find others to play with, and the two families continued to live side by side with as little interaction as possible.

Life carried on in Gossamer Falls, and Donovan’s briefing had concluded with the interesting tidbit that the feud was losing ground with a few of the family branches. In particular, Bronwyn Pierce had been close to three Quinns since childhood—Cal Shaw (his mother was a Quinn), Meredith Quinn, and her brother, Mo Quinn. But there were rumblings that while the Quinns seemed willing to let bygones be bygones, there was a contingent of Pierces who clung to their hatred.

Despite what Bronwyn said about the business side of things, could one of those Pierces be behind the vandalism? The timing was interesting, coming as it did right before Bronwyn offered the job to Cassie.

Bronwyn glanced over her shoulder and leaned across the table toward Donovan. Her voice was loud enough for the voice recorder, but just. “If you’d asked me that question yesterday, I would have told you that Cassie has been an unqualified success. That she’s universally adored by the staff, and our guests have been delighted with her approach to the menu.”

Donovan kept his voice low. “But you can’t say that now?”

“There’s a problem, but I don’t know what it is. I tried to get her to tell me this morning, and she said she had it under control. I was hoping that after I offered her the position, she’d be willing to tell me what’s going on.”

Bronwyn leaned back. “You probably already know how much Cassie abhors conflict. But when you talk to her, don’t let her off the hook. Something’s hinky in her kitchen. I want to know what it is and who’s behind it.”