Chapter Seven

His morning latte heating one hand and a frosty bottle of water chilling the other, Casey loitered by the Market's screen door, counting down the seconds.

Three… two… one…

"Bye, Kat," he called to the Market's prickly proprietor. "See you tomorrow."

Kat, arranging artisan Scottish shortbread next to the Oreos on her eclectic cookie shelves, merely hmmphed, but he detected a twinkle in her eyes above her cheaters.

Yeah, he wasn't fooling her for a second.

As he had for the two weeks since he'd arrived in Home, Casey stepped out onto the porch at precisely 7:35, the exact time Dev trotted into view next to the Historical Society building.

Gotta love a man committed to a routine.

Casey didn't bother to pretend it was an accident, the way he had the first couple of days, because, for one thing, water bottle. For another, there was no point. Nobody could be here at exactly the same time every day without some effort.

When he was feeling optimistic, Casey dared hope that Dev timed his runs to end at 7:35 just so they'd run into one another, but he figured that was wishful thinking. After all, Dev probably made this same run every day of the year. Casey had only been privileged to catch the end of it for fourteen days.

"Morning, Dev." He held out the water. "Good run?"

Dev grinned and accepted the bottle. "Yep." He uncapped the water and gulped about half of it down. Casey forbore from sighing at the way his throat worked, the sheen of sweat that made his dark skin glow, the curls rumpled by his workout. Sadly, he hadn't been shirtless since that first day. Casey wondered if there was some way to encourage a repeat, but since he didn't know what had caused it in the first place, he contented himself with appreciating the play of Dev's muscles under the snug fabric.

The two of them fell into step as usual, heading back toward Harrison House and Casey's daily purgatory. Mid-June in Home was even more glorious than the end of May had been, the air softer, the breeze lighter, the grass greener. Also as usual, Randolph Scott appeared out of nowhere to trot along between them like some kind of furry ginger chaperone.

Dev glanced down at the cat and chuckled. "He's really taken a liking to you."

"I think he's taken a liking to the treats I slip him, not me per se." Casey bit his lip. "It won't hurt him, will it? People food?"

"I don't think so, although Ty's the one you ought to check with." Dev chuckled again, a seductive burr that made Casey want to join in. "I've lost count of the times he's informed me that cats are obligate carnivores."

"They're what now?"

Dev grinned down at Casey and Casey had to suppress another sigh. "Means they need meat to survive. You should have heard him ranting at the vegan couple who were insisting that everyone in their household—including their newly adopted kitten—eat vegan too."

Casey laughed. "I'm guessing it didn't go well."

"Not for the couple. Ty accused them of animal cruelty, which, considering, you know, vegan, was quite the shock for them."

"Did they agree to feed the cat meat?"

"They didn't get the chance. Ty rescinded their adoption, took the kitten back, and found a different home for her."

Casey shook his head. "I've gotta say that always surprises me."

"About Ty getting militant? You've been here long enough to know how he feels about his patients."

"No. I mean how much everybody in Home cares. About their friends, their neighbors, their jobs. I bet something like a poorly matched kitten adoption happening in New York would pass unnoticed."

"Maybe, maybe not. But the people who live in Home are invested in the place, in what it's always stood for."

Casey smiled up at him. "Making Home a home, whether you have two legs or four."

Dev grimaced. "Although the six-legged residents can be a big pain in the ass. Black fly season is no joke. And the mosquitos? Well, let's just say that Ty's bat house initiative got a lot of support!"

They reached Harrison House's drive, and Casey sighed, shoulders sagging.

Dev's brows pinched together. "Something wrong?"

"Cooking," Casey said glumly.

"What's Sylvia got you whipping up today?"

"It's actually her day off. I'm using it to practice, because goodness knows I need it." He forced a laugh, although it was a pretty poor effort. "She's been very patient with me, but I think she's secretly appalled at what she's undertaken."

"I'm sure it's not that bad." Dev's tone could only be described as hearty. "I mean, the summer kitchen is still standing. Which reminds me. I finished building that shelf unit. Would I disturb you if I came over and installed it today?"

"Not a bit." I'll be grateful for the distraction. "Come on over any time."

Dev lifted his water bottle. "Thanks again for the water. Hope you put it on my Market account."

Casey merely hummed in response, because of course he hadn't, despite Dev's insistence. The eye candy and the company more than compensated for the cost of the water. Casey needed the boost to face the ordeal ahead.

Dev loped off across the field toward his cottage, and Casey watched him go. Not only because the view was spectacular—and the meadow dotted with wildflowers wasn't bad either—but because it meant he was free from the summer kitchen for a few more precious minutes.

That red door had started to loom in Casey's nightmares since his first day, when Sylvia had conducted what she called some basic evaluations.

She'd had him dice an onion—and had to lead him to the eyewash station when he'd absently wiped his streaming eyes with an onion-tainted finger. When he'd tried caramel, it crystalized in the pan three times and burned on the fourth. A basic roux should have been simple, she'd said, but Casey managed to set off the kitchen's smoke alarm. Twice.

On the bright side, Dev hadn't been home to witness it, and the firefighters from the county station were very nice and not at all judgmental.

After his abysmal attempt at a galette de rois, she'd sat him down for a little chat.

"Casey." She folded her hands on the marble pastry board, which was still littered with the remains of Casey's puff pastry fail. "What the hell are you doing here?"

He grinned weakly. "Learning to cook?"

She studied her hands for a moment, sighed, and then met his eyes again. "My dear, there are people who are born to cook. People who can achieve reasonable competence. But you?"

"If we're going all Shakespearean here, you could say I've had cooking thrust upon me." He toyed with a scrap of pastry that resembled shoe leather. "I know I've got a lot to learn—"

"Sweetheart, you have everything to learn."

"I know," he said humbly.

She half stood and grasped his wrist with a floury hand. "Cooking at the Michelin level isn't like the alphabet or basic math. For one thing, mastery and success aren't as well-defined. For another, you can survive perfectly happily in the world without it. There's no reason you should spend so much time and…" She let go and sat back on her stool with a sigh. "I probably shouldn't say this because I need the tuition, but why spend so much money on something that you quite obviously hate? It might be better for you to call it a day and go home."

Casey flailed, sending flour ploofing into the air like bleached dust motes. "No! I'll try harder. I promise. I owe it to Uncle Walt to make the effort. He's done so much for me, and my father's death was devastating to him."

"But not to you?" she asked gently.

He didn't meet her eyes. "Of course to me. He was my father, after all."

"Casey, you don't have to pretend with me. I met the man, remember? I know what he was like. But why can't your uncle reopen Chez Donatien with a different chef? Why do you have to be in the kitchen?"

Since Casey had no good answer to that, he'd simply hedged and promised to do better. Sylvia had agreed—albeit reluctantly—and set him on a course of basic kitchen skills that had lasted the first week. The second week, they'd worked on the same things he'd failed on that first day. He'd yet to produce an acceptable caramel or a puff pastry that actually puffed, but Sylvia had commended him on his knife skills, so that was something. And he'd managed to make a roux that wasn't singed around the edges. Or at least not much.

Today, though, he was going to attempt one of his father's recipes. He'd waited until Sylvia's well-earned day off because she didn't think he was ready yet. Well, Casey didn't think he was ready either, but he wanted to see how not ready he was after two weeks of full kitchen immersion.

He let himself into the summer kitchen and took a deep breath. A whiff of burned sugar still lingered from yesterday's caramel attempt, underlying the scents of vanilla, rosemary, and lemon cleanser.

When he'd stepped into the summer kitchen that first day, he'd been surprised it didn't resemble any of his father's restaurant kitchens in the least. Donald had always been adamant that there was only one way to outfit a kitchen properly. Sylvia apparently hadn't gotten the steel slab memo or else had tossed it in the trash, because her school had a totally different vibe.

The countertops at the six student stations were a combination of end-grain butcher block and marble, which Sylvia said had been specially crafted from local materials. Each bench had a sink, a four-burner gas cooktop, a double oven—one with a broiler—and a grill, capped by a refrigerator at the end next to the wall. And those appliances? Rather than the brushed chrome Donald demanded, they were all coordinated in bright colors named for foods: peach, carrot, lavender, lemon, avocado, tomato. The stations were named for their colors too, ceramic plaques announcing Peach, Carrot, Lavender, Lemon, Avocado, and Tomato hanging above each fridge.

Casey imagined that serious cooking students, or even hobbyists who were in it for fun, would be thrilled with the setup. While it wasn't as stark and intimidating as his father's kitchens, it still made Casey's belly clench. Because every one of those components—from the sink to the fridge—represented another place Casey could screw things up.

"Today will be different." He gulped down the last of his lukewarm latte and tossed the cup in the trash.

He marched past the Peach station where Sylvia had been working on her own projects while Casey had been sweating bullets at Tomato. Appropriately enough, a bowl of peaches sat on the end of the bench, their aroma tickling his nose as he flung open the pantry next to Sylvia's office.

"Today I shall conquer Marjolaine Donatien if it's the last thing I do."

His father had always shouted that Casey could cook properly if he'd just pay attention, although Donald had never acknowledged that his presence looming over Casey's shoulder and watching his every move was one sure way to draw his attention from the task at hand. Today, though, there'd be no distraction, not even Sylvia's unobtrusive pottering or the noise of the Manhattan streets.

"First things first," Casey muttered. He patted the sheaf of folded papers in his back pocket. He'd had to do a lot of research, because Donald's recipe said unhelpful things like make the ganache and make the meringue and make the Italian meringue buttercream—seriously, couldn't they come up with names that weren't so similar?—but didn't actually say how to do it.

He collected the ingredients and schlepped them to Tomato, although he needed to make several trips, because between all those meringues, this thing used fifteen egg whites.

"I can do this."

He extracted the bundle of instructions and smoothed them out on Tomato's marble countertop. All he had to do was follow the steps, one by one, and he'd surely end up with a decent result. It might not be as pristinely perfect as anything served at Chez Donatien, not yet. But if it tasted good, that was the most important thing, right?

Besides, the line cooks could make anything look good with the right garnish.

He pulled out a heavy All-Clad saucepan and glanced at the first page. "Step one. Make the caramel."

I'm doomed.