“You got a problem with that, Monroe?”
Law glared across the stainless steel pass. “I have a better idea, Chef.”
“You always have a better idea,” Executive Chef Delbert Tracey-Dobbs leaned closer, his beady brown eyes like pinpoints of hate. “But I’m the one in charge.”
Proving that life went way beyond unfair and possibly into the zip code of pointless. At least this argument was. Still, Law had principles. And that sauce? It crushed his principles and his palate. “I think we should—”
“I don’t care what sous chefs think, Monroe. Don’t care what we should do. I’ll tell you what you’re going to do and then, guess what? You’ll do it. Today, tomorrow, and for the rest of your days in this kitchen which, if I have anything to say about it, will be few.”
“One can hope,” Law muttered.
“Excuse me?” Chef slammed his hands on the pass, shaking a few waiting dishes and toppling a tower of thinly sliced tuna that another sous chef had spent ten minutes building. Here it comes, Law thought. A reminder of how many people wanted his job.
“I have a hundred resumes on my desk for a sous chef position,” Chef barked, right on cue. “I could have you replaced before midnight.”
Some of the clatter around him died down as a few people nearby slowed their choreographed movements on the line to listen to the showdown, most of them probably expecting it since Chef Del arrived six months ago and decided he wanted Sous Chef Law Monroe out of his kitchen.
Law looked down at the whimsical fennel grapefruit salad screaming for cognac sauce. But the sauce was crap and Law refused to use it.
“Add the cognac and get the order up,” Chef said between grit teeth.
Law didn’t make the flat, lifeless sauce, but this was his dish and he was the one who’d writhe in shame when a discerning customer sent it back. Or when a heady-with-Internet-power diner tossed a shitty review up on Trip Advisor, adding to the string they’d been getting since the new executive chef had arrived.
Law could outlast him, couldn’t he? Law could keep his smart mouth shut and cook. Just until he figured out who owned the restaurant where he was supposed to be now…the place Jake Peterson had allegedly left Law in his will. Except that will had yet to turn up anywhere and the Toasted Pelican was currently owned and managed by…a nameless, faceless company.
“The sauce, Monroe. Now!”
Jake never steered Law wrong. In fact, until the day he died, Jake was nothing but a fountain of wisdom and he knew what that man would tell him to do in this situation.
Make your statements with actions, not words.
Very slowly, Law lifted his hand and fingered the top button of his chef’s coat. Del’s eyes sparked.
“You wouldn’t,” the other man said.
Law flicked the button open.
“In the middle of a rush on a Saturday night?” Del’s voice rose in disbelief and now everyone in the kitchen stilled to watch the drama unfold.
The next button slid right through the hole with no effort at all.
“You’ll never work for a Ritz-Carlton again.”
He didn’t want to work for anyone but himself. So that threat was music to his ears. In fact, it played the perfect melody to flip that third button without taking his gaze off his boss’s reddened face.
“You’ll never work in this city again.”
Fine. Naples, Florida was full of old fart millionaires and their trophy wives. The last button was the easiest.
“You’re finished, Monroe! Get the hell out of here! Go back to the twelve-step program you came from.”
Law slipped the jacket off and folded it neatly next to the fennel and grapefruit. “With pleasure, Chef.”
With every eye in the kitchen on him and most of their mouths gaping, Law strode down the line with his head held high and his muscles and ink on full display under a tight undershirt.
Without a word, he grabbed his backpack from his locker and headed out the back door to the employees’ parking lot, where a blast of hot August air smacked him in the face, despite the proximity to the beach.
He sucked in a mouthful of it, getting a whiff of the Dumpster where that sauce belonged.
Trying to not think too hard about the fact that he’d just quit the job he spent ten years working to get, he slid a leg over the side of his bike, jammed the key in the ignition and flattened his thumb on the starter button.
Okay, Jake. Took that risk and took it fast, all action, no words. Now what?
He drowned out any mental answer with a rev of the engine and roared out of the lot loud enough to piss off the Ritz management. He didn’t hate them and he didn’t hate the restaurant. He hated being under anyone or anything, and the very definition of the word sous in his title meant “under” in French.
Well, now he wasn’t under anything, including a helmet. With the wind in his hair he’d cut short for summer, he blew out on to the main road. He didn’t have a “home”—or wouldn’t after tonight. After Jake died, Law had moved out of the house they’d rented after combing every inch of his friend’s belongings for that will he’d promised to write. Since he hadn’t found it, Law’s life was put on hold, so he opted for a cut in pay at his job at the Ritz and took one of the tiny efficiency apartments they offered to the staff, deep in the bowels of the resort.
So he’d have to move out of there tomorrow, making him officially homeless and jobless.
At least he was sober.
He waited for the kick of desire, the little tweak from a demon that lived in his belly and rose up on occasions like this to whisper “Jack and Coke, baby. That’ll numb all this misery.”
And that usually sent him straight over the causeway to Mimosa Key. There, he’d have slipped into the back door of the Toasted Pelican. Only a former drunk would appreciate the irony that his soft, safe place to fall was a bar and a glass of non-alcoholic beer.
Jake would be there, offering O’Doul’s and advice, cleaning up after the last customer had left.
Except Jake wasn’t there anymore. Instead the locks had been changed and the employees worked for a “shell” company that had mysteriously taken over. And Law had bruises from the brick walls he’d hit trying to figure out who or what had stolen the business Jake had promised to him.
He took the tight turn onto the causeway, settling into the seat as he accelerated up the long bridge over the Gulf, headed to the tiny island where he’d grown up and still thought of as home. If only it could be home again. He thought it would be. Jake had sworn it would be…but nothing concrete had emerged to show his friend had kept that promise.
Consumed by grief for the loss of his closest friend and the man who’d changed—no, saved—his life, Law didn’t care about Jake Peterson’s missing last will and testament at first. He’d gone into the Toasted Pelican a few days after the memorial and cleaned out the closet Jake used as an office, taking every shred of paper and files he could find. When he still didn’t find the will, he’d made an appointment with an attorney only to learn that the bar had been taken over by a private company in Miami that claimed to have ties to Jake Peterson.
Ties? What kind of ties? Jake had no heirs, no family, no ties to anyone or anything. He had his regular customers, his friends, the strays he occasionally collected, and a handful of locals who joked about how bad the drinks were and shitty the food was—when Law wasn’t cooking, that was.
Who would even want that rickety old bar and restaurant built in the 1940’s? Besides Law, of course.
But no one could identify the owner. One by one, a few of the staff had been contacted by some guy named Sam in Miami. The manager was entrusted with cash, and paychecks came in, and the business stayed open. But no one knew who owned it.
Someone had to know. And on a Saturday night? Maybe that someone was loose-lipped at the bar.
Parking in the back, Law shut off the bike and climbed off, noting that the lot was sparsely filled. Business had been crappy for month
s, and now it was completely in the shitter. Good. Surely whoever picked it up didn’t want this financial drain. If only he could find out who that was, he’d make an offer. Law had some money saved. Not much, but he’d get a loan if he had to.
Cause a former alcoholic who walked out of a five-star restaurant kitchen in the middle of a dinner rush was such a good risk. Screw ’em. He was a good risk. Jake had thought so.
Hadn’t he?
He yanked open the door and sucked in a whiff of two-day-old oil from the fryer and stale beer. God, he had such plans for this place. The kitchen was serviceable and the layout would work. He needed to update it, clean it, and launch that gastro pub menu he’d been working on since before Jake died. Everything would change, except the name. The Toasted Pelican was forever.
He glanced into the open door of the kitchen when he passed, noting the youth of the crew of only two guys on the grill. Pushing open the back door, he checked out the stairs that led upstairs to a small apartment that Jake had used as a storage area.
Something was…different.
Frowning, he noticed that the stain on the stairs had been stripped off and long boards of hardwood were laying on the landing. What the hell? They were renovating up there?
Fire and fury shot through him. Some stranger was renovating his property. Well, Jake’s…but it was supposed to be his.
More determined to get hard facts than ever before, he cruised through the dining area, which consisted of a dozen not very busy tables, and into the bar, where the real action was.
Only there wasn’t much of that, either. He glanced around the dimly lit area, counting few booths full and mostly empty seats at the bar. This place could not be running in the black. So who had the cash to lay hardwood upstairs…and why?
He slid onto a stool and looked around for the bartender. It would be one of the two guys who started working after Jake died, young guys, not locals, who claimed to have no idea who signed their paycheck. He couldn’t see around the tower of bottles and mirrors in the center of the round bar—that would be the first thing he’d get rid of. The booze rack blocked views of across the bar, a stupid design for a circular bar. He twisted all the way to look back at the booths, wondering if one of them had to handle the floor, too.
“I thought you didn’t drink, Lawless.”
At the woman’s question, he pivoted around to the bartender and came face to face with…oh, baby what a face. “Libby Chesterfield, you gorgeous piece of womanhood.”
She didn’t smile, didn’t move actually, except for the slightest tilt of her head and a shutter of heavily made up pale blue eyes fringed with what had to be fake lashes. Blonde hair—long, silky, sinful blond hair—spilled over bare shoulders. One perfectly arched brow twitched and full lips pouted ever so slightly to remind a man that she owned a mouth that was made for one thing and one thing only. Kissing. Well, maybe two things.
“Piece of womanhood?” She repeated the words as if the very taste of them was vile in her mouth. “That’s the best you’ve got?”
She put her hands on her hips, drawing his gaze over a form-fitting red tank top and cut-off jean shorts, and about five foot six inches of luscious. Every stinkin’ curve was pure perfection, especially the ones that rightfully earned her the name “Chesty Chesterfield” in high school.
She’d always been smokin’ hot. In high school, she’d been a boner maker, and all she’d done in the years since then was get better.
“Lib, you’re forty-five years old and you still make mouths water, heads turn, and cocks rise up to praise you. How do you manage to stay so exquisite all these years?”
She leaned over the bar enough to blind him with a glimpse of cleavage. “And you, too, Law, are a miracle of nature. Forty-five years old and you still think, act, and talk like an eighth grader. How did you manage to stay so incredibly immature all these years?”
“Forty-six now,” he corrected. “You missed my birthday.”
“Aww, what a shame. I could have blown…out the candles.”
“My candle can be lit and blown anytime, gorgeous.”
She leaned over the bar, pursed her lips, and puffed air in his face. “There. You’re blown…off. What are you drinking?”
Why was she bartending would be a better question.
“O’Doul’s,” he said, automatically ordering the non-alc beer. “So, uh, when did you start gracing the poor schmucks at the Pelican with all that hotness?”
She lifted a shoulder. “Both bartenders are gone and…” She turned to the fridge. “I’m helping out.” With her back to him as she got a glass, he used the opportunity to feast his eyes on the flip side of Libby, which was as sexy as the front in those denim shorts that hugged a heart-shaped ass and skimmed tight, toned thighs. Damn.
“Why would you help out here?” he asked.
“Just for something to do.”
Bartending at a dive? He’d chatted her up a little at the reunion a few months ago—well, attempted to get her in bed, an effort that had failed miserably. But he knew Libby drove a nice car, wore quality clothes, and the rumor mill said she’d taken her last husband to the cleaners in divorce court. Why the hell would she tend bar?
“I’ve been in and out of this place on a regular basis for most of my life, and I’ve seen you in here exactly once, about a month ago.” He remembered it well, though. Well, he remembered the sprayed-on black pants that could make a grown man weep. “You were on your way to some girlie exercise class,” he recalled.
She snorted softly as she yanked the tap. “It’s called yoga and I’d suggest you try it, but it’s really a practice for people seeking balance and wisdom.” She took a look at his body, her gaze lingering on the biceps on full display under the tight short sleeves of his T-shirt. “Obviously, you’d rather throw iron around a gym and grunt.”
“I like iron and grunting.”
She put the drink down with the tiniest spark of appreciation in eyes that weren’t quite blue or gray but a haunting mix of both. “I admit, it suits you.”
“Was that a compliment?”
“Unlikely.” She looked away when a couple took the last two seats at the bar. “Nurse that one for a while, Law. I have to work.”
“You really work here?” Since when?
But she’d slipped down to the other side, a much friendlier smile for the new patrons than the sassy one he got. He heard the woman order a margarita and could have sworn Libby inched back with a little trepidation at the order.
And while she made it, he figured out in a few scant seconds of observation that Libby Chesterfield didn’t know squat about mixing a drink or navigating her way behind the bar. So what was she doing here?
Law sat up straighter and looked around. Something was definitely up at the TP. It was damn near empty. The staff was thin at best. Some things had been taken off the wall. And Libby was bartending.
Okay, then. The first tendril of hope he’d felt all day—hell, in the year since Jake died—curled through his gut. If change was in the air at the Pelican and Libby was behind the bar, she had to know who owned this place.
And he would use every tool in his arsenal to get it out of her.
* * *
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Books Set in Barefoot Bay
The Barefoot Bay Billionaires
Secrets on the Sand
Seduction on the Sand
Scandal on the Sand
The Barefoot Bay Brides
Barefoot in White
Barefoot in Lace
Barefoot in Pearls
Barefoot Bay Undercover
Barefoot Bound (prequel)
Barefoot with a Bodyguard
Barefoot with a Stranger
Barefoot with a Bad Boy
Barefoot Bay Timeless
/> Barefoot at Sunset
Barefoot at Moonrise
Barefoot at Midnight
The Original Barefoot Bay Quartet
Barefoot in the Sand
Barefoot in the Rain
Barefoot in the Sun
Barefoot by the Sea
Acknowledgments
I absolutely could not have written this book without the assistance, handholding, and patience of a dear friend and fellow writer, Silver James, retired member of the fire service and law enforcement, who helped vet every reference to the hero’s career as a firefighter. Additional research and information came from retired firefighter Kristi Kobrin, who wandered into my yoga practice and kindly answered question after question and even took my phone calls. People who help writers do research are wonderful.
And shout out to the team! Kristi Yanta, the Picky Editor, went above and beyond with this one and I am convinced I cannot write a book without her. Much love to my copy editor Joyce Lamb, proofreader Marlene Engel, super-talented (patient and determined) cover artist Kim Killion, and hugs to James Franklin, a talented photographer who would not quit until we got the right silver fox on the cover. Also gratitude to formatter and all around miracle-worker, Amy Atwell. Behind the scenes, Maria Connor is an author assistant without equal and my Rocki Roadies (Roxanne St. Claire Street Team) bring it for every title. (Want to join the street team? We’re on Facebook and have tons of fun.)