Charming for Mother's Day (A Calendar Girls Novella)

The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

Copyright © 2013 by Victoria Ardito

All Rights Reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form, whether by electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without express written permission of the publisher.

Author Acknowledgement

Special thanks to
Ariana Faria and her mom for their insight into the character of Ariana Soto. Love is always a risk worth taking. Seize your chance and be happy!

Chapter 1

Lucinda

             
O.C.I.F.: Oh, Crap. It’s Friday.

             
While most people look forward to the weekend, to winding down and spending time with family, I’m not one of them. I’m on the other side of that fence. Since I’m the maître d’ in one of my town’s five-star restaurants, Friday always ushered in the craziest part of my hectic weekly routine.

             
After a full day of college classes and an hour-long ride, I stepped off the bus at the corner of Main Street and First Avenue. March’s icy wind bit my cheeks. The third month of the year in Snug Harbor is a mixture of extremes: raw and frosty today, mild and humid tomorrow.

             
With a puff of smelly black exhaust, the bus chugged away to its next destination. Burrowing into the fake fur collar of my parka, I trudged the three blocks to work. Gray skies, clumps of blackened snow left over from the last storm, and the still-closed seasonal businesses all deepened my blah mood. By the time my boots crunched over the gravel path that led to the Gull and Oar’s front entrance, I couldn’t feel my face anymore.  I pulled open the heavy wood and lead-glass door and stepped into the empty dining room. The welcome heat of the roaring fireplace greeted me.

             
My daughter’s sudden outburst of giggles from the rear of the restaurant warmed me straight through to my heart.  The kitchen, of course. She and my boss/father-in-law, Sidney, spent a lot of time in the restaurant’s kitchen.

             
“Hello?” I called out as I unzipped my jacket and grabbed a hanger from the cloak room.

             
“Mommeeeee!” Ariana burst through the rear door and sped toward me, arms spread wide. Today, her chestnut hair was tucked under a yellow chef’s hat with images of Lumiere from
Beauty and the Beast
dancing across the puffed top.

             
“Hey, doodle,” I greeted her with a tight squeeze and a kiss to her forehead. “How was school today?”
              Snug Harbor Elementary sat directly across the street from the Gull and Oar, so on my worknights, Ariana came straight here after school and hung out with her grandfather until
I
got out of my last class and met her here.

             
“Good.” Grabbing my hand, she yanked with enthusiasm. “Come in the kitchen. Grandpa has a surprise.”

             
A surprise? Doubt buzzed in my mind. Still, I allowed her to pull me toward the hive. As we approached, I heard voices, low but obviously male. One was definitely Sidney’s, with his distinctive whinny-style laugh piercing the air. The second voice, mellow and smoky, raised the fine hairs on my arms.

             
From the doorway, I noted my father-in-law seated on a stool at the stainless steel wait station, facing me. His companion stood beside him, his back to me. The stranger was tall—at least six feet—with broad shoulders squared off in a black tee, tapering to a narrow waist packed into faded black jeans. His light brown hair, buzzed short on top, skimmed his nape in the back. 

             
“Lucie!” Sidney waved me inside. “Come meet Chef Colin.”

             
Chef Colin? I stiffened. It couldn’t be. And yet, my daughter’s eagerness confirmed what I dreaded.

             
“Colin, this is the best maître d’ in the business. My daughter-in-law, Lucie Soto.”

             
He turned toward me then, an easy smile on his face. Recognition never clicked. Of course not. Why would it?

             
“Chef Colin.” I managed to sound cool and confident, in direct contrast to the turmoil roiling my belly. I could do this. I could show him I wasn’t the same naive young woman he’d dumped ten years ago.  Holding out my hand, I added, “Nice to see you again.”

             
“Wait.” Colin held up his left hand. “Again?”

             
No ring on his third finger. I don’t know why I noticed, and the idea I wasted a second’s time caring about his possible marital status irked.

             
“You two know each other?” Sidney asked, swerving his attention from me to Colin and back again.

             
“We knew some of the same people a long time ago,” I replied, emotionless. If he didn’t remember, I wasn’t about to humiliate myself by letting him think our brief interlude meant anything to me. “We’d run into each other at social events from time to time. I’m sure he doesn’t remember.”

             
But
I
did. So much of who I was today was tied up in that summer ten years ago. I couldn’t help but remember every sparkle in his eye, every time he smiled at me, and every time he’d kissed me.

             
“How come you didn’t tell me you knew him when we used to watch the show?” Ariana demanded, hands on her hips.

             
Because I didn’t think he’d ever stroll back into Snug Harbor. But I couldn’t admit that, didn’t want to have to go into deeper explanations about the past. Coward that I am, I avoided my daughter’s scrutiny. “Congratulations on your win,” I said to him instead.

             
Colin Murriere had appeared on the cooking reality show, “All Star Chef,” eventually taking the coveted title after a nerve-wracking finale showdown broadcast to a live television audience. Naturally. Because everything in life came easily to Colin. His family owned one of the top of the line vacation condo complexes in Snug Harbor. Born with a diamond-encrusted spoon in his mouth, he’d never worked hard to achieve anything. Unlike me—the daughter of a single mom who barely scraped by on wages as a maid at that same complex.

             
“Ariana’s your daughter?” he asked.

             
Panic whitened his complexion. I could almost see the calendar pages flipping in his head while he struggled to figure out exactly how well we knew each other in his rum-soaked days.

“
Mmm-hmm.” Although I enjoyed the momentary alarm his suspicions roused in his conscience—and his accompanying guilt—I wouldn’t use my daughter as an instrument of revenge. “Her father was Sidney’s son, Rob.” In the old days, Rob had been my best friend, but I lost him years ago—first to a fondness for alcohol and anger, and then, more permanently and inevitably, to a drunk driving accident.

R
elieved color returned to Chef Colin’s cheeks, and he murmured a solemn, “My sympathies to you both.”

Sidney and I, numb after years of accepting condolences, nodded our thanks.

“I’ll tell you this, though,” Sidney said, his wrinkled face beaming with pride, “Ari may only be eight
,
but she’s already on her way to becoming a future All Star Chef.”

Chef Colin turned to my daughter. “Is that ri
ght?”

             
“Absolutely,” Sidney exclaimed, his hand tousling her dark hair. “In fact, she’s the best apprentice sous chef I ever had.”

             
Ariana stared up at Colin, her honey eyes filled with girlish adoration, as if she’d found her personal Prince Charming. “I rooted for you on the show, Chef Colin.”

She and I had watched “All Star Chef” every
Tuesday night, with Ariana critiquing the different contestants’ skills and reporting her conclusions to Sidney every Wednesday.

“You did? Thank you. I appreciate the votes of confidence.”

Oh, puhleez. I had to turn away so he wouldn’t see me roll my eyes, and only faced the crowd again when I had my placid expression under control.

He lifted his gaze from
Ariana to me. “That must be why I won. I had two very pretty ladies secretly cheering me on.”

             
I winced, knowing what would come next. Sure enough, Ariana speared me with an icicle look. “Mom didn’t root for you. She wanted Chef Christian to win.”

             
His hazel eyes, familiar in my dreams, crinkled with amusement as Colin joined my daughter in the staring contest. Target: me. “Did she?”

             
My cheeks flamed, but I pulled off a dandy imitation of a casual shrug. “Guilty.”

             
“Mind if I ask why?” he persisted.

             
Damn him, he should know why. But of course, he didn’t. Why would he? I was just a summer fling—a fact he drove home when he dumped me after a few weeks, going so far as to give me an invalid email and the wrong phone number.

             
“She said you were too snotty to win.” Once again, my daughter pushed me under the proverbial bus.

             
To my surprise, though, he laughed. “She’s probably right. It’s certainly nothing I haven’t heard before.”

             
I didn’t react. On the outside. On the inside, my heartbeat hammered my ribs, and my throat dried to sawdust.

              After several squirm-worthy seconds, he refocused his attention on Ariana. “So, if your mom thought I was such terrible person, why did
you
want me to win?”

             
“I thought you had great knife skills,” she replied with more conviction than a prosecuting attorney. “Even better than Grandpa.”

             
“Watch it, snickerdoodle,” Sidney growled then grabbed her by the waist.

             
She screeched, and he pulled her against his side for a series of noisy kisses to her cheek.

             
Through a riptide of giggles, she amended, “Well, he’s pretty good, based on what I saw on the show. Maybe you guys can have a contest before you move to Florida.”

             
My rigid stance relaxed. Oh, thank God. In the back of my mind, I’d wondered why Colin had suddenly appeared at the Gull and Oar. But he must have just stopped by as a courtesy to Sidney before heading south. In that case, I could be gracious to him. Temporarily.

             
“Florida, huh?” I said to Colin. “Are you opening a new place down there? Whereabouts?” Not that I ever planned to visit, but—

             
“No, Lucie,” Sidney said. “
I’m
going to Florida. Chef Colin’s bought the Gull and Oar.”