The Glass Kitchen (11 page)

Cordelia answered. “Both. Did it ever occur to you that maybe, just maybe, you might not have been betrayed by your husband if you hadn’t been suppressing who you really are? Did it ever occur to you that turning your back on the … that trait Gram swore by made you blind to what was really going on with Robert and Sissy?”

The words hurt more than they should have. It wasn’t as if Portia hadn’t wondered exactly that. But it didn’t change anything.

“Just think about it,” Cordelia said, then gathered her things and left.

Portia paced from room to room in her small apartment. Small, at least, compared to the Texas house she and Robert had lived in. Size was relative in New York City. A closet in Texas was a million-dollar bargain in the city.

An hour later, the chirp of her cell phone caught her off guard. She grabbed her phone only to be brought up short by the display.

Robert Baleau.

She grabbed the counter, ducking as if her ex-husband could see her.

“No, no, no,” she whispered, letting the call go to voice mail.

As soon as the line was free, she dialed Cordelia.

“I’m at Saks; I can’t talk.”

Portia blinked. “You were just here. How can you be at Saks now, especially if your husband is out of work?”

“I’m just browsing. It’s like … therapy.”

“Tell me you didn’t just say that.”

“What do you want, Portia?” Cordelia shot back.

“Robert just called.”

“Oh, my Lord! What did he say?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t answer.” Her phone beeped. “He left a message.”

“Listen to it and call me back.”

Not a minute after she was done listening, her phone rang again and she answered to Cordelia, saying, “I’ve patched in Olivia.”

“What did that rat say?” Olivia demanded.

Portia’s hand shook as she held her phone. “He said he wants to talk to me. He wants to know where I am.”

“He doesn’t know?” Cordelia was surprised.

“No. And I don’t want him to know. If he calls either of you, you know nothing.”

“What about his lawyer?”

“Everything is going through
my
lawyer.”

“Have you gotten your settlement yet?” Olivia asked.

“No. Not yet.”

“Yep, typical male crap,” Olivia added. “I swear, you should have told the world about how he treated you. Why you haven’t told anyone who would listen what an ass he is makes zero sense.”

“I’ve told you. I have no interest in being in the news, and me telling the world that the good Christian politician Robert Baleau divorced me so he could marry my ex–best friend puts me smack dab in the middle of the news as yet another pathetic wronged-politician’s wife. I’ve already told you, no thanks.”

Olivia scoffed. “Portia—”

“No. I am not going there. Listen, I’ve got to run.”

She couldn’t breathe. She had to get out.

She pressed end, then threw on one of Evie’s old sweaters, grabbed her purse, and bolted. She didn’t slow down until she came to Columbus Avenue and the same bakery where she’d bought the cake for the Kanes: Cutie’s.

Before she thought it through, she was inside buying a baker’s box full of every variety of cupcake they sold. She couldn’t have explained the impulse if she had tried. She barely managed to cover the cost from the money she had in her wallet. Then she carried them home, nearly running all the way back, before slamming into her apartment. The minute she launched herself into the kitchen, she tore into the cupcakes like an alcoholic plunging into a binge.

Maybe thirty minutes later, maybe an hour, the door opened and Ariel walked in, finding Portia at the kitchen counter, half-eaten cupcakes spilling across the scarred linoleum.

“What are you doing?” Ariel said, gaping.

“These are terrible!”

“What do you mean, terrible?”

“Awful, hideous, dry. I tried one and couldn’t believe it. So then I started testing more of them, and so far they’ve all failed!”

“You’re testing cupcakes? Are they supposed to answer directly, or are you giving them a multiple-choice exam?”

“Ha-ha,” Portia said, taking a bite of a bright pink cupcake. She swallowed with a gulp of water. “Gah, these are awful.”

“They can’t be awful.” Ariel picked up the box. “Cutie’s Bakery. These are, like, the most famous cupcakes around.”

“So I’ve heard. Have one.”

“No thanks. I had a bite of that cake you brought from them. It wasn’t even close to as good as the one you made that first night. Hint hint.”

The words hit Portia in the gut, swirling around like plump, juicy blueberries folded into the kind of thick, sweetened batter perfect for licking off a spoon. Abruptly she stood, her mind whirling, when a huge
bang
sounded outside.

She and Ariel ran up the stairs and out the open door.

Gabriel was already there, two steps down. He wore faded Levi’s and a navy blue T-shirt that stretched across his chest. The sun hit his hair, the brown so dark it was nearly black. He looked great, Portia thought. Really great. No surprise there. What
was
a surprise was that he was howling with laughter, talking to a guy who was obviously a contractor. His eyes crinkled at the sides when he grinned like that, making him look downright approachable. Who would have guessed the beast had it in him?

Portia forced herself to focus, noticing for the first time that the outer front door had been ripped out. She gasped. “You can’t do that!”

Gabriel turned. “What’s all over your forehead?”

Portia swiped her skin, coming away with frosting. “Don’t think you can distract me with your, your … scowl.”

“My scowl?” He looked amused.

“You cannot rip out my aunt’s front door. I’m going to call someone, the historic society or something. I’m sure it’s listed. You can’t just rip out doors!”

“This is none of your business,” Gabriel said, the laughter disappearing.

“This is my home—of course it’s my business!”

He raised a brow.

“Okay, so it’s both of our homes. You on the top, me on the bottom.”

That got a different kind of raised brow.

“Errr!” Portia grumbled. “That door belongs to both of us!”

Gabriel’s jaw set.

“Well?” she demanded. “I bet we’re something like one of those insane apartment building co-ops they have in Manhattan, you know, giving everyone who lives there equal rights. I have rights to that front door, just as much as you do.”

“The door was rotting. And if you don’t like what I’m doing, you can always leave.”

“Funny. But I can’t. I have nowhere else to go.” Belatedly, she realized that after all her ranting, he just might ask her for half the price of the rotting door.

It flashed through her mind that maybe she should just sell him the apartment and be done with it. She had been scouring
the New York Times
real estate section, and she knew she could make a small fortune by selling.

Gabriel clearly saw her moment of vulnerability because he suddenly looked like a shark circling a floundering cruise ship tourist. He sensed blood. “Ariel,” he said, “can you give me a second to talk to Ms. Cuthcart?”

Ariel glanced between the two of them, shrugged, and trotted back inside.

Gabriel took two steps up. There was an intent look to his face that … well, Portia had the distinct idea that he was going to reach out and kiss her, never mind the work crew milling down below on the sidewalk.

But at the last second Gabriel’s eyes cleared and he said, “Why are you here?”

Portia blinked—then blinked again, hating the implication that she didn’t belong.

That was the thing. She
did
belong. Ever since that first morning she woke up in the garden apartment, she had felt as if her whole life had been bringing her to this place. Texas wasn’t home anymore. New York City was.

“I belong here,” she said. Then found herself blurting out, “You don’t like me, do you?”

That threw him. He gave her a look as if to say,
“You are such a girl.”
And who could blame him?

Aloud, he said, “I don’t even know you.”

Unbidden, the image of the way he had looked at her after peeling her out of the burger suit came to mind. He had wanted to know her that day, at least on some level.

“This is not about liking or not liking you,” he stated firmly.

“Dad!” Miranda marched out the front door. “There isn’t a thing to eat in the whole house! Are you trying to starve us? Huh? Is that what you really want?”

Gabriel took a deep breath. “Give me a second, Miranda. I’ll fix it.”

“Yeah, right. Sure, you will.”

She wheeled back inside.

“Listen,” Gabriel said, dragging his hands through his hair. “You need a job, right? Given the demise of the burger suit, I mean.”

“And?” Portia said carefully.

“The girls need someone to make meals for them. Breakfast and dinner, on school days.”

Portia felt her blood begin to boil. “Are you offering me a job as your cook?”

He eyed her. “I guess I am.”

“Either you are or you aren’t.”

“Fine, yes. I am offering you a job.” He told her an amount he would pay, and her stomach actually rumbled at the thought of all the boxes of cereal, not to mention fabulous food, she could buy with the amount. But then she remembered.

“What is the matter with everyone? How many times do I have to say that I don’t cook? Not anymore!”

Though she wanted to. God help her, she did.

Portia reminded herself of things that were normal. White picket fences. Food that didn’t come in visions. She took a deep, steadying breath.

“Ariel says you do. And you couldn’t be worse than me. Just give it some thought. In the meantime, I suggest you get out of the way before the workmen run you over.”

He left her standing on the steps. When Portia gathered herself and glanced around, she noticed the old man next door. Despite the closed window, the man raised a challenging eyebrow, as if he’d heard every word.

Her great-aunt Evie had followed her dream and moved to New York when it became clear that her future didn’t lie in Willow Creek, Texas.

“The measure of a person isn’t the bumps you hit in the road,”
Gram had always said. “
It’s how you pick yourself up and move forward.”

She could almost hear Gram asking a question:
“Who are you, Portia?”

Every direction she turned, she was hit with images and urges, thoughts and knowing. Then something else hit her, harder than it had before.

If she had been true to who she really was, would Robert have been able to deceive her, as Cordelia had said?

And suddenly she lost the fight. Before she could think better of it, she dialed Cordelia, who answered on the first ring.

“Get me the names of some investment bankers.”

A beat passed before her sister spoke. “What for?”

“We’re going to open The Glass Kitchen in New York.”

Third Course

Salad

Grapefruit and Avocado Salad with Poppy Seed Dressing

Eleven

P
ORTIA GROANED
over what she had done.

But there was no turning back, and as night fell later that day she managed to nurture a flicker of hope. She was giving in to cooking. She would bake. She would open a Glass Kitchen with her sisters. But she would do both like a normal person.

That was the key. It would be three normal sisters opening a normal restaurant in New York, serving the kind of normal food that was the opposite of the tiny portions so often served in Manhattan. None of that fancy food that was better to look at than to eat.

But Portia knew there was something else she had to do.

Stepping out into the dark garden, she noted the metal fire escape that zigzagged up the back of the town house.

The maze of metal ladders and landings used to be a dangerous wreck, but she’d bet anything that Gabriel would have had it fixed. She had no doubt he was a man who took care of his own. He was a man her grandmother would have respected.

The thought surprised her, left her off-balance.

She glanced up to the higher floors of the town house and found that the third-floor light was on. Back in the day, the room had been her great-aunt’s library. Gabriel Kane must have left it as a library, because through the sheer curtains she could just make out his large shape as he stood in front of the tall windows.

Without thinking, she started climbing the fire escape, just as she’d done as a girl. She didn’t want to go to the front door and ring the newly working bell. She didn’t want to call—not that she had his number. She didn’t want to wait until morning. If she waited a second longer, she would change her mind.

Her handholds were firm as she climbed, the years slipping away until she was just a girl with her sisters in New York for the summer. She had loved climbing the fire escape. Cordelia had not.

“Portia! Get down here,”
Cordelia had always demanded, her voice bouncing against the tall buildings surrounding them.

Olivia had always laughed, egging Portia on. “Keep going, Portia!”

But even Olivia had never followed Portia up the narrow ladders and landings. Portia was the only one who scaled the metal stairs like a cat, slipping into one of their bedrooms or Evie’s library. Cordelia and Olivia would fly into the house, then dash upstairs to find Portia already curled up in Evie’s favorite chair with one of their aunt’s magazines.

All these years later, with each handhold and step up the stairs, she came to the third floor once again, but this time Gabriel Kane stood inside.

Gossamer-thin draperies covered the library windows. Portia knocked and nearly fell backward when Gabriel whipped aside the curtains, something dangerous in his face.

“Oh,” she squeaked.

Before she could fall, flee, or figure out how to get back down without killing herself, Gabriel’s face shifted from dangerous to fierce. She felt like kindling in front of a flame. It wasn’t nearly as comforting as a welcome mat, but Portia would take what she could get, given a plunge to the earth made his harsh expression seem appealing.