“I lost a hell of lot more than a fight last evening,” Morgan said, finally bringing his gaze to hers. “I lost your good opinion of me. What can I do to make this up to you, Thea?”
“
Make it up?
Oh that’s some nerve you got there, Morgan Reed. Can you take back investigating me for fraud? Going through my financial records? Searching my house for evidence of crimes I’ve committed? No, you can’t take that back. So there’s nothing—not a damn thing you can do,” Thea told him.
“I’m here for three more months,” Morgan told her. “I’m not giving up on us, Thea.”
“Morgan, you gave up on any chance of their being an
u
s the moment you let yourself believe I would ever take a single penny from your father without a good reason. If you’re done with your lame apology now, I’ve got to get back to my customers. Tea is on the house. The last thing I want to do today is take money from a Reed,” she said, turning away from him to walk through the tables again.
Morgan watched her hips weaving through the tables as she talked to customers. Her body was saying the same things to him that it had been saying since he’d first set eyes on her. But he was hearing it differently this time and more clearly.
He had gotten a view of himself today through his father’s eyes and hadn’t liked the man he saw. Then he’d gotten a life lesson from the man about what it was to love—really love—another person.
By the time he’d delivered his father back home, Morgan had realized that he would feel compelled to offer that kind of support to Thea. Since he’d never felt that urge for any woman before, he hadn’t recognized the motivation for what it was at first.
He was in love with Althea Carmichael.
He’d been falling since the first time he saw her. If he didn’t get her back, memories of being with Thea were going to haunt him forever, just like the taste of ketchup on her fingers did now.
Just yesterday morning, she had showered and climbed right back into bed to kiss him awake before leaving. He couldn’t insert any woman he’d ever known into the same scenario and get the least little bit aroused by the idea.
All he wanted was Thea.
Morgan wished he knew what Angus Carmichael had done to obtain her forgiveness. He had plenty of ideas about how to help her save the restaurant and that would maybe make up a little bit for the harm he had done. He had no idea how to make up for what he’d wrongly thought. Like Amy, the only hope Morgan could cling to at the moment was that he was pretty sure Thea needed him.
When Thea clicked the door lock at a quarter to five on an empty restaurant, Morgan cleared his throat, hoping to find the courage to speak to her again. As she started passed him, Morgan turned on the bar stool and touched her arm briefly to stop her.
“Time to leave,” Thea said sharply. “I’m falling off my feet and need to go home. When I get my purse, you can follow me out.”
“I want to suggest something,” Morgan told her, sliding off the stool to stand. “For the next few months I’m here, let me be your dinner cook. You can think of it as community service for the trouble I’ve caused you.”
“No,” Thea said firmly, not even giving it any thought. “I don’t want you near this place or me any more than necessary. I’ll feed you if you come by with your father, but that’s the limit of my tolerance.”
The idea of working alongside the man who’d violated her trust seemed the height of stupidity to Thea, even if his pasta dinner had inspired last night’s customers to fill her seats again today.
“You need me, Thea,” Morgan told her, holding her gaze even though it was hard with her still glaring over every breath he took.
“I went without sex for a decade, Morgan. I think I can survive without it again,” Thea told him sarcastically.
Morgan smiled even though he knew it would not help his situation. He couldn’t help being happy that sex with him was the first “need” for him that had crossed Thea’s mind. And it gave him more hope than he’d counted on finding today.
“I was talking about being your cook for pasta night. You know it was a great moneymaker for the restaurant,” Morgan said, making sure he didn’t smile.
“Pasta night was a one time deal. And I may be naïve, but I’m not stupid enough to trust you again—in anything,” Thea said coldly, just in case he decided to smirk about her sex remark.
She was going to miss his lovemaking terribly, but she’d be damned if she let Morgan come watch her suffer on a regular basis.
“Think about it before you refuse, Thea,” Morgan said, walking to the door with her. “You’re not the only one that cares about the restaurant. Dad and customers like him need a place like this. Hell, Amy wants to run it one day.”
“Amy hasn’t said anything to me about that,” Thea said, frowning. “I find it hard to believe she’s confided in you.”
“Amy wasn’t confiding. I figured it out by listening to what she’s not saying because of guilt over her education. She loves working here. It makes her happy. That’s more than most of us find in our jobs,” Morgan said, making himself turn and leave before he begged Thea to let him go home with her. “Give it some thought, okay? I’ll see you on Monday, Thea.”
Thea didn’t answer, just watched the only man she’d wanted in years walk away from her. She was still hurting. Anger over his betrayal was no longer a raging fire in her, but it wouldn’t have taken much to poke the ashes and have it all flaring to life again.
Forgiveness was completely out of the question. How could she ever trust him after what he’d done?
Maybe he was genuinely sorry, but she had no idea how to get over her broken heart.
Chapter 11
Saturday evening Morgan heard the door open about nine and knew his father was home at last. He was in the process of cleaning the kitchen within an inch of its life and was currently working on the oven.
“I haven’t used that appliance enough in five years to merit all the work you’re putting into cleaning it,” Gerald said, smiling gently. “Never knew you were a cleaner, Morgan. You got that from your mother.”
“What do you mean?” Morgan asked, pulling his head out of the oven to meet his father’s gaze.
“I could always tell when your mother was upset because she would scrub the kitchen. I was the only man I knew who dreaded coming home to a spotless house. It meant I had screwed up royally,” Gerald said, dropping down into a chair at the table. “A perfectly clean kitchen still gives me the willies.”
Morgan considered that and laughed. “Sorry. I wasn’t trying to upset you more than I already have, Dad. I just needed something to do.”
“Did you apologize to Thea?” Gerald asked.
“Yes, but she wasn’t really in a receptive mood,” Morgan said, going back to his cleaning. “I guess I had no right to think she would be.”
A satisfying afternoon with Lydia had mellowed his disappointment and had Gerald moving back to wanting to help his son again. So he studied his son now with a critical eye and realized that he liked what he saw. True repentance, Gerald knew, was the first step to change for even the most prideful of men.
“Thea needs you,” Gerald said firmly, laughing when Morgan hit his head on the oven when he tried to pull it out too quickly.
“Ouch. . .yeah, I know she does,” Morgan said, agreeing and rubbing the bump on his head.
If he kept this up, he would be more injured when he left Sedona than when he’d arrived.
“That pasta special we ran made her some real profits. If she’d just let me work off my sins, I might save the restaurant from going under before I have to go back to Vegas,” Morgan said, frowning.
Gerald laughed at Morgan, the sound coming up from his belly and rumbling through his chest. He certainly hadn’t expected to be laughing at the end of this day, but here it was. Humor and hope wrapped up in a six-foot frowning man that he was finally proud of for something.
Morgan wanted to help Thea’s business and was willing to fight his way through her anger to do so. Gerald considered his son’s need to take care of the woman a very good sign.
“Thea needs a lot more from you than your damn pasta sauce recipe. I thought you were smarter than that,” Gerald teased, his face creased with amusement.
Morgan closed the oven door on a surface that gleamed. He tossed the cleaning materials in the sink and looked at his father.
“I need her too,” Morgan said. “And I want Thea to think I’m a good man. I don’t think I’ve made a mistake this big in my entire life.”
“Thea is mad and rightly so, but I don’t think the situation is hopeless. You need to meet her Aunt Lydia,” Gerald said. “Think you’re up to making dinner tomorrow night.”
After this morning, Morgan was a little surprised that his father was offering to let him meet another important woman in his life, but it was good all the same.
“Sure. I’ll cook. I want to try a new recipe anyway, in case Thea changes her mind,” Morgan said.
“If Lydia likes you, maybe she might have some tips to share about getting around her niece,” Gerald said, standing. “That woman seems to know everything. Goodnight, Morgan.”
“Goodnight, Dad. Sleep well,” Morgan said softly, watching his still agile father walk slowly but steadily out.
*** *** ***
“This is excellent chicken fettuccine, Morgan. I order this all the time at the best Italian restaurant in town, and it’s not nearly this good,” Lydia said, savoring her next bite. “You have a cooking talent.”
“Thanks,” Morgan said. “It really only extends to pasta. I’m hoping I can convince Thea to let me try this out on her customers.”
“Yes. I heard you stepped in it pretty deep and sank all the way to your eyeballs,” Lydia told him.
Morgan looked at his father. “Garden metaphor?” he asked.
Gerald nodded and smiled.
Morgan looked back at Thea’s aunt. “Did you like the fettuccine well enough to tell me what I can do to make this right with Thea?”
“Why don’t you tell me the story? Thea doesn’t really talk much about her private life. She just sort of announces she’s mad and goes on,” Lydia said, causing Morgan to sigh.
The reluctance to talk about Thea was a good sign, Lydia thought. It meant he didn’t want to cause Thea any more problems.
“I had a wrong idea and accused Thea of doing something she didn’t do. We had a fight. I have since apologized, but she doesn’t want to hear it,” Morgan told her.
Lydia laughed. “Thea holds a grudge, but she isn’t petty. Seems like an apology ought to have done the trick to clear up a simple misunderstanding.”
Morgan stood and took his dishes to the sink. “I guess it wasn’t that simple. I investigated her without her knowing about it, and then accused her of committing a crime. I even threatened to have her arrested when she argued about it.”
Lydia picked up her wine and sipped, fighting not to laugh. She could only imagine how furious her niece must have gotten. If she hadn’t seen the remorse on Morgan’s face, she doubted she’d be laughing about it herself.
“I can’t see Althea taking that well. She’s led an exemplary life. What was Thea’s response to what you said?” Lydia asked.
Though Amy had already shared what she’d seen, Lydia was very interested to hear the playback from Morgan’s point of view.
“Thea told me I was awful, punched me twice, and gave me a bloody nose. And that wasn’t the worst part,” Morgan said ruefully. “The worst was when she said she wished I had never touched her.”
The laughter couldn’t be held in any longer. “Oh, Morgan, you must have really pushed all her buttons. I don’t think Thea ever raised her hand to Angus Carmichael no matter what he said or did.”
Morgan thought about that for a minute, and then asked the question he wanted to know. “What did her husband do after she threw the beer at his head? How did he make up to her?”
“Oh, that was when he insulted her in front of customers at the restaurant.
Nothing
worked that time,” Lydia said, knowing Morgan would be surprised and disappointed. “Angus had to wait her out. He slept in the guest room and was very polite for the better part of a month. Eventually, Thea had a change of heart.”
“I don’t think Thea is going to change her mind about me willingly,” Morgan said. “Also, I need her back now. I only have a few months left in Sedona.”
“There’s not much you can do sometimes except wait it out. Keep showing up and sticking around. My guess is there will come a point where Thea will need you. After all, you’re the man Thea gave up her wididity to, so it may not take as long as you think,” Lydia said, poking a grinning Gerald in the arm. “No smart remarks from you, old man.”
“I haven’t said a word all evening. You and Morgan have talked about Thea the whole time,” Gerald said, laughing.
Morgan looked between them. “Sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean to exclude you.”
Then he looked at Lydia. “What do you mean Thea gave me her wididity?”
Gerald grinned harder when Lydia widened her eyes and didn’t answer. He looked at Morgan, amusement lighting his eyes.
“Look it up son, and use that argument on Thea next time you have words. Don’t say I never gave you any good advice, because this is gold,” Gerald said.