The Glass Kitchen: A Novel of Sisters

Eleven

PORTIA 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.

At least that’s what she thought until he wrenched open the window, grabbed her arms, and pulled her inside.

She wasn’t a big woman, but still. Gabriel lifted her with the ease of a bodybuilder lifting a can of peas. “What the hell are you doing out there?”

He was angry, she realized. Really angry.

“You could have killed yourself on that thing.”

She remembered him giving her that glass of water and making her drink. Now this. The man seemed oddly protective for a guy who clearly wanted nothing to do with her.

The fire in his eyes made Portia feel alive and reckless. “But I didn’t!” She gave him a sunny Texas smile. “More than that, I thought about your offer. Of a job.”

She watched as he visibly reined in his anger. “That was fast.”

She cocked her head. “That’s me. Fast, decisive.” In her dreams, sure, but he didn’t have to know that. “Are you impressed?”

“I’m impressed you didn’t fall and break your neck.”

She scoffed. “I’ve been climbing that fire escape since I was in grade school.”

“You’re certainly acting like you’re in grade school.”

“Sheesh, Portia,” she said out loud. “You handed him that one.”

He looked at her as if he hadn’t a clue what to make of her. “Who are you?”

She laughed, delighted. “Have you noticed that every time you see me, you wonder who I am?”

Gabriel ground his teeth.

“But that isn’t what you meant.”

His narrowed eyes showed he still wasn’t amused.

“All right. If you want the truth of it, then I’ve come to tell you that I officially accept the position as the Kane Family Cook.”

It all made sense. It would give her an income while she and her sisters got the business going. The job wasn’t full-time, and there wasn’t much in the way of commuting, so she’d have plenty of time to work on The Glass Kitchen.

Gabriel stared at her long and hard, not uttering a word.

Portia glanced around the room and noticed that everything about her aunt’s library was gone. The books, the bookshelves, the paintings. “You’ve ruined this room, too!”

“I didn’t ruin it.”

Her head shot around. “You did too—”

He didn’t let her finish. “You make me forget I’m a man who doesn’t do things without knowing every possible consequence,” he said, then pulled her to him, his mouth coming down on hers.

Of all the responses Portia had expected, kissing wasn’t one of them. She tensed, her hands coming up to his chest to push him away, though she didn’t do it. Instead, her body melted and she opened her mouth to him.

“God, you drive me insane,” he said raggedly.

“Same page,” she answered, her arms circling his neck as she leaned into him. His muffled groan sent heat through her. She wanted him, even though nothing good could come from getting involved with a neighbor—a neighbor who had offered her a job. Would he take back his offer?

Right then, she didn’t care.

Gabriel’s hands ran down either side of her spine. Her breath caught when he cupped her hips, pressing her to him. The kiss wasn’t soft. It was demanding, his tongue tangling with hers, and she gave up all hope of breaking away.

He backed her against the wall, his hands flattened on either side of her head. In the past, with Robert, she had always wanted more, wanted some deeper connection, but she had contented herself with a white-picket-fence sense of normalcy. Nothing about the way Gabriel Kane made her feel had anything to do with white-picket fences.

“You have driven me mad since the day I walked up to the steps and found you sitting there,” Gabriel said, his lips trailing down her neck.

“You with the compliments.”

“It wasn’t meant to be.”

Her head fell back, her eyes closed. “Of course not,” she breathed.

Portia felt the strength of his muscles beneath his button-down shirt. At his waist, she hardly believed it when she tugged up the material. She wanted to feel skin, feel heat. When his shirttail came free, she slipped her hands underneath to his abdomen, her palms sliding up over warm, taut skin, the single line of hair from his navel to his chest.

She felt his breath shudder before he reclaimed control of her body, and she did nothing to stop him. Portia wanted more, moaning as he gave it to her, his hand slipping beneath her shirt, his thumb dipping into her navel. Their kiss grew wilder, a kind of craving that she’d never experienced, and certainly never succumbed to. But right then, she would have given him anything.

The tips of his fingers brushed against her hip, then slid back, cupping her hips and pulling her to him.

“God, you taste good,” he murmured against her lips. “Like honey.”

He tasted like nothing so tame as honey. He was a decadent, caramelized brandy that made her press against him like a madwoman. Those clever fingers found her lacy boy-short panties, sliding his palm under the elastic, his foot nudging her legs wider.

She trembled, her breath catching in her throat. He deepened their kiss, turning it fierce, just as he brought his hand around and his fingers slid low.

“Dad?”

A paralyzed moment passed before Portia realized Ariel was headed their way.

“Fuck!” Gabriel ground out.

Right this second, she wished.

Instead, she sagged against the wall, trying to steady herself.

“Dad? Where are you?”

Portia could hear footsteps coming down the hall now, and she pushed him away so she could straighten her clothes. Gabriel shoved in his shirttail, turning to the closed door, ready to face his daughter. Portia, on the other hand, chose the coward’s way out and slipped back out onto the fire escape.

He pivoted back to her. “Don’t leave,” he commanded, his voice low and fierce.

“I’ll start work in the morning,” she said, throwing herself down the stairs, her heart pounding.

Back in her own kitchen, she looked around, as if the room would have changed. But everything looked the same, despite the fact that her world had just been rocked.

Twelve

ARIEL WAS ALMOST CERTAIN that her dad had been messing around on the fire escape.

That, of course, was totally impossible, since he had forbidden her and Miranda from going anywhere near the escape, even after he’d had workmen practically rebuild the thing.

Ariel had no problem obeying. While she wasn’t about to admit it, even the thought of having to go up or down the narrow metal stairs and landings terrified her. But Dad’s laying down the law had sent Miranda into one of her fits.

“So, what are we supposed to do if there’s, like, a fire?” Miranda had snapped in the tone of voice that never failed to get a rise out of their dad.

Tit for tat, Ariel thought.

Whatever. There was no reason why her dad would have been doing anything anywhere near the fire escape.

“What are you doing?” she asked, coming over to look past him. The garden below was dark. “Is Portia down there?”

She glanced sideways at him, thinking he would scoff at her, but there was a strange look on his face. Almost a guilty look. “You’ve been peeking!” She went right up to the glass and peered out. “You know, Dad, that’s, like, a crime or something.”

“I was not peeking out the window.”

It wasn’t hard to imagine Portia out in that garden dancing or something.

“I read Harriet the Spy,” she said, craning her neck. “I know what people get up to in New York. Next thing I know, you’ll get yourself a pair of binoculars. I’d better warn Portia.”

“Ariel.” Even she knew better than to keep going when he had that tone. It meant business.

“Good night!” she said cheerily, running back out of the room before he could launch into some sort of lecture.

But the next morning, if the possibility of her dad doing something on the fire escape was a surprise, breakfast was a real Lollapalooza of surprises.

“Good morning!”

Ariel blinked at the sight of Portia standing in their kitchen, wearing another pair of her whackjob high-waisted, wide-bottomed pants, a white T-shirt, and an old-fashioned apron tied around her waist.

“What are you doing here?” Ariel asked, still frozen in the doorway.

“Believe me,” Portia said, “I’m as surprised as you by this turn of events.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m your new head cook and chief bottle washer.”

“Seriously? Dad hired you?”

“He did.” Portia got a weird look on her face, then shook it away.

Ariel came over and peered inside the pot on the stove. “Sheez, what are you making?”

“Doughnuts.”

“Dad actually took my advice, amazing. And does anyone other than Dunkin’ make doughnuts?”

“Your advice? Then thank you. I guess. And funny.”

“I thought you didn’t cook anymore.”

“I wasn’t.” Portia gave the big spoon a swirl around the pot of boiling oil. “But sometimes we have to be brave in order to dig deep and find answers. Even if we’re not sure we’re going to like the answers.”

“I don’t want to be mean, but you sound like a really bad infomercial.”

Portia laughed, and started extracting golden-brown fried balls. After placing them on a paper towel–covered plate, she tossed them into a brown paper bag and started shaking.

Ariel’s mouth started watering. “Powdered-sugar doughnuts!”

Footsteps stopped in the doorway. “My favorite.”

Ariel and Portia turned; Ariel blinked. “Uncle Anthony.”

“None other.” He sauntered into the kitchen. “And look who else is here,” he added, winking at Ariel, then smiling big and wide at Portia.

Ariel liked her uncle well enough, though she probably would have liked him better if Miranda didn’t act like an airheaded nitwit whenever he showed up. It was the same with their grandmother. Nana was totally mean to Ariel’s dad, but she gushed like a demented schoolgirl when her younger son came to town. Ariel figured Nana was in hog’s heaven now that Uncle Anthony was staying with her.

Thankfully, Dad wasn’t like Nana. Ariel was pretty sure he loved both her and Miranda the same. And if she was ever a mom—not that she was going to be, because it was a seriously awful job, as far as she could tell—she’d love all her kids the same. Even if one of them was as mean as Miranda.

Uncle Anthony walked over the stove, never taking his eyes off their neighbor. “Portia, right?” he asked.

“Yes, Portia Cuthcart.”

“From downstairs,” he added.

“Right again.”

Just in case Portia and her dad were getting something going, the last thing Ariel needed was her uncle getting in the way. You only had to be around Anthony for five minutes to realize that grown ladies turned into mush the minute they saw him. Which made no sense since he was like a math equation with only one answer: He never committed. So how come she, twelve-nearly-thirteen-year-old Ariel Kane, had figured this out when full-grown women hadn’t?

Anthony picked up a doughnut and popped it into his mouth. “Amazing,” he said, licking his fingers. He actually sounded surprised. “So amazing that I’d like to take you out to dinner to show my appreciation.”

Portia laughed, swatting his fingers away. “No thanks. Hands off my doughnuts.”

He stole another, anyway.

“You’re like a ten-year-old who’s used to getting his way.”

“You’ve pegged my little brother so quickly.”

Dad to the rescue! Ariel gave him a big grin.

“Gabriel,” Anthony said, minus the big grin. He looked at Portia. “Even as a kid, he was a wet blanket.”

“Not everyone can make it through life on the largess of others.”

If Ariel wasn’t mistaken, something weird was happening with Uncle Anthony’s jaw, sort of like a spasm. A definite sign that he was mad. But then her uncle just laughed, making her think she’d imagined it.

“Ms. Cuthcart,” her dad said in clipped tones.

The two of them exchanged a massively weird glance, and for half a second Ariel thought her dad was going to fire Portia on the spot. That, or Portia was going to up and quit.

Instead, Dad glanced at the doughnuts on the counter. “This is what you’ve chosen to feed my children for breakfast?”

“No.” Portia opened the oven door and pulled out a platter. “For the girls, eggs, turkey bacon, whole wheat toast.” From another pot on the stove, she whipped off the lid. “Oatmeal.” Then, like some crazed hostess on a game show, she walked over to the refrigerator, from which she produced a bowl of cut-up fruit and some orange juice.

“Covering all bases, I see,” Dad said.

“Yep, that’s me.” She threw him a look, kind of sideways under her lashes. “Though now that I think about it, not so unlike you last night covering a few of your own.”

Dad’s jaw dropped, then snapped closed. There was that weird look in his eyes again, though.

Portia turned away, like she had surprised herself.

“Isn’t this interesting,” Uncle Anthony said in a kind of sour voice. Which was even weirder.

Miranda walked in just then. She scowled at their dad, for whatever reason, this time. Then she saw Uncle Anthony. “Hi!” she said with a big smile.

“Hi, yourself,” Anthony said, grinning back.

Her dad got that frustrated look about him, but instead of saying something mean, he just asked, “Anthony, what are you doing here?”

Ariel could feel tension in the room like she felt heat coming from the oven. It made her stomach clench and worry come up in her throat, a worry that was always there these days.

She didn’t dare tell the Shrink about the worry, because he would tell her dad, and then there would be hell to pay. Dad would watch her like a hawk, just like he watched Miranda. As it stood now, Ariel knew her dad felt pretty certain she was under control with the whole journal and Shrink thing. She wanted to keep it that way.

Miranda glanced at Portia, seemed surprised, though not in a good away, then sat down.

Ariel focused on serving a plate. She really hated all this weird family mess that, even as smart as she was, she hardly understood.

It took a second before something occurred to her. “How did you know what our favorite stuff was?”

Portia bit her lip. “Really? I mean, I figured I’d just make a little bit of everything.”

“I have to get to work,” Dad said.

“But you haven’t eaten!” Portia blurted.

Dad gave her a look, grabbed a piece of toast, and then he was gone.

“Are you staying for breakfast?” Miranda asked Anthony.

Anthony was frowning after Dad, but he looked back and his smile returned. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

They all sat around the kitchen table. Portia was still cooking and didn’t sit down, but Uncle Anthony yakked at her the whole time anyway. “So, are you going to go out with me?” he asked again.

She just laughed and said, “No.”

“We got an assignment at school,” Ariel said, breaking in. “We have to write about our family tree. Uncle Anthony, can you tell me something about Mom that you think I don’t already know. Like, when was the first time you met her? Did Dad do the bring his date home to meet the family sort of thing and there she was?”

Uncle Anthony looked totally weird. “Your mom?” But then he got a faraway look in his eyes and a kind of dreamy smile. “The first time I met your mom I thought she was the prettiest girl I’d ever seen.” He focused on Miranda. “You’re the spitting image of Victoria.”

“Really?”

Ariel scowled. She wished she looked like their mom. But no, she looked like some mongrel dog.

“So when did you meet her?” Ariel asked.

Anthony sat back. “Actually, I met your mom before your dad did.”

“No way!” Miranda breathed.

Great, more unstable ground. Sheesh.

Miranda came over and sat next to Uncle Anthony. “What was she like when you met her?”

“Well, like I said, she was beautiful. She walked into this place I used to go with a bunch of friends. Downtown. You know, music, dancing. We were young. Or younger,” he added with a twist of his mouth. “Vic walked in like she owned the place. She gave off so much wattage that you saw nothing but her.” Uncle Anthony gave sort of a half laugh. “Victoria Polanski. God, was she a handful.” He cleared his throat. “Like I said, she was just as gorgeous as Miranda here.”

Ariel ignored that and persisted. “Where was she from? New Jersey? Long Island? Did she grow up by Nana on the Upper East Side?”

Anthony blinked, coming back to himself, then leaned over and chucked Ariel on the chin. “Ask your dad that, A. I’m sure he’d love to talk about the old days.”

Yeah, right. She’d jump all over that. Not.

Her uncle glanced at the clock. “Gotta go.” He stood and walked over to the stove, where Portia was taking another batch of doughnuts out of the pot.

“You’re sure you can’t spare a few hours to keep a guy company?”

“I’m sure.”

“I guess I’ll have to settle for another of your doughnuts.” He grabbed one up. Just before he popped it in his mouth, he added, “At least for now.”

Thirteen

PORTIA FIRED UP THE LAPTOP she had borrowed from Cordelia and spent the next hour figuring out what a business plan looked like. She knew all about the practical elements of running a café, having learned the ropes at her grandmother’s side, so it wasn’t too hard. Plus, Cordelia and Olivia were coming over later to help.

Quite frankly, her intent was as much about work as it was about filling her head with something besides the memory of that kiss. She hardly knew how to square it away in her brain other than to chalk it up to the greatest kiss known to man. Which was melodramatic and completely absurd, especially given the fact that she hadn’t much to compare it to. She snorted. She didn’t need anything to compare it to. The man could kiss.

By the middle of the afternoon, her head was ready to explode with numbers and business details. She told herself that what really mattered was her ability to create food that wowed people. Which made her think of those Cutie’s cupcakes. And she knew with certainty that she could fix them.

The doorbell buzzed just as she was starting to put everything together, and Ariel walked in. “Are you baking?”

“Yes.”

“Something good.”

“One can only hope.”

“Interesting. You don’t strike me as the sarcastic type.”

Portia rolled her eyes, which she noticed Ariel ignored as she started rooting around in her backpack. The girl pulled out notebooks and magazines and set them on the table. Portia went back to her I Can Do Better Than Cutie’s cupcake. She had all the bowls and utensils out by the time Ariel was ready, her own project set up. Poster boards, magazines marked with Post-its, and some sort of list.

“What’s that?” Portia asked.

“Think of me as your fairy godmother.”

“You’re on the young side. Shouldn’t I be the fairy godmother?”

“My clothes are fine. Yours? Not so much. I’m going to fix you up. You can thank me with one of those cupcakes.”

“Fix me up?”

“So you can catch a, well, guy.”

Portia’s mouth fell open.

“I know you’re divorced and all. Still, you’re not so old that you can give up dating for the rest of your life. Right?”

“Are you sure you’re a child?” Portia asked faintly.

“I prefer preadult female. Now, stop talking and listen.”

Two minutes into Ariel’s “presentation,” Portia decided to ignore her and focus on the hideous Cutie’s cupcakes. If she wanted a makeover, she could ask one of her sisters. Well, not Cordelia.

Of course, Ariel just kept talking. She had ripped out a load of “perfect outfits” from Teen Vogue. But if Portia ever had money again, she wouldn’t be buying short, pleated skirts and platform tennis shoes.

The Cutie’s cupcakes were missing something. The more Ariel talked, the more Portia craved the cupcake fix. She mixed the dry ingredients in a bowl, stirring slowly, feeling a sense of peace come over her. Ariel battled on, talking about how tights could be coordinated with a short skirt.

Portia finished her first “fix” on the cupcakes, writing down what she had done, just as her grandmother had taught her.

Ariel peered at her. “Are you sure you’re listening to me?”

Portia put the batch in the preheated oven. “You bet,” she answered.

“I don’t believe you.”

“Don’t you have homework to do?”

“I spent a lot of time on this. The least you could do is listen.”

“I am! Think of me as a multitasker. I can bake and listen. Tell me more about stockings.”

“Not stockings,” Ariel said with disgust. “Tights! There’s a big difference, you know.”

“Sorry. Of course.”

Ariel’s eagle eye stayed on her as Portia went back to the mixing bowl and started on a second batch. An hour or so passed with Ariel talking and Portia baking.

Oddly, it felt good to have Ariel’s high voice providing a counterpoint to the sounds of baking. But by the time cupcakes covered every inch of counter space, Ariel was running out of steam. “Looks” from Teen Vogue and Tiger Beat battled with the cupcakes for space on the counter and kitchen island.

“I just can’t believe that Tiger Beat is still in business,” Portia said. “And you know I’ll never wear pants like that, don’t you? I’m not seventeen.”

“These are totally swaggy pants,” Ariel said indignantly. “Justin Bieber—not that I’m a Belieber or anything, but still—he wore them on his last tour. In leather.”

“Do I really look like a woman who would wear swaggy leather pants?”

“Well, the other things, then. I got these magazines out of Miranda’s room. She totally knows how to dress and she marked the pages, so everything I told you about is like picked by an expert.”

“Picked by a teenager,” Portia said, pushing the cupcakes on the table closer together so she could put out another tray. “For a teenager.”

“My dad says she dresses like she’s sixteen going on twenty-six. You can’t be much older than twenty-six. Right?”

“I’m twenty-nine, and fashion isn’t a priority for me right now.”

“Like I didn’t already know that.”

Portia just laughed and kept working.

“You know, you’re not really like other adults. Just saying.”

“Why not?”

“You don’t get worked up like the teachers at school. They always look mortally wounded or bear-woken-in-winter mad whenever I start talking without thinking my words through, which is pretty much all the time.”

Portia just laughed again, concentrating on the elaborate designs she was swirling into the cupcake frosting.

Everything was nearly done when the doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it,” Ariel said, as though she lived there.

Miranda followed Ariel back into the kitchen, which was unexpected.

“Hi, Miranda,” Portia said.

The girl stood there scowling, not looking even a bit happy to be there. “Yeah, hi—” The words froze in the air, and she stared at the table. “Oh, my gosh! How did you know?”

Portia took a deep breath. “Know what?”

“The cupcakes! How did you know I needed cupcakes? We’re having a sophomore class bake sale and everyone has to bring something.”

Portia couldn’t speak. She hated this feeling, hated that she couldn’t just bake like a normal person. In the morning she’d had the Kanes’ favorite breakfast without knowing a single thing about what they liked to eat. Now this.

“Awesome!” Miranda exclaimed.

Gabriel chose that moment to walk into the apartment. “I rang the bell, but no one heard,” he said.

When he saw Miranda laughing, the hard planes of his face eased, if only slightly. “I got your text that you needed cupcakes,” he said to Miranda. “There’s that cupcake place on Columbus.” His eyes shifted to the kitchen counters. “What’s this?”

“Cupcakes,” Ariel said.

Portia tried to ignore the way Ariel eyed her.

“Can you believe it! Portia already made them,” Miranda crowed. But then she seemed to realize what she was doing and stopped, the glower firmly back in place.

“How did you know?” he asked Portia.

“I didn’t. I was experimenting.” She refused to give in to the queasy emotions she felt. Maybe she just made the cupcakes because of Cutie’s. And maybe she was going stark raving mad. She turned to the girls. “Can you find some boxes to put them in? How many do you need, Miranda?”

“A lot. Like six dozen,” Miranda said.

Portia didn’t need to count. She knew on a sigh that if she did, there would be exactly six dozen sitting on the counter.

The girls went out to find boxes, which left Portia and Gabriel standing alone.

“You have batter on your face. Again.”

“Last time it was frosting.”

She would have sworn he swallowed back a smile.

She wiped her cheek and found a swipe of strawberry shortcake cupcake mix.

“How did you know about the cupcakes? Really.”

“I didn’t. I was trying to come up with a way to make Cutie’s cupcakes better. And I did.” She took a mock little bow. “The German chocolate cake was easy. So was the vanilla buttercream. But the strawberry shortcake gave me fits. Turns out, the final fix came when I baked a fresh strawberry in the middle of a vanilla sour-cream batter instead of strawberry batter with chunks of strawberries. Here, try one.”

“No, thanks.”

“What, you’re watching your boyish figure?”

Gabriel gave a surprised bark of laughter, snagged the cupcake, and took a bite. The amazement on his face made her smile. He stared at her concoction almost suspiciously before looking at her.

“And?” Portia prompted.

“And what?”

“What do you think?”

“I think you can bake.”

“I’ll take that as your way of saying you think it’s good. Thank you.” She shot him a saucy look, to which he raised a brow, his eyes intent on her.

The memory of him dragging her through the window and pulling her close made her light-headed, and she wondered if he was thinking about the same thing.

After a second he focused and saw the books. He picked up one with his free hand. “‘Hospitality and Restaurant Practices’?” He cocked his head. “What’s this for?”

“My sisters and I are going to open a restaurant.”

Saying it out loud thrilled her and terrified her in turn.

For a second she thought he was going to laugh. She just held his gaze.

“You’re serious.”

“As serious as an accountant at an IRS audit.”

His face closed off, reminding her of the ruthlessness she had first noticed about him on the front steps. “You have no business opening a restaurant.”

“Says who?”

“Says the guy who watched you try to extricate yourself from a burger suit with a knife.”

Her mouth fell open. “Burger suits and restaurants are two different kettles of fish.”

“Kettles of fish? Now there’s great business terminology.”

“Yep, Texas style.”

“You’re in New York, sweetheart.”

“I am not your sweetheart, thank my lucky stars.”

“Another of your quaint Texas sayings? What was the last one I heard you use? ‘Bless your heart’?”

She sliced him a tooth-grinding smile. “While you might not like them, you can bet your backside that a café that serves the kind of fare we create in Texas would have people lined up around the corner. Or, as we say in Texas, till the cows come home.”

He raised a brow as he eyed her. “Did you know that sixty percent of all restaurants fail?”

“Really, I thought the number would be higher.”

“Eighty percent in New York City.”

She refused to gulp. “Wow, I thought the number was more like ninety-five percent.”

“Some statistics put the number that high.”

Double non-gulp.

“Is it possible that something has left Portia Cuthcart speechless?”

She glared at him. “Okay, funny guy.”

His head cocked, but she kept going.

“I stand by my belief that a Glass Kitchen in New York will work.”

“Then tell me, if you’re such a prodigious businesswoman, what’s your cost-to-baked-goods ratio?”

“What?”

“Don’t know? How about margins? What kind of margins do you expect to achieve?”

She stammered.

The way he looked at her liquefied her insides, and she felt sorry for anyone who went up against him.

“Nope?” he said. “Then how much does a bushel of flour cost? Or how about the cost of small-business insurance?”

Her eyes narrowed.

“There’s more to running a café,” he finished, holding up her cupcake for demonstration, “than being good in the kitchen.”

Finally she broke free of her shocked stupor and walked over to him. “One, bakers don’t buy bushels of flour. We buy it by the pound, and last I checked—namely, this morning—a five-pound bag was going for $4.95; ten pounds, $8.95; twenty-five, $20.50. As to two on your rapid-fire list of insulting questions, small-business insurance varies, depending on the size of the small business, how many employees, what the business is, not to mention the city and state in which said small business is run. Having been a prodigious part of my grandmother’s restaurant, The Glass Kitchen, back in Texas, I’m well aware that there’s more to running a café than being a good cook.”

She stopped directly in front of him. “My sister Cordelia has plenty of access to investors, all of whom will be interested to hear how I took a famous but hideous tasting Cutie’s cupcake and turned it into the mouthwatering delight you now hold in your hand.” She snatched the partially eaten cake away from him. “Or should I say, held in your hand.”

She expected him to be embarrassed or, short of that, at least contrite. But no, not Gabriel Kane. He just looked at her, assessing, and she had to remind herself she wasn’t intimidated by him.

“Good-bye,” she said pointedly.

Gabriel raised a brow, then surprised her when he licked the frosting from his fingers. “Insulting. Rapid-fire. You’re cute when you get feisty.”

“Ack!” It was all she could do not to launch the cupcake at his head.

“Before you get carried away,” he went on, smooth as butter, “I have something for you.”

She eyed him. He pulled a key from his pocket and handed it over. “For my place. This way you can come and go when you need to, from the job that actually pays you money.”

She reconsidered launching the cupcake.

“I’ll leave money on the kitchen table to buy food. Later, I’ll show you how I order online, if you want to do that instead.”

Then he reached out, surprising her yet again, and wiped a smudge of frosting from the corner of her mouth. His gaze locked with hers as he sucked the sugar from his finger. “How is it that again and again, you make me forget the type of man I am?”

Portia felt heat rising in her cheeks. This was ridiculous. She didn’t like aggravating men. In all the years she had known Robert, he had never once aggravated her, at least not before he divorced her. And then he had devastated her, which wasn’t the same.

Truth to tell, for the first time since Robert had come home with his big announcement, Portia felt that maybe he had done her a favor.

When she dragged her gaze from Gabriel’s lips, their eyes met. For a second she thought he would kiss her again. But then his mouth went hard, his eyes shuttering, and she was certain irritation ran along his body like an electric current.

“There will be no more of that,” his expression told her.

Relief mixed with disappointment.

“I couldn’t agree more,” she shot back wordlessly.

He nodded and disappeared through the doorway.

Fourteen

THREE DAYS LATER, Portia forgot to set her alarm and ended up dashing up the stairs at ten minutes after seven, having barely thrown on cargo pants and a white cotton tee, and hastily brushed her teeth.

Gabriel leaned against the kitchen counter, reading the newspaper, a cup of coffee in his hand. His hair was still wet from the shower, a little long and raked back. He looked better than her cupcakes. Damn, damn, damn.

She had hoped to get breakfast done early; she had a lunch meeting a block away on Columbus Avenue with a potential investor. Cordelia had made the arrangements, and her sisters were supposed to meet her there. But Olivia had already e-mailed that she couldn’t make it; she had been asked to sub for an advanced yoga class.

“Since Olivia’s bailing, you have to be there, Cordelia,” Portia wrote back. “When you made it a lunch meeting, you promised to pay.”

“Stop worrying, P! It’s lunch; it won’t cost much. And I’ll be there.”

“Late?” Gabriel asked, breaking into her thoughts. “Only three days in?”

“It’s seven o’clock,” Portia stated. “Okay, seven-ish.”

“I didn’t realize that in a professional workplace seven sharp was more of a loose term.”

“God, you’re funny.”

He gave her a strange look.

“What? No one’s called you funny before?”

“No,” Gabriel said, the word quiet.

She looked at him, but before she could probe, he folded the newspaper and tossed it on the counter. “The girls should be down any minute. I have a meeting at eight. Though maybe the Civic Board really meant eight-ish. And at two I’m meeting the contractor here. Or maybe it’s two-ish.”

She shot him a look. “That probably is what they meant.”

His shout of laughter surprised them both.

She smiled at him then. “I won’t be late tomorrow, promise.”

A remnant of his smile seemed to fight with his standard glower. “Good girl.”

The words caught her off guard. Good girl. She had always been just that. Fun, maybe, but not much more than that. Always good.

She realized she was tired of being the good girl. What would happen if she wasn’t, if she gave in and lost herself in Gabriel Kane?

The girls entered, though it was a second before she realized Gabriel had already left. So much for losing herself in him.

“Good morning!” Portia said.

“What are you? A cheerleader?” Miranda grumbled.

“Hey, I made you cupcakes. Seems like you’d be in a better mood.”

“Yeah, okay, thanks.”

“Now, now, Little Miss Sunshine,” Portia teased, setting her own concerns aside.

Ariel grimaced. “You’re kidding, right?”

Miranda went over to a cabinet and pulled out a box of sugar cereal. “Maybe she thinks she’ll get paid more if we give her a good report.”

“Aren’t you the cynic?” Portia said, swiping the box away.

“Hey! That’s my breakfast.”

“Not as long as I’m in charge of feeding you.” Portia rummaged in the refrigerator. “Who’s up for eggs, bacon, and toast?”

Miranda and Ariel exchanged a glance. “Ah, no one.”

Portia made them eggs, bacon, and toast anyway, which Ariel ate and Miranda picked at, but picked at enough that Portia gave her a thumbs-up.

“Surely she’ll take it down a notch after she’s been here a while,” Miranda said to Ariel as the girls headed out the door.

“I heard that,” Portia called after them.

“You were supposed to.”

Once Portia finished up in the kitchen, she returned downstairs to get ready for the lunch meeting. After a quick bath, she dressed with care. Ariel wasn’t wrong about Portia needing a different look. Vintage clothes weren’t going to win her any prizes for business professionalism. So she did what she could with the clothes she had. Texas politician’s–wife clothes. Navy blue St. John Knits. Not a staple on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, but sure to instill more confidence than Annie Hall one-offs.

Ready to go, Portia fired up her computer to check her e-mail. The headline of Google News caught her attention.

Gabriel Kane Brings Global Inc. Down

Gabriel Kane? Her Gabriel Kane? Or, rather, her neighbor Gabriel Kane? Portia quickly amended.

The article was definitely about her neighbor, who, it turned out, wasn’t your Average Joe. His primary concern wasn’t going into one of those dime-a-dozen glass-and-steel office towers by day and bossing around a stream of people redoing his apartment by … well, the rest of the time. If the article was to be believed, his raison d’être appeared to be very publicly destroying some company named Global Inc. The reporter further went on to say that once Gabriel’s investment in the company went sour, he vindictively went after Global Inc., driving their stock price into the ground.

Portia headed out, her mind spinning. Yikes. While Gabriel looked ruthless, she couldn’t help but remember the way he had made her drink water after spilling out of the hamburger suit, or how he had seemed fierce about the danger on the fire escape. Not to mention the way he was trying to do right by his girls. She had to believe he was fair. That he wasn’t a man to bring people down ruthlessly. The article had to be an exaggeration. But on top of that, she realized that her neighbor was an investor.

With the thought tumbling around, she walked into La Maison five minutes early and was seated outside. Five minutes passed and Cordelia still hadn’t shown up. Portia checked her phone; nothing. After ten minutes, Portia dialed her older sister, but the call went straight to voice mail.

“You better be just about here, Cordelia,” she muttered into the phone.

Russell Bertram showed up by himself after a few minutes. “Portia?” he said, coming up to her and extending his hand.

According to Cordelia, he was the most promising of the investors on their list. He was handsome, with fair skin and coppery brown hair longer than a Texas banker would have allowed. He wore a brown sports jacket with blue pinstripes over a white button-down shirt and jeans. He didn’t seem anything like an investment guy. He definitely seemed too young to have enough money to invest in a café. But before more than a few words had left his mouth, Portia realized he was utterly charming.

“Sorry I’m late. I volunteer at my old school. They have a young-entrepreneur’s group.” He gave her a lopsided grin. “Once a month I spill out words of wisdom. If only they knew what a lousy student I was back then.”

Portia laughed. “Maybe you should tell them. It would be inspirational.”

“So tell me, how’s Cordelia? And James? I don’t know either of them well, but James helped me a lot when I put together my own fund.”

“They’re both doing great. James has a lot of amazing stuff going on.” She prayed it was true.

“That’s good. I was worried when I heard he got caught in the Atlantica General blowup. But if anyone could land on his feet, it’s James.”

Portia liked Russell more with each minute that passed. He ordered a surprisingly big meal, and when he suggested wine, she thought about how tired she was of being a good girl. She laughed and agreed.

They talked about the best restaurants in the city—ones he had been to, ones she had only read about, given her whole no-money problem. They even delved into Manhattan real estate, if only because no meal in New York was complete without mention of a street address or a co-op. There wasn’t a single mention of why they were actually there.

When Russell ordered a second glass of wine for each of them, Portia didn’t refuse. He leaned forward and looked her in the eye. “So, tell me, I hear you work with Gabriel Kane.”

The wine must have muddled her brain. “Pardon?”

“Don’t go coy on me.” He grinned, his blue eyes shining with schoolboy charm. “When I asked Cordelia about your experience, she said you work with Gabriel Kane.”

Portia’s head jerked back. Why would Cordelia say anything about her cooking for Gabriel?

But a second later, it hit her. Cordelia had known Gabriel was an investment guy all along. She had used his name as bait to get the meeting. No wonder her sister hadn’t shown up.

She ground her teeth. “You know him?” She tried to smile, trying to figure out how to salvage the lunch. She wouldn’t out and out lie, but she saw no reason to tell this guy that she not only didn’t work for Gabriel in any investment capacity, but that Gabriel had made it clear what he thought of her opening a Glass Kitchen.

Russell gave a modest shrug. “I know of him. Who doesn’t? But I’ve never met him.” He leaned forward, his elbows on the table, his forearms encircling his wine. “I have the greatest investment opportunity, one I know will blow Kane away. I’ve tried to get in to see him, but no luck. When you invited me to lunch, I figured you must have heard about it. I take it you do legwork for Kane.”

Portia blinked. “Legwork?”

“You know, get the lay of the land. See if something is worthwhile to show Kane?”

“You’re here because you have an investment opportunity you want to present to Gabriel?”

He smiled, excited. “Yes! This is awesome.”

Suddenly he seemed exactly as young as he looked. This was a man who thought he was getting the chance of a lifetime. He had no money to invest. He needed investors.

Disappointment seeped through her, every ounce of wine making itself known.

“Not so awesome,” she replied wearily.

Russell’s blue eyes stopped sparkling. “What do you mean?”

“I’m not here about your project.”

“Kane didn’t send you?”

“No.”

Freckles she hadn’t noticed before popped out on his pale skin as he hunched forward.

For a half a second he just sat there. Then he glanced at her expensive St. John suit and managed a guileless smile. “So,” he said, “even if you’re not scouting for Kane, are you looking for your own investment opportunities?”

He looked so dejected and sweet with those freckles and tousled red-brown hair, not to mention so fruitlessly hopeful, that she felt a nearly maternal need to comfort him, despite her own stinging disappointment. She reached across the table and squeezed his hand. “I wish I was.”

“Then why did you want to meet…” His voice trailed off as he looked at her hand on his. “I’m being stupid, aren’t I? Now I’m embarrassed. Your sister told me you were divorced and had just moved to New York.”

A heartbeat passed as she tried to make sense of what he was saying. Then it hit her, blood searing through her cheeks, and she jerked her hand way. To her horror, Russell blushed, too.

“Look,” he said awkwardly, “lunch was nice and all. I mean, I enjoyed meeting you. But, well, I’m not—I have a girlfriend.”

Her mouth opened, then closed, then opened again.

But before she could think of what to say, he jumped to his feet.

“Listen, I’ve got to go. But I’m glad you invited me to lunch.” His blush deepened. “I mean, you’re great. And if I was the kind of guy to have a fling, I would love having a fling with you.” If possible, he blushed even more. “Sorry, that came out wrong. Okay, anyway, gotta go. Thanks for lunch!”

Then he was gone.

She was mortified, aghast. But seconds later, she was frantic. Forget that he thought she was trying to have a fling with him. He’d left her with the check.

She scrambled into her purse, praying she’d find more than she knew was actually there. Sure, she expected that she, or rather Cordelia, would pay for lunch when it was meant to be their pitch to him, sans wine and steak. But steak! For lunch! The minute he’d ordered wine, Portia had assumed he would pay.

And it was all Cordelia’s fault. What had her sister been thinking, giving him the impression that she could help him gain access to Gabriel Kane?

Portia really was going to kill her sister.

Her hands trembled, a trickle of sweat forming beneath her fancy suit as she pulled out her credit card and handed it over. Not more than a few minutes later, the waitress returned. “Ma’am, I’m afraid your card was rejected.”

She cringed. “You’re sure?”

“Sometimes the machine just doesn’t like the card. Do you have another?”

“Well, no.” Part of Portia’s alimony deal with Robert was that he would pay her expenses for six months while she got settled—but she had only the one credit card, which he obviously wasn’t paying. Why was she surprised?

“Then it’ll have to be cash.”

Portia rummaged through her wallet again, but no wad of bills miraculously appeared. She started counting out what she had, but didn’t come close to the $150 bill.

All she could do was call Cordelia. But Cordelia still didn’t answer. Neither did Olivia. Not that Olivia had more money than she did.

Portia counted her money again.

In the end, she left her driver’s license with the manager and ran across the street to the ATM.

As soon as she paid, she went straight home. With every step she took, her anger grew. I can’t believe Cordelia did this to me, she raged as she took the steps to the town house. I am absolutely, positively going to kill Cordelia, she promised herself as she slammed into her apartment.

She came to a dead stop when she heard the noise, and a smell biting at her nose.

“Portia, is that you?”

“Cordelia?”

Portia marched into the kitchen to find Cordelia there, an apron tied over her perfect clothes. The counters and stove were covered with pots and pans. Fingerprints and swipes marked the thin coating of flour that covered the surfaces like a child’s watercolor painting project.

“What in the world are you doing?” she gasped.

Cordelia laughed, delighted, though there was something off about the look in her eyes. “What does it look like I’m doing?”

“Making a mess! And where were you at lunch?”

Cordelia paused mid-stir. “Oh my Lord! Lunch! Sorry. But just look at this. I’m cooking and baking! I woke up this morning,” she rushed on, “thinking of food. Just like how it happens to you. I have the knowing!”

“What?” Portia tried to make sense of the scene. After a second, she noticed that Cordelia’s clothes weren’t so perfect, after all. In fact, for the first time she could remember, her sister wore wrinkled pants, the blouse not coordinating with the rest of the outfit. And her hair. Cordelia usually spent a great deal of time at the salon having her tresses professionally done. Portia speculated that Cordelia hadn’t been to the hairdresser in a while.

“Cord, are you okay?”

Cordelia whipped around, spoon in hand, some sort of liquid flying across the room. “I’m fine! Don’t I look fine? Of course I look fine. You’re just saying that because I forgot about lunch. I am sorry, Portia.”

“Okay, sweetie,” Portia said carefully, coming closer. “Not to worry about the lunch.”

Behind her, she heard the front door open and close.

“Hey!” Olivia called out, then stopped in the kitchen doorway. Her long, curly blond hair was pulled up in a messy twist, her full lips shiny with a nude gloss, her standard yoga attire fitting like a second skin. “What happened in here?”

Portia and Olivia exchanged a glance. Portia shrugged carefully. “I came home to this.”

“Why isn’t she cooking at her own place?”

“I wondered the same thing.”

“She looks off.”

“Don’t mention it to her. She’s sensitive.”

“I’m standing right here, and I am not one bit sensitive. I’m cooking! It’s perfect. And it’s a sign that opening a Glass Kitchen in New York is going to be even more perfect! I’ll be able to cook, too!”

Portia and Olivia exchanged another glance. “Everything is burned,” Olivia mouthed.

“I know,” Portia mouthed in return, picking up a bowl filled with wilted lettuce swimming in dressing. She sniffed and tasted. Butter lettuce with, perhaps, a raspberry vinaigrette.

Olivia walked up to Cordelia, as if approaching a wild animal. “Sweetie, give me the spoon. I’ll keep stirring, then you can tell us all about waking up with the knowing.”

It looked like Cordelia would protest, but then her fake cheer and shoulders sank, like a rock in water. She relinquished the spoon, then walked over to one of the stools and sat.

Olivia set the utensil aside, then sat next to her.

Cordelia looked around, seeming to notice the mess for the first time. “I don’t have the knowing, do I?”

Olivia took her hands and squeezed. “Probably not.” She leaned forward and pressed her forehead to Cordelia’s. “Which you didn’t want anyway, remember?”

Portia turned away from them, wishing not for the first time that she had the same confidence with people that seemed to come to Olivia as easily as breathing. Portia focused on the pot on the stove and tasted whatever it was in the pot. She grimaced. “It’s not the worst stew I’ve ever tasted.”

“It’s supposed to be cream sauce. I was going to make creamed beef on toast.”

Portia turned off the heat, set the spoon aside, and walked over to sit next to her sisters. “Creamed beef?”

“Daddy’s favorite,” Cordelia said, the words quiet.

“Oh my God!” Olivia laughed. “That awful stuff?”

“You didn’t love it?” Cordelia asked.

“Seriously? Toasted bread slathered in creamed beef? No one loved that meal. Not even Daddy.”

Portia joined in, smiling as she remembered. “No, Daddy didn’t love anything about creamed beef on toast. But he loved Mama, and I swear she never knew that he barely choked every bite down.” She looked at the scratched linoleum. “What I’d give to have even half the love that Daddy felt for Mama.”

The sisters were quiet then. Portia knew they were lost in their own thoughts, their own memories of their parents. Then all of a sudden, Olivia leaped up.

“No dancing!” Portia said automatically. “And no singing!”

“Ha! Do I look that predictable? No. Let’s play Spit!”

Another of Daddy’s favorites.

Olivia raced into living room, and Portia heard her rummaging around in one of Aunt Evie’s cabinets.

“I am not playing Spit,” Cordelia stated.

Portia felt a trickle of relief. Cordelia was sounding more like her normal self again.

“Don’t be a stick in the mud,” Olivia teased with a wry twist of lips when she returned with a deck of ancient playing cards.

When they were growing up, their father had loved teaching his girls the rough-and-oh-so-impolite game called Spit, a game completely at odds with their mother’s book on manners. How many times had Daddy teased Mama about turning his girls into sissies, making Mama laugh until they ended up in the back of the trailer, the laughter shifting into something that pushed the girls out the door into the hardscrabble yard?

“You only want to play because you always won,” Portia said, smiling, grabbing up cards the minute Olivia handed her a pack.

Olivia and Portia played a quick hand, Cordelia looking on with a jaundiced eye.

“I win! And I’m starving!” Olivia said, as she started separating the cards.

Portia whipped up a quick meal for her sisters to eat from the few things left in the refrigerator. Sandwiches and a grapefruit and avocado salad topped with poppy seed dressing. The two sisters played and ate, while Cordelia only ate.

“You might win,” Cordelia said, finally picking up her deck of cards “but only because you always cheat.” With a put-upon sigh, she set up to play without having to be reminded how.

“I did not cheat,” Olivia said, then cried out, “Spit!” to start the game just before Cordelia was ready.

“See! Cheating,” Cordelia yelped, her fingers stumbling as Portia and Olivia started working their cards.

Portia lost herself in the game, worry fading away, laughing, as she slid a 2 onto a 3 just before Olivia got her own card there.

“Rats!” Olivia cried, slapping down a King, Queen, Jack, and a 10 with rapid-fire quickness, then threw up her hands. “I win!”

Portia was just a few cards behind. But Olivia leaped up and cheered. “I won! I won! You guys are turtles!”

Cordelia took a deep breath, then set her cards down. “Sorry about the mess, Portia. And sorry about lunch. But I better get home.” She ate her last bite of poppy seed–covered avocado, took off the apron, and smoothed back her hair before gathering her handbag. She walked to the kitchen doorway, then abruptly turned back. “Oh, and I probably should mention, it looks like James is going to be indicted.”

Fifteen

THE NEXT DAY, Ariel walked into the town house after school.

She loved asking questions, though she wasn’t big on answering them, as the Shrink had learned. But what was weird was that the Shrink didn’t even seem to know what the right questions were, much less know to ask them. Her mom died over a year ago now, but he kept asking her to tell him what she felt. Hello, lousy.

She wanted him to tell her something massively smart that would make her feel better, like: “Given the trajectory of matter over time, the miasma of your mind will not stay stagnant, therefore your sorrow will morph and change, making you feel more hopeful soon.” Or: “Given how incredibly smart you are, Ariel—a genius, really—your astounding brain is sifting through the data and soon it will make sense out of the senseless occasion of your mother’s death, and then you’ll start feeling better.” Even a lame: “Everything is going to be okay” would do in a pinch. But nope, he never spoke a word that made her feel anything other than that he really was a quack.

Whatever. Plus, what did it matter? Her mom was dead. Dead. She wasn’t coming back. How did that ever get better?

It didn’t.

But right then, Ariel had other problems. The report on her dysfunctional family, or what was left of it.

Yesterday she had roughed out a few pages, mainly in her journal. But that just made her realize she didn’t know anything about her family. It was like some sort of twisted nursery rhyme. Her mom was dead. Her dad made money. Her uncle was sort of sleazy. And her grandmother … Ariel hardly knew what to say about her. Nana was bizarre. The woman didn’t seem anything like a grandmother, or even a mother.

And then there was Miranda, who could be summed up as completely nuts. Or, maybe, nympho.

Just that morning she was muttering in her cell phone the way she always did, but Ariel managed to overhear her anyway. She was talking about a dare. With a boy.

Which meant it was time to raid the journal again, because someone had to look out for the family, now that Mom was gone. And poor Dad was just too clueless when it came to Miranda.

Ariel dropped her bag in the foyer, checked around the house, then snuck into Miranda’s room and found her journal.

A big, boldly written DARE blazed on top of a new page.

“Bingo,” Ariel whispered.

Tuesday, October 1

I don’t totally hate school anymore. I met some girls who are pretty nice. Not as nice as my old friends back in Jersey, but they’ll have to do. One way or another, I am going to get back to NJ. God, I miss our old house and Kasey just down the block. My new friend Becky lives on the Upper East Side, and her mom is a total stay-at-home type who is always there, or at least someone is always there. I’m the only girl I’ve met so far who doesn’t go home to someone. Actually, though, I’m lucky because I can do stuff and they can’t. Becky dared me to ask Dustin Bradford over after school. DARE. No question Dad would go Dark Side if he found out.

The sound of the front door opening took a second to register. Ariel slapped the journal shut and shoved it under the mattress. She was just shutting the door when Miranda rounded the bend in the staircase.

Her sister stopped short. “Were you in my room?”

Ariel scoffed. “No.”

“Then why are you standing in front of my door?”

“I heard you coming up the stairs.”

Miranda’s eyes narrowed; then she waved Ariel away like she wasn’t important enough to spend another second dealing with. “You are never allowed in my room.”

“Like there is anything in there that I’d want.” Nympho, she added silently.

She ran down the stairs and surprised Portia in the kitchen, unpacking groceries. “Hey, Ariel.”

“Hey? Is that a Texas thing, too?”

Portia laughed. “I take it you don’t say hey.”

“Nah. I pretty much stick to hi or the occasional how do you do—you know, when I want to throw off an adult.”

“Throw off an adult, huh?” Portia pulled a chicken from the bag. Next came onions and celery, carrots and brown rice.

“Most adults are clueless.”

“I’m an adult.”

“The jury’s still out on you.”

Portia laughed. “Tell me something I don’t already know.”

The woman definitely wasn’t easy to peg.

Ariel stood there a bit longer until Portia glanced over at her. “What?”

“I’ve been at school. All day. I’m a kid.”

“And?”

“Aren’t you going to ask me whether I have homework to do? Or whether I was bullied in gym? Or whether I threw up?”

“You don’t really look like the throw-up type.”

She had her there.

Miranda practically danced into the kitchen.

Portia glanced over her shoulder. “Hey, you.”

Miranda didn’t say a word. She walked over to the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of VitaminWater, then circled back to lean against the stainless-steel door and sighed, a weird smile on her face.

“What’s wrong with you?” Ariel asked.

“Nothing’s wrong. Everything’s great.”

Portia turned back to the sink. “She’s in love.”

Miranda’s eyes went wide. Then she did an even bigger sigh, tons of dreamy slathered on. It made Ariel want to gag.

“Maybe a little.” She giggled.

Portia kept working on dinner, washing the chicken, putting it in a pot.

“So who is it?” Ariel asked.

“Like you’d know him,” Miranda scoffed.

Portia still didn’t say a word, but then Miranda went off like a racehorse.

“His name is Dustin. He’s the cutest boy in school. Becky says so.”

Uh-oh. Dustin was coming to fruition.

“He’s in my algebra class.” Miranda said. “I hate algebra. Sooooo, I asked him to come over and help me! Not that he’s any better at it than I am, but he’s going to come over.” She glared at Ariel just as Portia walked into the pantry. “No telling Dad,” she hissed. “I told an adult I have someone coming over. I told her.” She nodded toward the pantry.

Who would have guessed Miranda was smart enough to come up with a way to win a dare without breaking the letter of the law? Dad’s law, that is.

“Me? Do I look like a snitch?”

Of course Ariel had already thought of several ways she could use this information to her advantage. But she really didn’t tattle.

Portia returned to the sink, and Miranda walked over to stand next to her.

“What are you making?”

What? The girl who hardly ever came out of her room except to barely eat and fight with Dad was making conversation?

“A cross between chicken and rice and chicken soup,” Portia said.

“Cool.”

Cool? Who was this girl? First, a non-adult adult, now a non-glowering teenager?

“My mom never cooked,” Miranda said. “But she loved my dad. And he loved her. A lot.” Miranda’s smiled shifted and changed. “In fact, just because you cook for us doesn’t mean you can take her place.”

“Miranda!” Ariel gasped.

Portia turned her head, didn’t look one bit ruffled. More like she looked determined, like she had been reminded of something totally true.

“Not to worry, Miranda,” she said. “I’m not trying to take her place. I’m just working for your dad. Your mom is your mom, and always will be.”

Hello, our mom.

But Ariel didn’t say that, either. She didn’t care to go into Miranda’s story about how their mom and dad brought home the wrong baby when they picked up Ariel, but then the hospital wouldn’t take her back. Sure, Ariel was smart enough to know that this was in no way possible. But Miranda said it with such authority that Ariel was half convinced there was some truth to the story. Maybe just that her parents hadn’t believed someone who looked like Ariel could be their child. Thank God Ariel had their mom’s weird green eyes, so no one could pretend she wasn’t their kid.

Miranda took a carrot and chomped down on it, turning away from Portia so she could glower at Ariel. “She might not have cooked, but she was fun.”

“Mom? Fun?”

The words were out of Ariel’s mouth before she could swallow them back.

Miranda glanced at her. “Of course.” Like Ariel was a moron. “You heard what Uncle Anthony said. She was the life of the party. And she was totally fun when…”

The words trailed off.

Portia glanced over at Miranda, but still didn’t say a word.

“Mom wasn’t fun,” Ariel said, “she was, like, beautiful. Always the perfect clothes and hair, always had her nails done. Totally beautiful.”

Miranda eyed Ariel, seemed on the verge of rolling her eyes, but relented. “She was all that. But she was fun, too. At least she was totally fun before you landed on our doorstep looking like a troll.”

Ariel felt the blood rise in her face. As always in circumstances like this, words eluded her. Her quick brain slowed; her heart hurt.

“Miranda.” This from Portia.

“What?” Miranda snapped back.

“You know what.”

Now Portia was being an adult. She had that steady gaze thing down pat. And Miranda backed down.

“Whatever. Mom was fun even after you arr—”

Another look.

“Fine. After you came home and weren’t a total troll.” She drew a breath. “She really was fun. When you were a baby, she could make you laugh and laugh.”

Ariel’s throat went tight, the same way it did whenever the Shrink asked her to talk about their mom. Then a memory hit her. “I remember a time, once, when Mom dragged me into the backyard to plant violets and watermelon. She laughed and said it would be fun.” The kitchen grew comfortably quiet. Finally, like giving in or something, Portia asked, “Do you have a photo of your mom?”

Miranda shrugged, then pushed up. “I do.” She went upstairs, then returned in a flash. “This is her. It’s the only one I have since Dad packed all the others away. But it’s a great one.”

The photo made Ariel’s throat tighten even more. It showed Miranda, Mom, Dad, and Ariel, all laughing, Mom leaning up against Dad.

But the photo had been taken when Ariel was little. Other than in this picture, she had never seen her mother laugh or lean against Dad.

“You should put it out,” Portia said.

Miranda gave her a look. “Yeah, so Dad can bite my head off? No thanks.”

Ariel explained. “He doesn’t like being reminded of Mom. Which makes it really hard to do the report I’m working on.”

“What report?”

“The one on our family. We have to write a paper on our family tree, without it just being a family tree. I ask, what does that even mean?”

“I had to do one of those when I was in middle school,” Miranda said. “I just asked Mom a bunch of questions. She told me stories about herself as a kid.”

“Really? What did she say?” Ariel asked, the words kind of breathy.

“Not much. I just wrote about her wanting to be a princess when she was young, and how it was special to me since I wanted the same thing when I was her age. I got an A.” Miranda looked at Ariel wryly. “You could hand in the same report, but I don’t think anyone would believe that you ever wanted to be a princess.”

Ariel’s heart twisted even more. Her mom had wanted to be a princess?

Miranda’s cell rang. One glance at the screen and she dashed from the kitchen, then out the front door.

Ariel and Portia watched her go. After a second, Portia poured a glass of coconut water with ice and handed it to Ariel. “I bet you have your own stories to tell about your mom, stories that are completely yours.”

“How do you know?”

“I’m a sister, just like you. And I’m a younger sister, just like you. All you have to do is dig around, find the memories. They’ll be there.”

“Dig around?”

“You know, ask questions, search out answers?”

“Like a detective?”

Portia laughed. “Exactly. Ariel, the Twelve-Year-Old Detective.”

“I’m nearly thirteen!”

“All the better.”

Portia turned back to the pile of food on the counter. Ariel took the glass and then headed out of the room to her dad’s office.

She felt a little better. She could look for some memories, like Portia said. She could get her own A, and not with some idiotic story about a princess, either. She would do an Internet search.

In the office, she fired up her dad’s computer, the one that didn’t have any kid blocks. She opened her backpack and rummaged around, looking for a pen and some paper. She really needed to clean out her backpack now. Before she knew it, she’d be thirteen. And, seriously, what self-respecting teenager carried around a calculator covered in stickers; a painted inhaler; or crazy socks with individual toes, like gloves for feet. She had outgrown them all.

But then there was the whole thing she couldn’t get out of her head. Her mom had given her the stickers. Her mom had whipped out the nail polish and painted Einstein on the inhaler after Ariel had refused to carry it around because it was stupid.

And the socks? She’d found those after her mom died, like some sort of weird relic from the past. Her mom had been super fancy. How many times had Ariel wondered how a girl who owned those socks could grow up to be a woman who always wore boring clothes and tons of pearls?

As usual, there were more questions than answers.

Ariel went to Google and typed in her mom’s name. Photos popped up. Ariel had seen them before. After all, she’d Googled her mom a zillion other times. No new photos. No new news, either. Just the same articles, the ones about all the good works Mom did, and all the variations on “Social Scion Dies in Crash.”

Pressure built up behind Ariel’s eyes.

Quickly, she moved on. This time, she typed in the name her uncle had used, Victoria Polanski. The computer spun for a second, and up popped a whole new batch of images. Mom way younger than Ariel had ever seen her. Mom with a group of girls glammed up like that old group the Spice Girls, arms linked, drinks in hand. The caption read: Beauty Times Four.

The article went on about Mom and a whole bunch of other people attending a big bash at a bar opening in Union Square.

Ariel couldn’t have been more shocked if she’d read that her mother was a vampire. This image, and the one that was lodged in her head, didn’t match. At all.

She kept scrolling down until she came to a photo of her dad. Actually it was of her dad and uncle, standing on either side of her mom. This time, the caption read: Two Beauties and a Beast. It said that her mom was a beauty, sure, but it was mainly about how her uncle was the beauty to his older brother’s beast. The thought made her hurt a little bit more.

Quickly, she clicked on another link, anything to distract herself. But what popped up made her flinch. An obituary. She hated obituaries. Avoided them like the plague.

On second glance, she breathed a little easier when she realized it wasn’t for her mother. Instead, it was for a man named Bohater Polanski. Bohater Polanski?

Ariel scanned the notice. The man was born in Poland; immigrated to the United States when he was a teenager; married, then lost his young wife; was a longtime maintenance engineer at the Amsterdam Houses, the same complex where he raised his only daughter, Wisia “Victoria” Polanski.

Her pulse slowed.

The photo included with the notice showed an old man with no smile but clearly proud of the teenage girl standing next to him, as if it were the only photo of the man to be found. Even Ariel couldn’t deny that the girl was her mother.

With her heart in her throat, she Googled “Amsterdam Houses.”

Ariel stared at the screen. Her la-di-da mother, who refused to socialize with anyone who wasn’t from the “right” family, was raised by a man she had never bothered to mention, in a housing project in an iffy section of the Upper West Side.

That was the woman who could paint Einstein in lime green nail polish and who owned crazy gloves made for feet.

Sixteen

A CRASH STARTLED PORTIA and she dashed out of the Kanes’ kitchen.

“Ariel?”

“Everything’s fine! No need—”

Portia came to a stop in the doorway to what looked like Gabriel’s office. The room had heavier furniture than the study one floor up. Ariel stood at a mahogany desk with a drinking glass at her feet, a spray of coconut water and ice cubes splashed across the floor.

“Ah, clumsy me.” Ariel closed the computer window, then turned off the machine. “I guess I made a mess.”

Portia eyed the computer. “What are you doing?”

“Homework.”

“That didn’t look like homework.”

“Portia, seriously, you’re showing your age. This is how we do homework now. On computers. We do research on the Internet, then write intelligent reports suffused with impressive detail.” Ariel stepped high over the water and drinking glass. “I’ll get some towels.” She walked across the hall and retrieved two hand towels from the half bath. “But don’t worry, I don’t think less of you for not knowing that.” Her smile widened, and she dropped down and mopped up the mess. Portia dropped down next to her, and they had it all cleaned up in seconds.

“Ariel, seriously,” Portia said in a perfect version of a teenage accent, if she said so herself. “Do I look like I just fell off the turnip truck?”

Ariel eyed her. “You probably don’t want me to answer that.”

Then she surprised Portia when she leaped up, tossed the towels back in the bath, and grabbed her hand. “I’m starved.”

Portia was still worried about Cordelia. After her announcement about the possible indictment, she had later explained that the authorities had started probing not just the bank, but James as well. James had not left the apartment in days.

Portia’s unease grew when she and Ariel returned to the Kanes’ kitchen and found that Miranda was back, this time with a boy.

Ariel stopped so fast that Portia bumped into her.

“Ariel,” Miranda snapped. “Shouldn’t you be upstairs or something, doing homework?” She eyed Portia. “And aren’t you, like, finished playing maid for the day?”

The boy actually laughed, though he also gave Portia a once-over like a bad imitation of a lech in a seedy bar. He looked older than Miranda, though he wore the same school uniform. His blond hair was shaggy, but somehow seemed professionally cut that way, as if he—or his mom—had paid two hundred dollars for the trim.

“This is your maid?” he asked. “My mom needs to fire whoever finds our housekeepers. Ours are always old and major ugly.”

Portia wrinkled her nose. “Do kids in New York really talk like that?”

“Huh?” the boy said.

“Ignore her,” Miranda said. “Come on, Dustin, let’s go upstairs to my room.”

Ariel’s eyes went wide. “You can’t take a boy to your bedroom! Dad will kill you!”

“Well, he won’t be home for hours, so he won’t ever know. Right?”

“I guess,” Ariel muttered.

“Right, Portia?”

“Don’t get me involved in this. I’m just the maid, remember?”

“Whatever. Come on, Dustin.”

Portia cursed under her breath. “Miranda, I don’t think it’s such a good idea to go upstairs. Stay down here, in the garden room.”

Miranda jerked around and gave her a look. “Dad hired you as a cook, I get it. But guess what? That doesn’t make you my babysitter!”

The boy laughed. “Dude,” he said with a nod.

“Your dad won’t be happy if he finds out you took a guy to your room. He might well decide that you need a babysitter.”

Portia didn’t register the sound of the front door opening until Miranda’s eyes went wide.

“What’s up?” Dustin asked.

“It’s Dad,” Ariel said. “He’s going to kill you. Dude.”

“You have to go,” Miranda added. “Shit, how do we get you out of here? What is Dad doing home so early?”

Before Portia could intervene, Miranda pushed the boy out the window and shooed him down the fire escape.

“Portia’s door is always open. I’ll take him out through there once Dad’s inside,” Ariel said as if Portia weren’t standing there.

Miranda nodded. “Great.”

“Hello, Dad!” Ariel sang frantically, blowing by him as he walked into the kitchen. “Back in a flash.”

Gabriel stood, taking in the retreating form of Ariel, and then turned to take in Miranda and Portia. “Did I miss something?”

“No,” Miranda blurted. “Not a thing. Right, Portia?”

Gabriel glanced between Miranda and her. What would she do if he asked her what was going on?

Just a few minutes later, Ariel burst back in.

Finally, he asked, “What’s for dinner?”

“It’s only five o’clock,” Portia said.

“I thought I’d come home early. See how my girls were doing.”

“Ah, yeah. Great,” Miranda stated. She tucked her hair behind her ear and strode past him.

“I’m glad you’re home, Dad,” Ariel said, as if trying to reassure him that he was loved.

Gabriel smiled. “Thanks, sweetheart.”

Then his cell phone rang, and he disappeared into his study. Portia was left alone again to finish dinner and was on the verge of leaving when Gabriel, Miranda, and Ariel reappeared.

“Dinner’s ready,” Portia said.

“Why don’t you stay?” Gabriel said.

Portia glanced around to see whom he was talking to. “Me?”

“Yes, you.”

“Thanks, but I can’t.”

“Come on,” Ariel chimed in. “Stay.”

Miranda glared.

Portia shook her head. “Nope. But thanks.” No way was she getting roped into another dinner with this crew, despite the fact that she was starving.

At six, she found a can of tuna in her cabinet downstairs. At seven, she had eaten and cleaned, then started to pace. At eight, she called Olivia to get away from her thoughts. At nine, she called to check in on Cordelia, though her call went to voice mail. At ten, she went out, hoping to stop her circling thoughts. She was worried and irritable over one unavoidable fact. She was running out of money.

She walked for nearly an hour, but didn’t feel one bit better. When she returned to the apartment, Gabriel was sitting on the front steps, his forearms on his knees.

He didn’t say a word as she approached.

He always took her breath away, the mix of power and brutality, stirred together with an ache that was only visible if you looked closely.

She didn’t need to be with any man right then; she had enough complications as it was. Not to mention the fact that this man had his own set of problems, the biggest of which being that he had lost his wife—the mother of his daughters—the one who didn’t cook but was fun, at least according to Miranda. More than that—if she needed more than that—was the fact that she worked for him. To top things off, if … no, when things fell apart, they would be stuck in the same building, coming and going through the same cramped vestibule.

She hated that he made her want to forget everything and dive into him.

“I want a raise.”

He cocked a brow, leaning back, planting his elbows on the step behind him, a grin sliding across his face. “Last I heard, Hello was the accepted form of greeting in the U.S.”

She slapped her thigh. “God, you with the jokes. But I’m serious. And as you just pointed out, this is the U.S. Haven’t you heard of redistribution of wealth? You appear to have lots. I need some. Hence the raise.”

His grin hitched into a smile. “You’ve barely made half a dozen meals.”

“A half dozen of the best meals you’ve had in a long time.”

“It’s pretty hard to get breakfast wrong.”

“You’d think. But I have a nose, Mr. Kane, and the smell of burned oatmeal wafted from your kitchen the other morning.”

“Wafted?”

“Don’t change the subject.”

His dark hair looked black as night in the sun, the waves reflecting the light, his matching eyes so dark that she couldn’t tell where the pupils ended and the irises began.

“You’re a good cook. I’ll give you that.”

“And then there were the cupcakes.”

“True.”

“Then you’ll give me the raise?”

“No.”

She heaved a melodramatic sigh, somehow feeling better already. “This really isn’t funny,” she said.

“Actually, it sort of is. You look like you’re sucking on a lemon.”

She shook her head with a jerk. “Untrue!”

“Nope, true.”

“Do men your age say words like ‘nope’?”

“This from the woman who just used the word ‘wafting.’”

For a second, she thought he was going to laugh outright. Again. This man who people said was ruthless. But then the lightness dissolved, his face shifting back into hard, unyielding edges, and he stood. “Haven’t you heard how intimidating I am?”

She rolled her eyes. “Who could have missed Big Bad You on the front of The New York Times?” She patted his shirt. “Go scare those poor guys at Global Guppy, or whatever company you’re trouncing. I’m not afraid of you.”

He actually looked a little insulted.

“One article does not a ruthless magnate make, Gabriel. What’re you doing? Warming up to doing a Donald Trump ‘You’re Fired’?”

“Me channeling Donald Trump is about as likely as me giving you a raise.”

“Well, you do have better hair.”

His head fell back, and he looked up to the sky. “Three females in one suddenly small town house, not a one of them who listens to a word I say.”

“Ariel listens.”

He glanced back at her. “When she wants to.”

They walked up the stairs and into the vestibule, but when she reached the entry to her apartment, she turned back. He was watching her, hands jammed into his pockets.

“For the record, I don’t believe a word of that article,” she told him.

He studied her. “You should. Every word of it’s true. I get what I want, Portia. And I crush anyone who gets in my way.”

She blinked, then broke into laughter. “If you’re not careful, someone’s going to ask you to star in your own reality-TV show.”

His eyes narrowed in a way that gave her a flutter of alarm.

“Were you sitting out there for a reason?” she hurried on.

He appeared to debate letting her change the subject. “I rang your bell and you weren’t home.”

“I was out.”

“What, no business plans to refine?”

“Ha-ha. You with the joking.”

He stood there for a second. “I’m guessing Miranda had a boy here this afternoon.”

Portia stiffened.

“I’m not an idiot, Portia. I assume he went out the kitchen window after I came in the door.”

She debated. “Yeah, he did.”

They stood in silence for a moment or two longer.

“I didn’t know much about the girls before my wife died,” he said, surprising her. “Now it’s just me taking care of them. And I know what those boys are thinking. That’s one thing I know about, being a kid lusting after a girl. You don’t think about the fact that one day you’ll probably have your own daughter.”

“You know what they say about karma,” she said delicately.

“I say it’s a pain in the ass,” Gabriel muttered.

Portia smiled at him. “There’s more to raising girls than protecting them. You need to figure out how to have fun with them. Let them see that you can have fun. Make them feel at ease so they’ll open up to you.”

Gabriel’s jaw set. “I know how to have fun.”

“Really?” she challenged.

“Really.”

“Prove it.”

He glanced at her. “I don’t have to prove anything.”

“Maybe that’s true in business. But with your daughters? Do you really believe you don’t have to prove anything, especially when you admit that you weren’t a big part of their life before their mother passed away?”

“What am I supposed to do?”

The noise of New York felt distant, as if just the two of them existed in this city of millions.

“Make something up,” she suggested.

“What?” The word came out as a snap.

“I don’t mean lie. I’m talking about simple kid things. Like looking up in the sky and finding shapes in clouds.”

“I am not a child.”

“No, you’re a dad who’s trying to connect with two daughters. You need to remember what it’s like to be young, Gabriel.”

He grumbled something, and then said, “There are no clouds.”

“You can’t see them because of the streetlight. But I bet if we go up on the roof,” she said, her tone teasing and singsong, “we could see some.”

“It’s night.”

“There’s a full moon.”

“We are not going up to the roof.”

She ignored his glower, then headed for the front door. “Come on. It’ll be fun.”

“Ms. Cuthcart—”

“Don’t go all ‘Ms. Cuthcart’ on me. I’ve wanted to see the roof again ever since I got here.”

She stood in the vestibule, waiting expectantly at his front door, his hard gaze locking with hers. She caught her lower lip in her teeth, trying to look sweet and innocent.

“That would work better if I didn’t know you’re only sweet around me when it suits you.”

She gave a surprised burst of laughter. “Touché.”

After a second, he relented and put his key in the lock. Before he could change his mind, she slipped inside and started tiptoeing up the stairs.

Amazingly, Gabriel followed, floor after floor, quiet so the girls wouldn’t hear them. When they came to the doorway that led to the roof, Gabriel reached out and opened it for her.

The minute she stepped outside, Portia smelled the cool evening air. She felt like the clock had been turned back, Gram still alive, Great-aunt Evie still here, the summers filled with promise of a very different kind of adventure. Portia had loved New York when she was younger, but in a way that was so different from what she felt for Texas, with its giant blue sky and easygoing charm, like sweet tea over ice on a hot day. In New York, nothing was easy; everything was dense, nothing fluffy about it, like bagels slathered with thick cream cheese.

Of course, Gabriel had renovated the space. Latticework provided privacy from the town house next door, a cabana-like structure creating a private space. The long swathes of roofing had been covered with a wooden deck. A table perfect for rooftop picnics stood to one side, with two chaise lounges perched at the far end.

The sky was a dark blue, almost black, the buildings like silhouettes. Only a hint of clouds could be seen.

“It’s too dark,” Gabriel stated, then turned back as if either this space, or the night sky, or maybe Portia, made him feel too much.

“Not so fast.” Without thinking, she grabbed his hand.

He glanced down, and Portia felt the shock of his skin on hers. He didn’t tug away when he dragged his gaze back to hers, but the expression on his face was unfathomable. “Are you intimidated by anything?” he asked softly.

Portia let go and walked away from him, with the same overwhelming awareness that he made her feel sliding through her like a warm sip of brandy. “Of course I am,” she called back.

“Like what?

The future. A life derailed. Twice. Not understanding what I did wrong, or what I could have done different to make things turn out right.

But she didn’t say any of that.

“Hmmm, like what?” She studied the wide black sky. “Like sports metaphors, navigating the Thirty-fourth Street subway station—I mean, seriously, how many subway lines do they have down there?—and SquareBob SpongePants. Or is it SpongeBob SquarePants? Whatever, I don’t get him or his underwater bikini world.”

She heard what sounded like a reluctant snort of laughter as she went over to one of the chaise lounges that sat side by side at the edge of the roof. After a second, she said, “Up here I feel completely alone, despite all the windows, the lights burning. Or maybe it’s because I know that even if someone does see me, here, in New York, no one cares. It’s freeing.” She lay down and looked up at the sky. Finally she looked over at him.

“Come on, Gabriel. The girls are asleep. They’ll never know you were up here instead down in front of your computer, slogging away like a efficient hamster on a wheel.”

She was almost certain he muttered a few curse words and that he would storm back downstairs. Instead, he stood there for a second before he strode across the roof, those broad hands of his shoved in his pants pockets. After a moment more, he lay down on the chaise next to hers, so close that they nearly touched.

“What do you see?” she asked finally.

When he didn’t answer, she rolled her head to glance over at him. He was looking at her, and this time his eyes held unmistakable heat.

The night air drifted between them, something charged. She told herself that she hadn’t had sex in well over a year and that of course a guy like Gabriel with all his barely contained control would make her think of just that. Sex. It made sense that he intrigued her despite the fact that she knew nothing good could come out of getting involved with her neighbor. Besides, he had kissed her. Sue her, she wanted another taste. Which, despite all her bravado about him not intimidating her, was about as sane as thinking it was safe to pet a cuddly-looking grizzly bear.

“The clouds. What do you see?” she asked.

He stared at her. “I see a woman who is tilting at windmills.”

Her eyes narrowed, thoughts of kissing and sex gone. “What does that mean?”

“Not a fan of Don Quixote?”

“Stop showing off and explain.”

His shout of laughter seemed to surprise him. “‘Showing off.’ You are priceless.”

She scowled.

“Fine, Don Quixote went around—”

“With Sancho Panza, trying to rekindle chivalry. Got that, but really don’t know how it applies to me.”

“So you know more than you’re letting on.”

“And you don’t do the same thing?”

She made out his smile in the dark.

“Don Quixote kept fighting battles that he couldn’t win.”

She sucked in her breath.

“As when he tried to battle windmills that he thought were giants that could be beaten.”

“I take it in your oh-so-not subtle way you’re telling me I’m fighting a losing battle,” she said.

“You sound like Ariel.”

“You should sound more like Ariel.”

He shook his head, but he still smiled.

“Just so we’re clear, which battle am I losing?” she asked.

“The Glass Kitchen.”

Portia bristled. “The Glass Kitchen is not a losing battle.” It couldn’t be.

“The way you’re going about it certainly is.”

“What does that mean?”

“You’re not asking enough questions.”

“I ask plenty of questions.”

She forced herself not to cringe at the memory of her disastrous investor lunch.

“What questions should I be asking?” she asked, her tone completely even.

“According to Henry Ravel, you didn’t ask him anything other than where did he prefer to meet. Midtown or Upper West Side.”

“Ack! How do you know about Henry Ravel?”

Henry Ravel had been at her second ill-fated investor meeting. The second meeting that had ended abruptly when he learned she wasn’t associated with Gabriel Kane, at least in terms of investing.

“He called me.”

“About what?” Though she was afraid she knew.

“Somehow he got the impression that you’re working with me.”

Portia groaned. “Sorry about that. He’s the second person my sister has done that to. But Cordelia’s out of sorts, and I haven’t found a good time to scream at her.”

“I’m not worried about the calls,” he said. “But here’s the thing: Even if I thought you should open a Glass Kitchen—which I don’t—you’re going about it all wrong. As I said, you’re not asking enough questions.”

Portia looked up at the sky. The clouds were riding high and fast, like horsemen chasing across the sky. As much as she knew she should jump all over his advice, she just didn’t want it. “Okay, you want questions, how about this: If you can’t see or hear a tree fall in the forest, has it really fallen?”

“You’re impossible,” he muttered, and before she knew what was happening, he reached over and dragged her into his arms, her legs sliding between his as they lay together on his chaise.

“Oh,” Portia whispered, their mouths only inches apart.

“Yes, oh,” he whispered.

Her heart beat hard. She wanted to feel his lips on hers again. She wanted him to wrap her in his arms and make her feel all the things that she hadn’t felt in years, if ever.

But just when he ran his hands up into her hair, she couldn’t help herself. “I do have one important question. Why have you erased all traces of the girls’ mother … your wife?”

They were so close that she could just make out the way his pupils contracted, the only sign of anger.

He didn’t respond. He just looked at her. After a long second, he put her aside as if she didn’t weigh anything at all and got up. He didn’t help her to her feet. He didn’t wait for her as he headed for the door.

“See,” she called after him. “No one likes the important questions. Not even you.”

He didn’t respond, and the door shut closed firmly behind him.

Seventeen

“WHAT’S WRONG?”

Portia found Ariel at the table, head on forearms, a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter by her side, a knife sticking out of the peanut butter like a metal pole planted in a pot. “Ariel?”

The girl stirred and groaned. “What’s going on?”

“You tell me,” Portia said, pulling out a chair next to Ariel and sitting down.

It was four in the afternoon. She planned to make breaded veal cutlets, mashed potatoes, and green beans, then leave it for the Kanes to eat. Between the cupcakes and the cooking, not to mention the trip up to the roof with Gabriel, Portia felt she was getting pulled into this family despite her best efforts to resist them.

With a silent sigh, she pressed the back of her hand to Ariel’s forehead to see if she had a fever.

“What’s going on?” Ariel repeated groggily, then winced at the sight of the peanut butter. “Oh, yeah. I was hungry. But I never got around to making the sandwich.”

“Didn’t you eat lunch at school?”

“Not really.”

“Why not?”

“The lunch room is not the best environment for eating.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

Ariel rolled her head and looked at her. “It means that it’s not a five-star restaurant, okay?”

Portia studied her for a second. “Not feeling well?”

But Ariel wasn’t hot. She didn’t sound sick either. She sounded more dismayed than ill.

Stop getting involved with this family, Portia warned herself. Remain detached. You are the cook. The maid, as Miranda said.

“So, do you want to talk about whatever’s bothering you?” she asked instead, cursing herself even as the words came out of her mouth.

Ariel eyed her for a second and then shook her head. “Nothing to talk about.”

Portia debated, then shrugged. “Okay, then I’ll get started on dinner.”

She could feel Ariel’s eyes on her back.

“Portia?” she said after a few minutes.

“Yes?”

“Did you mean it when you said that if you want answers, you need to dig, even if it makes you uncomfortable?”

Had she said that?

“You totally said that,” Ariel said, yet again reading her mind.

“We were talking about your report.”

“That’s what I’m doing. Trying to write a good report.”

Portia stopped working for a second and thought about it. “Yeah, I guess I meant it. We all have to dig sometimes. We all have to ask questions. Even if we don’t really want to hear the answers.”

Ariel grabbed the peanut butter, pushed up, and headed for the door. “Thanks.”

Portia eyed her. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine,” Ariel answered. “Really.”

An hour later, dinner prepared, Portia thought she heard the outer front door open and close. But she didn’t hear the bell ring.

A few minutes after that, she heard a door again. This time, the bell rang.

Curious, she made her way to the foyer and opened the front door. In the vestibule she found Anthony Kane and her sister.

“Olivia?”

“There you are.” Her sister smiled that particular brand of smile she had, like a single-malt scotch mixed with honey, both sophisticated and sultry sweet. Her long curly hair was loose, her long-sleeved white T-shirt tucked into jeans, a gossamer scarf twisted artfully around her neck. Of all the sisters, Olivia was the most comfortable in her own skin, throwing clothes together with an easy flair that made other women try to emulate her. On Olivia, the clothes made her look like a muse in an artist’s painting. And no doubt Olivia had served as an artist’s muse. Clothed, unclothed. Olivia had never been shy.

“I went downstairs, but no one was home,” Olivia said. “Lucky me, when I was leaving,” she added, her Texas accent stronger than usual, “I ran into this gorgeous man.”

Portia rolled her eyes. Anthony laughed appreciatively.

“Nothing better than a female who speaks her mind,” he said to Olivia.

The outer door opened and Gabriel walked in. He stopped at the sight of Anthony.

The four of them stood in the entry foyer of the Kanes’ house as Gabriel curtly acknowledged Olivia, glanced at Portia, and then gave his brother a particularly forbidding smile. “You’re here,” he said.

His younger brother put out his hands, palms held up. “In the flesh,” he said, his smile wide and charming. “You said you’d have a check for me. Of course I’d be here.”

Gabriel’s jaw ticked. More than ever, he looked the part of the beast. “My study. Now. We’ll discuss.”

“Discuss? I know what that means.” He took Olivia’s arm instead of following. “Maybe you should take a second to think about just what there is to discuss, Gabriel. In the meantime, I think this is as good a time as any to get to know Portia’s beautiful sister.”

“Anthony,” Gabriel stated.

“Just give me a few minutes, big brother. I have no plans for the rest of the night.” He looked at Olivia. “At least not yet.”

Olivia laughed and let him guide her out the door.

Portia glanced at Gabriel. He gave her a hard look.

“Hey, he’s your brother,” she said.

“And she’s your sister.” He turned on his heel and headed for his study.

A few minutes later, Portia found Anthony and Olivia sitting at her kitchen table downstairs, each of them with a glass of fresh-squeezed lemonade.

“I came by to make sure we are still on for tonight,” Olivia said. “The Bandana Ball, remember?”

Portia grimaced.

“Portia.” Olivia eyed her. “Tell me you didn’t forget.”

“What’s a ‘bandana ball’?” Anthony asked.

“It’s the best party in all of Manhattan,” Olivia said. “Every year Texans in New York put on a huge gala event to raise money for Texas charities. This year is a push for Texas literacy. And every year Portia and her—” She cursed. “Well, Portia came to town to join us. This year she’s already here.” She sliced Portia a look. “Here and going.”

“Do you dress up in ballgowns made of bandanas?” Anthony asked with a laugh.

“Actually, no. You dress up in Western wear. Boots, hats, jewels. We bought four tickets, but Cordelia is … well, a bit out of sorts these days, which means we have two extra.” Olivia turned to Portia. “You can’t back out on me, too.”

“I’m sure you have plenty of friends to take.”

“No way. You’re going with me if I have to dress you myself and drag you to the Mandarin Oriental Hotel.”

“I’ll go.” Anthony said.

Olivia gave him the once-over. “Perfect.” She paused. “In fact, I have an idea. I think we need to get your brother to come as well. How can Portia say no if her boss is going?”

“He’s not my boss.”

Olivia gave her a look. “Do you work for him?”

“Sort of.”

“How do you sort of work for someone?”

The boss chose that moment to walk in, without so much as a knock.

“If there is anyone who can sort of work for someone, Olivia, it’s your sister.”

Olivia laughed appreciatively. Portia scowled. But it was Anthony whose expression shifted the most when Gabriel turned to him.

“I’m running out of patience, Anthony. I have the papers ready upstairs,” Gabriel said.

Olivia interrupted without an apparent thought for the tension that crackled through the room. “Come to the Bandana Ball with us, Gabriel Kane.” She turned to Anthony. “Convince him to join us. Two Kane guys, two Cuthcart girls.”

“Olivia,” Portia snapped. “Stop.”

“I think it’s a great idea,” Anthony said. “We’ll go together. Dance up a storm.” He glanced at the clock. “Gotta go if I’m going to have time to pretty up! I’ll sign tomorrow, Gabriel.”

Olivia grabbed Portia’s hands and leaned close. “And don’t you dare wear something boring.”

“I can’t believe I got talked into this,” Gabriel stated.

Portia sat at a table underneath the vaulted ceiling of the Mandarin’s ballroom on Columbus Circle, looking out over Central Park, hardly believing she was there either. But Olivia had pointed out that by not going, she was letting her ex-husband take away something else from her that she loved.

Country-western music filled the hall, the strings and crooning at odds with the elegance of the modern hotel. Bales of hay and old-fashioned wagon wheels decorated a room full of men dressed in tux jackets, bow ties, jeans, and cowboy boots. The women wore diamonds the size of Texas, denim skirts of varying lengths, and stiletto heels straight off the runways of Paris.

Texas women might like their hair styled and their diamonds big, but you wouldn’t find a single self-respecting Texas female in a pair of cowboy boots.

Gabriel looked as if someone had picked him up and landed him on the moon.

“Having a touch of culture shock?” she asked.

He gave her a wry look.

He wore a black suit and a silver-gray tie. Hot, yes. Texas Bandana Ball? No.

She glanced out at the dance floor. Anthony and Olivia were already there, laughing, having fun. Gabriel hadn’t moved since they had arrived.

“Hey, I know,” she said, her tone needling, “why don’t we do something no one would expect us to do and, say, dance.”

“I don’t dance.”

“That’s how the whole unexpected thing works—doing something you wouldn’t normally do.”

“I’ve already exceeded my quota of the unexpected for the night.”

“How’s that?”

“I’m here.”

She laughed at that. “Fine, don’t dance. But could you go sit someplace else then?”

“What?”

“Someone else might ask me to dance,” she explained, “but not if you’re sitting here with me. And as long as I’m here, I plan to dance.”

“I’m not leaving you at this table alone.”

She wrinkled her nose. “It’s hardly a dangerous street corner in the Bronx. And I’m hardly alone. We’re surrounded with hundreds of people. Oh! There’s a guy I know. I bet he’ll dance with me.”

She jumped up, but she hadn’t gotten a step away when a woman came toward the man and led him onto the dance floor. When she glanced back, Gabriel looked exasperated but amused, too.

“If you’d worn running shoes, you could have gotten there faster.”

She shot him a sharp look.

The music coming from the speakers stopped, and a band appeared onstage. At the sight of the country-western band Asleep at the Wheel, the crowd erupted in wild applause; minutes later, the dance floor filled to overflowing.

“What are they doing?” Gabriel asked, his face a mask of disbelief.

Portia laughed. “It’s the Cotton-Eyed Joe.”

Lines of dancers formed spokes, looking like a wheel turning as they danced side by side, shouting out the words. Namely, “Bullshit!”

No surprise, Anthony was at the center, Olivia next to him, her head tossed back in the sort of abandon that drew men in.

Portia watched, wishing she were out there, wishing she possessed her sister’s ease, if not her abandoned behavior. Portia had been in Manhattan for only a few months, but already Texas felt distant. The women with their diamonds flashing in the glittering lights, heels high, fabulous attire, be it short skirts or long. The men with their wide, friendly smiles. But as much as she missed the only place she had ever called home, more and more she was finding that she felt as though she belonged here in New York. She wasn’t even exactly sure why.

She was startled out of her thoughts when two women stopped abruptly on the opposite side of her table.

“Portia? Is that you?”

Portia blinked, then felt her heart squeeze to a halt in her chest. “Hi, Meryl. Hi, Betsy.”

The two women gasped and hurried around to her. “Oh, my Lord! I never in a million years thought I’d see you again, much less here! How are you, honey?”

“Yes, how are you?” Betsy added with her own gasp.

Meryl Swindon and Betsy Baker had been a part of Portia’s world since elementary school. And, like Portia, they had married into the better part of Willow Creek. But unlike Portia, they had moved easily in the new world of heirloom pearls and Francis 1st silver. The only event Portia had truly loved was once a year when she and her husband had traveled to New York to attend the Bandana Ball. Here, in New York, these proper Texans let down their hair. They were more at ease, feeling a camaraderie in a foreign place that they didn’t share at similar events in their hometown.

“I’m doing great!” she replied with that thick cheerfulness she had nearly forgotten about in the few months she had been in Manhattan. “You both look fabulous!”

She felt more than saw Gabriel’s raised brow at her exaggerated cheer.

“You do, too!” Meryl and Betsy said.

“You look,… different,” Meryl added.

“Truly fabulous,” Betsy said. “I swear, after Robert divorced you, I thought the next time I saw you, you’d be a wreck. I mean, who wouldn’t be after Robert made it so public that you weren’t the woman for him.”

By then, Gabriel had stood, every inch the gentleman. Portia felt a sizzle of tension coming from him, filling her with a disconcerting rush of embarrassment. Meryl and Betsy looked at Gabriel, and seemed to assess him with a Texas woman’s eye.

“You’re obviously doing better than we possibly could have imagined,” Betsy continued on, then introduced herself.

The women wouldn’t ever have known that he wasn’t perfectly happy to make small talk with them. But Portia could feel tension run through him, a tension she didn’t understand as he turned to look at her, studying her while Meryl and Betsy went on about something else.

Finally, they walked away and Portia looked up at Gabriel. “Come on,” she all but begged, not wanting him to ask a single question. “This is a party. Dance with me!”

The song ended, the next starting up, and Anthony returned to the table. “I can’t believe you two are just sitting here.”

Olivia came up beside him. “Once upon a time, Portia used to be a great dancer. That is, until she married that ass—”

“Olivia!”

“Don’t you give me that look, Portia,” Olivia said, undaunted. Instead, she came over to Portia, sitting down next to her and forcing her to turn, her always languid eyes fierce. She took Portia’s hands and gave her a little shake. “I saw Meryl and Betsy come over to you. I know how they are, no doubt going on about Robert. But let me tell you, you are better than all the Meryls and Betsys put together. And you certainly deserved better than that philandering prick. If I could, I’d castrate him myself.”

Portia felt the sting of embarrassment at Olivia’s words, the brutal honesty that she was never uncomfortable with. But mostly she was embarrassed that Gabriel heard the truth about her marriage.

A man Olivia had promised a dance to came up. Olivia didn’t look at him. “Are you okay?” she asked Portia.

“I’m fine. Really. Go dance.”

Olivia appeared conflicted.

Portia would have stood, wanting to get away from Gabriel’s questioning gaze, but Anthony caught her arm while she was still sitting down. “Come dance with me.”

He ran his hand down to her fingers, trying to pull her away from the table. She sensed more than felt the tension that flared through Gabriel. She saw the two men look at each other, Gabriel like a dangerous jaguar, Anthony like a spoiled Abyssinian cat.

“Thank you, Anthony, but I can’t dance with you,” she said.

She wanted to dance, but not with Gabriel’s brother.

Just then another man walked up to them.

“Gabriel. Anthony,” the newcomer said by way of hello.

He was tall and good looking, with blond hair and blue eyes. The quintessential all-American boy.

“William,” the brothers said in unison. The man extended his hand to Portia. “William Langford,” he said.

“Hello, I’m Portia Cuthcart.”

“Portia. A fan of Shakespeare?”

“That would have been my mother. First Cordelia, then Olivia, and finally me, Portia.”

William laughed easily. He had charm, but not the bad-boy variety. His was more the elegant man about town. “Would you like to dance?” he asked.

“Forget it, Langford,” Anthony said with a proprietary smile. “She’s dancing with me.”

“Actually, she’s dancing with me.”

Gabriel stepped closer.

Anthony cocked his head, eyes narrowed. Portia could only look at Gabriel, take in the harsh angles of his face.

But as he took Portia’s elbow, to help her from her seat, she jerked to a stop.

Anthony laughed. “Second thoughts about dancing with my big brother?”

Portia gave Anthony a look, one learned at the knee of her grandmother, a woman who didn’t put up with anything.

“Hard to go anywhere when I’m pinned down.” She nodded toward Anthony’s foot. “You’re standing on my shawl.”

The group looked down to see Anthony’s fancy boot on the tail end of Portia’s gossamer-thin, golden scarf, which had partially unwound and drifted to the floor. Tiny translucent sequins glittered in the ballroom lights.

“Though I guess I don’t need it,” she added.

She stood, letting the wisp of fabric unwind completely, slipping from her shoulders, leaving them bare.

Every ounce of darkness in Gabriel shifted to heat.

When the scarf had been draped elegantly, no one had noticed that Portia wore a strapless gold brocade bustier she’d found in her aunt’s trunks. Instead of the traditional blue denim skirt, she wore a gold denim she suspected Evie had worn to some Texan event of her own, back in the day.

Olivia’s eyes sparkled with a sister’s pride.

Portia focused on Gabriel, who stood next to her, his expression indecipherable.

“Our dance, Mr. Kane,” she said, taking his hand and allowing him to guide her onto the floor. But once there, he held her stiffly as they stepped into a country waltz.

He was a good head taller than her, despite her heels. Portia felt tiny, delicate—and definitely undesirable, despite the flash of heat she had seen in his eyes seconds before.

“You’re maddening, you know. One minute you step forward like some warrior staking your claim for the dance. The next you’re holding me like I haven’t had a bath in a week. You could at least try to pretend you’re enjoying this dance.”

“I’m not.”

“Then you shouldn’t have asked!”

“I didn’t. You asked. More like you begged. Twice. It was pathetic.” He smiled at her then, his body easing. “I felt obligated. I don’t usually do pity, but there you have it.”

“I bet you make girls swoon regularly with speeches like that.”

“You got what you wanted, didn’t you?”

The country waltz was beautiful, reminiscent of an earlier life spent in Texas, her parents dancing under the stars outside the trailer, and Gabriel’s steps settled. They made their way around the floor, each turn easier as they learned each other’s rhythm.

“True, I did.”

Portia felt her tension ease and they circled the floor in earnest, his hand at her waist, her palm resting on the hard muscles of his shoulder. After a few minutes, she said, “Admit it. You’re enjoying yourself.”

“Not true.” But she caught a glimpse of his smile.

The music shifted, changing without stopping, to a soulful country three-step, still basically a waltz. Gabriel didn’t miss a beat. He shifted his step with the song, pulling her even closer. He smelled like Texas on a summer morning, the heat simmering, but the harshness lost in the overnight cool. Portia thought of long grasses and wild plains. She itched to press even closer.

“I can see how happy you are,” he said, his voice lower. “Your eyes shine when you’re happy, Portia. Did anyone ever tell you that?”

She tripped, but he caught her easily.

They made another circle of the floor.

“I miss this,” she said finally.

“Dancing?”

“Yes. Dancing, and country music.”

“What else?” he prompted softly.

“Kissing,” she said.

She felt the sudden surge of tension in his shoulder.

“I miss being carefree, driving along two-lane country roads, stopping at Willow Creek Lake, walking along the sandy edge in bare feet.”

“Kissing and…?”

“Just kissing. Sweet, innocent kisses from teenage boys with more hormones than they knew what to do with.”

“Was one of them your husband?” he asked.

“No. No sweet kisses from my husband. Or ex-husband.”

The music came to an end, and Gabriel cupped her chin and tilted her face until she met his gaze. “Your husband’s an ass,” he said. The intensity of his expression melted her heart, melted her dark thoughts.

“Ex-husband,” she repeated.

“Come on,” he said, taking her hand. “I saw some games.”

“The carnival booths!”

Portia had never been good with beanbags or horseshoes. But when they came to a baseball booth, she stopped.

Gabriel eyed her. “A woman who wants to throw?”

“You’d rather I just bat my eyelashes and drink sweet tea?”

“Do you even know how to bat your eyelashes?”

She tucked her chin and gazed up at him, her eyes sultry, then did just that.

He laughed out loud.

“I used to watch Olivia practice in the mirror when we were growing up.”

He shook his head, his smile easing the harshness of his features. “All right.” He handed over a set of tickets.

“You go first,” Portia offered. “I want to watch, see how it’s done.”

“Fine.”

Gabriel took up one of the six baseballs set in front of him, aimed, threw, and sent the ball through the small round opening with ease.

“Not bad,” she conceded.

Standing tall, his expression intent, Gabriel sent three more through the opening in quick succession with the ease of a major-league baseball player. A small crowd formed around him. By the time he had made five of the six, the crowd was bigger and more raucous.

“Do you think I can make the last one?” he asked her, his smile challenging her.

“You’ve made five of six easily. I’m guessing you’ll make the last.”

He turned back with a grin on his face. Taking aim, he pulled his arm back, then threw, but not before the group of men whooped—then groaned—when he jerked slightly and missed.

“Oops,” Portia said, walking forward with a deliberate sway to her hips, her gown glittering in the lights as she held out a hand. “My turn.”

Gabriel handed over the three necessary tickets. He smiled at her, playful, wicked.

She felt a shiver of joy at the sight of this man. “Thank you,” she told him as the vendor set out six baseballs, the crowd quieting.

“Ready?” the vendor asked.

Portia nodded, focusing. She threw once, twice, not stopping as the crowd started to go wild. Thwack, thwack, thwack, until she’d made five of the six throws. Tossing the sixth ball in her hand, one corner of her mouth turned up, she said, “Not bad for a girl, huh?”

Gabriel laughed out loud. “I take it you’ve played baseball.”

“My daddy made a diamond in a field not far from our trailer.”

She noticed the way Gabriel’s brow twitched at the mention of their trailer. But by then, the crowd of men cheered and stomped in their tux jackets, bow ties, and jeans. Gabriel looked at her with an amused smile, and for half a second, she would have sworn he was proud.

Turning back, her heart slammed against her ribs. She had indeed thrown a baseball since she was big enough to hold a ball, then played this exact game at carnivals since she was six. She could throw in her sleep. But with Gabriel looking on, not taunting her as she had expected, yet somehow looking at her in a whole new way, her nerves flared. But then she forced herself to stop thinking, aimed, threw, and sent the ball dead center through the opening.

The crowd erupted, and Gabriel tipped his head back and laughed again. He took her elbow.

“Hey, mister. Don’t you want the stuffed animal?”

“No, thanks.”

Portia tugged away and dashed back. “Of course we want it!” She grabbed all two feet of the plush giraffe and hugged it close.

Gabriel laughed and guided her through the crowd, back toward their table, but the last thing she wanted was to spend another second inside.

“I’ve had the perfect night. But now it’s time for me to turn into a pumpkin.”

“I’ll take you home,” he said.

“You don’t have to. Stay. Enjoy yourself.”

He gave her a look. “You can’t be serious.”

Which made her laugh. “Good point.”

Gabriel guided her out into the night, barely stopping at their table to gather her shawl. It was late, but Portia started to walk.

“We’re not walking home dressed like this. Not to mention the hour.”

“You’re forgetting how safe New York is now.”

“I’m not forgetting. It could be three in the afternoon and I still wouldn’t let you walk in that dress.”

Normally she would have bristled at his tone, but she refused to let him ruin her perfect night.

“All right. How about a bus?” She hurried across Broadway, then Central Park West, to the opposite side of Columbus Circle.

“No way am I taking a bus,” Gabriel said, still beside her.

“Then you’d better find yourself a cab!”

She came to the M10 bus stop on the north side of the circle just as a lumbering bus pulled to a stop. She dashed inside. Gabriel stood at the bottom of the steps for half a second before muttering a curse and leaping up beside her just as the doors closed.

“Does everything have to be your way, Portia?”

“You’re just used to everything being your way. I know how to compromise.”

Given the hour, the bus was empty expect for the driver and a man clearly getting off from the night shift, half asleep at the back. Portia slid onto a hard-plastic two-seater. Gabriel hung his head and sat down beside her.

They headed north on Central Park West, her knee brushing against his as the bus swayed like a boat on a gentle sea. The sky was dark but crystal clear; the sidewalks were crowded even at midnight. To the right beyond the sidewalk, the old stone wall of Central Park surrounded the giant rectangle of trees, lakes, and winding paths. To the left, mostly prewar apartment buildings lined the way like a wall of ancient stone and brick. This new world was nothing like Portia’s old one back in Texas, but the longer she was in Manhattan, the more she fell in love.

“Thank you for coming with me tonight.”

He was silent for a moment. “You’re welcome.”

When they reached the Seventy-second Street stop, Gabriel took her hand and pulled her off of the bus.

“Let’s take a carriage through the park,” Portia said.

“It’s late.”

“You go on.” She started to walk toward the carriages lined up at the entrance to the park, but he caught her around the waist.

They looked at each other before he glanced at her mouth. “I thought you were open to compromise,” he said.

“Ha!”

He didn’t say anything else. When he grabbed her hand and started walking up Central Park West, she followed. And when they came to the town house, a thrill ran down her spine when he guided her down the steps to her apartment.

Eighteen

PORTIA FELT NERVOUS. “Well, thanks again for going with me.”

Gabriel had leaned back against the wall.

“You have an amazing throwing arm,” she offered, her voice clattering. “Almost as good as mine.”

He just studied her.

She kept chattering. “It was fun. Lots of fun.”

His lips quirked up as she rambled. And really, she did have pride.

“So then, good night.” She raised her chin and squatted as gracefully as she could to retrieve the key she kept under the mat.

That wiped the quirk off his mouth. “I told you not to keep a key there.”

“You tell me a lot of things.”

He pushed away from the wall, dragging his hands through his hair. She saw the flash of frustration she made him feel on a fairly regular basis. And right alongside all that pride she’d just had was a wide swath of sympathy, for him. She cocked her head and gave him a sympathetic smile.

“Don’t you dare look at me like that,” he bit out.

“Like what?”

“Like I’m some sort of lost … puppy.”

“You? Hardly. More like a wounded beast.”

That surprised him. And she certainly hadn’t intended to say any such thing. The words had just slipped out.

His frustration turned to something darker.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Really.”

The frustration shifted again and he drew a deep breath. He nodded, and she realized that he was going to leave. Without thinking yet again, she caught his hand.

He stilled, and looked at their fingers, his expression wary. Then slowly he looked up at her. He was fighting, she could see it, and he had no intention of giving in to her.

“Good night,” he said, pulling away.

She should have been embarrassed. Instead, she reached up on tiptoes, slipping her hands on either side of his head, and pulled him down to her. She had dreamed of his kiss since the night he had dragged her through the window. After an evening of carefree baseball throwing and dancing, she felt lovely and alive. Careless. She didn’t want it to end.

They were close, she looking into his eyes. Then she pressed her lips to his. Soft. Barely a kiss. And he groaned into her mouth.

She could feel the way he dragged in a breath, the way he worked to marshal control. Then he gave in with a groan, or maybe a curse, and he crushed her body to his.

Portia closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of him. There was nothing sweet or chaste about their kiss now. It was hot and consuming. She tasted the smoky sweetness of bourbon on his tongue. She melted into him when he ran his hand down her spine, pressing her even closer.

“Give me that damned key.”

He unlocked the door and they crashed into her apartment, hands tugging at clothes, searching out skin. The kiss turned desperate. He tangled his tongue with hers, gentleness gone. He cupped the side of her face, tilting her head back, forcing her to look at him. Her breath shuddered as he ran his thumb across her lips. “I want you,” he said.

More proof that Gabriel wasn’t a man who asked. He demanded. And this demanding man wanted her. The feeling was heady and emotional.

He swept her up into his arms and headed unerringly for her bedroom. It was the only room she’d had time to paint. Small even by New York standards, it was painted a pearly blue that reminded her of a Texas sky—not on a hot day, but a cool one by Southern standards.

She saw the room through his eyes. Upstairs, everything was decorated with exquisite, refined taste that was paid for. She’d lived that life, albeit with Texas rather than New York style. This room was all hers. She’d stenciled the moldings with cream fleur-de-lis and hung luscious silk drapes in her tall windows. No need for anyone to know that the silk had once been a ball gown of her aunt’s. In the dim light it gave the room an unmistakable luster, a touch of what she believed Paris would be like on a moonlit night.

He set her down, letting go of her legs but holding her close, bringing her body into line with his. He dipped his head, kissing the bare skin of her shoulder. “What’s this?” he asked.

It took a second before she realized what he was talking about. “A scar,” she said, her stomach twisting at the memory of running into that sudden storm, crying, as she fought to reach her grandmother—and then the lightning throwing her to the ground in a tangle beside Gram, both of them like rag dolls in the dirt.

She began to push away.

“Stop,” he said, kissing the scar in a way that made her shiver with something more than desire.

She forgot about scars, her grandmother, the past.

The kiss in his library had been amazing, but this was different. He backed her up until her thighs hit the side of the mattress, his hands cupping her face.

“I’ve been trying to get you out of my head, but you keep creeping back in. You distract me, make me lose focus.” His hands drifted lower, his thumbs brushing her lips, then even lower until they brushed against her collarbone. “But I can’t stay away.”

She closed her eyes as he swept her up and put her on the bed.

He came over her. The scent of him filled her, like spice and wild grasses. He slid his knee between her legs, nudging one to the side before he sank down into her, and she could feel every inch of his erection through her skirt. With his arms on either side of her head, he kissed her, coaxing her mouth open, his tongue slipping inside.

Portia ran her hands up his arms, her fingers touching his face. Reality unraveled around them like thread from a spool. Nothing in the world existed but the two of them, touching, kissing, his body pressing into hers. Just when it seemed he couldn’t get enough, he broke the kiss and pulled back to look at her. She could see restraint trying to seep back to the surface. But then it was gone.

With one twist, he had the ties on her bustier falling to the sides. She gasped as cool air hit her skin. His palm came to her breast, pushing it high, his thumb brushing against her skin, an inarticulate sound breaking from her throat.

She arched to him, felt his hand skimming up her leg, gathering the hem of the skirt. Then with a quick jerk, he dragged the skirt off her body and tossed it on the floor.

He slid his hand down her stomach, slipping beneath the thin silk of her panties. The more he took, the more he seemed to need as he reclaimed her mouth.

She moaned, couldn’t help it when she thrust against his hand.

“Yes,” he murmured.

He was slow and sensual, caressing her, kissing her until she couldn’t take it anymore. She bit his lip, groaning against him. But just when he tangled his hand in her hair and entered her, hard, her senses suddenly jangled. She jolted as the images of fried chicken, sweet jalapeño mustard, mashed potatoes, cole slaw, buttermilk biscuits, and strawberry pie flashed through her mind. It was the meal that had first come to her when she was sitting on the front steps and Gabriel had appeared like a promise.

But a promise of what?

Nineteen

ARIEL STILL DIDN’T KNOW much of anything about her mom’s family, other than that they had lived in a housing project only blocks from her dad’s town house, and her granddad was named Bohater. Bohater? Seriously?

Not that she knew much more about her dad’s family that wasn’t the standard brown-haired, brown-eyed sort of stuff. Not the ingredients of an A-plus social studies report.

Determined to find something that fell between boring and the whole “My really fancy, rich mom used to be a wild partier and never bothered to tell anyone that she grew up in a really bad part of town” that would get her killed by her dad, she went back to the Internet. Googling her parents still didn’t bring up anything she hadn’t already learned.

Then it occurred to her: She had never heard a peep about her mom and dad getting married. Didn’t that stuff show up someplace? And if her parents had been in the news for parties they attended, didn’t it make sense they’d be in the news when they got married? Didn’t weddings make for great stories? A wedding report had to get her something decent, right?

She Googled that, too, but found nothing. If only she knew the date they got married. Didn’t there have to be some kind of record?

After more searching, all she came up with to find records was the City Clerk’s Web site. She’d have to go downtown, which was practically like going to New Jersey. No way.

The house was super quiet; Ariel was home only because her school was off a half day for teacher training. She hadn’t bothered to tell her dad, since she had a key to the house and could take care of herself. Besides, she had wanted time alone at home. All the better to exercise her detective skills.

Well, no time like the present. Her dad was at work; Miranda’s school didn’t have a half day; Portia was probably down in the basement cooking her brains out, or whatever she did in her spare time. Even if Ariel couldn’t make it to the City Clerk’s, she had time for a house search.

She bolted up the steps to the top floor that her dad used more for storage than for anything else. There were cedar closets and cabinets filled with drawers that lined the walls. There was a TV and a sound system in there, not set up, sort of like extra. And her old bike was there, too.

She ignored the stairs that continued on to the roof and started going through every nook and cranny. Surely there had to be more stuff about her family. A wedding date. Birthdays.

Looking in drawer after drawer at all the stuff the movers had unpacked and put away, Ariel found nothing. She grew more frantic with each cabinet she finished.

She had nearly given up when she found a box marked MIRANDA in the back of a closet. Not exactly what she was looking for, but she’d take what she could get.

Inside was a baby book. Date of birth. Footprints. A hospital bracelet. A photo. Miranda’s first curl. First tooth. But then the book went blank. It was as if their mom had gotten tired of documenting her first child’s existence.

No matter how much she dug, Ariel couldn’t find a corresponding book for herself.

“Figures,” she muttered to the empty room. Maybe she’d always been a little bit invisible.

When she’d searched every corner, Ariel stopped and looked around the room, mystified. She knew that the only stuff her dad had brought with them from the old house was important stuff like papers and files. But even with that, it was like her mom had disappeared, too. Her mom, her parents’ marriage. Her stomach churned.

Returning to the kitchen, she realized what she had to do. It was already after one, but if she took a cab, she could be down at the records office, get her parents’ wedding record, and hightail it home before her dad even thought about leaving his office.

Yanking on a light jacket, counting out a wad of ones and fives, and even a ten-dollar bill, Ariel flew out the front door. A cab was driving by, and she waved her arm.

When she barreled inside, the cabbie barely glanced at her.

“The City Clerk’s office,” she said in a tone of voice that meant business.

He craned his neck. “Where?” His accent was thick, and he looked like he ate little girls for breakfast.

“One forty-one Worth Street. It’s downtown.”

“I know where Worth Street is.”

“Okay then, good.”

He snorted, turned, and threw the car into gear. They were off.

Panic set in as soon as they turned left onto Columbus Avenue. “Be brave, be brave, be brave,” Ariel whispered to herself.

She hadn’t given much thought to the fact that she was going to be in a car. The kind of car that wrecked. Just like when she was with her mom. She had barely been in a car since.

Ariel reached up, wrapped herself securely in the seat belt, and prayed.

The cabbie careened through traffic, clutching the steering wheel with both hands and talking the whole time into his cell phone headset. She couldn’t understand a word. There was a ton of traffic, but that didn’t faze him.

Ariel closed her eyes, concentrating. “If you take one yellow cab,” she whispered to herself, “moving at one hundred miles per hour for five-second intervals, how long will it take the cab to go three miles?”

But word problems didn’t calm her.

“You say something?” the cabbie called back to her, their eyes meeting in the rearview mirror.

“No. Not a word. No reason to look back here. Best to look up ahead.” Where the traffic and cars are, Ariel added to herself.

They took rights, then lefts, and swooped under a bridge. By the time they arrived in front of a building made of huge rectangular bricks, Ariel’s legs were rubbery. On the backside of a heinous cab ride, she wasn’t sure she was up to the task of sleuthing out any information.

But which was worse? Stay in the cab and ask to be taken home, or get her sea legs back and continue her mission? The decision was made for her when the driver barked out the fare.

“Eighteen?” Ariel squeaked. “You mean eighteen dollars?”

He jerked around, eyes murderous. “Eighteen! If you don’t have money, you should no get in my cab!”

“Oh, no, it’s fine. I have the money.”

Keeping her hands from shaking by sheer force of will, Ariel counted out eighteen dollars. She knew she was supposed to tip, so she added some more. The cabbie grabbed it, waved her out of his car, and raced off, leaving her standing on the curb with only three dollars.

As much as she couldn’t imagine getting back in a cab, the thought of taking the subway home paralyzed her. She didn’t have a clue how to take the train home from downtown.

She started to panic.

“Buck up, Ariel,” she chided herself. “It’s a subway. You take it on the Upper West Side all the time.”

She turned to face the imposing heights of the City Clerk’s office. “You are fine,” she whispered to herself.

Inside she was confronted by intense security. She made it through, though not without a few raised eyebrows, and stopped at the information desk. “I’m here for the records department.”

A gruff woman with steel-gray hair looked down at her. “What kind of records?”

“Marriage.”

“You seem kinda young to be getting married.”

A man behind the desk glanced up from whatever he was doing and chuckled. “A mite young, indeed.”

Great. A couple of jokesters. “I’m doing a report for school.” Ariel tried to look young and smart and like she had a really good reason for them to let her in. “We have to document a city record’s search. I’m going to write about my experience working with New York City and the kind of treatment one gets while pursuing their rights within the law.”

“Whoo-whee,” the man said with a chuckle.

The woman got serious. “Are you some kid reporter?”

“Well no. Just doing a report for Miss Thompson’s social studies.”

The woman glanced at her watch for the first time, probably noting that as it was early afternoon, Ariel should have been in school.

“It’s a teachers’ training day. I’m using the time to finalize the details of my research.”

God, she was good.

“Whoo-whee,” the man said again. “A smart one.”

The woman debated, and then nodded toward a hallway. “Third door on your left.”

“Thank you,” Ariel said. “I appreciate how helpful you’ve been.”

Maybe that was a little much, she conceded. But she was glad she had thought of the whole research angle. She was even gladder after waiting in line for nearly an hour only to learn that she had to be one of the spouses to get the record.

“But, ma’am, I’m just doing a report. I don’t want the actual record. I’m just reporting on how it’s done.” Ariel trotted out the whole social studies angle, eyes wide and earnest. “So if I could just look up a record and explain how the process is handled, you know, how easy it really is for New Yorkers to get the things they need from the government, I would appreciate it.”

This woman gave her a strange look, half disbelief, half worry. No one wanted to be shown up by some kid publishing a tell-all blog.

And her dad said the Internet was a bad thing.

“Fine,” the woman said. “Go to that door over there and tell Ida I said to help you.”

Thankfully, Ida couldn’t have cared less who Ariel was, why she was there, or what she wanted. Ariel blurted out her mother’s maiden name and father’s name, and with a few keystrokes, Ida came back with a date. “June 27, 1998.”

Ariel wrote it down so she wouldn’t forget it. Something seemed wrong, but she couldn’t place what. She gave her parents’ names again. “That’s definitely the date for them, right?”

“Yes.”

Ida clearly wasn’t one to waste words. “Is that all you want?” she said. “It’s 3:15. We close at 3:45.”

“Really?” That seemed really early to close an office. But then Ariel realized she had to get home before anyone found out she was gone. And she still had to figure out the subway route. She slapped her notebook shut. “I mean, no problem.”

But outside, her heart raced. Spotting a policeman, she raced over to him. “Where is the subway? Ah, sir.”

The guy gave her a crooked smile and pointed. “At that brown building, take a right. The subway is a few blocks up on Canal Street.”

She followed his directions. Sure enough, when she came to Canal Street she saw the station. But it was for the N and R trains. She had never even heard of the N or R train.

Fear started to creep up, the kind of fear Ariel rarely allowed herself to feel. “You are not a panicker, Ariel,” she muttered.

Shaking herself, she found one of the posted subway maps. The spider’s web of multicolored lines wasn’t for the faint of heart, but Ariel wasn’t faint of heart, she reminded herself.

With her remaining three dollars, she purchased a single-ride MetroCard and made it to the uptown platform just as a train arrived. She hopped on. The bell rang, the doors slid shut, and Ariel offered up another prayer that this train would get her somewhere close to the Upper West Side.

“Excuse me,” she said to a lady standing next to her.

The woman narrowed her eyes at her.

“Does this go to Seventy-second Street on the Upper West Side?”

The woman hesitated, and in the silence, another woman answered. “No, sweetie, it doesn’t. You’ll need to get off at Thirty-fourth and change to a B. Or, if you need a 1, 2, or 3, you’ll have to go to Forty-Second and change there.”

Ariel’s head spun with a plethora of numbers and an alphabet soup of letters. She concentrated with every ounce of her ability as they came into each station. Prince. Eighth Street. Fourteenth Street. Stop after stop, the train getting more and more crowded, making it harder and harder to see station signs. Finally Ariel caught a glimpse of a sign when they pulled into the Thirty-fourth Street station. She squirmed out, relieved, only to find that she didn’t have a clue what to do next.

“Excuse me, I’m looking for the B train.”

She made it to a B just as it arrived in the station. On board, her heart pounded at stop after stop until she recognized Seventy-second Street.

When she came up onto street level across from Central Park, she was only a block from home. Ariel had never been so glad to see the horse-drawn carriages and masses of people taking photos of the building where some singer named John Lennon had been shot. And when she blew into her house, falling back against the closed door with a gasp, she nearly broke down in tears.

“What’s wrong with you?”

Her head jerked up. Miranda stood at the top of the stairs, scowling.

Ariel blinked furiously. She had no idea what to say. She had been fixated on the maze of subway tunnels and platforms, and hadn’t yet thought about the information she had found: Their mom and dad’s wedding was on June 27, 1998.

Miranda was born on November 19, 1998. Five months after their parents were married.

Twenty

AT FIVE, Portia bolted upstairs to make dinner. From the sunroom, she was surprised when she heard Gabriel’s and Anthony’s heated voices. She hadn’t seen or talked to Gabriel since he’d slipped out of her bedroom that morning. She felt her body in a way that she hadn’t in years, if ever. He had allowed her no modesty. He had taken what he wanted. But, if she was completely fair, he had given as well. Her body shuddered and sighed at the thought. “Bad, bad, bad,” she muttered to herself.

There was no denying that the whole fried chicken–meal thing had thrown her.

The other issue that threw her was that Robert had called three times during the day, but without leaving much by way of messages. Then her lawyer had called, saying that her ex was contesting the small amount he was supposed to pay her.

Her stomach twisted at the thought. She had to breathe through her nose to try to stay calm, releasing her breath slowly into the quiet kitchen. She didn’t have the money to fight him. Very soon, even with the money she was making from working for Gabriel, she wasn’t going to be able to survive in New York.

For the first time she was having to admit to herself that she might have to sell the garden apartment. No question the clock was ticking on her dream of building a new life in the city.

She left lasagna and garlic bread warming in the oven and a salad in the refrigerator and tiptoed out of the house. Once she was outside, the beads of panic didn’t lessen. Nothing was going as planned in New York. She felt as if she was trying to start over, transform her life, remake herself in quicksand. The harder she tried to get free, the deeper she sank. Trying to cook without embracing the knowing wasn’t working; it popped up constantly without warning. Trying not to fall for Gabriel? Also not working. Creating a viable way to support herself and help her sisters? Going the way of women wearing hats.

With no answer in sight, she began to walk. Traffic was heavy on Central Park West before she crossed into the park, veering onto the bridle path. Trees overarched like a canopy of green, runners passing her, generally in pairs, followed by two mounted policemen on giant horses. Portia walked fast, trying to outpace her thoughts. But even when she came to the Reservoir, she couldn’t slow her brain.

She headed out of the park, then turned south. She walked forever, hooking over to Broadway and the crush of tiny shops.

It was right outside of the Sabon bath shop that it hit her, the scent of luscious soaps drifting out into the street. Inside, the space was filled with soap and lotions, bath washes and candles. Her senses were filled, surrounded. Teased.

In an instant, after hours of walking and trying to stay out of her brain, a glimmer of an answer came to her like disparate ingredients coming together to make an unexpectedly perfect whole.

She couldn’t get home fast enough. Banging into the apartment, Portia went straight to the cabinet where she had stored the Glass Kitchen cookbooks. She pulled out volumes one and two, skimming through the first. Then she took up the second book, leaving the third volume where it was stored. Holding the second in her arms, close to her chest, she drew a deep breath.

The answer was here, she realized, in this cookbook. She just had to find it.

She cracked open the old spine and started flipping through the pages, taking notes. Once she had five pages of hurried scribbles, she condensed things down into one single shopping list. Then she began to turn the vision into reality, and a week later, a week of barely managing to avoid Gabriel with an odd assortment of excuses and meal preparation at even odder times, Portia was ready. She had finally put into place exactly what she needed to prove that a Glass Kitchen would work in New York City.