Читать книгу Sweet Dreams - Rochelle Alers, Rochelle Alers - Страница 12

Chandra followed Preston into an expansive state-of-the art stainless-steel-and-black gourmet kitchen outfitted with Gaggenau appliances. “Very nice,” she crooned.

“Should I take that to mean you like my kitchen?” There was a note of pride in Preston’s voice, as if he were talking about one of his children who’d aced an exam.

She met his questioning gaze with a wide smile. “Did you think I was talking about you?”

“I was hoping you’d think I’m nice.”

Chandra sobered. “Does it matter what I think of you, Preston?”

“Of course it does. After all, we’re going to be collaborating.”

“Hold up, dark and brooding. First you want me to develop a paranormal character, and now you’re talking about collaboration.”

“Pascual is yours, beautiful, and that means we’ll have to collaborate to make him a powerful and memorable character. I need for him to mesmerize the audience the second he walks on stage. Even before he opens his mouth, he must pull them in and not let them go until the final curtain.”

“Are you going to include him in every scene?” Chandra asked.

“No. It would make it too intense. Whenever he’s offstage I want to build enough tension for the audience to look forward to his reappearance. Enough shoptalk. I don’t know about you, but I’m ready to eat.”

Chandra was also ready to eat. Aside from the salad she’d eaten the day before, her only intake of food was a cup of coffee earlier that morning. “It looks as if you do some serious cooking in here.”

“It works whenever I host a dinner party. There’s more than enough room for a caterer and his staff to work without them bumping into one another.”

Preston’s kitchen was almost as large as the apartment she was renting from her cousin. It was furnished with top-of-the-line cook ware and miscellaneous culinary gadgets suspended on hooks from an overhead rack.

“How often do you have dinner parties?” she asked, recalling Denise telling her that Preston usually kept a low profile.

“I always host one before the debut of a new play. I invite the entire cast and production staff.”

She watched as Preston rolled back his shirt cuffs, exposing muscular forearms before washing his hands in one of the double sinks. “How long does it usually take for you to write a play?”

He dried his hands on a towel. “It depends on the subject matter and my state of mind. My first one took several years because I’d reworked it half a dozen times. However, there was one I completed in four weeks, but it took its toll on my health because I’d averaged about three hours of sleep each night. I took a couple of months off, checked into a resort and did nothing more strenuous than eat and laze around.”

Removing her suit jacket, Chandra hung it on a high-back stool pushed over to the slate-gray granite countertop. “You probably were burned out.”

“Probably? I was. It was another year before I was able to focus and write again.”

“How long do you project it will take for you to complete Death’s Kiss?” she asked.

Preston, resting his elbows on the countertop, gave her a long, penetrating stare. “That all depends on my collaborator’s availability.”

“And that depends on whether I can find a teaching position. I’ve applied to several schools with vacancies for Pre-K to 6. I’ll be available to you until I’m hired.”

The schools Chandra had applied to were in designated hard-to-staff districts. Belinda taught at a high school in those districts. Earlier that year one of Belinda’s students was arrested and expelled for discharging a handgun in her classroom. Fortunately the incident ended with no casualties.

Teaching in the public school system would be vastly different from what she’d experienced in the exclusive private school in Northern Virginia where the yearly tuition was comparable to private colleges. The most profound difference between the children who attended Cambridge Valley Prep, Philadelphia public schools and her former students in Belize was that the prep school students were the children of elected officials and foreign dignitaries.

Preston stood up straighter. “Where did you teach before?”

“The Peace Corps, and before that I taught at a private school in Virginia.”

“You really were in the Peace Corps?” There was a note of incredulity in his query.

“Yes,” Chandra confirmed.

“Where were you stationed?” he asked, continuing with his questioning.

“Belize.”

Preston never imagined that she had been a Peace Corps volunteer. There was something about Chandra Eaton that projected an air of being cosseted. Now that she’d revealed that she spent two years working in Central America he saw her in a whole new light.

“After you let me know what you want to eat, I want you to tell me about Belize, and if it is as beautiful as the photographs in travel brochures?”

Propping her elbow on the cool surface of the countertop, Chandra supported her chin on her heel of her hand. “I’d like an omelet.”

“Would you like a Western, Spanish or spinach?”

“Spinach.”

“Blue or goat cheese?”

“I prefer blue cheese.” Pushing back from the countertop, Chandra slipped off the stool. “Do you mind if I help you?”

Preston held up a hand. “No. Sit down and relax.”

She affected a frown. “I’m not used to sitting and doing nothing.”

Preston stared at the slender woman in business attire, realizing they were more alike than dissimilar. Even when he was in between writing projects he always found something to do. He usually retreated to his Brandywine Valley home to catch up on his reading and watching movies from his extensive DVD collection. He also chopped enough wood to feed two gluttonous fireplaces throughout the winter months. And whenever he heard the stress in his sister’s voice from having to deal with her four sons—both sets of twins—he drove down to South Carolina to give her and his probation officer brother-in-law a mini vacation. He took his rambunctious nephews on camping excursions and deep-sea fishing. Last year they’d begun touring the many Sea Islands off the coast of Georgia, Florida and their home state.

Preston enjoyed spending time with the seven- and ten-year-olds, becoming the indulgent uncle, yet oddly had never felt the pull of fatherhood. He wasn’t certain if it was because of his own father or because he hadn’t met that special woman who would make him reexamine his life and bachelorhood status.

Chandra had thought him a misogynist when he was anything but. He liked women. He liked everything about a woman: her soft skin, the curves of her body and her smell. It was the smell of her skin and hair that was usually imprinted on his brain. Whenever he dated a woman, he was able to pick her out in a darkened room because of her scent.

He preferred working in the kitchen without assistance or interference but decided to relent and let Chandra help him. “Let me get you something to cover your clothes. If you want, you can cut up the fruit.”

Chandra flashed a dimpled smile. She needed to do more than sit and watch Preston. She wanted to discover what it was like to actually cook in a gourmet kitchen. “Where’s your bathroom?”

Preston pointed to a door at the opposite end of the kitchen. “It’s the door on the right,” he said as Chandra headed toward the bathroom.

He stared at the roundness of her shapely hips until she disappeared from his line of vision. I like her. Preston liked everything there was to like about Chandra Eaton: her blatant femininity, natural beauty and the intelligence she made no attempt to hide.

When she’d mentioned the idea of writing a play using a vampire as the central character, it had started a flurry of ideas like a trickle of water that flowed into a stream, then into rapids and finally into a fast-flowing river. It reminded him of the Colorado River rushing through the Grand Canyon.

With his creative imagination going full throttle, he was able to outline the production, design the lighting, costumes and props. He could hear the slow drawling Southern cadence and Creole inflections that were as much a part of New Orleans as its cuisine. Death’s Kiss had come alive in his mind. All that remained was writing it once Chandra developed Pascual.

Preston had taken a package of frozen spinach, four eggs and a plastic container of blue cheese from the refrigerator/freezer as Chandra returned to the kitchen. She was barefoot and had twisted her hair in a loose chignon at the nape of her neck. He smiled when he saw the bright red color on her toes.

Reaching into a drawer under the countertop, he pulled out a bibbed apron. “Come here,” he ordered.

Chandra approached Preston, turning so he could slip the apron over her head. He adjusted the length until it reached her knees, then looped the ties twice around her waist.

Shifting, she smiled up at him. “I’m ready, chef.”

Lowering his head, Preston kissed the end of her nose. “Never have I had a more delicious-looking sous chef. If you look in the right side of the refrigerator, you’ll find fruit in the lower drawer.”

He left Chandra to take care of the fruit salad while he began the task of thawing the spinach in the microwave, placing it in a colander to drain before removing the remaining moisture by squeezing the chopped leaves in cheesecloth. Pausing, he opened an overhead closet and pushed a button on a stereo unit. The beautifully haunting sound of a trumpet filled the duplex.

Chandra shared a smile with Preston as she glanced up from peeling the fuzzy skin of a kiwi, revealing its vibrant green flesh. She found it ironic they had a similar taste in music. Before leaving for Belize, she’d loaded her iPod with music from every genre. Chris Botti’s Night Sessions had become a favorite.

“You have to have at least one romantic bone in your body if you like Chris Botti,” she said teasingly.

Preston stopped mincing garlic on the chopping board. “Okay. I’ll admit to having one,” he said, conceding.

He didn’t know what Chandra meant by being romantic. If it was about sending flowers, telling a woman she looked nice or buying her a gift for her birthday or Christmas, then he would have to say he was. But if a woman expected him to declare his undying love for her then she was out of luck.