Chapter Seventeen
Sameera was first in the kitchen later, and she stood staring morosely at the Cookes’ fancy coffee machine when Barb joined her. A few moments later, Sameera gripped a fragrant-smelling latte like a life preserver.
“I hope you don’t mind my saying so, dear, but you look as if you really needed that,” Barb said with a smile. “Late night?” Sameera flushed.
“I couldn’t fall asleep,” she admitted. “Tom and I were up talking.” Even after she’d left him on the patio, her thoughts kept doomscrolling between him, Hunter, her job, her parents . . . She wanted to text Nadiya again, but part of her knew she couldn’t handle being ignored.
Barb laughed. “Goodness, child, you don’t have to look so guilty.
I was young once, too. I remember what it’s like to lose track of time when you’re with someone special.
Not that you want to hear about any of that, of course!
Why, when Rob and I first found each other, we were on the phone for hours.
We were long-distance for the first few years. ”
Sameera smiled. “I’d love to hear that story,” she said. She was curious about how Rob and Barb had met.
But Barb changed the subject. “Ancient history,” she said. “What would you like for breakfast?”
Fifteen minutes later, she was seated at the large breakfast counter in Barb’s kitchen, feasting on a pile of fluffy scrambled eggs and orange juice, reaching for toast and accepting a second latte.
She looked around the kitchen—as usual for this time of year, the sun had not risen for the day yet, but the warm interior lighting made the house feel welcoming, despite its size.
Cooke Place was enormous. Sameera had been in many large homes in her life; her parents’ well-heeled friends had bought sprawling houses in gated communities all across Georgia and other states, but this house was something else.
She could feel the history in the walls, and though it had a well-loved and lived-in look, she was pretty sure Cooke Place could host two dozen guests and still feel empty.
“How do you maintain a place like this?” she asked.
Barb laughed. “With a lot of help, and the understanding that you won’t get to everything. I can’t remember when the attic windows last had a good scrub.”
Sameera flushed. “I didn’t mean to criticize,” she said, but Barb waved her words away.
“No offense taken, my dear. Would you believe me if I told you that I married Rob despite the large house and his stature in the community?”
Sameera could understand that. “It would intimidate anyone,” she agreed gamely.
Barb fixed herself a cup of coffee and took the stool next to Sameera.
“I wasn’t intimidated, exactly,” she started, looking around at her domain.
“I just understood the sort of legacy Rob carries, the history and responsibility. I know the toll it can have on a person. My mother started her own business back in the seventies, supplying uniforms for schools in Philadelphia. By the time she retired, she had a mini empire, built from the ground up. She ended up employing half of her friends and most of the family, too. It can cause a lot of friction when everything rests on your shoulders. Rob and I had that in common.” Barb sighed and, reaching for a cloth, wiped down the spotless counter.
“Is that why you don’t want to talk about how you and Rob met?” Sameera ventured. Thinking about her encounter with Tom last night, and the way he’d seemed to shut down at the end, her curiosity was piqued. She wanted to know more about him, and Barb was far more approachable than the prickly Rob.
Barb smiled. “You don’t miss a thing, do you?
The truth is, Tom wasn’t always my biggest fan.
I used to think his relationship with Rob soured when I arrived in the picture, but I soon realized they had their own issues well before.
Tom is more like Pamela, may she rest in peace.
Rob just about fell apart when she passed.
By the time he got his life back together, the damage to him and Tom’s relationship was done.
It doesn’t help that Rob’s a stubborn old ass, and refuses to accept Tom for who he really is.
Don’t think I haven’t told him so a dozen times. ”
“And who is Tom?” Sameera asked, careful to keep her voice neutral, but Barb wasn’t fooled.
“One of the most promising young chefs in the southern United States,” she said. “But of course, you know that.”
Sameera didn’t try to hide her surprise. “You never talk about his career.”
Barb’s smile was sad. “I don’t think Tom would like it, not when his father doesn’t say a word.
I loved that cooking series he did, and of course, the videos he’s done with you.
The one about chai you posted yesterday was fun.
It’s been obvious from the start that he is absolutely smitten, and no wonder. ”
Sameera ducked her head in acknowledgment of the compliment, and tried not to wince at their ongoing deception.
Still, she had promised she wouldn’t say anything to Tom’s parents about the real status of their relationship, not unless they specifically asked.
And things were getting more and more complicated between them, in any case.
“You said he doesn’t cook when he’s here,” she said.
Barb sighed. “Believe me, I’ve tried to encourage it.
Before you, he hadn’t come home in a long time.
Last time he was here, he tried to talk to his dad about what he had built in Atlanta, but Rob wasn’t ready to listen, and I think that really hurt him.
I think Tom decided that if his father wasn’t curious about his life and the things he was passionate about, then he wouldn’t bother sharing.
Which is why I’m grateful to you, Sameera.
” Barb’s face was earnest, and Sameera’s stomach dropped. Not this again.
“I’ve never seen Tom this relaxed, and it’s all due to you. This family was broken, so badly I wasn’t sure we would ever heal. But now that you’re in his life, our son is coming back to us. Rob has never been happier.”
Sameera didn’t know what to say. Everything had felt so simple when she and Tom first struck their bargain. It was supposed to be a mutual arrangement that hurt no one. She hadn’t signed up for this. Before she could respond, they heard the sound of a powerful engine, and they looked at each other.
“Is there a plane in your backyard?” Sameera joked, and Barb’s face lit up. She pulled on her boots and disappeared outside. Mystified, Sameera followed her, then abruptly halted.
There was a plane in the Cooke backyard.
A small two-seater propellor plane, neatly parked two dozen yards away from the guesthouse, as casual as the pickup trucks in the driveway.
Esa, alerted by the racket, ran up to her, and Sameera watched Tom join his stepmother, along with Rob. Barb’s face was wreathed in smiles.
“What’s going on?” Esa asked, and she shrugged, though she was pretty sure she knew who had finally turned up at the Cooke residence in such spectacular fashion: Andy Shaikh.
This was it. The reason she had agreed to the bargain with Tom.
Her entire future rested on Andy’s response to her pitch.
Her palms instantly felt clammy. Esa ran ahead to question his hosts, while Sameera took a moment to steel her nerves.
This man held the key to her continued employment, and her future. She walked up to Tom.
“Did Andy tell you he would arrive this morning?” she asked him.
What she really wanted to ask was if he had spent the rest of last night thinking about her the way she had about him.
Part of her regretted not inviting him to join her in her room, while the more rational part applauded her caution.
Not to mention that her parents would have been scandalized.
Still, it was hard to resist the temptation to lean against him and soak up his warmth.
“We expected Andy today or tomorrow,” Tom said, and she noted the slight coolness to his tone.
Was he not happy to see his friend? “He tends to come and go as he pleases.” There was an amused exasperation in his voice now; she must have imagined the coolness.
Tom had called Andy his brother, after all.
Though she was currently not on speaking terms with one of her siblings.
The man in question opened the door and popped out with a flourish.
Andy Shaikh was a handsome man, Sameera considered, as he climbed down the stairs, already in animated conversation with a thrilled Esa.
A few inches shorter than Tom, Andy had sharp features and thick, dark hair, a wiry build that reminded Sameera of a coiled spring.
He held a small leather backpack in his arms, and after they watched Esa excitedly introduce himself, Andy motioned for her brother to follow him to the—trunk?
Did planes have trunks? Esa’s excitement was clear as he took in whatever Andy had just shown him.
“I hope he didn’t go overboard again,” Barb said, affection clear in her voice. “He always brings treats when he visits, though we keep insisting we don’t need anything.”
Grinning, Andy approached his welcome party with arms outstretched. Behind him, Esa was entirely dwarfed by a giant box that contained a one-hundred-inch flat-screen television. Sameera willed him not to trip.
“You must be Tom’s mysterious new girlfriend,” Andy said. Her gaze had been fixed on Esa, but now she focused on the man of the hour, and her sudden nerves made her breaths shallow.
Andy’s eyes were so dark, they almost looked black, and fringed with thick eyelashes, eyebrows a bold slash across light-brown skin.
Though his smile was easy, his gaze missed nothing.
This was a man who wore his friendliness like a razor, using it to slice inside whoever had caught his interest. Which right now seemed to be her.