Tempting Donovan Ford (3 page)

He moved to his heavy glass desk and checked his email. He really did have plenty to keep him busy today and tonight and tomorrow. But his mind kept wandering back to Julia. Her sleepy eyes and slow smile. A man could lose his head to a smile like that.

“How did it go?” Mal, his younger sister—his only sister—stuck her head in, interrupting his thoughts. She was wearing the wireless earpiece that kept her in constant contact with her cell phone and meant she was liable to spin away midsentence to start a new conversation. But right now she simply watched him with knowing brown eyes. “Oh, my God.” She plopped down in one of the low-slung visitor’s chairs, kicking up her needle-thin heels. “Are you smiling? After that fit you threw when Dad insisted on going through with the purchase?”

He brought out his best older-brother I’m-in-charge-here expression. “It wasn’t a fit.” It had been a well-reasoned, logical attempt to change Gus’s mind. Donovan hadn’t even stomped his foot. “We had a discussion.”

“Right.” He never had managed much success in pulling anything over on his younger sister, but that didn’t stop him from trying. “So what happened?”

Donovan shook off thoughts of rosebud lips and sexy curves. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

“Not what I asked.” Mal raised an eyebrow at him. “You don’t have to do everything yourself. I’m here now. I can help.”

“I’m not doing everything myself.” He wasn’t. Hell, he didn’t even have a signed contract. “I’m just letting you know that I have everything under control.” Including his libido. Good thing he was seeing Tatiana tonight. The tall platinum blonde would be the perfect antidote to the discomforting feelings coursing through him.

Mal rolled her eyes in the same way she’d been doing since she was ten. “Whatever, Donovan.”

“I’m not trying to keep you out of the loop.” Or he was learning not to. Over the past couple of years, he’d gotten used to being the only Ford child heavily involved in the family business and the one their father relied on. Owen had never shown any interest beyond doing enough to collect a paycheck and, until their father’s heart attack, Mal had been living in Aruba with her fiancé, Travis, running a beach bistro. But Mal had flown home immediately after getting the call and had stayed, taking on the role of marketing and media-relations director for the company. And there had been plenty of times since then that Donovan had been grateful for her support. Not only was she a whiz at the job, but she was also someone he could count on to make good business decisions. “I’ll ask if I need help.”

“No, you won’t. You always think you need to do everything yourself.” Mal pulled out her smartphone, tapping something on the screen. An email pinged on Donovan’s computer in response. “The projections for Dad’s little restaurant and my media plan when we’re ready to relaunch.”

He and Mal had discussed the plan in depth last night. Her plan was three step. First, the announcement of the sale. Followed by a short article highlighting the new look and extolling the exciting new path La Petite Bouchée
was on. Finished with a personalized interview showcasing their chef. Donovan felt another flicker of attraction as Julia’s face flashed through his mind.

“When will we be ready to go?”

Donovan shoved Julia’s dark eyes out of his mind. They wouldn’t be ready to go until they had said chef’s signature on a contract. “I’ll let you know.”

But rather than nodding and accepting his information as gospel, Mal frowned. “No, I’m going to need more than that. Dates, decisions.” She ticked them off on her fingers. “We can’t hold off indefinitely. No one is going to write about the purchase two months after the fact.”

He knew she was right. He also knew that they couldn’t move forward without Julia’s consent. “Then we come up with a new strategy.”

She stared at him with that skewering glare she was so good at. “You thought this was a great plan this morning. What happened?”

“Nothing.” Which was the truth. No signed contract. No verbal one. Just a promise that they’d meet in a week and that sizzle of attraction.

Mal scowled, her earlier good humor disappearing. But she’d been like that lately. Quick to grow irritated over small details. About the same time she’d returned from a visit to Aruba no longer wearing the sapphire ring Travis had given her. “Then what am I supposed to do? Sit around and wait for you to dole out information? When, Donovan? I need to know when to start contacting my people, dropping hints about an exclusive and setting up other events.”

He rubbed his temple. “I know. Let’s discuss later.”

“When?”

He knew Mal wouldn’t leave until she’d pinned him down. It was just one of the many reasons she was so good at her job. He made a decision. “First thing tomorrow morning. You and me.” They could pick some hard dates and make decisions based on the assumption that Julia would have signed the contract by next week. He didn’t want to consider the fact that Julia might turn him down.

“You and me and coffee,” Mal agreed. She tapped on her phone again. “Should we invite Owen?”

“Why?” Donovan loved his brother even though he was regularly annoyed by him, but Owen was not a businessman. “What’s he going to do? Offer to sleep with the reporter?”

Mal smirked, some of her earlier good mood returning. “Oh, I don’t think you should be throwing any stones, brother.”

“Me?” Donovan enjoyed the company of women. A lot. But he was hardly the Romeo his brother was. Donovan doubted Owen had ever gone out with the same woman twice in a row and he regularly juggled multiple lady friends. Donovan was a one-woman-at-a-time guy. It was just that he hadn’t met a woman who made him want to give up all others forever. Nothing wrong with that.

“Yes, you.” Mal shrugged. “Hey, maybe you’d find the reporter so appealing that you wouldn’t be able to help yourself, and the great story with excellent placement on the front page would just be a bonus.”

“You would pimp me out for the family business?”

Mal considered that and then shook her head. “You’re right. It would be wrong of me.”

“Exactly.” Now, if she wanted to pimp him out to convince the new chef to sign...

“I’d pimp out Owen. He’s much prettier.”

Donovan snorted.

CHAPTER TWO

“
I
STILL CAN’T
believe you refused to sign.” Sasha stared at her with wide green eyes, looking impossibly innocent though Julia knew that to be far from true. Still, Sasha’s innocence or lack thereof wasn’t the point here.

They were holed up in a corner booth at Elephants,
a destination Julia hadn’t chosen and wasn’t comfortable with. But when she’d mentioned to Sasha that perhaps they should find another place to have a bite to eat and a drink to unwind, Sasha had overruled her since they were now part of the Ford family group of establishments.

Julia didn’t know about that, but she was keeping an eye out for the family in question. Or for one particular member. “Of course I refused to sign.” It was probably ridiculous to think that Donovan would be down here in the wine bar. He worked in the offices. He didn’t get down and dirty in the trenches. “No doubt it was full of legal ropes that would bind me to a lifetime of servitude.”

The interior of the bar was gorgeous. Not Julia’s style, but stunning. Although the lighting was low, everything sparkled and gleamed, like the inside of a snowflake. A long white glass bar and crystal lights that gave off just enough illumination to see without ruining the cool ambience.

“Exaggerate much? I hardly think he’s trying to trick you into indentured servitude. Although I have to say, if I was going to be tied up, he would definitely make the list.” Sasha tapped a finger against the stem of her wineglass. “And I thought he seemed nice.”

Julia rolled her eyes and turned her attention to the food on the table. It was a little boring but tasty. Not something she’d serve, but then, this wasn’t her restaurant. She swallowed the sudden lump in her throat. Ignoring the fact that she didn’t have a restaurant to call her own. Not really.

“He had a nice body. Or are you going to tell me you didn’t notice that, either?” Sasha wasn’t giving up.

Oh, she’d noticed, and filed it away as a wasted observance. Because the only thing Donovan Ford had that she wanted was La Petite Bouchée.

Julia noted the lascivious glint in Sasha’s eye, obvious even in the dim interior of the wine bar. She didn’t like it. “Not that it matters, but he’s off-limits.” She wasn’t going to get into a session about the rest of Donovan Ford’s obvious attributes. Danger and distraction lay that way. And really, she didn’t care who or what he did in his spare time, so long as her staff weren’t involved.

“Oh, is he?”

Julia ignored the teasing tone and questioning look. “I told him I wanted him to pay me in shares.”

The diversion appeared to work, since Sasha frowned and asked, “For the restaurant?”

“Yes. Like the deal I had with Alain.” The original owner, the one who’d loved the restaurant as much as she did. The deal she’d never bothered to get in writing because she’d trusted Alain. Julia sighed. It was her own fault.

When she’d returned to Vancouver, she’d been thinking only about caring for her ailing mother, not her career. But Suzanne had wanted Julia to take the role of executive chef at La Petite Bouchée, a role Suzanne had held for a decade. Julia had agreed, noting that it was only temporary, just until her mother recovered and could return to the kitchen. Except Suzanne had never recovered, the cancer metastasizing through her body, leaving Julia with no family and a temporary job.

When Alain had offered her the position permanently, she’d agreed. There had been comfort in working at the same place as her mother, working with the staff who had loved Suzanne as much as she had. And she found consolation working in a space imbued with her mother’s presence. Due to the restaurant’s struggling fortunes, Alain had been unable to pay her the salary she knew she deserved, but he’d offered something better. The promise that when he retired the following year, he’d sell her La Petite Bouchée at a discounted price.

Except Alain had passed away before retirement, and when his nephew and sole heir, Jean-Paul, claimed no knowledge of the deal, Julia found herself with no legal recourse. Just a nearly empty bank account. But she could learn from her mistakes. This time, she’d get everything on paper. And notarized. Assuming she could talk Donovan Ford into it.

“And what did he say?”

“He wasn’t amenable to the idea.” Which was putting it mildly. He’d been painfully, stridently clear that he wouldn’t offer shares. On the other hand, he’d admitted he wanted to sell, which provided her with opportunity. If she could find a way to merge the two, they might have a deal.

“And will you sign without them?”

That was the question that had been rolling around in her head since the meeting. Without some sort of ownership promise from the Fords, she was merely an employee and replaceable. After all, there were plenty of fantastic cooks in the city.

The thought of leaving the restaurant made her stomach twist. A strong, visceral gut reaction of no. No way. No how. No dice. La Petite Bouchée
was hers. No matter if her name was on the deed or not.

“I don’t know,” she told Sasha, not willing to go into her thoughts until she had some of them sorted out.

Julia had spent too much time thinking about it. She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it all day. Not when she chopped vegetables, oversaw the evening service or assisted with cleanup after closing. But she was still no closer to figuring out what she would do if she and Donovan couldn’t come to an agreement.

She did know one thing. “I won’t be undervalued.” Julia didn’t think it was bragging to say that the only reason La Petite Bouchée
hadn’t gone completely under when Jean-Paul took over and decided to cut her budget in half was that she’d made it work. Unwilling to see the once-grand restaurant where her mother had been head chef declare bankruptcy, she’d worked around his ridiculous decisions, always with an eye on the final prize of buying it from him.

Of course, that hadn’t gone according to plan.

Julia’s throat tightened. She lifted her wineglass to her lips and then put it down without sipping. Wine wasn’t going to ease the rigidity there. The restaurant, her mother, family had all gotten twisted together and she didn’t know how to separate them. She sniffed and dabbed at her eyelashes.

“Your mom?” Sasha asked, her voice quiet but still audible under the hubbub of other conversations, most patrons half-corked by this time of the night. One of the benefits of being such close friends and spending so much time together meant she didn’t have to explain why she was feeling emotional.

Julia nodded. Her mom had been gone for just over eighteen months, but it still felt so close. There were mornings she woke up and couldn’t believe she was gone. She wondered if that place in her heart would ever be filled or, at least, not feel so big.

She had no other family. An only child of an only child. Her grandparents had died when she was little and she’d never known her father. All her mother would tell her was that he was a Parisian she’d met while apprenticing as a chef in the City of Light. No name, no background, not even a photo, though Julia could surmise he’d been lithe and dark like her. Her mother had been short and round, the years of butter and heavy cream she featured in her dishes showing on her round cheeks and rounder hips. Suzanne had also been much fairer than Julia.

“I miss her.”

“Of course you do.” Sasha hugged her. Julia absorbed her friend’s comfort. The kindness and sympathy offered without judgment or expectation of payment. Sometimes Sasha reminded her of her mom. The welcoming way they invited others into their lives so easily.

When she’d gone to Paris for staging—working in high-end kitchens for a pittance, the real salary being the opportunity to train under a highly respected chef—she’d looked for her father, checking the eyes of every man of the right age to see if they looked like hers.

Her direct appraisal had gotten her hit on a few times, but no closer to finding her father. She’d finally come to accept that she would probably never know. Her mother claimed not to have even told the man she was pregnant. Julia suspected he might have been married. Maybe she had an entire family in France, half brothers and sisters, a stepmother who would make those clucking French noises when she didn’t like something and a father who shared her eyes. But she wasn’t going to find them.