One Winter's Day: A Diamond in Her Stocking / Christmas Where They Belong / Snowed in at the Ranch. Marion LennoxЧитать онлайн книгу.

       CHAPTER SIX

      THE SATURDAY TASTE-TESTING brunch at the café was in full swing. Bay Bites was packed with people, most of whom Lizzie didn’t recognise, all of whom she wanted to impress. She’d spent all of Friday prepping food and working with the staff Sandy had hand-picked for her. They’d bonded well as a team, united by enthusiasm for the new venture. Now it was actually happening and it was exhilarating and scary at the same time.

      She took a moment out from supervising her new kitchen staff to stand back behind the dolphin-carved countertop and watch what had turned into a party of sorts.

      So far, so good. Her menu choices were getting rave reviews. She’d decided to serve small portions from the basic menu, handed around from trays, so people could try as many options as possible. She’d gone as far as printing feedback sheets to be filled in but the Dolphin Bay taste-testers were proving more informal than that. They simply told her or the wait staff what they thought. She took their suggestions on board with a smile.

      ‘I’d go easy on the chilli in that warm chicken salad, love,’ Jesse’s seventy-five-year-old great-aunt Ida said. ‘Some of us oldies aren’t keen on too much of the hot stuff.’

      ‘The only problem with those little burgers was there weren’t enough of them,’ said the bank manager, a friend of Ben. ‘Your other greedy guests emptied the tray.’

      ‘The triple chocolate brownies? Bliss,’ said one well-dressed thirty-plus woman. ‘I’ll be coming here for my book club meetings—it’s ideal with the bookshop next door.’

      Lizzie soon sensed an immense goodwill towards the new venture. Not, she realised, because of any reputation of hers. Because of Ben and Sandy, she was accepted as a member of the well-loved Morgan clan.

      And then there was the Jesse effect. A number of these people were the wedding guests who had discovered her and Jesse kissing on the balcony. She was, and always would be in their eyes, one of ‘Jesse’s girls’ and included in their general affection towards him. Who would have thought it?

      From her corner behind the counter, she watched Jesse as he worked the room, towering head and shoulders above most of the guests. Was he aware of how many female eyes followed him? Her eyes were among them. No matter where he was in the café she was conscious of him. It was as if he had some built-in magnet that drew female attention. She was no more immune than the rest of them. She just had to continue to fight it if she was going to be able to work with him.

      He’d insisted on wearing the same blue jeans, white T-shirt and butcher-striped full apron in sea tones of blue and aqua as the wait staff. How could a guy look so hot in such pedestrian work-wear? But then a guy as handsome and well-built as Jesse would look good in anything. Or nothing. She shook her head to rid both her brain and her libido of such subversive thoughts. Jesse was off-limits—even to her imagination.

      He’d arrived this morning before anyone else. ‘I’m here to help,’ he’d said. ‘If I wear the uniform, people will know it.’

      ‘I thought you were here to taste the food,’ she’d protested as he’d tied on the apron, succeeding in looking utterly masculine as he did so. The colours of the stripes made his impossibly blue eyes look even bluer.

      ‘I can do both,’ he’d said in a tone that brooked no argument.

      She’d let it go at that, in truth grateful for the extra help. And he had excelled himself. It appeared he knew most of the guests—and if he didn’t he very soon did. Through the hum of conversation, the clatter of cutlery, the noise of chairs scraping on the tiled floor, she could hear the deep tones of his voice as he made people welcome to Bay Bites and talked up the food while he was at it.

      If she had hired an expensive public relations consultant they wouldn’t have done better than Jesse in promoting the new business.

      She froze as she saw him bend his dark head to chat with Evie, the pretty blonde wife of the dairy farmer Jesse had introduced her to on Thursday. Straight away Lizzie had sensed that the girl was more than a mere acquaintance. Sure enough, it turned out she had dated Jesse in high school.

      How many other women in this room had Jesse been involved with? Was involved with right now?

      Was he really a player in the worst sense of the word, moving on once he’d made a conquest? Or was he just a natural-born charmer? She suspected the latter. The nurses in the hospital where he’d been born had probably gone gaga over him as he’d lain kicking and gurgling in his crib. And she’d bet he’d been a teacher’s pet all the way through school—with the female teachers, anyway.

      Evie had come to the taste-testing without her husband; rather she was accompanied by a curvy auburn-haired girl who was a friend visiting from Sydney. Lizzie gripped tight onto the edge of the counter as Evie’s companion laughed up at Jesse. She schooled her face to show no reaction. He could talk and laugh with whatever woman he pleased. It was nothing to her.

      That uncomfortable twinge of jealousy she felt as she watched them was further reason to keep Jesse at a distance.

      Jealousy. She had battled hard with herself to overcome what she saw as a serious character flaw. As a child she’d been jealous of Sandy, not just for her toys or pretty dresses, but also because she’d been convinced her father loved Sandy more than he’d loved her. Thankfully, her mother had identified what was going on and made sure no rift ever developed between the sisters. She’d helped the young Lizzie learn to handle jealousy of other kids at school and later jealousy when she’d thought people at work had been favoured over her. As an adult, Lizzie had thought the demon had been well and truly vanquished. Until she’d met Philippe.

      She’d been just twenty-one and working at an upmarket resort in Port Douglas in tropical far northern Queensland. She had worked hard and played hard with talented young chefs from around the world on working holidays. Good-looking, charming Philippe had been way out of her league. But he’d made a play for her and she’d fallen hard for his French accent and his live-for-the-moment ways. It hadn’t mattered that other girls never stopped flirting with him because he had assured her he loved only her. She’d followed him to France without a moment’s hesitation.

      But the jealousy demon had reared back into full flaming life after she’d given birth to Amy. For the first six months she’d been stuck at home living with his parents while he’d continued the work-hard-play-hard lifestyle they’d formerly enjoyed together. And Philippe had not been the type of man to do without feminine attention.

      Just like Jesse, she thought now as he smiled at the auburn-haired girl who was hanging onto his every word. Who could blame the girl for being dazzled by his movie-star looks and genuine charm? She couldn’t let it get to her. Women of all ages gravitated to Jesse and he gravitated to them. That was the way he was and it wasn’t likely to change. It was