“Just, you know, getting the day started,” Jacob said.
Was he the designated spokesman for the morning? They seemed to choose a different one each day.
Lissa poured herself coffee, added cream, added sugar, stirred, sipped, took her time while working up something she could say that would let them know how much she loved them, how much she appreciated their love for her, but how it was time for everybody’s life to return to normal.
Hell. She decided she’d simply improvise.
“Listen, you guys…” They all looked at her as if they expected a message from an oracle. She cleared her throat. “I have something to tell you.” No one moved. No one breathed. Even the babies were still. “I’m going home.”
That did it. They all spoke at once. Different voices, different words, one message.
She was home!
“No,” she said gently, “I’m not. What I mean is, this place will always be home, of course. But I have a life in L.A. Such as it is, anyway.” She tried a smile; unfortunately, nobody smiled back. “My apartment is there. My things. My contacts. And before you point out that the one thing I don’t have there is a job, well, I’m going to do something about that.”
“Like what?” Caleb said.
There was a note of belligerence in his voice. One wrong word and for all she knew, her crazy, wonderful family was capable of barring the door to stop her from another try at taking on the big, bad world.
“For starters, I’m going to visit the last place I worked. Really worked, I mean. I was executive chef there and—well, the details don’t matter. What does matter is that I let people think I’d messed up and been fired. I didn’t and I hadn’t, and I’m going to sort that out first. Then I’m going to talk with my agent. I might look for a different kind of job. Private cook to some big-shot producer. Or start my own boutique catering service. Boutiquey stuff is big in La La Land.”
She tried another smile and was rewarded with a twitch of the lips from one sister and two brothers.
“I might even decide to pull up stakes and try another city.”
“How about Dallas?” Travis said.
She knew he was dead serious, so she gave a dead-serious answer.
“Maybe.”
“What do you mean, maybe?” Jake said. “It’s a great place—you already know that. And we know lots and lots of people who’d line up around the block to eat at a place Lissa Wilde ran.”
“It’s the Wilde part I’m trying to get away from,” Lissa said, even though she’d never realized it until that instant. “I love our family. I’m proud of our name. But—”
“But she wants to succeed on her own,” Emily said. Everyone looked at her and she blushed.
Her husband, Marco, took her hand and brought it to his lips. “And you did, bellisima,” he said softly.
Jaimie nodded. “Making it as yourself, not as a Wilde, is really, really important.”
Zach, her fiancé, slipped his arm around her shoulders.
“That’s my James,” he murmured, and dropped a kiss on her temple.
Lissa looked at her brothers. Their expressions were impassive. Then, Jake sighed. Travis shrugged his shoulders. Caleb nodded his head.
“Go for it, kid,” he said.
Lissa laughed. She cried, too, but these were good tears.
She went from Wilde to Wilde and hugged them. “I love you all,” she said.
She went upstairs and changed her clothes. She didn’t even bother packing; that would have taken too long. Besides, she had a closet full of clothes back in L.A. The only thing she didn’t have back there was the garish-pink goody called Pleasure Pleaser. It was here, still inside the suitcase she’d brought with her, and it could remain there.
She’d never gotten around to using it.
She hadn’t had to use it, she thought with a little lump in her throat.