Part 4 (1/2)
”What good is a stove without food to cook?”
”You've got salmon,” Ryder said with a poisonous smile.
”Two guesses where I put your salmon this time...?” Kim Sun fired right back.
”I brought you an instructor,” he said, pus.h.i.+ng Ivy forward. ”She and her mother make the best salmon croquettes south of the Antarctic.”
Kim Sun bowed elegantly. ”Miss Ivy. So good to see you again. Tutoring in the art of salmon cookery would be much appreciated.” He glared toward Ryder. ”Some people too stupid to realize one must be educated in preparation of a desired new food.”
”Call me stupid one more time, and I'll send you home in a cornflakes box!”
”No breeding,” Kim Sun told Ivy, shaking his head. ”This peasant knows nothing of proper social behavior. I shall undertake his enlightenment. Again,” he said with practiced weariness.
”Who are you calling a peasant?” Ryder demanded. ”Who the h.e.l.l pays your salary?”
”That pittance?” The indignant man scoffed at his employer. ”You pay me not one tenth of my true worth.”
”Listen, buster, if you got what you were really worth, you'd owe me money!” Ryder ground out. ”A pittance!” He threw up his hands and looked skyward. ”He must be the only cook in Georgia who drives a Mercedes-Benz!”
”Now, now,” Ivy said gently. ”Remember your blood pressure. Come on, Kim Sun, let's retreat before he cuts loose another barrage.”
”Good idea,” he replied. He made a face at Ryder. ”Tomorrow, I quit!”
”Tomorrow, I fire you!” came the gruff reply.
Kim Sun said something in his own language and strutted off to the kitchen with an amused Ivy behind him.
He was a quick study. It took no time at all for Ivy to teach him how to make the croquettes that Ryder liked.
”Is he really so horrible to work for?” she asked, nibbling at a celery stick while she watched Kim Sun fry the croquettes in vegetable oil.
”Not horrible. Impossible!” Kim Sun shook his head. ”He stays up all hours, never eats properly-work, work, work. He has no time for women, and he seems not to sleep very much. At first, I thought he was wasting away for love of someone. But now I think it is an addiction to making money.”
”He's always been a restless kind of man,” Ivy mused, smiling with the memory. ”He could never sit still. But I didn't think you'd have a problem getting him to eat. Heavens, his appet.i.te is legendary around these parts.”
”Only for things I cannot cook. I thought he knew I was a pastry chef. The first time he asked for beef stew, I had a nervous breakdown. From that day, everything went downhill.”
”I can imagine,” she said, laughing. She pushed back her long hair and got up from the table where she'd been sitting. ”I'd better go and rea.s.sure my mother that he hasn't kidnapped me.”
He stared at her curiously. ”Were you ever engaged to Mr. Boss?” he asked unexpectedly.
”Oh...why, no,” she faltered. ”Why do you ask?”
He averted his eyes. ”Please excuse my curiosity,” he asked softly, and even smiled. ”Someday perhaps you will understand the reason for the question. Are the croquettes done now?” he added to divert her, drawing her attention back to the frying pan.
She wondered what he knew that she didn't. Ryder's att.i.tude was brotherly for the rest of the afternoon. He talked to her about Eve and her husband, showed her the wooden elephants he'd brought home from Sri Lanka, and coaxed her to stay and eat a small salad and some of the salmon croquettes. Kim Sun had done a great job, she had to admit.
”Next week, fried chicken,” Ryder told her, leaning back in his chair after he'd polished off an exquisite Pavlova that Kim Sun had created from egg whites and fruit and whipped cream. ”You can't stop now. We'll make a Southern chef out of him yet!”
”Not likely,” Kim Sun muttered as he removed dishes. ”One dish does not a chef make.”
”Then we'll get her to give you weekly lessons,” Ryder a.s.sured him. ”She can consider it part of her job.”
”Kim Sun might not like me for a role model,” she began.
”He will,” Ryder said, glaring at the fuming cook. ”Or I'll let him polish the entire family silver service tonight.”
A furious spate of Korean echoed from the direction of the kitchen after Kim Sun exploded out of the room and down the hall, both arms waving emphatically.
”He'll quit one day,” Ivy a.s.sured Ryder.
”He wouldn't dare,” he replied smugly. ”Where else would he get a cushy job like this and a terrific boss like me?”
Ivy burst out laughing. ”Poor Kim Sun.”
”Poor me,” he sighed. ”The minute you leave, he'll hide my coffee.”
”I don't really blame him,” she said, but she smiled, her dark eyes lingering involuntarily on the strong lines of his face.
Her intent scrutiny made his pulse leap wildly. He returned the long, steady stare and saw the color seep into her cheeks before she jerked her eyes down. Her shyness made him feel protective.
He got up from his chair. ”I'll run you home. Can you be ready to go by six Monday morning?” he added, all business in an instant. ”We'll have to catch a commuter flight out of Albany so that we can make connections in Atlanta.”
”Yes, I can be ready,” she a.s.sured him. Mentally she was kicking herself for agreeing to work for him. It was probably going to be the worst mistake of her life.
Jean didn't think so. She was all smiles when Ivy told her. ”You'll enjoy it, you know you will,” she told her daughter. ”And Ryder will take care of you.”
”I suppose I'm doing the right thing,” Ivy sighed.
”Just take it one day at a time, sweetheart,” her mother said gently. ”And don't worry. All right?”
Ivy smiled and hugged her. ”All right.”
Ryder picked her up at the house at 6:00 a.m. sharp the following Monday. He looked elegant in a dark blue vested pin-striped suit. A black Stetson and black boots completed his ensemble. She felt much less stylish in a two-year-old black suit with a simple white cotton blouse.
”Did it have to be black?” he muttered after they'd said goodbye to Jean and headed for the Albany airport.
”My suit, you mean?” she faltered. She smoothed a hand over her hair, which was pulled tight into a French twist at her nape. ”It was the only one I had....”
”I could have advanced you enough to buy something less morose,” he said tightly.
”It isn't morose,” she returned. ”Basic black is supposed to be very flattering.”
His eyes stated his opinion of it. He s.h.i.+fted his gaze back to the road. ”I'm sorry to toss you into the deep end like this. Ideally you'd have a few weeks in the office to get used to the routine. But I've got to do some work in Phoenix on site, and you might as well see what we're doing out there. It will help you to understand the work you'll be involved with.”
”I've never been to Arizona,” she confessed.