The Offer She Couldn't Refuse Read online

  “Stitches,” she squeaked fearfully.

  He grinned. “They don’t hurt that much. And maybe you won’t need them. Don’t worry, you’ll be all right. But there’ll be no waitressing for you today.”

  Just who the hell did he think he was, Superdoctor? “Did your X-ray vision tell you that?” Demi wanted to know.

  “Demetria,” her mother chided.

  It irritated Demi no end that her mother was still holding Jared’s damn roses. And worse yet, the next moment Jared came to her defense.

  “That’s all right.” He looked at Demi, wiping off his hands. “No, my common sense tells me that,” he answered Demi’s question. “That, and a crash course in first aid at the local Y.”

  She held that highly suspect. Corporate vultures like Jared Panetta didn’t go slumming at the Y and take courses in anything. That was for working-class people like her.

  “And why would you take a crash course in first aid? To deal with the heart attacks you instigate?”

  If she was trying to get him to lose his temper, she was going to be disappointed. He hadn’t lost his temper in a long, long time. Not since Gloria had walked out on him and Theresa.

  “No, to be prepared in case something happened to my little girl. I like knowing I can deal with anything that might come up.” Although, in this case, he had a feeling that there was no crash course at the Y that would prepare him for one Demetria Tripopulous.

  Antoinette looked surprised. Her face softened as she related to him, one parent to another. “You have a daughter?”

  He nodded. “Theresa. She’s five.”

  “Do you have any pictures?” Antoinette asked eagerly, temporarily forgetting about Eleanor.

  “Plenty.”

  The wallet he produced from his pants pocket fairly bulged with photographs of his daughter. As he flipped it open to one, even Eleanor oohed over the little girl captured with ice cream over her sunny face.

  Demi looked, too, despite herself. His daughter looked like him, except her hair was a soft, silky blond. An angel.

  Demi was beginning to feel as if the deck was stacked. Panetta seemed to just be reeling them in with everything he did.

  “Any pictures of your wife?” Demi asked pointedly, congratulating herself on effectively bringing an end to this session of show-and-tell.

  Jared’s face darkened as he returned the wallet to his pocket. “No. I took those out.”

  Why? she caught herself wondering. But that was probably just what he wanted her to do—to wonder about him. To wonder and be subtly drawn in to the web he was weaving.

  It wasn’t going to happen, she promised him silently, her innate curiosity notwithstanding.

  “Well, this impromptu sharing period is all very lovely, but I’m down one waitress, my cousin the cook is sitting with his head between his knees and I have a party of a hundred and seventy-five people coming to celebrate a christening in less than two hours.”

  “I’m okay.” George’s voice came up to her weakly from floor level. “Just give me a minute. Has she stopped bleeding?” He raised his head slowly from between his knees.

  Demi rolled her eyes. No one would ever accuse George of taking after his namesake, Saint George the dragon slayer.

  “Yes, she’s stopped bleeding. You can come up for air now.” Demi turned to her mother. “Ma, get rid of those damn roses and drive Eleanor to the emergency room, then come right back. I’m going to need you here in the kitchen with Theo and George. We’ve got a lot more Kreatopittes to make. George, take a few deep breaths and then get a broom and clean up this floor. I don’t want any more accidents.” She shifted toward the other waitress. “Lena, I want you to get back out there and cover for Eleanor. I’ll be out to help you as soon as I can.” After two weeks of slow afternoons, Murphy’s Law dictated that this would be the day that they would be swamped.

  Jared closed the lid on the first-aid kit. “What do you want me to do?”

  “That’s easy.” She pushed past him as everyone scattered to comply with her instructions. “Get out of my way.”

  This was definitely not going to be a piece of cake, Jared thought as he followed her to the small office. He felt himself loving it.

  When she looked up at him accusingly, he elaborately replaced the first-aid kit, then firmly closed the bottom drawer.

  “What are you going to do?” he wanted to know.

  Maybe the best way to deal with him was to ignore him as much as possible. She began to rummage through the different piles of papers, looking for her address book. “About what?”

  “Your party of one hundred and seventy-five.” He doubted she could wait on them with just Lena. He’d seen the way the other waitress moved, like glue in a container. And quick though she was, Demi couldn’t hope to do it all herself.

  Her temper threatened to get the best of her. “Not that it’s any business of yours, but I intend to handle it. All I have to do is find my book with the number of the temp agency in it.”

  She shoved another stack over and found nothing. She began patting through the papers, looking for a telltale five-by-seven lump. It continued to elude her.

  Demi smacked the top of the table with the flat of her hand. “Damn, it was right here.” She looked at him accusingly. “Did you put it someplace?”

  “The tornado had already struck by the time I got to your office. You could lose Texas in here and not know it.” The corners of his mouth lifted engagingly. “I’d ask you how you ever manage to find anything in this mess, but I think I already have my answer.”

  What had she ever done to deserve this? “Yes, you do, and that answer revolves around the word no.” At the end of her patience, she turned to the file cabinet, only to find her way blocked. She stared him down. “Now, unless you want to be bodily removed, I’d suggest you leave.”

  He wasn’t ready to move just yet, not until she satisfied his curiosity. “And just who would be doing the bodily removing?”

  Demi squared her shoulders, rising to her full height of barely five-two. “Don’t let my size fool you. The women in my family are very strong.”

  After a momentary debate of weighing the pros and cons of the physical contact, he stepped aside. But his smile remained intact.

  “Not that I don’t think that might be an interesting and very possibly pleasant experience, but I think you’re being a little too hasty about throwing me out.”

  “You’re entitled to your opinion, but mine’s the one that counts.” She shoved the last drawer shut with a resounding bang. “Damn it, where is that book?”

  Knowing it was a little like sticking his head into the lion’s cage, he still turned her around to face him. “You don’t need the book.”

  What was he talking about? “Of course I need the book.” She shrugged his hands off her shoulders. “I don’t remember the agency’s telephone number.”

  “You don’t have to call the agency to send someone. I’ll help.” He’d done some waitering and bartendering while he’d been in college. It was at one of these functions that he had first met Winfield.

  It was one of the few times in her life that Demi remembered ever being speechless. But she was. Completely.

  4

  “Did I just hear you correctly?” Demi stared at Jared in disbelief. Just what the hell did this man think he was up to? “Are you volunteering to be a waiter at this evening’s banquet?”

  Shoulders that were a little too broad for a comfortable off-the-rack fit rose and fell casually in response to her incredulous tone.

  “Why not? It’s honest work and a break for you. You can’t get any better rates than free.”

  He really had to think she was a simpleton to fall for this Good Samaritan act of his. “Why are you doing this—as if I didn’t know.”

  If she was trying to get under his skin, she was going to have to do better than that, Jared thought. He was the soul of innocence as he answered. “Because you and I got off on the wrong foot and I wa
nt to make amends. Besides, there is the small matter of the half-eaten dessert I didn’t pay for.”

  Now he was trying flattery again. The man bounced around like an energized handball in a concrete room, hoping, undoubtedly, to tire her out.

  It was evident he didn’t know who and what he was up against, Demi thought.

  “My baklava is good, Mr. Panetta, but it doesn’t warrant three hours’ work in lieu of payment.” Her gaze met his as she issued her warning. “You’re not going to break me down by trying to be nice.”

  The same slow, lazy smile he’d worn earlier slipped over Jared’s lips and into her with annoying ease. “I’m not ‘trying,’ Demi. I am nice.”

  Yeah, right. Nice. He was here to get her to sell the restaurant to his firm any way he could. That included, or maybe even encouraged, subterfuge. Well, she wasn’t born yesterday or the day before that, and she definitely wasn’t a fifty-seven-year-old woman desperate to marry off a daughter she feared was passing the prime childbearing years of her life.

  “That might work on my mother, but she’s been sheltered.” Demi looked at him pointedly. “I, however, haven’t been.”

  God help him, he was beginning to get a kick out of this. It was like a game of mental chess. He couldn’t remember when he’d enjoyed his work more.

  “I’m not the big, bad wolf, Demi.”

  He wasn’t sure just what possessed him. Maybe it was even a tactical mistake on his part, but it was one he couldn’t seem to help, Jared brushed his fingers against her hair. Just the barest ends as they swirled a couple of inches shy of her shoulders. He needed to satisfy at least that much of his growing curiosity about her.

  Her hair felt thick and lush. Just as he thought it would.

  To his surprise, Demi didn’t jerk her head back. It was the look in her eyes that made him drop his hand. It was as if she knew he was going to do that and he’d just proven her right.

  With effort, Demi succeeded in keeping out of her voice the quiver that was traveling through her body. “Wolves come in many shapes and sizes. They don’t all have a long snout, fur and long legs.”

  Touché. As he stepped back, Jared’s eyes drifted over the length of her compact, firm body. “Speaking of legs, yours are very nice.”

  The look was so sensual, she could swear she felt it pass along her body. For a second, just the tiniest measure of time, she savored the effect. It was a mistake. It allowed Jared to know he’d scored a point, however small.

  Damn him, anyway.

  She wasn’t going to let him get to her. It was just what he was trying to do. To get to her and to undermine her.

  “My legs are none of your business, Mr. Panetta. And my business is none of your business, either.”

  Striding on the long legs he’d noticed the first moment he’d watched her walk away from him, Demi marched through the kitchen into the dining hall. She looked around as if she were trying to locate someone. And then he saw her smile.

  “Bruno, want to make a quick ten bucks an hour?”

  The man she was talking to was seated at the far table, just in front of the booth where her grandfather and his friend were still staring at the regal, and as yet unmoved, chess pieces.

  Bruno looked up from his newspaper when she addressed him. In Jared’s opinion, he looked big and clumsy, more apt to drop dishes than to carry them. It was obvious she was getting desperate.

  “Sure. When?”

  Saved, Demi thought, relieved. “Tonight at six. I need a waiter.”

  The cheerful expression faded from his large-boned face. Bruno looked at her sheepishly. “Gee, Demi, I wish I could, but I’ve got to meet Estelle this evening. She’s taking me to her folks’ house for dinner.” He looked as if he equated the ordeal with a slow, painful death.

  Demi nodded. “Thanks anyway.” Avoiding looking in Jared’s direction, she scanned the dining room for any volunteers among the regulars.

  Everyone she asked had something else to do or somewhere else to be. There were no takers and she didn’t have time to call around. Even if she found her telephone book, the temp agency probably wouldn’t be able to send anyone in time. She was stuck.

  “Offer still stands,” Jared told her cheerfully when she turned around.

  She’d almost bumped into him. Annoyed, she stepped back. What was he up to now, understudying her shadow? “Do you have to stand so close?”

  She looked ruffled, and unless he missed his guess, it only partially had to do with finding a replacement for Eleanor. Ever so slowly, he was gaining an advantage. Jared silently congratulated himself.

  “No, that’s a bonus. For me.”

  He wasn’t exaggerating completely. She did smell good. Amid the combined heavenly aromas seductively drifting out from the kitchen was something arousingly different when he stood close to her. Something musky that was immediately absorbed by every pore in his body.

  She didn’t like the way he was looking at her. As if she was the very last piece of baklava left on the dessert cart. She liked the way she was reacting to that look even less.

  Struggling with the unsettled feeling that insisted on washing over her, Demi took refuge in business. “Do you have any experience?”

  “Some.”

  When the smile on his lips widened, she had to curb the temptation to give him a swift kick. She wasn’t about to listen to a recitation of the women he’d had. “I meant at being a waiter.”

  The smile, along with the tone, turned innocent. Only his eyes continued to be amused. “That’s what I meant, too.”

  The hell he did. She knew what he was up to. He was mocking her. Well, let him if that was what kept him happy. She’d have the last laugh in this little drama. He wasn’t deluding her. It wasn’t her he was interested in, it was the restaurant. He obviously thought the way to secure her signature on the dotted line was to play up to her. Okay, fine, she might as well make the most of the opportunity that presented itself. Having thought it over, she’d decided that he wouldn’t try to sabotage the party. There was nothing to gain by that if he was trying to play up to her.

  “All right,” she relented. “I’m in a bind and I could use you. Pays the same. Eight dollars an hour.”

  Not that he intended to take it, but the pay was not the same. “You were going to give him ten.” He nodded toward Bruno.

  He wasn’t on the job yet and he was already challenging her authority. “I offered him ten because he’s experienced and I knew what I was getting with him. As far as I’m concerned, you are a pig in a poke.” She sincerely hoped she wasn’t going to regret this. But her back was to the wall. What else could she do? “All right, I want it clear that you do exactly as I tell you to. Oh, and one more thing—you break anything, you pay for it.”

  That sounded fair. It was her tone that didn’t. “I can see why you have so many people clamoring to work for you.” Amusement crept from his eyes to highlight his entire face. “You must have to beat them off with a stick.”

  Right now she was contemplating beating him with a stick. A very large stick.

  It annoyed her that she was in a position where she needed him. But even she knew her limitations, and she couldn’t be everywhere at once. She needed at least four extra hands besides hers serving food and drinks.

  Demi never missed a beat. “And since you’re working for me, I’ll thank you to keep any comments you might have to yourself.”

  Obliging her, Jared saluted smartly. “Your wish is my command.”

  Demi shut her eyes, biting her tongue. With all her heart, she wished that Eleanor hadn’t picked today to be so clumsy. But she had, and Demi was just going to have to work with it.

  Opening her eyes again, she looked at Jared. She might as well put him to work setting up the banquet room before people began arriving. But first, she had to see to things in the kitchen.

  “Wait here until I call you,” she instructed tersely.

  “With baited breath.” Pleased, he sat down in the boo
th he’d shared with her mother. “By the way, can I have one of those little desserts while I wait?”

  Couldn’t he even remember what it was called? “Baklava.”

  “Baklava,” Jared repeated, wrapping his tongue around the word as if he were caressing a lover.

  Demi had to concentrate to shake free of the feeling he was too damn successful in creating.

  “You’re a waiter now. Get it yourself,” she tossed over her shoulder, afraid that if she looked at him, he’d see the effect he was having on her.

  His voice drifted after her. “But I’m not on duty until you call me, right?”

  Demi shoved the door open with the flat of her hand, annoyed. This was not shaping up to be one of her better days.

  Demi fully expected Murphy’s Law to go into fourth gear once the Forakis christening party got under way. After all, she was working with an unknown. What was worse, try as she might, she was depending on him to some extent, and he knew it.

  But Murphy’s Law had been repealed, at least for the evening. There were no further mishaps in the kitchen, or out of it. Things went amazingly smoothly as she, Lena and Jared went in and out of the banquet room, weaving through a crowd that seemed to be perpetually in motion. Because they were constantly milling about, there appeared to be twice as many people as had been quoted. But that was only an illusion. The music, the dancing and the noise all contributed to the feeling that the banquet hall was filled beyond capacity.

  She worked hard, moved fast. And felt wonderful. Demi never felt as alive as she was in the center of a crowded room filled with people eating her food.

  When her feet began to ache into the second hour, she barely noticed. It was something she would deal with later, after everyone had gone home and she and the others had cleaned up. Right now, there were people to accommodate.

  She seemed bent on everyone having a good time, Jared thought, watching her. Whenever possible, he’d been observing Demi in action. He was beginning to understand why the restaurant had the reputation that it did. Demi seemed to be everywhere, exchanging bits of conversation with about two thirds of the people at the banquet. All while making sure that everything was running like the proverbial Swiss watch.