Here Comes The Bride

“Restaurant?”

“That’s right. I’ll do the cooking. She’ll help me run the place.”

“You cook?”

“I do.” He pulled the looseleaf binder toward him and pointed to one of the pictures. “You see that patio with all the tables?”

“Yes?”

“My grandparents enlarged their house and ran a taverna there for many years.”

“You never told me that before.”

“I thought I did. I learned to cook in my grandmother’s kitchen.”

“Well, I remember you saying something about that, but I had no idea you meant she turned it into a business.”

He nodded. “She taught me how to make everything according to her exact specifications. It was a sad day when she passed away. My grandfather stopped wanting to live. He died within the year.”

She lowered her head for a moment. “How hard that must have been for you.”

“You would know,” he murmured. “The place was so full of memories, and so empty, I couldn’t stay there alone. So I put it in the hands of a Realtor to rent, and I left for New York on a worker’s visa.”

“I can relate to wanting to leave.” No wonder Alex was being so solicitous of her today. His ties to his grandparents were as great as hers to Lilian. She loved him that much more for being sensitive to her needs.

No man she’d ever met could measure up to Alex. Reese was shattered by his admission that he was deeply in love with someone else.

“There are plenty of Greek restaurants in New York in need of a good cook,” he continued to explain, unaware of her agony. “I had all the work I wanted while I continued to study English and begin the arduous process of becoming a citizen.”

How come he’d waited all these months before confiding this kind of personal information to her? When she thought of the many talks they’d had…

“What brought you to Los Angeles?” Even though she knew there was this important woman in his life, Reese couldn’t prevent herself from asking more questions. As long as he was giving her the opportunity, she had this incurable need to learn everything and anything about him.

CHAPTER SIX

BENEATH his dark brows, Alex’s black gaze trapped Reese’s. “You fell into acting because of a fluke. So did I.”

“How did it happen?”

“I worked under a famous Greek chef at the Athena Plaza in downtown Manhattan. Someone suggested he do a pilot for a television show. He needed an assistant and asked me to help. It meant more money for me, which I badly needed to support myself.”

“That’s how you got on TV? A cooking show? Fabio Andretti?” She couldn’t believe it.

His smile reached his eyes. “Not Fabio. The upshot is, the pilot did well, but the weekly series didn’t. My boss didn’t have the personality of a Chef Emeril, who’s been a great success on American television.”

“I love his show!”

“You and everyone else who changed channels to watch him instead of my boss. But it was my lucky day because a Hollywood soap producer happened to catch a few of the episodes, and he contacted someone at the network doing our show. I was asked to fly out to LA to read for a part.”

“I’d call that destiny,” she whispered in a shaky voice.

“I didn’t know it at the time, but I do now. You’re absolutely right. It was destiny.”

She had an idea he wasn’t talking about his career alone. “Then this woman you love isn’t from Greece?”

“Who told you she was?”

“No one. But you know how people gossip. I heard you were committed to someone, so I just assumed as much.”

He leveled his all-encompassing gaze on her. “If that were the case, I would never have left Greece in the first place. As it was, I needed a total change of scene. New York seemed the right destination for me.

“When the offer came, I jumped at the chance to see another part of the country and make a decent salary. But the producer of the network in New York warned me not to do anything until I’d found myself the right agent.”

“Nobody in the performing arts should make a move without one.”

Alex nodded. “He gave me a name. That favor turned out to be critical for me. This agent wouldn’t let me sign any contracts until I’d auditioned for as many soaps as I could. He wanted me to hold out for the top salary.

“Naturally the money was important, but I also realized that if I was asked to play a part I couldn’t abide, then it wouldn’t have mattered how much I was offered.”

“I know what you mean,” Reese inserted. “If I’d been asked to play the role of Melissa, I wouldn’t have done it. I’m not an actress at heart. I couldn’t act the part of a person of whom I didn’t approve, even if it was all for pretense.”

“That makes sense. The first few scripts I read didn’t interest me either. In both cases I was supposed to play a mobster from the underworld. I didn’t want to start out like that and then be typecast forever doing the same roles.”

“You were smart.”

“Not really. The truth is, they held no appeal. I wanted something different. Out of the blue my agent asked me if I could do an Italian accent. Since one of my good friends was Italian, that was easy. I just mimicked him for my agent, and he took matters from there.”

Reese smiled. “As my aunt told me, you’re the quickest study she ever met.” She’d said a lot of other wonderful things about him, too, but Reese didn’t dare tell Alex or he would realize how deep her feelings for him went.

“It’s because of that accent I got the part of Fabio Andretti, the priest who left the monastery because his soul was conflicted.”

“Just as yours was,” she said quietly.

He studied her for a minute before nodding his dark head. “It tore me apart to leave Greece. It tore me apart to stay.”

“I’m sorry you had to be in that kind of pain, Alex. No wonder you played the part of Fabio so convincingly. Many times during our scenes I felt it and knew it had to come from someplace deep within you.”

She kneaded her hands beneath the table. “Has your sorrow diminished at all?”

“Of course. No one stays in that dark place forever. One day I took a drive and ended up here. The minute I saw this damaged gallery, I could envision my grandparents’ villa. It would be like planting an old vine in new ground.

“Once that idea took hold, I never let go of it. By December, I had enough money saved to make an offer on the property. A Christmas present to myself.”

Her eyelids prickled with unshed tears. “It’s a fantastic plan. But-”

“But what?” he broke in.

“There’s always a fire danger here. Malibu’s not protected from the worst of the Santa Ana winds like Orange County or San Diego.”

“I’m aware of that fact. The Realtor warned me I might find myself having to remodel again in a few years, or even be forced to build an entire new restaurant.”

He leaned toward her. “It doesn’t worry me. As long as I have my memories, I can rebuild anywhere.”

She averted her eyes. “I’m sorry I brought it up. Believe me, I didn’t mean to sound negative. More than anything I want your project to be a great success.”

“I know you do, and I appreciate your concern.”

“What are you going to call your restaurant?”