“I’m guessing the meals you serve your guests are as imaginative as the décor.”
“I don’t have décor,” he pointed out.
“That’s what I said.”
“I meant,” he said through gritted teeth, “I’m not interested in making this place into a fashionable inn.”
“Oh, I agree. That would be all wrong. After all, you’re going for the whole manly Survivorman thing, right? It doesn’t have to be fussy,” Daisy countered, already seeing in her mind’s eye how it could look. A few pillows, some colorful braided rugs, maybe some splashy paintings on a few of the bare walls. “You want your clients to be comfortable, don’t you?”
“This isn’t a vacation camp. People come here to learn skills. Leadership. They come here to pit themselves against the mountain and Mother Nature.”
“And when they come back to the inn victorious you want them to still be roughing it?”
He inhaled sharply and Daisy thought maybe she’d gone a little far. So she backed up fast. “I’m not saying you should put up lace curtains or use chintz slipcovers. I’m just saying that making this room a little more … comfortable would go a long way toward making your guests feel at ease. Couldn’t hurt to think about it, right?”
“How did we get onto this track?” he wondered aloud.
“We were talking about how good I’d be for your business,” Daisy told him and shushed Nikki when she growled.
He spared a dark look for her dog before he met her gaze again and said, “No, I was telling you I don’t think this is a good idea.”
“But you’re wrong,” she argued.
“I don’t think so.”
“You haven’t given me a chance at all,” she said, fighting both the glint in Jericho’s eyes and the flutter of nerves in her belly. “You don’t even know me. Plus, you haven’t tasted my cooking. You haven’t tried my fried chicken or home-style scalloped potatoes or my fudge mountain cake—”
“This isn’t about. Fudge mountain?”
Daisy grinned as his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “It’s amazing. I’ll make it for you.”
Jericho took another deep breath, and she was frankly astonished that his broad, muscular chest could expand even farther. The man really was huge. And yet, he didn’t give off the kind of “danger” vibe she associated with very big men. There was something … quiet about him. And that something was very attractive.
“It’s not that easy,” he said.
“Oh, making the cake isn’t easy, but I promise you it’s worth the effort.” She deliberately misunderstood him. Keep him off balance, she told herself. He’s not sure what to do about you, so keep him that way, she told herself.
“The job, Daisy,” he said, and waved her over onto one of the couches. “Offering you this job isn’t that easy.”
“Sure it is. You offer, I accept. Easy.”
He took a seat on the chair opposite her and braced his elbows on his knees. “When Sam was telling you about the job, did he bother to mention the survival test?”
She blinked. “Survival test?”
“I didn’t think so.” He scrubbed one hand across his face. “You see, there’s a policy here at King Adventure. All new hires have to spend the weekend on the mountain with me. They have to prove they can make it here. Prove they have some survival skills.”
Daisy set Nikki down onto her lap and stroked the little dog’s back. Her mind was racing and her stomach was churning. Survival? All she knew about surviving on a mountain was finding a good hotel with a nice fireplace and room service. Why in heaven should a cook have to prove herself in the wild?
Anxiety pumped through her system and her positive thoughts began to crumble like broken cookies. But even while doubts slapped at her, she knew she couldn’t give up on her idea before she even really got started.
“No,” she said, “I didn’t know about that.”
“See?” His voice was kind, his eyes shone with relief and the patient smile on his face only irritated her immensely. “It just wouldn’t work out, Daisy.”
“Well,” she shot back, “it’s not like you’re going to drop me off in the middle of nowhere with a knife and a piece of string. Are you?”
One corner of his mouth lifted briefly. “No.”
“Then I can do it,” she said, covering her own doubts with a veil of confidence.
Now he simply shook his head. “No, you can’t. Hell, you couldn’t take a few steps across the lawn without falling on your face.”
She flushed and felt the heat of it stain her cheeks. “That was an accident.”
“And out in the forest, an accident like that one could kill you.”
“Then I won’t let it happen again,” she argued.
“Damn it, why won’t you listen to reason on this?”
“Because I need this job,” she told him flatly, fingers curled protectively around Nikki. “My roommate got married and I couldn’t keep the apartment on my own. My old job was downsized when the owner hired his cousin’s nephew as head cook and—” She broke off quickly because she wasn’t about to beg. And she wasn’t the kind of woman to go all weepy, either, using tears to get her way.
“It’s been a rough couple of months,” she said simply. “So when I heard about this job opening, it seemed perfect. It is perfect. And I think I should get the same chance to prove myself as any other employee here has had.”
He pushed himself out of his chair and stalked a few paces off. Glancing at her over his shoulder, he said, “It wouldn’t be easy.”
“No,” she agreed, already dreading being out in the great outdoors. “Probably not.”
“Why are you so determined to do this?”
“I told you why,” Daisy hedged. “I need the job.”
“If you’re that good a cook, you could work anywhere.”
“I want to work here.”
“Which brings me,” he said tightly, “back to the original question. Why are you so determined to work here?”
She lifted her chin, squared her shoulders and said softly, “Because you knew Brant.”
He rubbed his face again in irritation. “I know it’s not easy, losing family.”
“My only family,” she corrected and hated that her voice broke on the words. “Brant and I only had each other. When he died, I was alone. And I don’t like alone.”
Which was the absolute truth as far as it went.
She couldn’t give him the whole of it, now could she?
She’d already admitted that she really did have nowhere else to go. She had no one. Her brother, Brant, had been her only family. Daisy was completely on her own now. And she hated it. She watched other families and felt her heart ache. She watched mothers with their children and something inside her wept. Daisy really wanted love in her life again. But she didn’t want another man.
No, thank you. She had both been there and done that and hadn’t even gotten the T-shirt. She’d convinced herself a couple of times that she was in love and it had ended badly. She wasn’t interested in risking another broken heart. She wouldn’t set herself up for that kind of disappointment again. But she did want to love and be loved. She wanted