Page 7 of The Sweet Spot (Kodiaks Hockey #3)

Chapter Seven

Wolseley

I think Mom and Dad figured out that they were part of the reason I was heading out West. I loved my parents, but spending nearly every waking minute with them was a problem, especially after I’d enjoyed living on my own for so long. Suddenly, having people around all the time was a hard adjustment. Dad had recently retired from teaching history at the University of Minnesota for more than thirty years, and Mom was working part-time as an accountant after having worked in the field all her life. She was on an extended break for the summer, so the three of us had a lot of togetherness. My brother was long gone, living with his long-term partner and their two small kids. Lucky him.

Mom’s dark blue eyes were filled with tears as Dad helped me put my luggage and carry-on into the car. We’d always been close—maybe too close because I often worried that I was disappointing her, but I had to make this move. I had to get away from the restaurant, the stench of Daniel, and the complete disaster of my life. And if I could impress Brandon, then maybe I’d have a new start. The best part of all was that I’d be reunited with my two best friends. I’d missed them so much over the last two years. First, when Tangi moved to Vancouver, then when Jill got transferred to Toronto, lost her job, then moved to Vancouver, too, when the Kodiaks PR job came up. Maybe not having my two best friends around had led to me making so many crappy choices.

“Call me when you arrive,” Mom said.

“I will.”

“And you promise to call or text every day?”

“Yes,” I said, giving her one more hug. She wasn’t coming to the airport because she was afraid of making a scene. She bawled like a baby at the hospital when my nephew was born, so it was probably for the best that she stayed home.

Dad and I drove to the airport, talking about anything except how my life had taken a nosedive. Dad refused to talk about it, which suited me just fine. I didn’t want to talk about it, either, especially how the Gazette had made me sound like a total flake who’d been duped by an ingenious sous chef. Sure, I’d been duped, but Daniel was hardly ingenious. He was a fraud.

“It’s a good thing we kept up your and your brother’s dual citizenship,” Dad said. “You should be able to find work there in no time if the personal chef angle doesn’t work out.”

“That was a good thing. I appreciate that you and Mom did that.”

“It seemed like a good idea at the time. And now it’s paid off. And I hear Vancouver is beautiful. Imagine having an ocean on one side and the Rocky Mountains on the other. You’ll have to invite your mom out there. She’d love to see it.”

“And you, too, Dad.”

He smiled. “Yes, me too.”

“Your mom and I want you to know that you can always come home if things don’t work out there. Our door is always open.”

Lucky for me, my parents had kept Craig’s and my dual citizenship because it probably would have been next to impossible to get a work permit otherwise. Or at least not that quickly. A private chef was hardly a stable job, and getting Brandon Warde to fill out my work application? Could he even spell his own name? That was mean of me, and I knew it, but I had Ethan to go by. He was great, but he was hardly a rocket scientist. Jeremy was sweet and clever, but he wasn’t a Rhodes scholar. No, this was negative talk and unkind. I had to think better of all the Kodiaks. But still, filling out a work permit application on my behalf? The best option was to make it no option at all. Hence my dual citizenship. I’d applied for a passport the second Brandon had floated the job idea. My gut was way ahead of my heart and head.

After a long hug from Dad, who told me to be careful, as if I were eighteen and going off to college, I headed to the airport to check-in. A four-hour flight later, I landed in Vancouver. Jill and Tangi were waiting to pick me up, and I nearly cried when I saw my two best friends. We had a group hug, grabbed my luggage, and headed for Tangi and Ethan’s condo. I’d been there before on two previous trips, but the view from the balcony never got old. Even though it was only six o’clock in Vancouver, it was nearly eight back home, but this didn’t stop us from ordering out from an Indian restaurant nearby. I was ravenous after a long flight and grabbed a samosa, a heaping helping of chana marsala and korma. I couldn’t eat it without some naan.

“This is so good,” I said. “I think they add extra cumin and maybe turmeric in this chana masala.”

“All I know is this is the best creamy vegetable korma I’ve ever had,” Jill said. “And the butter chicken is to die for, but Wols, you’ll just have to trust me on that.”

I tried the korma and had to agree. I’d tried a lot of Indian food in my life, but this blew all others away. I could probably incorporate some of these dishes into Brandon’s sampler, but I’d need to tone down the spice. From his instructions to me, he liked all kinds of food but didn’t want anything overly sweet or spicy. That made sense to me. He wanted simple, tasty, and nutritious meals. I could easily accomplish that.

“Are you excited about your taste test with Brandon?” Tangi asked, reaching for more naan, followed by a generous helping of butter chicken and a bit of rice.

“It’s scheduled for next week. I’m going to spend the next few days sourcing some fresh food, exploring, then trying out some of my recipes. He seems pretty easy. And I’ve done a ton of research on the diets of athletes, particularly hockey players. Ethan and Jeremy were helpful with what they eat, so I think I have this figured out.”

Tangi dipped a piece of naan into her butter chicken sauce. “Did either one of them bitch about Brandon because I have specifically told Ethan to give it a rest.”

“Just a bit about him being demanding.”

“Don’t let anyone scare you about Brandon. He is a nice guy,” she said.

“And you would know,” Jill said.

Tangi rolled her eyes. “You and everyone else better cut it out. Ethan still gets sensitive about it. And for the record, Brandon and I were only ever friends .”

“But it was no secret that he was in love with you. Probably still is,” Jill said in a singsong voice. “I saw the way he was looking at you at the wedding. Like he could have killed Ethan and switched places. ”

“Now you are being silly,” Tangi said. “It was never anything, and he didn’t love me.”

I listened to their back-and-forth and couldn’t help but feel a pinch in my heart. No, I wasn’t pining for Brandon, but I would have killed for anyone to look at me that way. I’d dated and had a few boyfriends—nothing serious—and not one of them looked at me the way Ethan and Brandon looked at Tangi and the way Jeremy fawned over Jill. And that’s how Daniel duped me. He smelled my weakness and exploited it. I fell for it.

“I’m going to change the subject. I’m back at work, but I’d be happy to show you around any evening,” Tangi said.

“Me too,” Jill added.

“If it’s all right with the two of you, I’m going to spend my first few days checking out the city. I’ve already mapped out a few places I’d like to go to, and if I find myself lost, I’ll call an Uber.”

They were satisfied with that but made me promise I would hang out. I asked them to come over in a few days to sample all the dishes I planned to present to Brandon. I told them they could bring their significant others along.

“Anything from Ryan?” Jill asked.

Tangi narrowed her gaze. “You’re still asking about Ryan?”

She motioned for us to move in closer even though no one else was in the condo. “Word is, he hasn’t lost an ounce. Clay is livid. Coach Anthony is ready to send him to the Ravens for conditioning. How embarrassing is that? I told Jeremy to run the idea of hiring you past Ryan again.”

“I’m not sure I can take on two clients, especially if they have such different palates.”

“But Brandon hasn’t hired you yet,” Jill said. “And look at it this way: two clients is double the salary in a city where you don’t have to pay rent. ”

“About that?—”

“Nope,” Tangi said, putting up her hand to stop me. “We aren’t asking for rent.”

“But I have to pay something.”

“Ethan and I talked about this already, and if you insist on paying something, you can pay the condo fees. But they are a lot. You’re looking at almost eight hundred a month.”

I cringed at that, but there was no way I would find a place to rent for less. And there was no way I’d get anything close to Tangi and Ethan’s condo. The thought of living in someone’s damp basement—even though I’d lived in worse—was not in the cards.

“That should be fine,” I said, thinking of my bank balance. I didn’t have enough to cover the first month!

“And don’t even think of paying it until you land a job.”

“I appreciate that,” I said, tears welling in my eyes. “My parents gave me some money, but eight hundred would have bled me dry.”

“I know what it’s like starting out here,” Jill said. “I insisted on paying Tangi and Ethan something too. And if you land Brandon and Ryan …”

Tangi glanced at her watch. “Oh, look at the time,” she said, shooting Jill another cut it out look. “It’s late for Wolseley, and I’m sure she’d like to settle in and rest. We will touch base with you tomorrow, and for now, don’t worry about Ryan. Right, Jill?”

Jill seemed to have gotten the message. I walked my friends to the door, and suddenly I was feeling tired. I put away the leftovers, took a hot shower, then crawled into bed and fell soundly asleep.