“Could be talking about arthritis,” Billy joked. “My knees ache every morning.” He played another high-scoring two-letter word. Star raised her eyebrows and looked at Georgia but said nothing. She got a measly six points for “hat.”
Georgia bit her lip. Then she laid her tiles out for her final word, “gone.” She hazarded a glance at Cole, finding his ice-blue eyes pinned on her with a peculiar pained expression. She looked away, caught off guard by the directness of his gaze.
“And that’s the game,” Billy said happily, laying out his last word, another two-letter high scorer. Star tallied the points. Colewas watching Georgia across the table, his gaze intent. It made her self-conscious.
“Billy wins by a landslide,” Star announced.
Cole stood abruptly. “I think I’ll head out,” he murmured. “I’ve got an early morning.” With that, he excused himself.
Georgia didn’t see him for days afterward. She told herself it was for the best, but each day that passed brought a little ache between her ribs. She ignored it, but it didn’t change the fact that she could not deny it was there.
•••
On a brightSaturday morning two weeks after she’d first set foot in Anemone, Georgia awoke and checked her phone to find a sweet, slightly off-key voice text from Phoebe singing her the “Happy Birthday” song in French with a heavy Scouse accent. Georgia blinked in surprise. She had, in truth, forgotten it was her birthday. Usually, she was working on her birthday. Etienne would get her a luxurious gift, often French lingerie (which in hindsight seemed more like a gift for himself, now that she thought of it). On her way to work, she would always swing by Ladurée and select a box of macarons for her birthday treat, but that was the extent of the fuss made about it. No macarons this year, she thought with a touch of regret. There was another text, this one from Michel.
The competition is in two weeks on Saturday at eleven at La Lumière Dorée. Bring your best inspiration. After that I will make my decision.
Georgia’s stomach dropped.Bring your best inspiration.In two weeks it would be decided. Her best shot at a kitchen of her own.
She texted back.
I’ll be there. Hard at work on inspiration. Who else are you considering?
Thirty seconds later she received a response.
Gerard Boucher and Leonie Alarie
She frowned when she saw the names. Gerard Boucher was not really a threat. Pompous, arrogant, he was a good chef, but unimaginative and cooked with a heavy hand that leaned toward the classics. She was surprised Michel was considering him at all. It wasn’t the direction Michel wanted to take La Lumière Dorée, she was sure of it. But Leonie Alarie was a different story, a significant threat. Originally from the South of France somewhere near Marseille, she had come to Paris a year or two after Georgia and had been climbing the ranks as fast—okay, Georgia hated to admit it—faster than Georgia had. They shared a similar drive, a tireless work ethic, and the same fire and determination. Leonie could hold her own against Georgia, and her fresh, modern twist on French cooking would work well at La Lumière Dorée. Georgia worried her lower lip, thinking. She’d heard a rumor that Leonie was going to be named head chef at a Michelin-starred restaurant in Nice. Apparently, she’d heard wrong. She felt a flutter of apprehension. She was really going to have to step up her game to beat Leonie.
She reread Michel’s text. Two weeks before she needed to be back in Paris and ready to dazzle Michel with her newly restored spark in the kitchen. A spark that was partly revived, but not entirely. She felt a frisson of panic skitter up her spine. What if she wasn’t ready? She was doing all she could—nurturing hersense of wonder, trying to cultivate delight, making progress at not being so goal oriented, not trying so hard to keep everything in line. And she had seen the good fruit of those choices. She licked her lips, remembering the joy of tasting the sour flavor that now dominated her palate. Could she design an entire menu of bitter and sour if she didn’t regain any of the other three flavors in the next two weeks? That sounded horrid. She shuddered. She needed to regain the other flavors to have a prayer of winning. That was all there was to it.
She glanced out the window, down to the little cabin by the bay, and caught a glimpse of a figure in bright orange overalls walking up toward the house. Cole. Her stomach flipped. She felt a peculiar bittersweet tug of regret when she thought of him. She knew it could go nowhere. In two weeks she would be back in Paris where she belonged, but still...
She shook off the sensation. She had two weeks left. She had to make the best use of them. Maybe today would be a lucky day. Maybe she’d get a little birthday miracle.
“Georgia,” Star called up the stairs. “Breakfast. Cole’s here.”
“Be right there.” Georgia hurriedly dressed. As she grabbed her favorite navy blazer from a hanger in the closet, a shower of little green plants fell out of the pockets and scattered across the floor.
“What on earth?” She shook the blazer, and more fell out from under the collar. She bent over and picked one up, already knowing what they were. Four-leaf clovers. Dozens of them.
“What are you trying to tell me?” Georgia murmured, gathering up the four-leaf clovers and setting them on the nightstand. She gave her blazer a final shake and slipped it on over a good-quality fitted tee. With one final puzzled glance around her room, she went down to breakfast.
Five minutes later, Georgia was seated at the table acrossfrom Cole as Star stirred oatmeal at the stove. Georgia and Cole kept covertly glancing at each other, and every time their eyes would snag, both would hurriedly look away. Georgia cleared her throat uncomfortably. How many points could she get in Scrabble for the word “awkward,” she wondered? Or “ridiculous crush”?
“Here you go.” Star set a plate down in front of Georgia. “Happy birthday!” It had a single lit pink candle stuck in a giant dill pickle. Georgia laughed in surprise and glanced up at her mother. She certainly had not expected any sort of acknowledgment.
“Thank you.” She was touched that Star had remembered her birthday. This was the first birthday Star had acknowledged in almost thirty years, she realized with a pang.
“Blow out the candle and make a wish,” Star urged. “You don’t need to eat the pickle unless you want to.”
“A wish.” Georgia stared at the lit candle. She cleared her throat, not sure what exactly to wish for. To get her spark back completely? To regain the last three flavors? To win the competition for La Lumière Dorée? To have all her questions about Star finally answered? And that didn’t even include the fact that her stomach did a backflip every time she laid eyes on Cole. She fixed her gaze on the cheery little candle flame and avoided looking in his direction entirely. She was going to need a lot of birthdays to make all her wishes come true.
She closed her eyes, threw caution to the wind, and made a single, silly romantic wish, then blew out the candle. When she opened her eyes, Cole was watching her across the table. “Happy birthday,” he said, his eyes catching hers for a long moment.
She concentrated hard on removing the birthday candle from the pickle, not looking at him. “Thanks.”
“Are you excited about the Oyster Shuck tonight?” Star asked,ladling scoops of oatmeal into bowls and bringing them to the table.
