The Best is Yet to Come Part 4

"What good is a stove without food to cook?"

"You've got salmon," Ryder said with a poisonous smile.

"Two guesses where I put your salmon this time...?" Kim Sun fired right back.

"I brought you an instructor," he said, pushing Ivy forward. "She and her mother make the best salmon croquettes south of the Antarctic."

Kim Sun bowed elegantly. "Miss Ivy. So good to see you again. Tutoring in the art of salmon cookery would be much appreciated." He glared toward Ryder. "Some people too stupid to realize one must be educated in preparation of a desired new food."

"Call me stupid one more time, and I'll send you home in a cornflakes box!"

"No breeding," Kim Sun told Ivy, shaking his head. "This peasant knows nothing of proper social behavior. I shall undertake his enlightenment. Again," he said with practiced weariness.

"Who are you calling a peasant?" Ryder demanded. "Who the h.e.l.l pays your salary?"

"That pittance?" The indignant man scoffed at his employer. "You pay me not one tenth of my true worth."

"Listen, buster, if you got what you were really worth, you'd owe me money!" Ryder ground out. "A pittance!" He threw up his hands and looked skyward. "He must be the only cook in Georgia who drives a Mercedes-Benz!"

"Now, now," Ivy said gently. "Remember your blood pressure. Come on, Kim Sun, let's retreat before he cuts loose another barrage."

"Good idea," he replied. He made a face at Ryder. "Tomorrow, I quit!"

"Tomorrow, I fire you!" came the gruff reply.

Kim Sun said something in his own language and strutted off to the kitchen with an amused Ivy behind him.

He was a quick study. It took no time at all for Ivy to teach him how to make the croquettes that Ryder liked.

"Is he really so horrible to work for?" she asked, nibbling at a celery stick while she watched Kim Sun fry the croquettes in vegetable oil.

"Not horrible. Impossible!" Kim Sun shook his head. "He stays up all hours, never eats properly-work, work, work. He has no time for women, and he seems not to sleep very much. At first, I thought he was wasting away for love of someone. But now I think it is an addiction to making money."

"He's always been a restless kind of man," Ivy mused, smiling with the memory. "He could never sit still. But I didn't think you'd have a problem getting him to eat. Heavens, his appet.i.te is legendary around these parts."

"Only for things I cannot cook. I thought he knew I was a pastry chef. The first time he asked for beef stew, I had a nervous breakdown. From that day, everything went downhill."

"I can imagine," she said, laughing. She pushed back her long hair and got up from the table where she'd been sitting. "I'd better go and rea.s.sure my mother that he hasn't kidnapped me."

He stared at her curiously. "Were you ever engaged to Mr. Boss?" he asked unexpectedly.

"Oh...why, no," she faltered. "Why do you ask?"

He averted his eyes. "Please excuse my curiosity," he asked softly, and even smiled. "Someday perhaps you will understand the reason for the question. Are the croquettes done now?" he added to divert her, drawing her attention back to the frying pan.

She wondered what he knew that she didn't. Ryder's att.i.tude was brotherly for the rest of the afternoon. He talked to her about Eve and her husband, showed her the wooden elephants he'd brought home from Sri Lanka, and coaxed her to stay and eat a small salad and some of the salmon croquettes. Kim Sun had done a great job, she had to admit.

"Next week, fried chicken," Ryder told her, leaning back in his chair after he'd polished off an exquisite Pavlova that Kim Sun had created from egg whites and fruit and whipped cream. "You can't stop now. We'll make a Southern chef out of him yet!"

"Not likely," Kim Sun muttered as he removed dishes. "One dish does not a chef make."

"Then we'll get her to give you weekly lessons," Ryder a.s.sured him. "She can consider it part of her job."

"Kim Sun might not like me for a role model," she began.

"He will," Ryder said, glaring at the fuming cook. "Or I'll let him polish the entire family silver service tonight."

A furious spate of Korean echoed from the direction of the kitchen after Kim Sun exploded out of the room and down the hall, both arms waving emphatically.

"He'll quit one day," Ivy a.s.sured Ryder.

"He wouldn't dare," he replied smugly. "Where else would he get a cushy job like this and a terrific boss like me?"

Ivy burst out laughing. "Poor Kim Sun."

"Poor me," he sighed. "The minute you leave, he'll hide my coffee."

"I don't really blame him," she said, but she smiled, her dark eyes lingering involuntarily on the strong lines of his face.

Her intent scrutiny made his pulse leap wildly. He returned the long, steady stare and saw the color seep into her cheeks before she jerked her eyes down. Her shyness made him feel protective.

He got up from his chair. "I'll run you home. Can you be ready to go by six Monday morning?" he added, all business in an instant. "We'll have to catch a commuter flight out of Albany so that we can make connections in Atlanta."

"Yes, I can be ready," she a.s.sured him. Mentally she was kicking herself for agreeing to work for him. It was probably going to be the worst mistake of her life.

Jean didn't think so. She was all smiles when Ivy told her. "You'll enjoy it, you know you will," she told her daughter. "And Ryder will take care of you."

"I suppose I'm doing the right thing," Ivy sighed.

"Just take it one day at a time, sweetheart," her mother said gently. "And don't worry. All right?"

Ivy smiled and hugged her. "All right."

Ryder picked her up at the house at 6:00 a.m. sharp the following Monday. He looked elegant in a dark blue vested pin-striped suit. A black Stetson and black boots completed his ensemble. She felt much less stylish in a two-year-old black suit with a simple white cotton blouse.

"Did it have to be black?" he muttered after they'd said goodbye to Jean and headed for the Albany airport.

"My suit, you mean?" she faltered. She smoothed a hand over her hair, which was pulled tight into a French twist at her nape. "It was the only one I had...."

"I could have advanced you enough to buy something less morose," he said tightly.

"It isn't morose," she returned. "Basic black is supposed to be very flattering."

His eyes stated his opinion of it. He shifted his gaze back to the road. "I'm sorry to toss you into the deep end like this. Ideally you'd have a few weeks in the office to get used to the routine. But I've got to do some work in Phoenix on site, and you might as well see what we're doing out there. It will help you to understand the work you'll be involved with."

"I've never been to Arizona," she confessed.

"You'll love it or hate it," he said. "Especially the part of it we're going to."

"Sand and rattlesnakes?" she suggested nervously.

He smiled. "Wait and see."

They flew into Phoenix several hours later, and Ivy, who had the window seat, gasped aloud at the height of the jagged mountain ranges they flew over before they landed at the airport.

"I thought it was flat!" she exclaimed.

Ryder chuckled softly. "Did you? This isn't the only surprise you'll get."

He was right. When they got off the plane, she saw mountains rising right off the desert floor. And as they drove out of Phoenix after he picked up the rental car he'd reserved, she realized that what looked like desert from the air was alive with vegetation. It wasn't the green mountains and valleys and abundant streams of Georgia, but the changing colors of the landscape and the variety of plant life were beautiful just the same.

The air was clean and clear away from the city, and the pace of life itself seemed to slow on the long, rolling highways that arrowed toward endless horizon.

Ryder was enjoying Ivy's fascination with her surroundings. She made it new to him, and he watched her face as he pointed out the various types of flora and fauna on the long drive to the town where his retirement complex was planned. He'd reserved rooms in a luxury resort nearby. One, he was careful to point out, that wouldn't be compet.i.tion for his project.

"It's so much bigger than I thought it would be," she remarked as they drove toward Mesa del Sol, a small grouping of buildings in the distance.

"The land, you mean?" he asked, chuckling. "It's the lack of trees, honey," he explained. "The horizons seem bigger because there's nothing to hide them. If you think Arizona is big, you should see southeastern Montana."

"Are there any ghost towns around here?" she asked suddenly, all eyes.

"As a matter of fact, there are quite a few. I'll try to find time to escort you around one or two of them. Okay?"

She smiled broadly. "Okay!"

They settled in at the hotel, in adjoining rooms with a connecting door, and drove immediately out to the site, where a construction gang had already graded the area, laid the foundation and finished the ground floor of two buildings.

"It's beautiful, Ryder," Ivy commented, approving of the way the stucco design fitted in with the jagged mountains and the desert.

"I think so, too," he agreed. He escorted her to the main building, where the construction foreman-a redheaded giant of a man-was waiting for them.

"This is Hank Jordan," Ryder introduced the other man. "He's in charge of the project. Hank, this is my new a.s.sistant, Ivy."

"Nice to meet you," the foreman greeted cordially.

She nodded and smiled shyly.

"How's it going?" Ryder asked his foreman.

While they talked shop, Ivy wandered around what had to be the offices of the complex, enjoying the s.p.a.ciousness and simple lines of it. She could imagine potted plants and modern furniture filling it, and mentally she approved Ryder's choice of architects.

"What do you think?" Ryder asked eventually, taking her arm to lead her back down the long corridor toward the car. "It will house approximately sixty couples, and include a doctor's building, a restaurant, a theater, a pharmacy, a small grocery store, clothing boutiques and even a hardware store. We'll have our own water and sewage system, not to mention built-in air filters and air conditioning."

"It sounds like something out of the future," she exclaimed.

He smiled down at her. "Hopefully it will be. s.p.a.ce is already at a premium most places. This complex will make the most efficient use of its s.p.a.ce, with emphasis on complementing the existing ecosystem around it."

"Greek," she informed him.

"By the time it's finished, you won't think of it as Greek." He slid back his cuff to check the time. "Let's get something to eat. Hungry?"

"I could eat sand," she said heartily.

"Tacos are better. In fact, fajitas are much better. Let's go."

They said goodbye to Hank, and Ryder drove back to Mesa del Sol and the huge motel complex where they were staying. The temperature was surprising. Ivy had dressed for winter, but it was warm, and the heated swimming pool was a real temptation. She wished she'd had the presence of mind to pack a bathing suit.

She changed her suit for jeans and a pink striped shirt with a bulky pink sweater and sneakers. She pinned her hair away from her face but left it loose. When she met Ryder downstairs in the dining room, she found him similarly dressed in casual dark slacks and a burgundy pullover, but he was still wearing the boots and the Stetson that were such a familiar part of his usual dress.

"You look more comfortable," she remarked, smiling up at him.

"So do you, honey. Tired?"

She shook her head. "I can't remember when I've had so much fun," she said, laughing, and meant it. Being with Ryder was an adventure in itself. "I feel dishonest. I should be taking notes or typing or something."

"Plenty of time for that later," he a.s.sured her. "I'll feed you and then we'll do some paperwork out by the pool if you like. Did you bring a bathing suit?"

"There was frost back home," she pointed out.

"This is Arizona," he replied. His eyes slid over her body possessively, and a darkness lingered there just momentarily before he seated her at a window table and broke the spell.

They ate tacos and fajitas and refried beans and drank incredibly large gla.s.ses of soft drinks. Amazing how thirsty you get out here, Ivy mused. Perhaps it was the evaporation rate on the desert terrain that accounted for it.

Ryder was unusually quiet throughout the meal. When it was over, he excused himself and went to get his briefcase before he joined her at the pool. He seated them at a table with a sheltering umbrella and started pulling out doc.u.ments. He pushed a pad and pen toward her.

"Time to pay the piper, then we can relax for a while," he said. "I need you to take down some figures for me. If I have a laptop sent up, can you transcribe them this evening?"

"Of course," she said. She couldn't protest. This was why he'd brought her with him. But he'd been tense since they'd arrived in Arizona, and she wondered what was bothering him.

She couldn't know that her proximity was working on him like a drug, making him vulnerable and restless and hungry. He was doing his best to keep it from her, but the way she looked in those tight jeans was making him crazy. Work at least kept his mind where it belonged. Having enticed her into working for him, he couldn't risk losing her again by being impatient.

His eyes fell to her hand on the table. She was still wearing the wedding band Ben had put on her finger. Ryder longed to rip if off and throw it as far as he was able, to purge her of Ben's mark of possession, to make her his own. But even as he thought it, he knew how impossible it would be. Despite Ben's faults, Ivy had loved him. How could he compete with that?

Perhaps in time, she might turn to him. He had to hope that she would. It was all that kept him sane.

Chapter 4.

Ivy hardly had time to worry about being in a room adjoining Ryder's. He seemed to be deluged with paperwork and correspondence that had to be answered. The laptop was familiar to her, and it saved quite a lot of time, but it took the better part of her day to transcribe Ryder's terse dictation and produce emails that satisfied him. Often, he rewrote the same email three times before he allowed it to be mailed. He was on the run almost constantly and spent much of each day out at the site. When he was in his room, they were working.

The number of emails was incredible. There were the usual intercompany memos, notices of meetings, updates for his board of directors, problems to be solved overseas that required ma.s.ses of doc.u.ments, queries about sites and funding, replies to bank queries...enough to keep three a.s.sistants stoop-shouldered.

Ryder eventually noticed that Ivy was having trouble coping.