CHAPTER THREE
RICO SWORE ONCE, violently. The rodent scuttled down the steps and slunk behind some garbage bins.
A rat. A goddamn rat! The Health Department would have a field day with that. For a moment his vision of a thriving chain of charity cafés blurred and threatened to slip out of reach. Unless...
He glanced at Neen. Unless he could convince her to keep her pretty mouth shut about the incident. Unless he could—
He broke off his thoughts to drag a hand down his face. What on earth was he thinking? He couldn’t put the public’s health at risk like that. Besides, that kind of scandal would scupper all his plans. But...
His head dropped. His shoulders sagged. He was so darn tired of fighting for every allowance, for every penny of government money, for every—
He stiffened. Get over yourself, D’Angelo! You have nothing to complain about.
All-too-familiar bile filled his mouth. He lifted his head and pushed his shoulders back to find Neen surveying him with narrowed eyes and pursed lips.
His gut clenched. Then a car backfired and she jumped and whirled around. She turned back, patting her chest. ‘Rodents make me jumpy,’ she said with a weak smile.
His lip curled. Rodents of the ex-boyfriend variety.
‘Are you up to date on your tetanus shots?’
That threw him. ‘Yes.’
She pointed at the door. ‘Then you can go back through there, switch off the lights and lock up. I’ll meet you out the front.’ She headed for the gate. ‘Oh, and grab my handbag, please? It’s on the counter in the kitchen.’
And then she disappeared.
Scowling, he did as she’d asked and met her on the footpath in front of the café. He handed over her handbag and tried to think of something encouraging to say but couldn’t think of a single thing. Her eyes were too bright, too perceptive. She’d witnessed his moment of despair and it didn’t matter how much he wished she hadn’t. It was too late now—he didn’t have the energy to make light of rats or cockroaches or dodgy wiring.
He went to unlock the car, but she shook her head and took his arm. ‘C’mon.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘We’re having an emergency meeting.’
‘A...? Where?’
‘At the pub around the corner.’
‘But...’
She stopped and kinked an eyebrow at him. ‘But what?’
He didn’t know. Just...but.
She let go of his arm and kept walking, but he noticed the way she scanned the surroundings. As if waiting for something unpleasant to jump out at her.
He hesitated for a fraction of a moment before setting off after her. ‘I have work to do.’
She raised an eyebrow. ‘Ain’t that the truth?’
A weight fell onto his shoulders so heavy he thought it might flatten him into the ground.
‘And excuse me if I correct you, Rico, but we have work to do.’
The weight eased a fraction. He moved forward to open the pub door for her. ‘What would you like to drink?’
She lifted her chin, her eyes almost daring him to contradict her. ‘It’s been a hell of a week, and I’m thirsty.’
He couldn’t have explained why, but his lips started to twitch. ‘A schooner of their finest?’
She smiled. ‘You better make it a light. I don’t want to go all giggly and stupid. And a packet of crisps—salt and vinegar. I’ll be over there.’ She pointed to a table in the corner.
When he returned, he found her seated with a pen and pad in front of her. She sipped the beer he handed her. She tore open the packet of crisps and crunched one.
‘Okay, we need to make a list of what needs doing and prioritise it.’
He set his lemon squash on the table with a thump. Rather than despair, he should have started troubleshooting—like Neen. He should have been proactive. He was usually so—
Louis’s birthday. He fell into a chair. Today should have been Louis’s birthday, and the knowledge had taunted him from the moment he’d opened his eyes that morning, surrounding him in darkness and a morass of self-loathing.
He jerked in his seat when he found himself the subject of Neen’s scrutiny again.
‘When was the last time you had a decent night’s sleep?’ she asked.
Ten years ago.
The unbidden answer made him flinch. He stared back at her and ferociously cut off that line of thought. ‘I could ask the same of you,’ he said, noting the dark circles under her eyes.
A shadow flitted across her face and he immediately wished the words unsaid. Some jerk was harassing her. Of course that would be playing havoc with her peace of mind. Then there was that dinner of hers last night, which obviously hadn’t gone well. The last thing she needed was to be reminded of her troubles.
‘What happened at dinner last night?’
He couldn’t believe he’d asked. He stiffened, seized his squash and took a gulp, almost choking on it. She raised an eyebrow and he couldn’t tell if she was laughing at him or not.
‘Sorry, none of my business.’
‘It ended in accusations and angry words.’ She shrugged. ‘Which is what I expected. But a girl can hope, can’t she?’
His hand tightened about his glass. Very carefully he set it down. ‘You didn’t entertain that ex who’s—?’
‘What kind of idiot do you think I am?’
Blue eyes flashed at him, easing the tightness in his chest. He frowned when he realised the tightness had threatened to relocate lower. He did what he could to ignore the burn and throb. Louis’s birthday. It had thrown him off kilter the entire day.
‘Sorry, I...’ He shook his head. ‘I’ve had too much experience with women getting caught up in the cycle of domestic violence.’
‘Personal experience?’
‘No.’ He hadn’t watched it from the sidelines growing up. He hadn’t suffered from it himself. He had no such excuse. ‘On-the-job experience.’
She stared into her beer. ‘It’d be awful to see one’s mother go through that.’
It was hard enough watching it in the families of the kids he was trying to help.
‘Remember how I said there was an issue of a contested will?’
He nodded.
‘Dinner last night was with the other interested party.’
And it had ended with angry words and accusations? ‘I’m sorry it didn’t go well.’
She shrugged. ‘Thank you, but it has nothing to do with work. What we need to do is come up with a game plan.’
He was so used to people requesting—demanding—assistance from him that Neen’s take-charge attitude threw him.
In a good way.
‘I see the most pressing concerns as, one: getting the place fumigated, and two: getting in an electrician to check the place over. Rats will gnaw through anything.’
‘I know a good electrician who’ll be happy to help in return for a bit of advertising.’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘Precisely how big are we going to make our menus, Rico?’
That surprised a laugh out of him. ‘I don’t have any contacts in the pest-control industry.’ Though whichever company he selected he could talk to them about taking on an apprentice or two, couldn’t he? There might just be a silver lining in all of this, after all.
‘You’re obviously worried about the budget.’
She lifted her beer to her lips and it suddenly struck him how pretty she was. Not in a loud, showy way—nobody would ever call her beautiful—but with her fall of thick chestnut hair, pert nose and wide mouth she was most definitely pretty.
And the longer he stared at her the more that weight on his shoulders lifted.
She touched her face. ‘What?’
What was he doing? He didn’t have time to consider a woman’s finer attributes. He didn’t have time for romance. Certainly not with an employee. He was tired, that was all. He brushed a hand across his eyes. He hadn’t had a holiday in...
Ten years.
‘Worry about budgets goes with the territory,’ he bit out.
Behind the blue of her eyes her mind clearly raced. She had lovely eyes—not too big and not too small, but perfectly spaced and—
He dragged his gaze away. This woman didn’t miss a trick, and he would not be caught out staring at her again.
‘Look, this is a charity café, right? It’s a programme to help train disadvantaged youth and place them in the workforce, yes? Then there must be huge scope to get the community behind it.’
‘Every single charity and community service initiative can make that exact same claim.’ He sat back. This was one of the major problems he faced—getting good exposure for his programmes, finding backing and sponsorship. ‘The community is feeling a bit...’ he grimaced ‘...a lot “charitied out”. People only have so much to give.’ And they were asked to give to so many different causes.
He understood that. He even empathised. But if he could just get a few more key players interested... The problem was, his kids weren’t cute and cuddly. They were scowling, slouchy, smart-mouthed teenagers. That didn’t do him any favours in the advertising stakes.
Neen tapped the table with her pen. ‘Earlier in the year there was a family whose home was severely damaged by a storm. Unbeknownst to them it wasn’t covered in their insurance.’
He scowled. Rotten insurance companies.
‘One of the local radio stations put a call out to tradesmen for help and they were flooded with offers. Apparently the advertising the tradesmen received was worth the work they did. We could do something similar. We could create a bewitchingly irresistible press release and send it in to the station of our choice.’
That had potential. ‘I have a contact at one of the radio stations.’ His heart started to thump. If they could get a fumigator and an electrician free...
For a moment he was tempted to seize her face in his hands and kiss her. He took a gulp of his drink instead.
She shimmied in her chair, her eyes bright. ‘Do you have a contact at the local television station?’
Why wasn’t he the one bubbling over with ideas? Once upon a time... He shook the thought off. ‘You’re thinking of getting someone to interview me, you, some of the staff?’
‘I’d prefer to remain in the background.’
He remembered her ex-boyfriend and beneath the table his hand clenched. ‘Right.’ He frowned. ‘Look, I’ve spoken to the press a lot, Neen, and I have no problem with that, but some of the boys are barely articulate.’ If they did a television interview they’d need to show the boys to their advantage or they’d be doing more harm than good.
Her lip curled. ‘Aren’t you sick of all those earnest ad campaigns?’
He shrugged. All he knew was if you stuck a puppy, kitten or a baby in front of a camera you received ten times more funding.
‘Why couldn’t we do something fun? Use humour?’
He recognised the fire in her eyes and momentarily envied it. ‘Like...?’
She suddenly laughed, and it hit him that she smelled of the crisp alpine air that could be found in Tasmania’s Southwest National Park. A place he hadn’t visited in over...
Ten years.
He swallowed and kept his eyes on Neen’s laughing face until the darkness started to dissolve and lose its hold.
‘Why couldn’t we show a motley bunch of teenage boys walking the streets and looking threatening and scary, with a voiceover that says, “Do you want these boys prowling your street?” There could be elderly people rushing into their homes and locking their doors in a really over-the-top way. And then we could pan to the café, with all the boys gainfully employed and serving coffee and scrummy cake to all those previously scared residents. The voiceover could then say something along the lines of, “Help us get them off the streets and gainfully employed”.’
Rico had to laugh at the picture she’d created.
‘We wouldn’t show them actually doing anything illegal. There’d just be a whole gang of them, and they’d be pushing and shoving each other and yahooing like teenage boys do. For some reason people seem to find that intimidating.’
But she didn’t?
He remembered the way she’d bellowed at Monty on the beach and shook his head. Of course she didn’t. He frowned, though, when he remembered the way she’d jumped when that car had backfired. Was that just to do with her ex?
‘It’d generate interest.’
‘It’d cost valuable money...and time.’
‘But if it brings attention to your cause...?’
She had a point.
‘Anyway, let’s move on. As far as an advertising campaign goes, that’s your lookout.’
He marvelled at her energy.
‘I think once we have the occupational health and safety approval we should organise a working bee. We could do the whole radio call-out for help, but can you convince your teenagers to work for nothing?’
‘Some of them, yes.’ Some of them desperately wanted work, wanted a chance. More than he could possibly employ this time around.
‘If they help paint and decorate the café I expect they’ll start to feel invested in it. Especially if we reward them with free pizza.’
‘That’s an excellent plan.’
She sipped her beer. ‘And one you’d already thought of, I see.’
It was something of a relief to know she didn’t have a monopoly on good ideas. ‘Promise teenage boys free food and they’ll be there—wherever there is.’
She laughed. ‘This is probably something else you’ve already considered, but...’
‘But?’
‘We will get tradesman who’ll offer us their time free of charge—painters and carpenters—if we put a call out. Are there any likely suspects among your boys who’d welcome an apprenticeship in those areas?’
He was already on it, but... ‘Darn, you’re good.’
‘I also think we need to build up hype for the café’s opening. Could we raffle or auction tickets to attend lunch on our opening day?’
He rested his elbows on the table. ‘I think it’s a great idea, but I still want to open the café a week Wednesday.’
She pursed her lips, and he almost laughed at the way she hauled in a breath.
‘So we’re going to be busy next week, huh?’
‘Flat out. I’d rather advertise a gala event for a couple of months down the track. I’d like to invite restaurateurs, managers of catering firms, hoteliers...anyone who might be interested in hiring our trainees.’
She clapped her hands. ‘We could work towards a Melbourne Cup luncheon. That gives us plenty of time to get the boys up to scratch.’
And it would give them time to create a snowball effect in the local media too, with the clock ticking down the days. ‘Excellent!’
He sat back. Instead of hard work and an endless round of bureaucratic red tape, Rico started to envisage the fun of the project, the satisfaction of achievement...and the knowledge that he could make this project work.
He could get boys with too much time on their hands off the streets. He could give them a sense of direction.
He stared at Neen. Again he had to fight the urge to reach across and kiss her.
He rolled his shoulders. Gratitude. That was all it was.
He drained the rest of his squash. ‘Neen, I’m impressed. I knew the moment you walked into my office that you were the right person for the job.’ Which begged the question, why had he ranked two other applicants higher? Why hadn’t he trusted his gut instinct?
‘But?’
‘It’s only now I’m seeing exactly how right you are for it. When you refused to sign the two-year contract I questioned your commitment, but I was wrong.’ He sat back. ‘Exactly where have you come by all your energy, your ideas?’ Because if he could he’d bottle it.
Her eyes suddenly filled with tears. She ducked her head to hide them and his chest clenched tighter than a politician’s handout.
‘What...?’ He swallowed. ‘I was offering you a compliment.’ Or at least trying to. ‘What did I say wrong?’
* * *
The red sting took Neen completely off guard. She forced herself to breathe through it, though the effort left her throat bruised and her eyes aching. She gave thanks that the pub was dim and quiet.
‘What did I say wrong?’
She was barely acquainted with this man, but she knew down to the last detail the frown he’d be wearing. She went to say it was nothing, that she was just being silly, but the words refused to come.
To be perfectly frank, she didn’t feel like lying. Not to Rico. He might be driven, and wholly given over to his good cause, but beneath it all he was a nice man. He saw a problem and searched for a solution.
Except for that brief moment back in the courtyard earlier. Then he’d looked as if he could sleep for fifty years.
She glanced up and winced at the concern in his eyes. She didn’t want him turning her into some paragon and sticking her on a pedestal titled ‘Exemplary Employee’. She’d only disappoint him. She expected that enough of his job was thankless as it was. She didn’t want to add to his load.
She forced back a sigh. ‘You asked me where my energy and my ideas came from...’
‘The question was rhetorical. I was trying to praise you.’
‘I know, and I appreciate it. You made me feel I was doing good work, making a difference in a good way.’ It had been a while since anyone had made her feel like that.
‘But...?’
She leaned towards him. She almost reached out to touch his hand. At the last moment she pulled back, though she couldn’t have explained why. ‘Rico, my dream is to own my own café. For three and a half months I thought that dream was about to become a reality. I was scouting out premises. I was playing around with prospective menus. I got talking to people in the know about prospective staff. My mind was buzzing with ideas. But...’