When I Fall in Love(35)
Even Max appeared hot, sweat beading across his hairline.
“Did you pour in your arrowroot too fast?”
“I don’t know—ah!” He took his pudding off the heat, turned away from it.
The look on his face said that he hovered on the verge of walking out of the kitchen, never to return.
“Max, calm down,” Grace said. “Listen, it’s just like your mother’s banana pudding. You have to keep whisking it like this.” She put his pan back on the heat, turned it way down to a simmer, and began to whisk it against the side of the pan.
“I’ve made haupia before,” he growled. “I’m just off my game.”
“Then get back in the game. C’mon, you try it.” She’d already worked out a couple lumps and now took his hand, guided it with hers.
He took the whisk, blew out a breath.
“See, it’s evening out.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“It’s just pudding, Max.”
She got pinched, tight lips in answer.
“No time for mistakes. Right.” She glanced at Keoni, who was headed their way. “I don’t suppose there is some cinnamon contraband in the back . . .”
“Grace.”
She smiled.
Keoni walked by, glanced at her haupia. Nodded. Kept walking.
“I got a nod. A nod!”
Max’s mouth lifted up on one side. “Calm down, Chef Christiansen.”
“You just wish you could make haupia like the master.”
“It’s my life goal.”
The smile stayed as he poured his cream into a rectangular pan and brought hers with his to the refrigerator to chill.
She was cleaning her work area when Keoni returned. “You’re doing well, Grace. I have to admit, for a mainlander, you can keep it cool under pressure.”
She bit back a quip. Keoni scared her a little, with the seriousness in his dark eyes, the way his gaze seemed to study her.
Max returned to the counter. “Chef?”
“Max, I’d like you and Grace to consider entering this year’s Honolulu Chop. It’s a four-day competition for amateurs, in teams, and I think you two would do well. I’ve been watching your partner here, and Grace seems to know how to think on her feet. And you . . .” He lifted a shoulder. “You know Hawaiian food.”
Grace glanced at Max, back at Keoni. “You’re not serious.”
“Why not? You two are a good team.”
A good team. She couldn’t read Max’s face. He wore almost a baffled expression.
“I, uh—”
“Max, we don’t have to do this. I know you’re just here on vacation.”
“The prize is ten thousand dollars,” Keoni said.
Oh.
“Think about it,” Keoni said. “You can tell me Monday, when class resumes.” He strode off to inspect more haupia.
Grace stood there, for the first time thankful for the rain that would keep her away from Max’s company for the rest of the day.
Poor man didn’t know how to tell her no.
Imagine, the Iron Chef meets . . . Well, she wasn’t quite Julia Child. Maybe more like the Galloping Gourmet. “Max, we’re not going to do this. We’re here to learn and have fun.”
“Absolutely. Which is why it’s Pearl Harbor day,” Max said, shedding his apron and chef’s uniform.
“What?” She followed him out of the kitchen, dropping her coat in a hamper and shucking off the chef’s pants as she went. Underneath, she wore shorts and a T-shirt. She followed him through the covered shelters that connected the kitchen to the rest of the resort.
He was ten strides away from her.
“Max!”
He stopped next to a pond where water cascaded from the thatched roof of the walkway. Koi swam in the pond, and a white cockatoo clung to a piece of bamboo under the cover of a pair of tall palms. “What?”
“You can stop babysitting me now. Really.” She caught up to him, fighting the urge to press her hand to his chest. He wore a black T-shirt, a pair of cargo shorts. “And that includes this competition. I know I’ve been a burden to you—you haven’t even gone surfing yet.”
His mouth tightened, and he looked at her with such fierceness that she could almost see the battle waging inside.
“Listen, I’m going back to my room. I’m going to read a book. I like books. I like to read. And I can do that alone. All weekend, if I have to.” She smiled at him. “The answer is no. No Pearl Harbor and no competition.”
Then she walked past him, straight to the lobby, and got on the elevator.
There. See? That was easy. Just . . . easy. She could let out her breath now.
The doors were nearly closed when Max stuck his hand in and muscled his way onto the elevator.