CHAPTER ONE

      MAC PRESSED THE heels of his hands to his eyes and counted to five before pulling them away and focussing on the computer screen again. He reread what he’d written of the recipe so far and fisted his hands. What came next?

      This steamed mussels dish was complicated, but he must have made it a hundred times. He ground his teeth together. The words blurred and danced across the screen. Why couldn’t he remember what came next?

      Was it coconut milk?

      He shook his head. That came later.

      With a curse, he leapt up, paced across the room and tried to imagine making the dish. He visualised himself in a kitchen, with all the ingredients arrayed around him. He imagined speaking directly to a rolling camera to explain what he was doing—the necessity of each ingredient and the importance of the sequence. His chest swelled and then cramped. He dragged a hand back through his hair. To be cooking...to be back at work... A black well of longing rose through him, drowning him with a need so great he thought the darkness would swallow him whole.

      It’d be a blessing if it did.

      Except he had work to do.

      He kicked out at a pile of dirty washing bunched in the corner of the room before striding back to his desk and reaching for the bottle of bourbon on the floor beside it. It helped to blunt the pain. For a little while. He lifted it to his mouth and then halted. The heavy curtains drawn at the full-length windows blocked the sunlight from the room, and while his body had no idea—it was in a seemingly permanent state of jet lag—his brain told him it was morning.

      Grinding his teeth, he screwed the cap back on the bottle.

       Finish the damn recipe. Then you can drink yourself into oblivion and sleep.

      Finish the recipe? That was what he had to do, but he couldn’t seem to turn from where he stood, staring at the closed curtains, picturing the day just beyond them, the sun and the light and the cool of the fresh air...the smell of the sea.

      He kept himself shut away from all that temptation.

      But it didn’t stop him from being able to imagine it.

      A ping from his computer broke the spell. Dragging a hand down his face, he turned back to the desk and forced himself into the chair.

      A message. From Russ. Of course. It was always Russ. Just for a moment he rested his head in his hands.

      Hey Bro, don’t forget Jo arrives today.

      He swore. He didn’t need a housekeeper. He needed peace and quiet so he could finish this damn cookbook.

      If the rotten woman hadn’t saved his brother’s life he’d send her off with a flea in her ear.