Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Epilogue
Heidi’s Story
Acknowledgements
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
Straight Talking
Jemima J
Mr. Maybe
Bookends
Babyville
Spellbound
The Other Woman
Swapping Lives
Second Chance
The Beach House
Dune Road
VIKING
Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A • Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England • Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd) • Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd) • Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India • Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) • Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published in 2010 by Viking Penguin,
a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
Copyright © Jane Green, 2010 All rights reserved
Publisher’s Note This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA
Green, Jane
Promises to keep / Jane Green.
p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-101-19022-7
1. Sisters-Fiction. 2. Parent and adult child-Fiction. 3. Divorced parents-Fiction.
4. Maine-Fiction. 5. Life change events-Fiction. 6. Domestic fiction. I. Title.
PR6057.R3443P76 2010
823’.914—dc22 2010008120
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrightable materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
http://us.penguingroup.com
In memory of Heidi Armitage
1965-2009
And dedicated to all the remarkable
women on the discussion boards of
www.breastcancer.org
Chapter One
Steffi elbows her hair out of her eyes before grabbing a frying pan, splashing olive oil liberally into it and scraping the finely chopped onion into the oil. Ignoring the sweat running into her eyes, she spins around, hurrying over to the counter opposite, where Jorge is slicing spring onions.
“More of the green,” she says, peering over his shoulder, then leaning forward to show him. “Take it all the way up to there.” She runs back to the frying pan and shakes it hard, turning down the heat for the onion to soften, before pacing quickly to another chopping board and thinly slicing a giant portobello mushroom.
The rest of the world might be falling apart, but you’d never know it to look through the window at Joni’s on Twelfth Street, the tiny vegetarian restaurant downtown that is becoming almost impossible to get into.
The crowds come for the cozy atmosphere, the friendly staff and, mostly, the food, which garnered a rave review in New York magazine the other week, and is solely because of their scatty but brilliant chef, Steffi Tollemache.
In the past year, Steffi has been astonished to see how busy the restaurant has become. It is her first proper job as a chef, and she knew, within days, that she had finally found her calling.
It wasn’t just the excitement of being given free rein to reinvent the menu that made it so perfect, but the people. For the first time, Steffi felt part of a community, with most of the customers living in the hood and almost all becoming regulars.
The lunchtime rush is over when Steffi looks through the hatch to see Mason at a table by the window, immersed, as usual, in a manuscript, and sipping from a mug of coffee.
She owes him a thank-you—last week a box arrived containing advance copies of two new cookbooks that Mason had told her about, knowing she would be interested.
Wiping her hands on a towel and pushing the damp strands of hair off her face, she nudges the kitchen door open with her foot and walks over to the table with a smile.
The restaurant is almost empty. Just a table of four who are lingering over their mint teas and Middle Eastern orange cake.
“Are you the chef?” One of the table of four stops her as she passes, and Steffi nods.
“This. Cake. Is. Awesome.”
“It’s incredible,” the rest of the table chorus. “This is the most amazing cake I’ve ever had.”
One of the girls leans forward eagerly. “I’m a serious cook, and I would love to have the recipe.”
“Thank you for all your great compliments,” Steffi says and grins, catching Mason’s eye as he listens and looks up. “And yes, of course you can have the recipe. I’ll only have to charge you two hundred and fifty dollars for it.”
“What?” Their mouths fall open in shock.
“I’m kidding!” Steffi laughs. “Didn’t you ever hear the Neiman Marcus chocolate-chip-cookie story? I’m pretty sure it’s apocryphal, but I couldn’t resist.”
“Oh my God!” one of the group exclaims. “I’ve baked those cookies! I love them.”
“I know,” Steffi says. “Me too. I’ll have to write down the recipe for the cake. Do you want to give me your email address? That’s probably easiest.”
“That would be great,” the girl says. “Thanks!”
“I think I underordered,” Mason says. “I clearly need some of that orange cake.”
“Everyone needs some of the orange cake!” Steffi smiles, turning to call to Skye, the waitress who’s hovering by the bar at the end. “
Skye? Can you bring Mason an orange cake?”
“Do you have time to sit?” Mason gestures to the chair and Steffi gratefully sinks down into it, relieved to be finally off her feet.
Skye comes to the table bringing the cake for Mason, two spoons and a cup of Lemon Zinger tea (her favorite) for Steffi, who smiles gratefully and squeezes her hand after she sets them down, then shakes her head as Mason tries to foist the second spoon on her.
“Oh come on, you have to. I can’t eat all this by myself.”
“So eat half and take the rest home for Olivia.”
He splutters with laughter. “Olivia won’t eat this! She’s allergic to carbs, wheat and sugar. Oh, and dairy.”
“She is? Seriously allergic?”
“Of course not, but that’s what she says now because it’s easier than having to explain how she looks that fantastic after two kids. Mmmm. I have to say, she’s seriously missing out on the fun stuff.”
Is she ever, thinks Steffi, who would never dare say anything.
Mason and Olivia live with their perfect children, Sienna and Gray, in a perfect apartment on Park Avenue in the East Sixties. And not just any building on Park Avenue in the East Sixties, but a building that is considered to be one of the top three buildings in Manhattan.
She only knows the apartment is perfect because a few weeks ago, waiting to see the doctor after a particularly nasty cold that had left her with a wicked sinus infection (dizzy spells and loss of balance were not great while working in a busy kitchen), she picked up a copy of Elle Décor.
There, on page sixty-five, was a giant glossy picture of Mason and Olivia, with Sienna and Gray looking adorably cute, in their stunning apartment. They were described as a glamorous power couple, he the highly respected publisher who formed his own imprint five years ago, and, thanks to three huge successes, is now regarded as a serious player in the publishing world.
His wife, Olivia, is a Bedale. Yes, from those Bedales. The super-wealthy Southern oil family. Steffi asked a friend who worked in publishing about them, and the money, it seems, the riches that funded their extraordinary apartment, is her family money. While he is now a player, that wouldn’t earn him anything like the sort of income that bought this apartment, and the art contained within it.
They are not the sort of people whom Steffi would usually know, but Mason works around the corner and comes in for lunch a couple of times a week.
Olivia met him there for lunch one day and Steffi was stunned. Though Olivia was charming to her, Steffi had never imagined Mason to be married to someone so . . . perfect.
Mason is always a bit of a mess. His hair is never brushed, he often has at least a day’s worth of stubble and his suits never seem to quite fit him, hanging off his lanky frame. There are times when Steffi wants to force-feed him, and although she knew, long before seeing the magazine article, that he was married, never did she expect him to be married to someone who looked like Olivia.
Olivia looks frighteningly high-maintenance. The day she walked in, on her own, waiting for Mason, Steffi happened to be at the hatch and she was tempted to run out and tell this woman she was clearly in the wrong place, then redirect her to somewhere like Café Boulud or the Four Seasons.
What was she doing at Joni’s?
A tiny symphony of blond and white cashmere, her diamonds cast pinpricks of light on the ceiling, a veritable disco ball, as she turned to see if Mason was there.
Who was she?
“Excuse me?” Her voice was light and lilting, clearly Southern, and she laid a hand on the waitress’s arm with a beaming smile. “I am so sorry to bother you when you are this busy, but I think we have a reservation?”
“We don’t take reservations.” Skye said. “But you’re welcome to wait in line for a table.”
Her face fell. “Oh. I’m certain my husband would . . .” She trailed off as the door opened and Mason walked in. “There he is!” she said in exasperation, as Skye raised an eyebrow at Steffi, still peering through the hatch, and winked at Mason to indicate she would seat him as quickly as possible.
They may not have taken reservations, but they still tried to look after their most regular and valued customers, and Mason was definitely one of them even though his wife was a . . . surprise.
As with all their regular customers, particularly the ones who, like Mason, arrive after the lunchtime rush, she has gotten to know them, has even grown to consider some of them friends.
“I totally meant to thank you.” Steffi picks up her tea and sips. “I can’t believe you remembered to send me the cookbooks.”
“Of course. What did you think of them? This, by the way,” he gestures to the cake, “is sublime.”
“Thank you. And I did look at the books. You were right about the slow-cooking one—there’s a lot of meat in it, so I had to look at it more carefully, but I loved the recipes, and I see how you could take the meat out and adapt them.”
“That was the point of my sending it to you,” he says. “I knew you’d like the vegetables.”
“I have to say, the chili is incredible. I made it the other day.” She sighs, barely perceptibly.
“You did? But doesn’t it have turkey in it?”
Steffi laughs. “Yes, but I made it for my sister’s birthday. We’re having a surprise party for her on Friday, so I made two batches, one with turkey for the party, and then I adapted it slightly for a vegan batch. Also, I added some allspice and cinnamon, which was gorgeous—made it ever so slightly sweet. And now,” she sighs again, heavily, “I have to make it all over again tonight.”
“It was that good?”
“No. Rob invited a ton of people over last night while I was at work and, several pounds of grass later, they all attacked the chili. Which would normally be fine, but I’d made it for my sister’s birthday party this weekend, and Rob knew that,” Steffi says in disgust. “Sometimes I think I’m living with a child.”
Mason laughs heartily. “I think all rock stars are a bit like that.”
“I thought it was all men?”
“That too.”
“Christ.” Steffi shakes her head. “And according to my dad I’m still a child. How is it I’ve ended up with someone even more irresponsible than me?”
“I take it he isn’t the love of your life?”
“I can’t even talk about it,” Steffi says sadly, for she recognizes this feeling, and knows it is now just a matter of time. Talking about it, even with someone as sympathetic as Mason, would just make it real; giving voice to her inner feelings would mean she would then have to make a change, and how can she run when she doesn’t know where she’s running to?
“So tell me more about the cinnamon with the chili,” Mason says. “I love that idea. It’s very Moroccan, to mix the sweet and the sour. Interesting to do that with chili. It worked, I take it?”
“Apparently so. At least according to the stoners lounging round the apartment last night. You should try it,” she says and grins. “Or maybe I’ll add it to the menu.”
“Do that and you’ll have to pay me royalties.”
“Please tell me you’re joking.”
Mason throws up his hands. “Okay, I’m joking. So when are you going to write a cookbook for me?”
“When I can think of an angle that will sell it.”
“I asked you ages ago to start thinking.”
“Are you sure we really need an angle?”
“Yes. But when you’re ready come and see me and we’ll talk.”
Steffi sighs again. “I must be the only chef in the country who is being offered a publishing deal and is too busy to take it.”
Mason laughs. “I haven’t actually offered you a deal . . . yet. I just said come and talk to me when you have a good story to tell.”
“Isn’t being a rock chick and vegan chef in a vegetarian restaurant enough?”
“Sadly, no,” Mason says. “Hey, there was something I’ve been meaning to ask you.”
“Ask away
, but quickly.” Steffi checks her watch, and notes that Skye is getting itchy feet, clearly wanting to leave.
“So we’re moving to London . . .”
“What?”
“We just bought a publishing house in the UK and we’re merging the two businesses, so I have to spend some time over there to get this company going.”
“I can’t believe we’ve been sitting here talking about chili when you have this huge news. That’s great! It’s great, right?”
“It is great, and we’re all really excited. Olivia’s there now, working with the decorator to get the apartment ready. But here’s the thing: we can’t take Fingal.”
“Fingal?” Who is Fingal, Steffi wonders. Butler? Driver?
“Our dog. Fingal.”
“Oh!” She laughs. “I thought it was a butler.”
“Don’t be ridiculous!” Mason shakes his head and winks. “The butler’s coming with us.”
“Tell me that you’re joking now.”
He shrugs. “I know. It’s really ridiculous. That we have a butler.”
“It’s insane! What are you even doing here? You’re much too posh for this restaurant.”
“It’s not me!” He suddenly sounds like a little boy. Plaintive. “It’s Olivia. This is how she grew up, I guess.”
“Wow. So let me ask you a question.” There is a twinkle in her eye as Steffi leans forward. “If you have a butler, how come your suits are always so horribly pressed? I think you should fire him.”
Mason sinks his head into his hands with a shrug. “I can’t help it. When I put them on they’re perfect, but everything I wear looks like I’ve slept in it within an hour. It drives Olivia nuts. She makes me change my clothes every couple of hours when I’m at home.”
“She does?” Steffi is astonished.
“I know. But anyway . . . Fingal. He can’t come with us—no dogs allowed in the apartment in London—so we need to find him a home. Do you by any chance know anyone?”
Steffi’s eyes glaze over for a moment as she realizes what a dangerous conversation this is for her to be having. She loves dogs. She has always wanted a dog. She is known in certain circles as the dog rescuer, and has never been known to leave an animal rescue center without a dog in tow.