“Excuse me?”
“Salt? Do you hate it?”
Fire and anger and pride seared beneath my skin, setting my bones ablaze and my blood to boil. “No, I don’t hate salt.”
He jabbed his hand at my food. “Then why do you abuse it like you do? It’s a supporting actor, not the star of the show. It should enhance flavor, not slap you in the face with it.”
My gasp cut through the plaza, high and shrill. “Stop! Stop it right there! I don’t want to hear your opinion or your thoughts or your criticism. No more, Killian! I mean it.”
His attention moved so quickly from the meatball to my face that I stumbled back a step. There was so much intensity to him. So much aggression and focus and emotion. He wasn’t someone you could forget. He left an impression in seconds. Or an imprint. He was a force like the wind, or a tornado. He blew over you with destructive intent, annihilating everything you thought you knew about the world with his brutal opinions and cocky confidence.
When he just stared at me, I began to shrivel. My hands and knees started trembling, and I felt the immediate urge to bolt, to just run away.
Finally, he stepped forward, scooping up a bite of pita and meatball with this fork. He held it toward my face. “Try it.”
My voice was nothing more than a breathless gasp. “What?”
He jerked the fork toward me again. “Try it. Try the meatball.”
“I did—”
“Humor me.”
Unwilling to give this difficult man everything he wanted, I crossed my arms over my chest and said, “Don’t you have a kitchen to run?”
“Yes, I do. So take the bite.”
“No.”
He stepped closer, losing some of his hard edge. “Humor me.” After a beat of silence, he added, “Please?”
It was his please that did it. My body reacted to the softly spoken plea before my brain could intervene. I closed my mouth around the fork, his fork, and took the bite. A shiver rolled down my spine when I realized how strange the gesture was, how intimate.
I didn’t make a habit of eating off other people’s forks.
“See?” His question brought me back to reality, and I remembered to taste the food that was in my mouth.
I had spent hours over this recipe. Hours and hours. I’d put every last bit of my talent into creating the perfect lamb meatball. I had made sure it was well spiced, a good, solid texture with just the right notes of earthiness and comfort. The gravy was my own recipe, and it was thick and creamy but not too rich. I’d pickled the vegetables myself and made sure each dice was exactly even and consistent. They were tangy and just barely still crisp—just the way I wanted them. And the pita was a trick I’d learned from a Greek grandmother in Italy. I’d worked with her son at a small bistro, and I’d convinced him to let her teach me how. The pitas were perfection.
And yet now that he brought up the salt…
“Goddamn you,” I hissed at him after I swallowed.
He poked at the fries. “The fries are clever and would have been the highlight if not for everything else. The flatbread is fine. But the vegetables are bland, and the meatball is too salty. Your tzatziki is stringy.”
“I hate you.”
He shook his head, ignoring me. “You hate that I’m right.”
If I didn’t before, I did now. “Go away, Quinn.”
By now a line had formed again, and Molly had filled the ticket line with orders. I needed to get back to work and serve people that didn’t care that I’d slightly over-salted the meat. They wouldn’t even be able to tell.
Yes, fine, Killian was right. But only a professional would be able to tell.
At least that’s what I told myself. The sweet tasting lie would give me the courage to finish out the night at least.
Killian opened his mouth like he wanted to argue with me some more, but Wyatt appeared in the side door of Lilou. “We need you, Chef!”
I seized the opportunity to get rid of him. “Your kitchen needs you, Chef. So get out of mine.”
He grinned at me, as if enjoying my hatred. “Enjoy the desserts, Vera. It was worth the trade.”
He tossed his half-eaten meal in the trash can and sauntered back to his restaurant. If I didn’t know any better, I would have even said there was a spring in his step.
“God, what an asshole,” I growled once he was out of earshot.
When Molly didn’t immediately agree, I turned to look at her. She shrugged innocently. “I think he’s used to getting his way.”
“It’s obnoxious.”
She fanned herself with her notepad. “And so damn hot.”
I should have disagreed with her. But that would have been a filthy lie.
Chapter Nine
I hoped Killian had gotten the message that I didn’t want anything more to do with him. It was weird hating a chef of Killian’s caliber, but the guy was intolerable. I couldn’t stand him.
He had to realize that by now.
I didn’t like to think of myself as an opportunist, but in culinary school I’d made it a point to get to know as many notable chefs as possible. Whether they were teachers or guest speakers, I wanted to glean as much technique and talent as I could from them.
It wasn’t anything more than a desire to get the most out of my expensive education. But in the end, it had backfired.
I’d gotten to know one guest chef too closely. And then I’d fallen in love with him.
Instead of getting a foot in the door of an ultra-competitive industry, I’d traded my goals and aspirations for a toxic relationship that inevitably ruined any chance I had at making a name for myself.
But even if it weren’t for my firsthand experience with self-absorbed, verbally abusive chefs, I still would want nothing to do with Killian Quinn. He was rude, intrusive and insensitive. I didn’t ask him for his opinion.
And I certainly didn’t want it.
What I wanted was for him to leave me alone.
Apparently, that was too much to ask.
I’d seen him arrive at Lilou an hour earlier. It was Saturday afternoon, and I was deep in prep work for this evening’s dinner service. The second I saw him pull up, I had ducked out of view, where I watched him like a weird stalker from the shadows.
He’d dismounted his motorcycle with the same careless ease he always did and tugged the helmet from his head. Only this time instead of going straight inside his restaurant, he stared at the food truck for a solid two minutes.
My heart pounded inside my chest, afraid he would walk over here. I scrunched back against the cooler, praying he couldn’t see me as I hid like a coward. But his gaze stayed so intent that I started to wonder if he had super-vision.
Finally, he propped his helmet on his bike and disappeared inside Lilou. I took a deep, stabilizing breath and contemplated trying to convince Vann to move the bike shop. Like across town. Or to a different city. Maybe, possibly, the moon.
I already knew my brother would never do it. Selfish bastard.
The sauce in front of me simmered in the pan, bubbles bursting every once in a while. Dipping a clean spoon in it, I lifted it to my lips and tasted. Not salty enough.
Damn it.
I needed to get the meatballs in the sauce, but now I was afraid of ruining the flavor. The self-doubt wasn’t natural for me, and I hated it even more because it was inspired by the idiot across the street. It wrapped around me like cracked, too-tight skin I desperately needed to shed.
A sharp knock on the door interrupted my internal freak out, and I spun around ready to face Vann or Molly and ask them to restore some of my confidence with flowery, over the top compliments.
I wasn’t ashamed to beg for verbal affirmations. Sometimes a girl just needed to hear how freaking awesome she was.
Before you judge, I gave out verbal affirmations in return. Because I was a good friend and a good sister. And because Molly and Vann truly were freaking awesome.
Unfortunately, it was neither of them.
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“Do I need to get a restraining order for you to take the hint?”
Killian stared at me, his mouth just barely twitching. “We’re neighbors. Our kitchens aren’t even one hundred feet apart.”
I snorted. “And wouldn’t it be a pity if you lost your job because you can’t leave mine alone?”
His cocky expression turned into a scowl. “I knew you were green, Delane. But I didn’t think you were a baby.”
“I’m not taking your bait, Quinn. You might as well leave.”
“The thing about baiting is that sometimes it takes a little persistence. You’ll give in. I’m not worried.”
I slammed a hand on my hip, remembering that I hadn’t changed into professional clothes yet. The weather still sizzled around the temperature of the sun, so I’d worn loud, yellow, flowery high-waisted shorts because they were every girl’s best friend, and a navy blue lacy crop top.
“I’ve got work to do, Killian. What do you want?”
He stepped inside the truck but didn’t come further than the entryway. “I wanted to…” He took another step toward me, his gaze catching on the simmering pan. “Are you reworking your gravy?”
I swallowed against the offended lump in my throat. “No.”
He sniffed the air and moved closer to me. “Are you sure?”
“This isn’t gravy,” I lied to him. “I’m trying to figure out your shortbread recipe.”
His low chuckle slid over the back of my neck and whispered down my spine. “You could have just asked.”
I whipped around to face him, jumpy from feelings I shouldn’t be having. “And you would have given it to me?”
He shrugged. “Sure.”
I wasn’t planning on making my own desserts, but I wanted to test him. “Okay, give it to me.”
“What do I get out of it?”
“Who says you get anything out of it?”
He held my gaze, his mouth quirking at one corner. Good grief, he was unfairly hot. Molly was right about that.
Standing this close to him in daylight I could finally check out his tattoos. And I did, uncaring if he caught me staring. We were well beyond polite shyness.
An anatomical heart had been strikingly etched on the inside of one forearm with a giant, bloody butcher knife piercing its center. Celtic designs wound around the rest of the space disappearing underneath the sleeve of his black t-shirt. On the other forearm, a large compass stretched from the inside of his elbow to his wrist, filling up almost the entire space. Instead of arrows pointing toward the direction markers, kitchen utensils had been cleverly used. A spatula pointed west, and a whisk pointed north, like a clock telling time.
He crossed his arms over his chest, breaking the momentary spell his tattoos had put on me. “That’s how we play this game, Delane. You give me something. I give you something.”
I blinked at him. “We’re not playing a game.”
“Are you sure?” His tongue swept over his bottom lip, and I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from mimicking him.
“Yes,” I told him firmly.
“Try it,” he suggested. “Ask me for something. I’ll tell you what it costs.”
“So how do I stop you from giving me any more unwanted advice?”
His mouth broke into a full grin. He watched me for a few, long seconds as he debated something internally. “It doesn’t matter. The shortbread recipe isn’t mine. I can’t give it to you.”
I would have been surprised had it been his. He wasn’t known for his desserts after all. “I didn’t want it anyway.”
“But you do want my help with the sauce.”
“I don’t.”
He reached past me, brushing my waist with his hand, uncaring that I was standing between him and the stove. “If you’ll just…” Unable to reach a clean spoon, he gripped my hip with two hands and physically moved me to the side.
“What the—”
Outraged I watched him try the sauce and then tap his nose with the tip of the spoon. He stood there in thought before grabbing a meatball out of the cooler and biting into it. He got a different spoon and tasted the gravy again before finishing the meatball.
He slammed around my kitchen, rifling through shelves and opening metal cabinets. Finally, he moved to the cooler and pulled out fresh mint.
I bought it for the tzatziki sauce. I’d contemplated putting it into the meatballs, but I hadn’t. I didn’t want that particular flavor to be overwhelming.
Killian moved back to the counter and pulled down a clean cutting board. Then he helped himself to my knives.
My hands clenched into fists. “What are you doing?”
He glanced at me over his shoulder. “Oh, do you mind if I just…” He gestured at the cutting board with the knife already in his hand.
“I—wha-”
He turned back to the mint and started chopping it into minuscule pieces. “This is a nice knife.” He read the brand and went back to work. “At least you know how to take care of your tools.”
“What a dick thing to say.”
His shoulders shook with a silent laugh. “I just gave you a compliment.”
“You gave me a backhanded compliment. And you know it.”
He moved the mint to the white sauce and added dill. Then he went back to the cooler and pulled out a lemon. “Take the compliment, chef, and stop assuming that everything I say is an insult.”
He called me chef.
He called me chef!
My ego perked up at the unexpected accolade and I tried to remember all the horrible things he’d done to me in the short time I knew him.
“You’re making it too much like the tzatziki,” I complained.
He shook his head, his lips quirking up in a private smile. “Have a little faith.” He then grabbed the red pepper flakes and tossed in a generous amount.
He stood over the pan and stirred while I watched him. Neither of us said anything for a long time. I couldn’t guess the thoughts in his head, but I was trying to come to terms with how comfortable he looked in my kitchen.
He should have been too big for the small interior. But he hunched his broad shoulders when he worked, curling his long torso over his food protectively… thoughtfully. His muscles rolled with every small movement, every stir of his whisk or lift of a new spoon to taste his progress.
His ego should have made him seem pretentious and out of place in my humble space. But he moved around with a natural ease that was at once alluring and intimidating. He guessed where things were, but most of the time he was right. He mastered my knives like he’d used them all his life. And he worked the sauce like it was his original recipe.
He was too good for my kitchen and yet he didn’t act like it. No matter what we’d said to each other leading up to now, he was being nice.
Even friendly.
And it was weirding me out.
Panic twisted in my gut, warning me that this was dangerous. He was dangerous. “What do you want, Killian?”
He turned around with a spoon in one hand, the other making a cup underneath. “For you to try this.”
He all but shoved the spoon in my mouth. I closed my lips around it because there was no other choice.
It was too hot, but I still had to stifle a groan. He’d taken my good sauce and made it a masterpiece. He’d transformed my modest recipe from necessary to essential, from dead to alive, from anonymous to five-star-worthy. I stepped back, keeping hold of the spoon. His eyes followed me, waiting, expecting. “It’s too similar to the tzatziki,” I told him.
“That’s the point,” he explained. “Only use the gravy. Save the tzatziki for the fries. You’ll separate the flavor profiles and make it more interesting.”
I clenched my teeth so hard, my jaw ticked. He was a pushy, intrusive asshole. And completely right. Damn him. I shoved my way between him and the stove, grabbing for the red pepper flakes, just to make a point that this was still my kitchen.
“You went a little light.”<
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He peered over my shoulder, his chest pressing momentarily against my back. His deep voice rumbled in my ear. “Careful, chef.”
I shivered. I couldn’t help it. He made the relentless summer day feel frigid compared to his body heat. His breath danced along my earlobe and despite the savory sauce filling the kitchen with Mediterranean scents and tangible defeat, all I could smell was him.
The whisk in my hand trembled once, twice. I leaned back into him, unable to resist exploring what it would feel like to be pressed against his hard chest, how he would make me feel against his body.
I had to know.
He leaned closer, and my shoulders settled against him, his hand landing on my hip with the lightest touch. A ripple of uncertainty vibrated through me. I should pull away. I shouldn’t have gotten this close to begin with.
I started to step to the side, and Killian’s fingers dug into my hip, holding me in place, taking the decision away from me. His touch was light only seconds before, but now it was strong, familiar, possessive. He was used to getting his way, and I’d suddenly stopped coming up with reasons why I shouldn’t let him have it.
“Sorry, I’m late, Vera!” My dad’s voice boomed inside the truck and Killian and I jumped apart like we’d been caught cooking completely naked.
Dad ambled inside, catching Killian and I avoiding each other’s eyes and shuffling to opposite sides of the small space. “Oh, sorry,” Dad murmured. “I didn’t realize you had company.”
“I don’t!” I rushed to explain, knowing my eyes were wild with guilt. The reality of how easy it had been to let myself touch Killian crashed down on me carrying the burden of my abandoned dreams and failed relationship. “I mean, he’s not company. Or a friend. Or really, anything.” Dad and Killian shared similar expressions of confusion. Translation: I was acting like a lunatic. “What I mean is he was helping me, but now he’s leaving. Killian runs the kitchen across the street. He was just, uh, giving me his opinion on my sauce for tonight.”
Killian thrust out his hand for my dad to shake. “Killian Quinn. Like Vera said, I run Lilou just over there.”
The Opposite of You Page 10