“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.”
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.”
My dad followed Killian’s pointer finger before taking his hand. “Hank Delane. Vera’s said nice things about that restaurant. She’s the only expert I know, but she always knows what she’s talking about. You must be proud.”
“Very, sir.” He half turned around, staring at the sauce I stirred absently. “I’ll see you later, Vera. Good luck tonight.”
Not wanting to seem rude in front of my dad, I mumbled, “You too.”
Killian left quickly, taking all his weird energy with him. I let out a shaky breath and glared at the gravy.
“He seemed nice,” Dad said. “You made him out to be such a superstar. I wasn’t sure what to expect.”
I snorted and felt a tingle of relief as I remembered how I really felt. “He’s not usually so welcoming. You brought out the decent human in him. Most of the time he’s obnoxiously combative.”
My dad snickered, taking a seat at the tall stool I’d bought for Vann and Molly when they helped me out. Neither of them could be here tonight, so my dad offered to take money instead- even though I was positive he didn’t fully understand what that entailed. I felt beyond guilty asking him to stay up hours past his bedtime, but he insisted. I loved him more for it, plus I needed him to look at my cooler and work his mechanical magic. “I don’t think I’m the reason he was over here helping you with your sauce.”
My face flushed tomato red. “Oh, my gosh, Dad!”
“Well, baby girl, honestly.”
I stared harder at Killian’s creation—I couldn’t even call it mine anymore. “Are you sure you’re up for this tonight? I hate risking your health.”
He waved me off with his meaty hand. “Vera May, there is no place I’d rather be than right here with you. If I have to go, at least let me spend my last days with the people I love most doing the things they love most.”
Hot tears pricked my eyes, but I refused to let them fall, not yet. “Dad, you’re not going anywhere, so stop talking like that. Besides, I’m going to teach you how to use a fancy phone and then you’ll realize how much you have to live for.”
He grunted and said something that sounded suspiciously like, “Jesus, take me now.” I finally lifted my face to smile at him. “You can do it, Pops. I believe in you.”
“Alright,” he finally grumbled. “Show me how to work the hoozywhatsit.”
I filled out the sauce to accommodate all the meatballs, following Killian’s additions, hating him every second of it. Then I showed Dad how to use the PayPal card swiper on my phone. He practiced with his credit card while I finished the prep work.
By the time we had our first customer, he’d deposited two hundred dollars of his ow
n money into my account, claiming that he couldn’t resist the opportunity to invest in such an exciting business venture.
“I’m paying you back,” I told him sternly.
He didn’t bother to take me seriously. “What for? I can’t take it with me.”
I hated that he kept referring to his death as if it were going to happen tomorrow. I wanted him to fight his cancer. Fight it and win.
That said, with dad helping take orders, it was the roughest night I had so far—even worse than the first night when I had to do it all myself. He loved talking to the customers, but got most of the orders wrong or mixed up. He kept accidentally deleting apps from my phone when it sat too long, and he had to pull up the pay app on his own. And he ate more meatballs than I sold.
Or at least it seemed like it.
But we had so much fun. My dad was funny, and he kept my customers and me entertained. I didn’t remember that about him from my childhood. Or I guess I did, but it was in a distant way.
I had been so excited to flee this town and his house, that I hadn’t let myself appreciate him or his sense of humor. I should have spent the last few years getting to know that about him, getting to know him.
Instead, I’d let myself get locked away. Derrek had never wanted to visit, never wanted to let me come back here. At first, I blamed his job. He was an executive chef after all. He had to work late and be up early. He didn’t get weekends or holidays off. He couldn’t leave his kitchen.
Later, when his abusive nature made itself known, I realized he preferred the control. He didn’t care about my family and didn’t want me to care about them either. He wanted me for himself. Where he could keep an eye on me. Where he could dictate my every move and thought.
Dad had always been polite to Derrek, but just barely. I knew I hid what was really going on the few times Dad and Vann had come to visit us, but they both saw that I was unhappy.
And for those reasons I’d kept Dad at a distance. I felt like I was only just now getting to know him since I’d moved back. But now my time with him had an expiration date. Dad was dying, and I couldn’t make up for all the time lost.
I closed the truck two hours early. I was nearly out of meatballs and Dad looked tired. Besides that, I was exhausted from trying to babysit him at the window and get through all those orders.
Dad helped me clean up and carry what I needed to my car. I walked by Lilou wondering what Killian would think when he came outside and I was gone. Usually, he left before me.
Shaking my head, I realized how ridiculous that was. He wouldn’t care. Or notice. Whatever we were, we weren’t friends. We weren’t even enemies.
Enemies implied that we were on equal footing of some sort, but he had made it clear time and time again that he was the superior chef. What had he called me in that note?
Pedestrian.
Dad followed me home and went straight to bed. He barely made it through his bedroom door before I heard the deep rumble of his snores.
I couldn’t fall asleep easily after a shift. I was always too amped up.
Plus, I usually smelled like the inside of a deep fat fryer. I took a shower and washed work off me, all the different smells from the night and the shadow of failure I couldn’t shake.
I blamed Killian Quinn for that.
Or at least tonight I did.
After I’d put product in my hair and brushed my teeth, I sat on my bed and pulled my laptop out. I tried not to get too obsessive with my business page or the reviews that popped up every other day, but I couldn’t help it. Feedback was addicting. And thankfully, so far the response had been so positive that it was hard not to bask in the glow.
Besides, after putting up with Killian for two days in a row, I deserved a little glow.
There was a message waiting for me, and my heart sank when I saw that it was from James Q, the same heckler that had originally reached out to me.
James Q: How’s business? He’d asked. Like he knew me.
I thought about ignoring him completely. But this guy had assumed I would fail from the start. He needed a verbal lashing.
Or at least an I told you so.
Foodie the Food Truck: Fantastic. It’s been better than I could have ever expected. And it had been. It wasn’t a lie.
His response came quickly. James Q: I’m impressed, Foodie. I honestly didn’t think you had it in you.
I wasn’t sure how to respond. Foodie the Food Truck: Uh, thank you?
James Q: It was a compliment.
My brow furrowed. How had I gotten sucked into another conversation with this guy?
Foodie the Food Truck: I assumed.
James Q: I’ve been told I don’t give very good compliments, so I just wanted you to be sure.
This conversation echoed too closely to Killian, and I immediately clicked on his name to cyberstalk him more closely. There was no profile picture, although from his feed and small friends list it was clear this guy was involved in the food industry somehow. I scrolled through past posts and pictures of the dishes he made both at home and in an industrial kitchen. But his posts were few and far between, and there were never any face shots.
He could have been any chef.
He could have been Derrek.
He could have been Killian.
I shook my head, hating how absorbed in Killian I was. I obviously needed sleep. Anything to stop thinking about him.
Foodie the Food Truck: Well, thanks again, James. I hope you get to check out Foodie sometime soon.
He sent me back a thumbs up, releasing me from the conversation. I clicked off the message box and shut my computer down.
Putting aside the message, and Killian and Lilou, I lay back on my bed and rubbed my hand over my heart.
It burned in my chest, punching against my breastbone, wanting something I couldn’t define. I hated this feeling. I hated that it followed me around like a specter, taunting and poking and never leaving me alone.
I’d felt it in high school the second I realized I wanted to be a chef. Every time I researched schools or made plans for my future, it was there, spurring me on to chase my dreams. I’d had a momentary break from it during culinary school, but it returned in full force once I was tied to Derrek and realized my dream of becoming a famous chef faded in the long shadow of his illustrious career.
In the beginning, I had hoped Derrek would help me in my career. I hadn’t wanted to use his connections for unfair advantages, but he’d been an opinion I trusted, a gentle critic that would both inspire me to do better and point out my flaws. Until we moved in together. Then he’d quickly made it clear that I could cook in a kitchen, but not one that I ran. He didn’t want to compete with me. He didn’t want me to suffer a schedule like his. He didn’t think that we would survive both of our career goals.
So, I’d blended into the background while he continued to accomplish everything he wanted to.
My heart started hurting again the day I was offered a sous chef position in an up and coming bistro. I’d come home elated and so proud. Derrek had been excited for me too, but then started asking questions carefully crafted to make me doubt myself. By the end of the conversation, I’d believed I wasn’t ready to be a sous chef. He’d helped me realize that if I took that important of a position, then I wouldn’t be able to see him or take care of our apartment. It was a great kitchen, but not one on the top of my list. If I settled now, I would always be settling.
I turned down the offer and worked part time at a bigger, more commercial kitchen. The food wasn’t interesting, and the head chef was obstinate and self-absorbed. I would never have moved up there. I would never inspire new and creative dishes. I would make the same generic crap over and over again under the thumb of a man that didn’t even know my name.
But I did get to see Derrek whenever he was home or needed me. I did get to play house with our apartment.
And that was just the beginning of how things went so wrong.
I continued to rub my che
st, wondering when the ache would go away. Derrek was gone. I ran my own kitchen. I owned a business.
I’d been forced to change my dreams since my young culinary days, but I’d recalibrated and made new dreams. Set new goals.
And I was reaching them.
So why did it feel like settling?
Ten
The next four weekends became a circus routine of trying to make the best damn food on the freaking planet and Killian sending one of his spies to infiltrate my very carefully vetted line of customers every time I changed up the menu.
It was infuriating.
He was infuriating.
I would have denied access to every single one of his moles except I couldn’t screen as thoroughly as I would have liked. Not while I was busy cooking. And not while he dressed them in disguise—or at least made them take off their chef jackets.
Not to mention, when it came down to it I was afraid to refuse service to anyone just in case they didn’t work for Killian. Refusing to serve customers based solely on my irritation with the man across the street would obviously be very bad for business.
So, to combat Killian’s ruthless criticism, I kept the menu at one option instead of two. And I honed every one of my techniques to master level. I became a freaking black belt at cooking.
The notes still didn’t stop.
The weekend I made meatloaf burgers on onion buns he sent this back: Mushy and over seasoned. I’m taking away your salt privileges. And if you don’t stop using parsley as a garnish, I’m suing. I will sue you for defamation.
The next night, Friday night, I chopped up four cups of parsley out of spite and sent it over to Lilou in a to-go container. I made Wyatt give it to Killian. Actually, I tried to get Wyatt to throw it in his face and yell, “Make it rain, motherfucker!” But Wyatt was a giant, skinny chicken. Basically, Wyatt just handed it to him and explained my evil plan. And then apparently, they had a nice chuckle over it. I hated them both.
Lesson learned, never send a man to get a woman’s revenge.
That Saturday night, I’d removed the parsley from the dish—mainly because I used it all in my flop of a prank—tightened up the spices and added a thorough fry to the meatloaf burger on the grill top to make it less “mushy.” Killian stopped by after Lilou closed to suggest I use Panko in the burgers instead of regular breadcrumbs, add turmeric to the seasoning mix, and top them with fried onion rings instead of sautéed onions.
Opposites Attract: The complete box set Page 11