Well, I’d survived worse than Clara Romero playing a fuck-me game. I’d survive tonight, too. She resolutely ignored me as she ordered a glass of red wine.
Keep to the course. Win at all costs. No distractions.
My body reacted to the memories of the way we fit perfectly together. I tapped out my irritation like Morse Code on the countertop of the bar. It drew her attention, of course.
“Liam,” she said, slipping her glass behind her body. Oh, sweetheart. I wouldn’t lapse so easily. But I might lapse into Clara if she kept looking at me that way.
“Clara.”
“I can’t believe we’re halfway done,” she began, but I held up my hand.
“Don’t do this shit. This pretend small talk. Just focus on your food and I’ll focus on mine.”
She swiveled in her bar stool, away from me. “You know, I can’t believe I ever thought you were a decent guy. Misunderstood, perhaps, but decent. My mistake.” She gave me one last appraising look, knowing exactly what she was doing.
It was ridiculous. The way she ran her eyes up and down my body, lingering on my zipper. There were so many reasons not to be together, and few reasons why we should. In fact, I couldn’t think of one, apart from the sex.
God, the sex was good. It was more than good. The sex bent my reality and rearranged my world, changing all of my perceptions about what a relationship could be.
A corner of a smile played at her mouth, almost as if she could read my thoughts and knew she was winning.
If she won this, if she won my soul, she could win the whole fucking competition. I knew my priorities. Keep to the fucking script.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Clara
Kochi, India
What a fucking bastard. As if all he had to do was look at me, and I’d go mushy at the memory of him—the hard feeling of him inside of me, filling up all of my emptiness. It was beside the point if that was exactly what happened. I could barely sit properly in my chair without squirming at the wet feeling in my panties. He’d done that with only a look.
But two could play that game. Thank you, Mary, Mother of God, for little black dresses. Slowly, I crossed my legs and dragged my eyes seductively down from his lips to his chest to his abs. I raised an eyebrow and pointedly looked at the tent in his pants.
Ha. As if he could hide it from me. He might have pushed me away, but it wasn’t because he didn’t want me. He just wanted to win this competition more. What a fucking bastard.
Shit. Except staring at his hard outline, knowing exactly what it looked like when I let him loose, wasn’t exactly helping me keep my cool. I tore my eyes away and focused on the menu.
Fish. Lots of fish.
A light went off in my head. Kochi was a coastal town. At least one of the challenges would be seafood. I tried to ignore the lust Liam stirred so vigorously in me and concentrate on the ingredients.
Take that, Liam Long.
We ate dinner, mostly in silence. Even the cameramen got bored with our lack of conversation and slumped their huge cameras onto the vacant chairs. I made a few notes and studied some of the techniques. The fish was delicate and light, served in a consommé I’d love to replicate. It was nothing like the thick Indian curries and dals I was expecting. But then again, I knew now my expectations about everything were completely wrong. Again, thank you Liam Long.
Afterward, Emma and I went back to our room, our nerves jangling about the challenge tomorrow. We barely put our pajamas on before I heard a knock on the door.
Liam.
I yelled through the crack in the door. “What do you want?”
“To talk.”
This was it. I could finally give him a piece of my mind. He wasn’t the only one capable of rejecting someone.
“Emma, get in the closet,” I hissed, waving my arm behind my back.
“What? No! You get in the closet!”
I turned around. “So you want to argue with Liam for me? Actually, I’m fine with that. Tell him he’s an ass, would you?”
Emma opened the closet door. “If you even think about making out while I’m in here… I can’t think of anything off the top of my head, but rest assured, I’ll be Googling something sinister while I’m stuck in the closet.”
“Make it hurt,” I told her. I opened the door, breathing in all of Liam’s clean, earthy scent and quickly making a mental list of reasons why botanical shampoos should be outlawed.
I got right to the point. “What do you want?”
“Clara, about what I said before.”
I stopped him immediately. “Don’t. Don’t apologize. I think it was for the best. You were right. This is a competition, and we both need to focus.” I smiled at him, making it so he couldn’t quite tell if my statement was sincere or a trick. “Honestly. You’ve taught me so much.”
“Okay, well, I was only doing what I thought was best for both of us.”
I nodded, a sardonic smile replacing my previous one. “Of course you were. You got to decide everything about our relationship, like you always do. You’re the older, smarter, more experienced one, so it’s only fitting. Really, I’ve learned so much from you. Now I know exactly what kind of man to avoid in the future.”
Liam stiffened, his eyes completely easy to read. They were full of anger and lust. “Glad I could help,” he said, backing out of the room.
As soon as the door closed, Emma cracked open the closet and came to hug me, wiping away a traitorous tear rolling down my cheek. “Men suck.”
I nodded. “Maybe we should date. You’re hot, I’m hot, and neither of us are men. Wanna make out?”
Emma pulled me onto the bed in a giant bear hug. “You’re crazy, but I love you anyway. Get some sleep so I can properly kick your ass tomorrow.”
The streets of Kochi bustled with colors, motorbikes, and people. Lots of them. My fellow contestants and I wound our way through the chaos, my mouth half open the whole time, to a beautiful spot by the sea. Ancient Chinese fishing nets dangled in the air twenty feet above our head on handmade platforms. From a distance, they looked like floating pyramids. The tang of the sea breeze left salty whispers on my lips.
Our newest judge introduced herself and began telling us about Kochi’s history. Thanks to its strategic location on the ocean, it’d been a hub in the spice trade for centuries. Everyone from the Chinese to the Europeans had knocked on Kochi’s door, and as a result, every religion and twice as many cuisines were represented.
She took us to a few street food carts and let us try a spicy mutton soup, a couple biryani rice dishes, some fresh caught sole, and plates piled high with roti and sauces. The flavors overwhelmed and terrified me. I’d eaten my share of chana masala and lentil dals on Curry Row in Manhattan, but if I thought that meant I knew Indian food, I was so wrong.
Whatever the challenge was, it was going to be hard. My only saving grace was that no one else seemed to understand Indian flavors either. We all had the distinct face of someone caught with their pants around their ankles during the Christmas work party while fucking their secretary. By their wife.
The judge suddenly pointed to Bethany and Emma. “You will work together in groups of two with the person standing next to you. Your task will be to man one of these stands for the lunch rush. Whoever sells the most will not only win an advantage in the elimination round tomorrow, but ten thousand U.S. dollars. You have thirty minutes to prep. Good luck!”
With that, she turned and walked away, meaning the clock was ticking, and unfortunately, it was Liam standing next to me.
Similar to our sex life, Liam and I couldn’t agree on how to proceed. I wanted to do a fish plate and explore some of the curries we had tasted the night before. Liam thought that was silly.
“We should do standard samosas,” he insisted, arms folded. “Chicken or vegetarian with traditional curried spices. It’s worked for hundreds of years for a reason.”
I stood my ground. “That’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve ev
er said, which is saying something. Samosas are everywhere and they aren’t even Indian in origin. They’re made to adapt to the region. To do them well, we’d have to master the spice profile here and then give it a new twist. Unless you have a secret Indian culinary master up your sleeve, we’ll bomb it.”
“Because giving it a ‘new twist’ worked so well for you in Paris? Foie gras as a pasta sauce? Please.”
I flamed red, the heat of the day already making me frazzled. “We don’t even know what this new judge is like. I say we do a coin toss.”
“You want to base our decision on fate?”
“Got any better ideas?”
Liam sighed and pulled a rupee from his pocket. “Wavy line side, you win. Year side, I win.”
“I can’t believe we’re flipping a coin,” I muttered. “Just because you don’t want to admit I’m right.”
Liam ignored me and flipped. The coin landed in the dirt and we bent to see it, knocking our heads together. “Ow, hey, oh! I won! I won!” I yelled. “Suck it, Long!”
“Wow. You are so wrong.”
I bent again. Damn. Liam was right. I crossed my arms and considered my options. I could sit here and argue about it or go cook the best goddamn samosas of my life. Also, the first samosas of my life.
After a quick decision to go vegetarian, since many Indians didn’t eat meat and we wanted as large of a customer base as possible, I got to work chopping green onions and grinding spices while Liam made the dough.
A large wok with oil colored yellow from turmeric bubbled vigorously. That had to be too hot, but the vendor assured me it was perfect. I left Lousy Liam to man the frying portion while I frantically ran around the streets trying to drum up business.
Apparently, a tiny Italian-American girl waving her arms up and down does more to scare business than lure it in. Who knew? By the end, I was miserably hot and sweaty. Liam looked equally spent. We didn’t offer each other encouragement or pretend like we’d done well enough to win the money. We knew better.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Liam
Kochi, India
Despite the pounding they were giving us about our shitty samosas that had apparently made all of India weep, I kept to the standard script and chef’s code. Stand together and fall together. “We were both involved in the decision-making and the execution. I know it wasn’t our best effort, but I stand behind our dish.”
Clara cleared her throat and stepped forward. “I’m sorry, but I have to disagree. It was Liam’s decision to do a samosa. I would have preferred trying something more original.”
What the cutthroat fuck was going on? Was Clara seriously throwing me under the bus to save her own ass? “It wasn’t just the decision to do a samosa that sank us,” I said, my tone clipped but professional.
The new judge waved me aside. “And what would you have done?” she asked.
Clara looked thoughtfully at her for a second. “I would have done a riff on the international flavors we’ve tasted in Kochi. There’s so much Dutch influence here. I think I would’ve tried to make a fish kroket with a traditional curry dipping sauce instead of going all vegetarian. That way, we would draw on local customs, like seafood.”
“That sounds ambitious. But lovely. Too bad,” the judge said. “You still have one more opportunity to survive India. In fact, all four of you will cook back at the Rice Boat tonight, making sure to incorporate one special ingredient. Your entrées should all have coconut zinging through them. Emma and Bethany, you both will receive ten thousand dollars for selling the most with your crispy chicken skewers. In addition, you will have an hour of personal instruction from the chef de cuisine at the Rice Boat. Use your time wisely.”
We all nodded politely until the blinking red camera light went dead. Then all hell broke loose.
“What the fuck was that?” I hissed at Clara.
“It’s called sticking up for myself. I wasn’t going down with the ship because of your terrible decision and execution.”
“It wasn’t even an elimination challenge! There was no reason to blame me for your shitty curry sauce.”
“My curry sauce wasn’t the reason we lost, you asshole.”
We glared at each other for a minute, my chest heaving and my face in a perpetual scowl. Yet, even through the anger, I couldn’t help but notice how fucking hot she was with her eyes on fire. They begged me to make the next move, and I almost did. I almost jumped onto her, putting all of that angry passion to work. It would have been so satisfying.
But I didn’t. This food cart competition was a perfect reminder why Clara and I couldn’t be together.
“I’m going to study,” Clara said heavily. “I suggest you do the same. That way, you can’t blame me anymore for your shitty food.”
“Perfect, sweetheart. I would hate to have an excuse.”
I tried not to, but I couldn’t help it. I watched her adorable little ass swagger away, all of her anger making the sway more pronounced.
Three hundred and fifty-nine days.
I tried to concentrate on my dish and not the way Clara’s angry gaze burned holes into my chef’s jacket. Like everything she did, I was hyper aware of her proximity, or lack thereof.
“Ten more minutes, Chefs! Give us your best Indian dish using coconut,” the judge shouted over the kitchen.
I wiped my forehead with a towel and raked the coals under my makeshift grill. “Come on, get hotter,” I muttered.
My potato puree was already done and at the risk of going gummy. I put the pan in a shallow pot of barely simmering water to keep it smooth before going back to curse the grill gods.
Finally, I got a hotter spark and quickly threw some chunks of coconut to blister over the coals. I’d marinated freshly caught prawns in a slew of spices and coconut milk. I waited a moment, then set them next to the coconut. With only four minutes to go, I dipped my lightly battered soft shell crab into the hot oil before dropping the whole thing in to bubble and crisp.
At the one-minute warning, I sprinkled cilantro and mango over the seafood and piled the grilled coconut on top. I stood back, heaving, feeling like something was missing. Clara was pulling her creation out of the oven with an apron tied around her waist like she was fucking Betty Crocker taking out some freshly baked chocolate chip cookies for her kids’ after school snack.
Fuck! The potato puree.
I grabbed a spoon and flung puree around the edges of the bowl. If they questioned the sloppiness, I’d pretend it was some avant-garde, tweezer shit. When in doubt, say it’s modern.
“Please step back from your dishes, Chefs! Time is up.”
The large clock beeped as I threw the spoon in the pot, cursing under my breath. I’d done it, but barely. Clara, on the other hand, barely had a hair out of place. It would not shock me if Betty Crocker actually called after the show to hire her as their new spokesperson.
The next hour was always the worst. The food sat there getting cold and inedible as production got the perfect shot for the editing stage before the judges tasted our food.
Emma’s was first. She’d prepared grilled red snapper in a banana leaf with a coconut and lime broth.
Next was Bethany. They asked some neutral questions about getting to work with local chefs for their advantage, and why she decided to boil coconut water for her lamb sauce.
“At home, I make chutney with filtered water, but I wanted to incorporate more coconut flavor for the challenge today,” she explained.
They took one more taste of her lamb and moved to my station. I quietly explained the dish, saying something about modernizing while looking to the past. Or something like that.
“I see,” one judge said, spooning up some of the scattered puree.
The second judge moaned a bit when biting into the coconut. Either I poisoned her or she loved it.
“Liam, you cooked the seafood beautifully. I love the grill marks, especially on the coconut itself. We grill coconut a lot here on the coast, and it remind
ed me of childhood snacks. Thank you.”
I blinked. Love it was.
Clara was last. She looked composed, but I knew her well enough by now. Beneath her olive skin, there was a red tinge of nerves.
With her chef’s knife, she cut around the top of her puff pastry dome and lifted off the golden crust. Steam enveloped her face as she poured a rich, white coconut sauce inside the puff pastry shell and scattered her toppings with a flourish.
“Judges, I’ve made biryani rice with shrimp and vegetables. You’ll want to scoop some of the puff pastry with your bite. There’s also fried ginger and some pickled green mango on top.”
“It’s quite a showstopper,” the judge admitted. “Why did you use puff pastry and rice?”
Clara pointed to the pastry. “It’s a fusion of all the things I’ve come to love on this adventure, like French pastry and things I never even realized existed, like how elevated perfectly cooked rice can be.”
“Are you sure all of the pastry and rice doesn’t overpower the delicate fish?”
Clara nodded. “I believe it’s properly balanced.”
“Okay, thank you.” The two judges conferred and walked in front of the cameras to give us the news. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Clara and Emma lace their fingers together for support.
The judges took their time for the cameras, surveying each of us. Finally, “Clara.”
She stiffened and I did along with her. Not Clara. Not now. My traitorous breath caught in my throat and I coughed. There was too much left to say for her to leave.
“Clara, we thought your dish was going to be overwhelmed by the richness of the pastry. But you nailed it. The acidity from the pickled mango and brightness from your sauce were spot-on. Congratulations.”
Clara doubled over, a huge smile radiating through the kitchen when she came up for air. She nodded her thanks.
Seared (Cooking up a Celebrity Book 2) Page 12