Pony Up

by Colleen Charles

  Basil merely nods, showing his interest with his questing eyes. “Go on…

  “He apologized for badmouthing Sakana, for one.” I sigh, trying to make all these feelings unjumble. “And it seemed genuine – not like he was just saying it to get into my pants. Some kind of strange magic flowed between us. It blinded my good sense, rendering me stupid with lust. Or something.”

  “Genuine is good,” Basil says, nodding in approval. “I’m not quite sure about the blinded by lust part. That’s usually a one-way ticket down the wrong track.”

  “It is,” I agree. But I’m no longer thinking of Carter’s apology – I’m thinking of how good his rock-hard abs felt against my body as he thrust inside of me, my pussy clenching around him in perfect synergy.

  “So, what happened?”

  “I don’t know. It was…well, to be honest, it was kind of perfect.” I shrug, throwing my hands up in the open space in front of me. “He took me out to this secret little porch behind Steakhouse, and the sky was so beautiful, and I’d had a couple of drinks. The air just seemed so charged, you know? It was like we were the only two people left in the universe.”

  “That’s baby-makin’ talk right there,” he says, raising an eyebrow and causing me to flush again. Before Carter, I never flushed unless I stood over a hot stove.

  “Hush your mouth,” I snap, tossing my head like some kind of prim, nineteenth-century schoolmarm. “It was no such thing – he used a condom.”

  “Good,” Basil says. “Because given how you can barely talk about him, I’d be worried if you decided now was a good time to reproduce.” He raises an eyebrow, and my flush deepens, heating my face with tiny pinpricks of blazing heat.

  “And then he took me back to his place.” I recall the perfect ecstasy I’d felt when Carter pushed me down on the floor. “We didn’t even make it to his bedroom,” I add, raising an eyebrow. “Right in the foyer.”

  “Oooh, this is good,” Basil says, clapping in approval. “It’s like a Friday episode of The Young and the Restless. Please don’t leave it on a cliffhanger.”

  “I won’t,” I say. Now that I’m talking about it, I can practically feel Carter’s hands caressing me once again, and goose bumps break out on my skin.

  “So, what went wrong? I haven’t heard anything diabolical yet.”

  My mental image of Carter and myself, tangled up together in a sweaty naked frenzy, pops like a soap bubble.

  “We fell asleep,” I say. “And in the morning…well, let’s just say we got into a fight about food.” I toss my hair and roll my eyes. “I don’t understand how a chef – of all people – can be so self-righteous. We may be in direct competition with each other, but he’s walked a mile in my shoes. How can he completely lack empathy? Or understanding? He reminds me of…my…my dad.”

  Basil reaches out and grabs my hand. “He probably thinks you’re the same way,” he says. “But I can understand how one wouldn’t want a fatherly image to appear when thinking of one’s lover. And remember how you freaked out when I suggested adding Korean pork belly to the menu at Sakana?”

  I narrow my eyes as I think back. “That was a dark time, and we won’t ever discuss it again,” I say, brushing it off. “And of course I care. I can’t believe he shovels red meat down his throat like there aren’t any more sophisticated or evolved food choices. He’s probably going to get heart disease before he turns forty, even if he works out. And that’s not even touching on what all that meat consumption does to the environment, it’s so–”

  Basil holds up a hand to silence me. “Pepper, that’s enough,” he says, shaking his head as he caresses my palm in bestie solidarity. “I get it. Your beliefs are really important to you. I doubt the man wants to hook you up to an IV drip of animal flesh. Did you ever think that maybe his values are important to him too?”

  “Sorry,” I say, shrugging. “It’s just–”

  “It gets you all hot under the collar,” Basil finishes for me, giving me a crooked half-smile. “I get it, I really do. But you like this guy, and I’ve never seen you go to pieces over anyone like this before. You know what they say about the opposite of love being indifference? You’re anything but indifferent about Carter Caldwell.”

  “I’m not going to pieces over Carter,” I argue, crossing my arms over my chest. “I’m just expressing myself. I’m a person who cares about what I believe in.”

  Basil pulls out his phone and checks the time. “Do you know you’ve been talking about him for twenty minutes?” He holds up the phone for inspection. “I don’t know that I’ve ever heard you talk about something that long before…besides Sakana, I mean.”

  I roll my eyes. Twenty minutes too long, more like, I think as I watch Basil take the last bite of his now-cold omelet.

  “Well, on to more important things,” I say, taking the Food Network paperwork from Basil’s hands and flipping through it. “I’ve got to decide what I’m going to make for my audition.”

  Basil nods, his eyes sparkling with excitement. “Why not roast Carter with a side of arrogance?”

  I roll my eyes, but I can’t help bursting into giggles. “That would be just perfect,” I say, shaking my head and snorting. “I’m sure I’d walk away with the prize. Who could deny how delicious that would be?”

  Basil raises an eyebrow. “Especially if he keeps his shirt off the whole time. Maybe we could serve sushi rolls off the indentations in his abs. You’d have the female vote for sure.”

  As much as I hate to admit it, I know Basil’s right. Not about the roast Carter, of course – but about the fact that no matter what asinine thing he does, I can’t seem to get him out of my head.

  What in the flaming hell is happening to me?

  Chapter Fourteen

  Carter

  What in the flaming hell is happening to me?

  As pissed – and confused – as I am at Pepper for starting an argument and ruining our perfectly great morning, I know I have to eradicate the fiery vixen from my head. Every bit of her. Her grey eyes, her thick, silky hair, those freckles…damn it.

  Every. Fucking. Thing.

  I’ve had my share of girls, but they never stick around in my mind like this. It’s like she’s popped a tent and built a campfire in my brain cells.

  It must just be because of how we fight whenever we talk for more than thirty seconds. The sparks fly, even if they’re not always positive. Whatever. I’m done with her – she can grow up or fuck off, as far as I’m concerned, and right now I’ve got bigger steaks to fry. The Food Network can make my dreams come true, so laser sharp focus is needed. No distractions in the form of perfect pussy.

  My first order of business is to demand Claude never serves another strawberry dessert in Steakhouse again. They used to be my favorite, and now my palate has lost all taste for them.

  After Pepper storms out, I take a shower and check the mail. There’s a huge packet for me, waiting with my name printed in official-looking font. With a grin, I rip it open right then and there.

  It’s from the Food Network – and I’m hoping it will explain the audition process, so I can start preparing my menu. Before I can really sink my teeth into what they’ve sent, my phone buzzes in my pocket.

  “Hello?” I don’t even look at the caller ID – I’m far too excited about what’s in my hands to care.

  “Carter, it’s Nix,” my brother says, managing to sound professional and like a pain in the ass all at once. “Are you at Steakhouse?”

  “Not yet.” I cover a yawn with my hand. I don’t have time for his demands today. “Relax, man, we don’t open for another two hours – the brunch crowd can wait.”

  “No, I wasn’t expecting you to be there early,” Nixon replies. “I wanted to congratulate you. I heard from Marcella that your Cody Higginbottom hot sauce preview went really well. Sounds like you’ve got a hit on your hands.”

  I pull the phone away from my ear and glare at the screen. Is he calling to gloat? Typical Nixon – he’s always
so busy with his own shit that he sends his wife on errands. It still pisses me off he couldn’t even do a drive by last night.

  “For one thing, it’s barbecue sauce,” I say, correcting him. “And yeah, it did. It went really well.”

  “That’s great news,” Nixon says. “I’m proud of you.”

  I resist the urge to roll my eyes and flip him a bird he’ll never see. “What are you, my dad?”

  Nixon doesn’t reply, and I immediately regret my rash words. Our dad killed himself because of Dante Giovanetti, and it’s been a sore spot for all of his sons ever since that dreadful day.

  “Sorry,” I mutter. “I had kind of a rough morning.”

  “Too much hot sauce give you some reflux?”

  “Dude, it’s barbecue sauce,” I say again, shaking my head. “Are you working on spreadsheets or some shit right now? Or maybe you’re watching your hot wife on the closed circuit instead of your employees. You sound distracted.”

  “I’m just wrapping up some projects here,” Nixon says. “Look, Carter, I’m really glad your new project is going so well. But I don’t want you to lose sight of what’s important here. Vegas is about to hit peak tourist season, and I want you to change the menu at Steakhouse. You know, shake it up a little.”

  “What?”

  Fuck you, Nixon. You can’t let me be successful without wanting me to do something else…something that’s going to distract me from what I want. What I need. My fucking future.

  “I said, I want you to revamp the menu a little,” Nixon repeats. “Nothing too drastic, but look into some food trends, maybe make up some new appetizers that are hot right now. You know – what’s good for business. Maybe catch a few episodes of Food Network.”

  I scrub a hand down my face in annoyance as I roll my eyes. If he only knew. Not that he’d give a shit.

  “You’re the businessman, not me,” I say, with no other reason than being arbitrary. Sometimes just the sound of his voice is enough to trigger me into acting like a crabby toddler. And I do passive aggressive better than most. It’s a middle child thing.

  “Yep, I am,” Nixon says. “So, draft out a new menu and fax me over the changes by the end of the day. I’d really like to put it by Marcella first.”

  “Right,” I say sarcastically. What does a college student know about fine dining? He’s more pussy-whipped than he knows. “Because I’ve got nothing better to do than jump to whatever wild hair has grown up your asshole.” Glancing down at the Food Network paperwork in my hands, I think about telling Nixon how good it would feel to throw it in his face right now. But then I realize he wouldn’t care – if anything, he’d only be pissed that something else was drawing my attention away from Steakhouse. And his already lucrative bottom line.

  “Carter, don’t be an ass,” Nixon says. By the sound of his voice, I can tell he’s sick of my shit. “I just want what’s best for the restaurant.”

  “No, you just want what’s best for the casino,” I reply. “Look, I’ve gotta run. I’ll talk to you later.”

  I hang up before Nixon can reply and shove my phone back in my pocket with more force than necessary. It’s just like him to do this – drag me down when I’ve finally had a taste of my own thing. My own thing where I didn’t need his help. Between Nixon the genius businessman, Reagan the genius lawyer, and Ford, the genius developer, I’m sick of feeling like I got all the stupid genes in the family.

  I look down at the Food Network paperwork and smack a hand over it. You and me, pal, I think to the papers. And you’ve got to help me make a name for myself – a real name, not just Caldwell. I toy with changing my last name to something else.

  By the time I get back inside, anger courses through me. But I know I need to turn this anger into a purpose – I need to harness it so I can create the best possible menu for the Food Network audition, the menu that’s going to make me a nationwide star.

  Gordon Ramsay, who?

  After dropping the paperwork in my living room, I drive down to the strip and slide into my personal parking space inside the Armónico employee garage. Steakhouse is practically a ghost town. There’s only a couple of people in the dining room, busy cleaning up from the barbecue sauce preview last night. I’m surprised at how much trash litters the floor. People must’ve really enjoyed the launch, I think with a satisfied smile. And of course, they did – because it was fucking awesome. But as I walk farther into the restaurant, a putrid smell hits me, and I almost gag.

  “Christ,” I mutter, stomping toward the source of the odor. “What the hell is that stench?”

  It smells like something died, then came back to life and died again in a pile of burning garbage with a decayed corpse holding the match. Holding my nose, I grab one of the cleaners.

  “Hey,” I say, pulling her aside. “What’s that rank smell?”

  The poor girl looks just as nauseated as I do. She’s busy pinching her nostrils closed with the skinny fingers of one hand, and she shrugs with a wrinkled grimace.

  “I don’t know, Chef Caldwell,” she says, sounding as if she has a very bad head cold. “It was already here when the cleaning crew arrived.”

  “Thanks for your help,” I mutter sarcastically, brushing her off and stalking into the kitchen. If the cleaning crew didn’t take out all of the barbecue trash from last night, I’m fucked – there’s no way Steakhouse can open smelling like a rotting cadaver.

  The smell only worsens as I move farther inside. It’s a putrid, foul stench that emanates into my lungs, burning my nose and mouth – I can practically taste rotting meat. My eyes water until I can’t see a foot in front of my own face.

  “Monsieur Carter!”

  At the sound of the familiar, distressed French accent, I groan.

  “Monsieur Carter, this is tres affreaux!” As usual, Claude’s in tears and clutching at his face. “Someone has delivered zee carcass! Zut alors, les mort mouffette!”

  My jaw drops toward my heaving chest. Claude doesn’t realize that he’s so ramped up, he’s reverted back to his native French. I rack my brain to my high school days, and I’m pretty sure he said there are dead skunks in the kitchen. The foul odor seeps further into my sinus cavities, so far it’s teasing the lobes of my brain. But right now, I’m too angry to care.

  “What?” I ask, narrowing my eyes. “Claude, what the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Monsieur Carter, zee delivery came zis morning! Zee delivery man said eet was for you, and no one else! Why zees happen?”

  Suddenly, it hits me in my skunk-soaked brain like a curveball going two hundred miles per hour.

  Pepper.

  She. Fucking. Sabotaged. Me.

  She’s out for revenge and her pound of flesh, using rotting meat to do it. Well, I won’t stand for it. If it’s war she wants, step aside while I grab my razor-sharp sword and run up the hill.

  “Claude, calm down,” I say. “And stop crying. I’ll handle this, I swear. It’s not the end of the world.”

  But maybe it is.

  Claude tearfully runs into the bathroom, and I glance around, searching for the offensive dead little carnivores. It’s not lost on me that she selected the smelliest meat-eating creatures to ruin my life. Sure enough, in the back of the kitchen are a dozen or so cardboard boxes. One of them is open, and I can see a flash of black and white fur peeking from inside.

  I can’t believe she’d do something like this.

  It’s petty. It’s monstrous.

  It’s beneath her.

  My head shakes in an angry ball of flailing hair, and I grab my phone from my pocket, dialing Nixon. This is one call I dread more than disposing of the stinky carcasses.

  “Hello?”

  “It’s me,” I say, clenching my teeth as I stare at the boxes filled with dead skunks. “Someone sent a fucking delivery of skunks to my kitchen. I need you to call in the hazmat crew.”

  Nixon doesn’t reply, and his silence just ratchets up my anger to a near explosion.

  S
ilence reigns supreme. And says it all.

  “I’m being fucking serious,” I spit out. “And I think I know who it was too.”

  “This is going to cost me thousands of dollars,” Nixon says. His voice is quiet, but I can tell he’s seething with rage. “We’ll have to be closed for days, and you’ll have to work pretty goddamned hard to get the stink out of everything.”

  “What, me?” I narrow my watering eyes. “What the fuck do I have to do with this? It isn’t my fault. Do you fucking think I sent dead skunks to myself?”

  “Look, Carter, I don’t know who you pissed off,” Nixon replies. “But I’m not fucking holding your hand and cleaning up your messes anymore. You’re pushing thirty. I’m going to call in a special cleaning crew, and you need to stay right there until they arrive. And when they do, I want an estimate. Call me back immediately, don’t leave me hanging on this. Take accountability for once in your life. Grow the fuck up.”

  I’m flabbergasted. I can’t believe my own brother thinks I’m partially responsible for this shit show. Just because Pepper got her dander up and wanted to send me a bunch of rotten meat, how is that my fault?!

  Chapter Fifteen

  Pepper

  “So,” I say to Basil and Kristin, demonstrating as I wrap up the soft-shell crab in rice and nori. “What do you think of this?”

  “It looks good,” Kristin offers. After a strained second, her face wrinkles up into a frown. Something’s wrong. My stomach drops to the floor, and I clamp my eyes shut. Can’t anything just go right for a change?

  “It needs something,” Basil adds. He cocks his head to the side and reaches into the bin of freshly-cooked tempura shrimp I have on the counter. “What if we slice one of these and put it on top of all the rolls?”

  “No,” Kristin says, shaking her head. “That’s too busy. We’ll add one tempura shrimp at the end of the roll, and drizzle the whole thing with…” She trails off, gnawing at her lip.