In the Fire

by Eileen Griffin

  Sometimes I just had to remember New Guy was just that. New.

  * * *

  One lunch and dinner service, one dull headache and a hollandaise-spattered chef’s jacket later, I pushed my office door open, beyond exhausted. Eager to make up for his earlier error, Tyler had taken on my basic sauce assignment. It took skill to properly whisk the egg mixture over heat at the right speed. Too slow or cold and the mixture of egg yolks and butter curdled. When the mixture was too hot it wouldn’t emulsify, leaving Tyler’s sauce a runny mess. On the tenth try and dozens of eggs later, he’d succeeded and smiled shyly when the rest of the kitchen had razzed him relentlessly.

  Eventually everyone left and I locked up. My favorite part of the day. I popped the top off the beer I’d taken from the cooler and took a healthy swig, sighing with pleasure. Fine wine might have paired better with the food my kitchen prepared, but nothing was better than a cold brew at the end of a long shift.

  I yanked off my jacket, tossing it in the laundry service bin and made a disgusted sound when I got a good whiff of my T-shirt. I smelled like ass. The combination of dried sweat from working in a blazing two hundred degree kitchen, blood from the side of beef I’d broken down, fried food, and stale cigarette smoke permeated everything. When I finally dragged myself back to my apartment later, I’d shower and pass out for a few hours.

  Despite the rise in popularity of foodcentric TV and magazines, there was nothing glamorous about being a working professional chef. When I was younger and fresh out of culinary school I’d had grand designs about starting up my own restaurant. But no one just hands a twenty-two-year-old the millions of dollars of capital required to start a new restaurant from the ground up. When my favorite instructor from school, Chef Boulanger, had hooked me up with aging restaurant owner Calvin Sharpe, I’d jumped at the chance to be his new executive chef. Over the last eight years together we’d overhauled the menu and doubled business.

  Long hours of managing the staff, designing daily menus around what I could get fresh from local suppliers, making sure lunch and dinner service ran smoothly—it all kept me on my feet from early morning to late night six days a week.

  This beer at the end of service was my one concession to inactivity. One glorious bottle of Belgium’s exported finest.

  I leaned back in my chair, tented my arms behind my head and let my eyes close for a minute. I had just gotten comfortable when I heard my office door squeak open. Without opening my eyes, I said, “Look, New Guy, I appreciate all your effort but go home for the night. The trick of mastering mother sauces will still be waiting for you tomorrow, I promise.”

  “They invented these things called beds. They’re big and rectangular and soft. You sleep on them. Or if you’re really lucky you get to sleep with someone else.” Despite the long day, Claire’s wry voice made me smile. “What are you still doing here?”

  “Just having my post-service beer.” I held up the green bottle in salute, chuckling when she raised her own in response.

  She perched herself on the edge of my desk, her face uncharacteristically serious.

  “What?”

  “When are you going to tell Cal you’re going to New York?”

  “Who says I’m going to New York?” My raised eyebrow and nonchalance could have won an Oscar.

  “This fancy invitation I discovered the other day when I was trying to find your smokes says you are.” She wiggled the paper with the logo for the American Culinary Honors Awards on it and tossed it at my lap.

  I caught it and rolled my eyes. “I’m not going.”

  Her eyebrows rose and her eyes narrowed. Oh shit.

  “Ethan, you have to go. You deserve to be recognized for all the work you’ve done and all the long hours and time you’ve spent sweating your ass off in this kitchen.”

  “I’m not saying I don’t appreciate the honor, Claire. I do. I just have no urge to go to New York to schmooze a room full of fancy chefs who haven’t stepped foot in a kitchen in twenty years.”

  “The fact that famous chef James Lassiter is presenting your award has no bearing on this decision?” Her eyebrow rose even higher.

  “None.”

  She burst into laughter. “E, you’re full of shit.”

  I closed my eyes, rubbing the throbbing spot between my eyes. “Claire, I’m not going. I have nothing to say to him after all these years.”

  When I opened them again she was watching me with concern. “You loved him, E. Like I’ve never seen you love anyone else. And he loved you. You can’t tell me you’re not at all curious about why he never came back.”

  “Why would he? He had the chance of a lifetime in Europe.”

  “Which you helped him get, you bonehead. Or did you forget?”

  “No, I didn’t forget.” Far from it.

  “Just go and talk to him. Smile pretty and accept your award. If you get the chance to talk to him you can at least get closure.”

  I made a face. “Closure? It’s such a chick thing to say.”

  “It’s true. You can’t tell me you’re honestly happy banging random hookups all the time. It’s not healthy. Don’t get me started on Lily—”

  I rolled my eyes. “Claire, I swear to god I’ll go if you promise to stop trying to Dr. Phil me.”

  She gave me a smug smile. “I know. I already talked to Cal about it and he said for you to get your ass on the plane.”

  “Traitor,” I grumbled.

  “It’s awesome publicity for you and the restaurant, E. The more business we have the more money you make. The sooner you can buy out Cal like you planned, the sooner you can turn this place into yours.”

  My sister knew how to go for the jugular.

  * * *

  My talk with Claire had left me too unsettled to head to bed after I tossed my keys on the counter. When my stomach growled, I struggled to remember what I’d had to eat all day and drew a blank. I changed out of my clothes into sweats and a T-shirt and scrounged through my fridge. Italian sausage. Onions. Peppers. Cheese. An extra loaf of bread I’d taken home a couple days earlier. Everything for the perfect sausage and pepper sandwich.

  As I set a pot for the sausages on the stove, the memories I’d tried to keep locked away assaulted me. With our dad leaving and our mom dying the summer after Claire graduated high school, it seemed like I’d been taking care of us both for a long time. I didn’t like taking help from anyone. At least until my third year of culinary school, when I’d been failing and had let Claire’s very attractive male pastry class partner tutor me. Determined to make it on his own after his rich family had disowned him for coming out of the closet, he’d worked his way into whatever passed for my heart. Jamie Lassiter was funny, handsome, sexy and completely out of my league, but I’d fallen hard for him. I’d pretty much given up any fight for the scholarship we’d both busted our asses for. He’d deserved it more, and I’d done what I could to help him get it. When he’d left for the six-month study abroad component, I’d believed we were both on the same page and he wanted the same things as me.

  I chopped onions and peppers.

  Jamie hadn’t wanted those things and he’d stopped wanting me. Eight years later I was alone in Seattle trying to build up the capital for the perfect restaurant we’d both envisioned. Farm to table, focusing on fresh local ingredients and making good food we could be proud to serve to our customers, friends and family. Jamie was somewhere in the world, rich and famous and back with his own kind.

  I tossed the onions and peppers in another pan with olive oil, cranked up the heat to sauté and cut up the bread for the sandwich. After the veggies and sausage were cooked through, I pulled the whole grain mustard out of the fridge, spread a thick layer on the bread and dumped the sizzling peppers, sausage and onions on top. Best. Sandwich. Ever.

  My stomach hurt for a second. Sa
usage and pepper sandwiches had been one of the go-to meals we’d cooked together after we both got off work. Nothing had been better after a long day than a late-night meal with him. Until he’d left.

  I poked at the sandwich, suddenly no longer hungry. I managed to eat it and chased it down with a beer, staring out my kitchen window as the ever-present Seattle rain drizzled down outside.

  What did I want? More than anything, I wanted to own Cal’s restaurant outright and make it my own. I’d clawed my way up from the time my dad left to now, and I could almost taste the victory of finally having a place of my own. If I had to do it on my own instead of with the person I had originally imagined doing it with, so be it.

  Getting the award would be excellent publicity for the restaurant, and in today’s economy, every little bit helped. Having to see Jamie again was going to be shitty, I knew. But I’d worked and sacrificed everything else in my life. What was one more small thing like pride?

  Chapter Four

  Jamie

  I sipped my coffee. Sweet caffeinated perfection. Too wired from the taping but too exhausted to do anything besides just lie in bed and stare at the ceiling, I’d lain awake for hours last night. Between the coffee and Foo Fighters blaring through my speakers, I was beyond grateful I had nothing more pressing to do at the moment than go through the mail that had accumulated while I was gone. It was time to think about how I was going to spend my next few weeks off from the promo grind. I crossed the room to turn up the music, needing Dave’s growls to wake me up, when a loud pounding at the door stopped me.

  “Dammit, Jamie! Turn down the shitty grunge and open your door!”

  I clicked the volume a few notches higher in rebellion before I opened the door to an exasperated-looking Trevor. “Good morning to you too, Trev. I see I’m not the only one who got up on the wrong side of the bed today.”

  Trevor brushed past, picked up my remote and turned down the music. “How the hell can you listen to this crap this early in the morning?”

  Dave Grohl’s voice faded into the background. Trevor tossed the remote aside and wound his way into my kitchen to pour a cup of coffee. Black with no sugar. I shuddered, looking into my highly doctored coffee, thankful I’d stopped on the way home the night I’d flown in from Charlotte for extra heavy cream and sugar. I could do without food in my pantry and fridge for a couple of days, but no cream for my coffee was a recipe for disaster.

  I picked up the remote and turned up the music to an acceptable level, smirking at him when he sank down onto my black leather sofa. “Have we been in New York so long you’ve forgotten where I grew up? Just be thankful my musical tastes aren’t heavier, or I’d have made you listen to much worse over the years.”

  Trevor snorted and tossed me a large manila envelope. “Yeah, I’ll keep it in mind next time we have to go on a road trip. Here are the details for this weekend’s American Culinary Honors Awards ceremony with the itinerary for pictures and cocktails, plus the reservation information for your room Saturday night at The Plaza. We’ve both got standard rooms, but you know everything there is ridiculously upscale. I figured why spend the extra money on a suite when you were only going to be there for one night.”

  I pulled out the packet of information and thumbed through the details about the hotel quickly. “You do know I happen to live in Midtown. I don’t need a room at The Plaza. I could have always come back here to crash after the awards ceremony.”

  We’d had this argument before, but one quick look at him told me he’d booked the rooms in the hope I would actually attempt the mingle-and-relax thing. I could do it when I needed to, but I hated smiling vacantly until my face hurt. “Thanks, Trev.”

  He set his coffee aside and turned to face me, a serious expression on his face. “It’s what you pay me for, right?”

  I snorted and pulled out the rest of the information in the envelope. “I pay you for busting your ass, but you’ve always been my friend and I trust you. I always have.”

  Trevor opened his mouth as if to say something but instead picked up his coffee again and took a long drink. When he spoke, his voice was soft. “You need someone to take care of you. I’m just glad you let me do it.” He paused and tugged the paperwork out of my hands. “You do know Alex is going to be there, right? You okay with that?”

  I sighed and took the paperwork back, but looked into Trevor’s concerned eyes. “It’s fine.” His look told me he didn’t believe me. “Really, it’s all good. It’s been over for a year and we split on good terms. We both knew it wasn’t a good fit for either of us. And I’ve seen him since, or don’t you remember Jordan’s party last month?”

  His eyes narrowed. “I remember Alex getting drunk and hitting on Casey while everyone else stood by and watched with horrified expressions. As far as this weekend goes, I’ll be there on Saturday to help run interference if you need it. I just want you to be prepared when you see people from your past.”

  “Everyone has a past, Trev.”

  He looked down at the paperwork again. “Speaking of pasts...”

  My eyes caught a single name on the itinerary for the awards ceremony right as his words trailed off. The paper in my hand trembled. “When were you going to tell me?”

  His words came rushing out as he took the paperwork from me. “I just got the details this past weekend. You were still in Charlotte and I knew you’d rather hear it in person. You sounded exhausted every time we talked and I thought it would be better if I gave you a few days to unwind.”

  Not trusting my voice, I got up and refilled my mug. I took a long pull from it, grimacing at the bitter coffee and the lack of sugar to help make it more palatable.

  Trevor scrubbed a hand through his dark, gelled hair, mussing it slightly. The skin around his dark eyes was tight with worry. I pushed away from the kitchen counter and rejoined him on the couch, taking the itinerary back. I skimmed the page again, complete with notes hand tailored for me by the awards committee:

  5:00—Cocktails in The Champagne Bar

  6:00—Pictures for all award Recipients and Presenters

  7:00—Take seats (table assignment included in packet) in The Grand Ballroom

  7:30–9:30—Awards Ceremony

  *8:45—Presentation of Outstanding Pacific NW Rising Chef Award

  * (James Lassiter to present award to Ethan Martin)

  9:30–Midnight—Drinks and Dancing

  A rush of emotions washed over me as I stared at the name on the page. Ethan Martin. Here. In New York. And I was scheduled to introduce him on a stage in front of our peers and people we didn’t even know, all while pretending we didn’t have history.

  “Jamie. Hey. I can always tell them you’d rather not present the award for personal reasons. I’m sure someone else could do it.”

  I cleared my throat. “It’s fine. I can do this. We’re both professionals, right? I’m sure we can be at the same function and not let our past get in the way of our careers.”

  Today was Wednesday. Only three more days. Three days after not seeing him for over eight years. Holy shit.

  Trevor gently pried the paperwork from my hands before my fingers could completely mangle it. “They said they’d paired you two because you were in the same class at culinary school, but shit, J. You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

  I stood up and crossed the room to shut off the music, having lost my interest for anything except silence, staring out the window. After weeks of cold and gray, New York was finally getting a break from the usual bitter weather. “I’m fine, Trevor. Don’t change it. It’s one night. I think I can handle one night.”

  He stood and started to walk over to me. “Jamie—”

  I turned from the window and waved him off. “I can handle it, Trev.”

  The look on his face was a mixture of concern and anger. B
efore he could say anything else, I took our coffee mugs to the kitchen and set them in the sink. I was too tired to have the same old conversation we usually had whenever Ethan’s name was mentioned. “How about dinner tonight at La Terrazza? I have nothing in my apartment except stuff to make coffee and I’ll go nuts if I don’t have their fried ravioli soon.”

  I knew I was avoiding the conversation, but I’d deal with it tomorrow. Or Saturday. Not today. I was too tired to deal with any of it today.

  Trevor knew when not to push, as he just nodded and headed to the door. “Sounds perfect. How about I cab it over around eight and we’ll walk over? I’ll call Therese ahead of time and reserve us a table.”

  He paused as if there was more he wanted to say, but I didn’t want to hear anything else about my past or Ethan. “See you. And thanks for taking care of the arrangements at The Plaza.”

  Trevor leaned forward and grasped my shoulder. “It’s my job, right? Taking care of your famous ass.”

  I laughed. “Well my ass and I thank you. See you tonight.”

  Trevor squeezed my shoulder one last time and closed the door behind him as he left. I wondered how to banish the images which had roared back when I saw Ethan’s name on the itinerary. Eight years.

  As if on autopilot, I went to the spare bedroom. I’d gotten the two-bedroom in case I ever had guests, even though it hadn’t been used once since I moved in over two years ago. After a quick search in the bedroom closet, I found the box I’d put together when I had first moved out of Trevor’s apartment and into my own place. I’d looked through it a few times, but mostly it had gone from one closet shelf to the next. Sitting down on the bed, I laid the box down and lifted the lid, taking a deep breath to steel my nerves.

  Set in a sleek black frame was a picture of Ethan and me taken during our first and only New Year’s Eve together. Claire had taken it before we had all piled in their car to go out to a local brew pub for the night. His arm was wrapped tightly around my waist and instead of looking at the camera like I was, Ethan was focused on me.