Flambé: An Enemies-to-Lovers Romantic Comedy (Flambé Series Book 1)

by Elle Berlin

  “Man, this is going to be fun,” I respond, looking back to see a large glass paperweight glittering in shards all over the ground. “Wow, that could have rendered me unconscious, boss. Good thing your aim sucks.” A stapler smacks against my back and that’s my cue to get out. “Right. See you in three days!” I throw back, grabbing the door and opening it. It swings open with ease—unlocked. I point at the keyhole. “Hey, look at that,” I say cheekily, referencing my earlier challenge to see if she dared to have sex with me in here and risk someone walking in on us. “You are a ‘live on the edge’ kind of girl. I like that!”

  Arie props back her arm and starts throwing everything she can get her hands on: papers, the phone, tax books. I shoot out of the room as fast as possible, clicking the door shut as it’s bombarded with thumps and smashes. My heart pounds, but I can’t help but laugh, despite the fact that I know signing that contract was a horrible idea. I just made a deal with the angriest dragon in all of Hawaii, and there’s no way—not after what I just pulled—that she’s going to let me get away with it.

  In three days, I’m going to be skewered and roasted.

  I can’t wait.

  16

  Arie

  I text Simon that the contract is signed. Then, I follow it with several more texts explaining Connor’s demand for three days off before he starts and a reminder that it’s Simon’s job to follow up with all the paperwork crap. And, oh yeah—our kitchen is about to turn into an inferno—so he’d better buckle the hell up because the wrath of the demon is coming!

  I neglect to mention that the incoming heat has anything to do with the fact that I’m so pent up from what Connor just did that I can’t see straight. I toss my phone in my purse, knowing that if I talk to anyone—especially Simon—I’m going to go postal. Instead, I lock up our offices and front door and stalk straight to the elevators, hitting the button for the second floor.

  I need a lobotomy.

  Or a libido-otomy!

  Or—at the very least—I need a massage that’s going to pound out these mountains of knots and pent up lack of release.

  On the second floor is The Mandara, the spa where my sister works. When the elevator doors open, I beeline it for the sanctuary with the words relax, rejuvenate, revive sandblasted into the sage-green glass. Honestly, what I really want right now is angry make-up sex, the hot furious kind that leaves you ragged and exhausted, but there’s no way I’m going anywhere close to Connor for the next 72-hours! Instead, I need to steam. Maybe an hour—or three—in the sauna will do the trick. I definitely need some woo-woo chakra alignment of burning hot coals searing down my spine, guaranteed to remove all the toxins (and hot-naughty images) from my body, stat!

  I stalk up to the reception desk as a blond bombshell named Naomi greets me at the counter. “Hi, Arie!” she says in a voice that’s far too chipper for my mood and I muster up the best smile I can. Only, I must look like hell because Naomi’s face falls and before I say a word she’s ushering me into the spa. “No worries, Arie,” she says, nodding fervently. “Take a seat in the second portico and I’ll get your sister.”

  The service here is impeccable.

  “Thank you,” I say hoarsely, maneuvering past the desk into the adjoining room that’s dark and scented with essential oils powerful enough to tranquilize a camel. Minimalist benches surround a water feature of cascading stones, and the sound of trickling water envelopes me as I sit. I close my eyes and let the darkness seep through the back of my lids. Slowly, the soft flickering of orange dances in my periphery—the candlelight—and I take a deep breath. Heck, I probably take twenty, as I try to focus on the sound of dripping water and the Zen flute music they pipe in.

  “Arie?” A soft voice slides in between my desperate breathing—my sister’s voice. “Naomi said you looked like you were going to murder something.”

  “Preferably something fluffy and adorable,” I shoot back. “Are bunny stranglings on the menu? Is that a service you provide here?” I open my eyes to see my sister looking back at me in the candlelight as if I should be checked into the loony bin instead of the spa. “I’m kidding,” I explain, which of course she knows, but I always seem to be able to shock her.

  “Okay,” Esme says, not missing a beat. “Do you need heat or a pounding?”

  I almost moan at the undertones of such a phrase. “Probably both,” I admit, my body wanting both the steam room and hands karate-chopping down my back till I’m made of Jell-O. “Is your schedule free? Or am I walking in and blowing up your world right now?”

  “No, I can move a few things around,” Esme says, checking over her shoulder and looking toward the reception desk. She’s the spitting image of me, except her light purple hair is pinned up into a loose bun on top of her head. The purple strands are spun in a messy elegance that encapsulates all things calm and ephemeral. We have the same face, but we’re opposites. I’m all parts fire. She’s all water and wind and dreaminess. “We aren’t that busy today,” Esme concludes. “I can easily give one of the other masseuses my clients.”

  “I would owe you ten-thousand crème brûlées if that’s really an option,” I promise. Esme nods like it’s nothing and I know my sister is waaaaay to nice for her own good, but bless her, she’s my damn salvation. “Seriously, crème brûlée for life.”

  She waves me off with a dismissive hand. “You know my ass would never survive a deal like that.”

  “We have the same metabolism,” I shoot back, but she shakes her head, standing in her black masseuse’s smock. She looks like a super-model in that thing, which is basically a glorified version of scrubs, but give it to my sister to make it look like the hottest new thing to wear to an art opening.

  “Why don’t you take steam room two,” Esme explains, pointing me in the right direction. “It’s the private one at the end of the bamboo hall. Take an empty locker and robe in the dressing room. I’m going to need about twenty minutes to adjust my schedule, but then I’ll come join you and you can tell me everything about him.”

  “Him!” I startle. “This has nothing to do with—”

  But my sister is wagging her finger at me. “Oh no no,” she says with her eyebrow high. “You don’t get to bullshit me, and I’m pretty sure this has to do with Mr. Triple-Orgasms that you mentioned this morning.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You said something like that?” she nods, patting me on the back condescendingly. “Maybe not in those words, but…”

  “Dressing room is this way?” I point to the left and Esme smiles sweetly.

  “You’re going to tell me every dirty, glorious, naughty detail! That’s the deal.” Esme motions to the spa as if to say what can be granted can be taken away.

  “Fine!” I concede, knowing I would probably start blabbing on about it anyway. “Can you please make sure the room is at quadruple heat?”

  “That bad?”

  “Murdering fluffy bunnies, remember?”

  “Right.”

  I head for the locker room and Esme nods. Today, I need total obliteration!

  17

  Connor

  Unsurprisingly, Mason’s reaction to the news is similar to Arie’s: flying objects and a stream of obscenities are involved.

  “You’re a lame piece of shit who is thinking with his dick instead of his brain!” Mason yells, stomping across the Gin n’ Lava’s kitchen to get in my face.

  I get it. I’ve doubled the man’s revenue in the last three months and he doesn’t want to lose his cash cow. Can’t blame him.

  “Trust me, this is temporary. Like a sabbatical,” I explain to Mason, a tiki glass flying past my head and crashing into a stack of pans, which all come smashing to the ground.

  “Sabbatical? What are you, a French professor?” Mason growls.

  “Trust me, this whole scenario is not going to work,” I say again. “She’ll fire me before the week is out.”

  “No! Not working is what you’ll be doing when she fires
your ass. You’ll be unemployed.” Mason draws out his words with a bug-eyed expression on his face to match. “You quit and you’ll be out of a job in both of our fine, upstanding establishments. Got it? And I will laugh when she kicks you out on your ass.”

  “You want me to take all my secrets to a new bar?” I challenge, snatching up a nearby pot to deflect the rain of sugar packets that catapult by. “Put you and her out of business?”

  “Your face is pretty,” Mason sneers. “And your cock is probably bigger than a prize unicorn’s, but don’t oversell your talents.” Out of sugar packets, Mason grabs a nearby tiki cup and starts pulling back for the pitch.

  “Dude!” I grab his forearm, stepping up to him before he breaks all of his ceramic cups. “I’m on your side. This is totally for fun. A game. It will give me a little excitement after bailing from the mainland, and trust me, the sex is fucking hot.”

  “It won’t last.”

  “You saw her, man! If I wasn’t first in line, you would have done your best to charm that dragon.” Mason frowns, not wanting to admit he would’ve totally hit on Arie.

  “I wouldn’t quit my job over it.”

  “Oh, trust me.” I smile at him and take the tiki glass out of his fist, placing it as far as I can reach on the counter behind me. “She’d have you selling this joint and smuggling drugs up your asshole for another taste.”

  “Pussy is never that good.”

  I shrug and smile at him, to which he glowers, and now I’m not sure if he’s angrier that I’m quitting or rubbing his face in my sexual escapades.

  “I should fire you right now,” he growls. “For being an asshole.”

  “You should thank me,” I counter. “For being an entrepreneurial spy who’s going to tell you exactly what the competition is doing.”

  “I’m sure she had you sign an NDA.” Mason rolls his eyes and walks out of the kitchen into the dining room.

  “You’d think that,” I agree, following him as he starts wiping down tables. “But she didn’t, because if there’s one weakness this girl has … it’s me.”

  Mason throws his dirty rag at me and I snatch it out of the air before it slaps against my face. “You sure it isn’t the other way around?” He glares at me and I take his point. I’m rash around her. I did flip-flop from insisting that I wouldn’t take the job to signing on the dotted line.

  “Look, it’s good money,” I say to get him to back off. “A month working for them and I’ll be able to get my own place and I won’t have to rely on Ned.”

  “Sorry that my shit-show can only throw you peanuts,” Mason digs, stalking toward the bar and washing his hands as if he needs to find something to do with himself before he starts throwing punches.

  “It’s not about that,” I explain. “I’ll never fit in over there with their whole fancy high-end shtick. If I wanted the suit and tie gig, I wouldn’t have blown things working for my dad.”

  “Or working for your brother,” Mason grumbles under his breath.

  “Ned knows I’ll never be in a courtroom again!”

  “Does he?”

  “Look,” I try leveling with him. “Let me get this broad out of my system, make some cash, and then I’ll be back here concocting magical mai tais and getting you laid every weekend.”

  “I did just fine with the ladies before you came around, thank you very much.” Mason frowns, turning his back on me to start drying the glassware—which is already dry.

  “Are we cool then?”

  Mason shrugs, not answering, but then he points back to the kitchen. “Those mugs and pans are coming out of your last paycheck. You obviously can afford them now.”

  I smile, knowing that’s as close to a blessing as I’ll ever get from him. “Thanks, man.”

  “Oh no.” He shakes his head, turning to give me a grim look. “Don’t thank me. Thank your brother, the one who hooked you up with this gig. The one who expects you to wise up one of these days and stop being a dipshit. It’s not my permission you need. Ned’s the one you’re going to have to explain all this to. Especially when the last time you dropped the ball for a woman, he had to bail you out of the fucking slammer.”

  My stomach drops. I didn’t think about that.

  Mason starts laughing. “Oh man!” Mason roars, his head tossed back. “Now that—” he points at me with an over-excited finger “—now that might just be worth all the hassle.”

  “Ned will understand.”

  “Sure he will.” Mason smirks. “This new chick is nothing like Zariah, right? Ned will totally understand after he went out of his way to bail you out, and fly you to Hawaii, and set you up in his sweet-ass apartment, and get you a decent job where—” he motions to the dining room we stand in “—where you could have all the pussy you want, except—” Now Mason’s face is flushed red with laughter. “Except, you’re giving him the great big middle-finger of love, cause you know better. Cause you’re chasing after unicorn pussy and you haven’t learned yet: that shit don’t exist. Please, please—” He gasps between his words, laughing too hard. Now it’s my turn to want to punch someone in the face. “Promise me you’ll Facetime me in when you have this conversation with your dear, sweet, understanding brother?”

  Mason’s practically rolling on the floor, my face falling as I try to pretend everything he’s said isn’t one-hundred-percent on point.

  “Yeah, well,” I stuff my hands in my pockets and head toward the door. “You’ll see!” I say weakly and he roars of laughter.

  “We’ll see Ned give you a new definition of ‘kind!’”

  “Ned isn’t violent,” I argue, but Mason just keeps laughing.

  “No, he isn’t,” Mason agrees. “But he’ll twist your words right back on you till you’re licking his bootstraps and begging to be his bitch.”

  I swallow hard, realizing Mason has a point. Ned’s generosity only stretches so far. I pull out my phone and text my brother, cursing Mason, even though I know he’s right. I text Ned and tell him to meet me at the pier, then I hit send before I can lose my nerve.

  “He’ll understand,” I say to Mason, who’s still shaking his head.

  “Sure, he will,” Mason replies, walking back into the kitchen and leaving me behind.

  I walk out of the Gin n’ Lava and down the busy street, cars honking and humidity bowling me over like a dog slobbering. Ned’s always had my back no matter what crazy, hare-brained stunt I was pulling. Sure, he’ll be pissed, but he’ll get over it.

  Right?

  I head for the pier and try to ignore the sweat on my palms that tell a different story. Mason’s right, my brother isn’t violent, he’s a cunning fox who will sweet-talk me in circles and leave me blind.

  He forgave me once. He won’t do it a second time.

  18

  Arie

  Twenty minutes later, I’m naked and on my back in the private steam room. I’m stretched out over the wooden slats, every inch of my skin beading with sweat, and the heat is so thick I’m breathing clouds.

  Esme comes in wrapped in a towel and sits down opposite from me, snorting at how hot it is. She clutches the towel and crosses her legs, leaning back against the sauna walls and staying covered, her slender neck framed by wisps of lavender hair.

  “You don’t have to be modest for me,” I say, gesturing to my own steam-soaked nakedness. “I’ve seen it all before.”

  Esme pins me with a glare. “Some of us don’t need to flaunt all our skin every hour of the day.” Then, without a word, she raises her eyebrows just high enough to imply perhaps that’s why I’m in such a foul mood today.

  I muffle a laugh. “Touché!”

  “Now tell me,” Esme says casually, “all about Mr. Triple O, and what, in the name of all that’s holy, is the problem.”

  “Oh girl, you’ve no idea how big and talented he is with—” I moan in appreciation as I think about Connor. Esme lets out a tiny sigh of jealousy, biting her lip as she closes her eyes. “You know, you could have—�
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  “No no!” Esme raises her hand and flicks her wrist as if she’s shooing my words away. “We aren’t talking about me. This is the part where you start from the beginning and tell me everything—where you met, how you seduced him, all the precise details of his talents—”

  “Dirty girrrl!” I say approvingly and she gives me that one.

  “Seriously, why exactly are you in this steam room baking out every last thought of him, instead of living the real-life version of an erotic film?”

  “You mean a porno?” I say crassly to get under Esme’s skin. She’s the romance-novels-and-torn-bodices type who will never admit to watching an erotic film. “Have you even seen a porno, sis?”

  “Why would I need that when I have the real-life adventures of Arie Noel to listen to?”

  “I have dry spells,” I insist. “The last eight months have been—”

  “All work and no play,” Esme answers, revealing that she’s paid far more attention to my personal life than she probably should. “Is that it then? Restauranteur and sex goddess are two professions on different sides of the spectrum?”

  “They shouldn’t be,” I admit, wiping sweat from the back of my neck. All the beads of steam slip down the sides of my body, making me acutely aware of how sensitive my skin is. “But yes, that seems to be the issue.”

  “Like I said,” Esme smiles sweetly, “go back to the beginning and tell me everything.”

  I close my eyes and let the steam coat my pores, then I open my mouth and start with The Orchid.

  19

  Connor

  Ned sits hunched over a small café table, staring at his iPhone like it owns his ass.

  The image of my brother dominated by his hand-held device is the exact reason I never want to work for him at his branch of our parents’ firm. Job-whipped, entrenched, and completely at the beck and call of one’s career is my version of Hell, and it’s the exact reason why I’m in the doghouse with everyone in the family except for Ned. Of course, Ned will always play his kindness off as pity than admit true brotherly love.