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

by Elle Berlin

  Simon glares at me, gripping the contract, the knuckles of his fist as white as bones. He’s pissed. Far more pissed than I expected and maybe the stress of this venture is getting to him too. Hell, who am I kidding, of course it is. If we’re not careful, this whole thing really is going to go up in flames and not in the way I want it to.

  “Simon,” I shake my head and walk up to him, trying to keep the scorpions of frustration at bay. He’s my best friend, and a damn good business partner. We need to make this work. I square off with him, putting my hands on his shoulders. It’s an eerily similar move to what he did to me last week, right before I met Connor. “We’re stressed. Both of us. I get it. And my secret sauce—per your prescription—was to go out and have a wild night.” Wild and ironic, seeing that my night with Connor is the exact reason Simon and I are blowing up at each other right now. “I’m not as perceptive as you, okay. I don’t know what to tell you to do in order to relax, other than to go out and do whatever it is you need to do to relax. I can call Esme down at the spa if that’s what you need. A deep tissue massage, a hot soak, tell me what your poison is and I can get it scheduled. But we can’t keep doing this. We have to be on the same team.” Simon pinches the bridge of his nose and takes several deep breaths. I’m pretty much preaching to the choir. He’s already schooled me on all of this. “Look on the bright side. The good news is we have our investor, so all you need to do is adjust the business plan to include Connor’s salary and let’s get back to work. You’re a miracle worker and Hamblin can help with where the red ink doesn’t line up. That’s your genius. This isn’t a huge roadblock. It’s a bump in the road, and you’re the type of brilliant strategist who can turn this back around, alright?”

  Simon releases his death grip on the contract and places it on his desk. “You’re right, we can’t keep doing this,” Simon says, his tone measured. We’re still skating on thin ice with each other. “We aren’t even open yet.”

  “Okay, I promise. No more decisions without you.”

  “Good.” Simon frowns, picking up a stack of invitations to our opening gala. “You said Connor will be in this afternoon?”

  “Yes.” I nod, a slight sweat dampening the back of the dress I’m wearing. It’s a fancier dress than I’d normally wear, clinging to me in a Grecian pewter color that hugs all the right curves in the perfect way without being over-the-top. My ringlets swirl in a flow of curls, the type of messy-but-casual look that took way too long to tame this morning. And yes, I may have layered on the lipstick pretty thick. I know I don’t need to dress up for work, since we’re not open yet, but the fact that Connor’s going to be here every day has me on edge. And the best way to deal with that edge is to dress to the nines and drive him insane. If he’s going to tease me, then two can play at that game, and I already know his weaknesses when it comes to short skirts and wild hair. “He comes in at three and I’ll be showing him the ropes,” I continue. “I’ll have him stock the bar and see how he fares at our signature flaming cocktails. He has to know how to charm and seduce without lighting himself on fire.”

  “Will you please have him come speak to me before you do all that?” Simon asks, a calmness finally draining the red from his face.

  “Of course,” I say, eyeing the contract on the table next to Simon’s pinky. “Can I ask what about?”

  “Tax forms, company policy, the normal,” Simon’s eyes go dark, like I shouldn’t bother to worry about it.

  “You bet.” I nod curtly. If Simon wants to talk to Connor about his salary, or whatever, fine. It’s his business. My job is to make sure Connor can make my recipes blindfolded and still keep Flambé’s reputation classy. A feat I’m still waiting to see happen. Whatever money games Simon wants to play, he can play. “I’ll send him to your office when he gets here.”

  I spin on my heels and stalk out, leaving my irritation behind me. Dealing with Simon’s frustrations are easy; we’ve blown up at each other in the past, it’s nothing we haven’t weathered before. He’s my best friend, it will work itself out.

  The true test shows up at three o’clock and is two hundred pounds of pure gorgeous muscle that’s going to test both my patience and my sanity. I walk back through the kitchen in search of my new chefs, my stomach—to my dismay—already squirrelly.

  21

  Connor

  I walk into Flambé as the three o’clock sun reflects perfectly off the bay and lights up the entire restaurant. I normally wouldn’t notice something like that, except for the fact that the light shoots straight through the room to the bar area, igniting all of the glassware in reflections that sparkle like a chandelier. Of course, the true gem is Arie, who stands precariously balanced between a step stool and the bar top as she tries to stack martini glasses onto the highest shelf. Her whole escapade is spotlighted by a sunbeam, like it’s a theatrical event, causing me to almost laugh at how evocative it is.

  I stroll over to the bar, drinking in the view. Her long legs on full display and her tight—and completely sinful—ass begging me to spank her, especially considering how little of it is covered by the tiny silver dress she’s wearing. Arie’s obviously the type of woman who’d think it was appropriate to wear a cocktail dress for her first day of army basic training, completely unafraid to threaten you with the spike of her heel for making a comment about the ridiculousness of her outfit.

  I round the bar and look up, the darkest hint of her scarlet thong visible from where she stands above me, outstretched, attempting to place two glasses onto the shelf.

  “I thought this was supposed to be a classy joint?” I tease, nodding to her less-than modest display above me and smiling wickedly. Only Arie startles, not expecting me, and loses her balance.

  “Jesus fuck, what kind of a—” Curses spill of her mouth as she swivels and knocks a wine glass off the shelf with her elbow. I shoot out my hand and catch the glass before it smashes on the countertop next to her ankle. Only, Arie wobbles precariously, ready to follow the glass in its downward descent.

  “Woah, there!” I unload the glass and grab her. “I’ve got you!” My hands slide up her calves and grip as she flails and slaps a palm against my shoulder to catch her balance. It’s an awkward wobble of curses and hands slipping as we adjust, before the whole almost-debacle manages to teeter back and forth and we find a point of stasis.

  When Arie looks up through her mane of ringlets, we both realize my hands are on her thighs with her legs open. If I hadn’t already been naked under her, this would make for one hell of an awkward first day. I can’t help myself from lifting an eyebrow to insinuate I’ve only been on the job for two minutes and look where she’s already got me.

  “Don’t you dare say what you’re thinking!” she hisses, making me belly laugh and hold tighter.

  “What?” I tease. “I shouldn’t mention that putting away glassware in five-inch heels is—”

  “That is not what you were thinking!” she snaps through a huff of curls.

  “It’s half of it,” I say with a smirk, my eyes flicking to just above my hands where her thong is an unmistakable ruby color. Did she match them to her hair on purpose? And furthermore, did she start putting glasses away exactly in time for me to arrive for the show?

  “Let go of me!” Arie grumbles, her face blushing, and possibly her thighs along with her. Damn!

  “I don’t think that’s the best idea,” I advise, nodding to the fact that my hands are the lynchpin of this balancing act we’re doing, and without them—well, this little feat of temporary engineering is going to be in a tsunami of trouble.

  “Get your hands off—”

  Her tone is so sharp that I remove them out of pure instinct. When—of course—she topples forward like the world’s least-elegant aerial dancer and we all go crashing down like a bad game of Jenga: step stool, Arie, me onto my back. I do my best to tuck her head into my chest as my left hip and shoulder take the brunt of the fall, smashing us onto the floor.

  She yelps.
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br />   There’s more cursing.

  Lots of it.

  I’m also a part of that cacophony of expletives since my entire left side is ringing in pain. When I finally look up, Arie’s on top of me with disheveled hair and I can’t help but smile at just how familiar the angle is.

  “Well,” I say cheekily, biting through the pain in my shoulder. “We’ve been here before, now haven’t we?”

  Arie glares at me, her nostrils flaring. I can’t imagine anyone making pissed off and angry look as hot as she does, but that’s what happens when you’re a seething dragon of heat. Not to mention her whole body is pressed against me, her knees on either side of my hips—yup, we’ve definitely been like this before. I lift my hands up like a criminal, making a show of the fact that I’m not trying to touch her legs or ass, even though my cock is twitching in excitement.

  “You did that on purpose!” Arie hisses, pushing back and doing her best to scramble off my torso.

  “Ouch! Okay—” I curse as she twists her knees, not caring for the fact that I’m the big fleshy pillow that just broke her fall. “A simple thank you, would suffice,” I grumble, as she pulls down her skirt and steps away from me to the far side of the bar. “Why, thank you,” I say mockingly. “Wasn’t it nice of you to break my fall, Connor. Golly, you’re such a gentleman.”

  “Gentleman, my ass!” Arie snaps, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring down at me. I have to hold my tongue and not make a quip about the dominatrix woman-on-top way she’s standing.

  This is the perfect start to a new job.

  “Just showing you my talents,” I say, not hiding my snark. If we’re going to work together, she’s going to have to learn she has to toss back the insults like she’s one of the guys, and twice as fast. I sit up and rub my shoulder gingerly. “This is why you hired me, right? To make every woman within a ten-foot radius want to open their legs?”

  “Don’t get cheeky with me,” Arie sasses. “I’m your boss, remember?”

  “Oh yes, I absolutely remember. You’re the boss who—on my first day—was spread above me showing off her tiny red thong!”

  “Simon wants to see you,” Arie snaps, her skin a brilliant rouge, matching her undergarments. “If you’d like to make a complaint while you’re filling out your W2 forms, you can do so with him. He’s your go-to HR representative.”

  “You think I should lodge a complaint?”

  “I think you can lodge whatever you want up your ass!”

  “Is that a kink of yours that I don’t know about yet, or—”

  “This is why I didn’t want to hire you!” she snaps. “You don’t know when to shut up. You let every obnoxious and unsavory thing that flits through your tiny little mind come out of your mouth.”

  “Other things are not so tiny.”

  “You have no class!” Her nostrils flare.

  “Oh? And flashing your satin-string hoo-ha at me was classy?”

  “I was getting the job done until some Neanderthal decided to look up my skirt.”

  “I see,” I nod curtly, standing up and brushing myself off. “Well, for the sake of safety and class, you can at least leave the glasses to me, so that you don’t break a leg before I come back from talking to Simon.”

  “I’m perfectly capable of—”

  I step forward into her personal space. “Let me be clear,” I say, silencing her with my proximity. “My favorite part about fucking you is how wild you are, and I’m pretty sure a full-body cast is going to ruin the way you like to play.”

  Her eyes blaze. “Don’t you dare talk to me like—”

  “Like what? A hot, dirty Neanderthal that’s going to get every woman’s strappy red thong wet as a candy cane?” She glowers at me. “I can be classy when I need to be, but when I want to be dirty, I will be. Don’t go telling me that your whole standing above me with your thong on display was completely innocent, because—” I point to where she was on the step stool, happy to let me ogle her goods “—I’m pretty sure most bosses don’t wear the shortest, tightest, hottest dresses they own when setting up a bar. Do they? Or is that a completely normal thing to do? The classy thing?” I point to her now. “You’re telling me this little number is what you normally wear every day, is it? It has nothing to do with wanting me to whisper into your ear all the dirty and inappropriate ways I want to bend you over this bar and make your thighs quiver?”

  She lifts her chin up eerily, not taking her eyes off me. Her gaze is ice, but the flush of her skin tells a different story. “If you can’t handle me in a short, tight, little dress, Connor, we’re going to have a big problem.” Her eyes sparkle at me. “Because I actually do wear things like this every day. It’s part of the brand. Speaking of …” She places a hand on my chest and pushes me away from her before pointing at my t-shirt and jeans. “You’re going to need a new wardrobe. Suit. Slacks. None of your Gin n’ Lava tourist bullshit.”

  “You don’t want me prancing around in a leopard-print speedo, drizzling myself in Goldschläger and ice?”

  She frowns, not amused. “This isn’t a strip club.”

  “Too bad,” I sass back. “Cause we both know you like me best when I’m naked and wearing nothing but you, riding my cock.”

  Arie’s eyes dilate and her mouth falls half-open.

  That was dirty. Raw.

  It was a complete low blow that’s even getting me a little hard.

  The hint of her tongue licks the edge of her perfect mouth and frankly, I regret absolutely nothing. She doesn’t want to admit she’s turned on, but she is. Arie wears pissed off and hot as sin like a goddess ready to tear my head off. It makes my blood broil. Hell, her reaction to that comment makes me wonder what I’d have to say to get her whole jaw to unhinge.

  She recovers quickly, the stab of her eyes ready to punch me in the gut and slice me open like a prize vulture about to feast. Her reaction is more measured than I expect as she shakes her head disapprovingly and shoots a hand past me, pointing toward the hallway that leads to Simon’s office.

  “Right,” I say, not giving an inch. If I’m going down in flames for this job, I’m going down my way, with her writhing and smothered against me. “Tax forms, got it.”

  Either this is the best first day in history or I’m about to get fired. Though honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if Arie showed up at my apartment later tonight to anger-fuck me for forcing her to have to lay me off, which might actually be worth becoming Ned’s slave for life. Sell my soul to the devil … right?

  22

  Arie

  It’s almost ten p.m. when I walk into Flambé’s dining room to find Connor at the bar behind a line of fifteen martini glasses. Everyone’s gone home and the entire main room is dark, save the moon glistening off the bay and the up-lighting behind the bar that makes the alcohol bottles glow like colorful lanterns.

  “What are you still doing here?” I snap, my agitation getting the better of me as I stalk toward him with a swagger that ought to make him look up, only he’s fixated on the chain of glasses lined up before him. “Connor! Hello? Your shift ended two hours ago.”

  At eight o’clock, I told him to piss off and practice the second half of the specials list tomorrow. The fact that he’d mastered half of my menu in a few hours is more than enough to put me on edge. The fact that he’s still here trying to master the other half, like some overachieving wunderkind, makes my skin itch. There has to be something he isn’t good at. I need some grain of sand to hold onto in order to keep my pride, and I hadn’t even realized he was still here till I walked out.

  “Seriously, Connor—”

  Something in his hand ignites—a match, a lighter—it’s too fast for me to catch, but then he waves his hand over the first two martini glasses at the end of the chain. They ignite like a magician playing a Jedi mind trick, the first glass catching the next and then the next and then the next. It’s a shooting flame of fire that runs the entire length of the bar, heat crackling with scorching speed,
the whole whoosh of flames reminding me of a dragon exhaling.

  It’s bloody gorgeous.

  It’s the kind of pyrotechnic extravaganza I should have invented.

  My eyes shoot to Connor as he leans over his masterpiece behind the bar with a devious smile, his teeth shiny white in the flickering inferno. I hate how goddamn amazing he looks, or the fact that I’m absolutely in love with his stunt, despite the fact that I don’t want to admit it. It’s the kind of overture that’s certain to impress, especially at something like our opening gala. Damn him!

  “It’s my take on the Dragon Tamer,” Connor says smoothly, pointing to the specials board where I left the recipe for the drink I made after meeting him. Connors eyes light up, his normal grey color masked by flames and dancing behind his grin. “Simon told me that one’s new. That you were suddenly inspired.”

  Everything about him makes me want to scream—his cheeky tone, the delicious grin on his face, the feast of martini glasses that flicker like a magical line of fire between us. It looks phenomenal. He looks phenomenal. I hate that he looks so damn sexy right now that I want to ignore all of my resolve. And worse, he’s created this whole charade with my drink, inspired by our hot night. Somehow, he’s turned my creation into something spectacular and glorious, and if it was anyone but him doing it, I’d probably be gushing with amazement. Damn, I want to gush, because it’s impressive. It’s everything I want Flambé to be. I just don’t want Connor to be the one creating it.