by JD Hawkins
“Oh,” she says, eyes lidding over with pleasure. “This salmon mousse…”
“You like?” I say, enjoying her expression.
“I love.”
“So do I.”
She looks at me for a beat, a slight moment of wild, inarticulate tension passing between us, before the presence of the watching waiter and the obligation of the job at hand pull us back to reality.
“You know, maybe a dash of something red to make the color pop. Paprika? Saffron?”
“Slow down,” I say, scribbling in my notebook. “You’re critiquing faster than I can write. And we’ve got a long way to go.”
Willow doesn’t slow down, though, and for the next three hours she runs through ideas, impressions, and opinions that would put a dozen food critics out of business. We argue over the Escoffier sauce, agree completely on the wild game dish, and both teach the other something when it comes time for the eclairs. I go through about seventeen different emotions with her during each course, swinging from offended and contemptuous of her American-style ideas, to marveling at the utter brilliance with which she seems to cut through to the heart of what makes great food.
Tongues alive with the onslaught of flavors and textures, bodies humming with the satisfaction of a thousand different ingredients, minds almost working as one by the time we reach the final dessert, I find myself realizing something very singular: This woman is absolutely incredible.
She slouches back in her chair, hands on her stomach as if it were potbellied and not as perfectly toned as the rest of her, and sighs happily.
“Is that it?” she says.
“That’s it,” I say, slapping my notebook shut.
“That’s a hell of a menu.”
“You just made it a hell of a lot better.”
She looks at me with a curious smile.
“I doubt you’re going to take any of my advice anyway.”
“Is that because of a lack of confidence in yourself? Or in me?”
Willow tilts her head slightly.
“In you, of course.”
I laugh along with her and check the time.
“We should get going,” I say, standing up.
“Aren’t we going to talk interior design?” she asks.
“Soon. For now I’ve got something more important I wanted to show you.”
Willow squints at me, trying to decipher my half-smile—and then my phone rings. It’s my second in command, so I need to take the call.
“Give me a moment,” I say with an apologetic expression, taking out my phone and walking out of earshot. “Hey, Martin.”
“Hi, boss. Just wanted to give you an update on the guy I mentioned—the one working at the Italian spot down on Mateo. Now he’s pretty happy there, and I’m still not sure he’d move to Vegas, but I honestly think if we make an offer that—”
“Martin, stop,” I say firmly. “I’ve changed my mind.”
He doesn’t talk for a second, and when he does he sounds completely perplexed.
“What about? I don’t understand.”
I look back at Willow, sitting and chatting with one of the chefs, making him laugh, the guy looking like he’s already as besotted with her as I am.
“I’m gonna do what you suggested; move Michelle up here to Vegas.”
“Really? Ok…well…yeah. That’s good. But we’ll still need to find a replacement for her at Knife.”
“We’ll need a replacement—but not for the head chef.”
“I don’t follow.”
“I think I’m gonna offer the position to Willow.”
There’s a pause. “Willow? The one I just hired as a line cook?”
“Yeah.”
Martin’s disbelief sounds like a cough, spluttering for words.
“Cole,” he says, his voice taking on a soothing tone as if he’s talking me off a ledge, “she’s worked there for a couple of weeks. Plus she had hardly any experience before that.”
“She’s a phenomenal cook,” I say, looking back at her again and winking when I catch her eye. “Why would I hire somebody else when one of the best chefs I’ve ever seen is already working for me? She’s got the skills, the training—and she’s got instinct. You can’t learn that.”
“Yes. But…well…she’s never been a head chef before. It’s one thing to be a great cook, another to lead a whole kitchen. It’s a big step. Most people spend years and years—”
“Give her one week and I guarantee you she’ll make that kitchen her bitch.”
“I don’t know,” Martin says, and I can almost hear him rubbing his brow. “The crew won’t like it. The new girl suddenly being their boss after a couple of weeks, getting a job that any one of them probably feels more qualified to do. Will they take orders from her?”
“I didn’t hire them to be advisors.”
Martin sighs, and I can tell he’s mulling it over. “Leo will probably quit on the spot, you know—I don’t think he likes her.”
“Good. It’ll save me the trouble of firing him.”
“Cole…”
“Like I said, I’m only just now thinking about it. I haven’t actually made a move yet. We still need to talk to Michelle about Vegas, anyway. So why don’t you go ahead and carry on with the shortlist, and we’ll talk more when I get back.”
“Yeah. Ok.”
“Great. See you then.”
“Wait!” Martin says, a split second before I hang up. I wait, but all I hear are throat-clearing sounds as Martin struggles to get his thoughts out. “Is this…never mind. Forget it.”
“You want to know if this is because I’m fucking her.” Martin coughs as if the very idea offends him, but I save him the trouble of protesting. “The answer’s no. You should understand where I’m coming from, Martin. Hell, you’re the one who hired her. You’ve seen what she can do in a kitchen.”
He lets out a nervous laugh.
“Sure, sure. I know she’s good. It’s just a question of whether she’s good enough. I mean, I know you have faith and all, that’s obvious, but do you really trust her that much?”
I look back at her again. She’s at the bar now, leaning over on it and sipping martinis with the cooks.
“Yeah. I trust her.”
I finish up the call with Martin and go over to peel Willow away from the chefs, with whom she’s already in so tight you would never guess she’d just met them. We go outside and get into the car, Willow bemused by my eagerness.
“Where are we going now?” she asks.
“It’s a surprise.”
Twenty minutes later we’re pulling up beside a dusty airstrip, the Nevada sun beating down on us. Willow shields her eyes and scans the shimmering horizon.
“What are we doing out here?”
I nod in the other direction, and she suddenly notices the helicopter starting to spin its blades. She looks back at me, grinning like a kid on Christmas, and I put a hand on the small of her back to hurry her toward the chopper.
“You ever see the Grand Canyon?”
“Not in person,” Willow says, almost laughing with surprise.
“It’s one of the most majestic places on earth—spiritual. Especially when you see it from the sky.”
We duck under the hard pressure of the whipping blades and I open the door for Willow to climb in, getting in after her. The pilot has us buckle up and then lifts us up, spinning away dramatically and making Willow squeal through her overwhelmed smile.
Before long we’re swooping through those sunset-gold cliffs, the grandeur around us making us feel insignificant, even at this height. The horizon all around us filled with that ancient landscape, etched and scarred and formed by time, a history written by nature itself.
But even that can’t compel me as much as the woman beside me, can’t tempt me to peel my eyes from her, can’t diminish the magnificence in her face. Unconsciously, our hands find each other’s, fingers interlocking, as if they were meant to go together.
The chopper
veers and dips, pressing our bodies closer. Willow lets out a sudden laugh and we find ourselves staring at each other, our faces inches apart.
“How did you know?” she asks, the roar of the blades stealing her whisper, but her lips easy to read.
I take a second to think about it, to wonder what it was that made me understand she’d like this. But the answer doesn’t come, the feeling something I couldn’t put into words. An answer, a meaning, a thought, that I can only give by moving my lips across that unbearable distance to hers and kissing her with everything I have.
14
Willow
I wake up to the sound of running shower water, light and echoey in the massive suite. A gentle aroma of tea tree oil shower gel tickling my nose and making me roll between the soft, rustling sheets onto my side. I open my eyes to the large, open plan hotel room, the clear window letting in a cool morning light, the messy king bed, and the hazy memory of all the things Cole and I did to each other last night, the scenes flooding back to me in vivid detail.
More than anything else, though, it’s the tender sensitivity of my naked body, my insides still humming, vibrating on some satisfying frequency, as if still bearing the impression of his cock, that reminds me.
We’d stumbled back up to the room from the hotel bar, where we spent the last few hours of the evening eye-fucking each other while talking about the perfect way a chocolate gateau needs to crumble, the most sensuous texture for its filling to be. Using words like ‘melt’ and ‘tight’ and ‘full’ until the words seemed to lose all their original meaning, and the truth of our thoughts were only thinly veiled. Then, half-arguing over whether the garlic in puttanesca should be sliced or crushed, we left the bar. A mixture of alcohol, lust, the musical rhythm with which we talked, the liberation of being in this new place, this luxurious hotel, all finally coming to an inevitable conclusion.
He kissed me in the elevator, and I danced out of his grip when the doors opened on our floor, the low rumble of his teased pride music to my ears. It must have taken us twenty minutes to make the thirty paces to our room, Cole’s hands finding my body again and again, pulling me into kisses so good I almost achieved vertigo, until he pulled away breathlessly and said we’d better get somewhere we wouldn’t be caught by security cameras or gawked at by other guests.
Inside the massive suite he slammed the door behind him, leaving all his restraint on the other side, turning into a sex-god beast. And I let go of modesty, gave myself to the hunger of his hot mouth on my neck, the insatiable grip of his hands spreading my thighs wide open, the relentless stroking of his rock-hard cock pounding deep inside me, never having been so aware of my own body as when he made me the object of his ravenous appetite. Clawing at the rug in dizzying rapture, pressed against the window as if Cole wanted the world to see him taking me, bent over the bed gasping for breath, watching his torso in the mirror as he thrust back and forth, faster and faster, groaning as his fingers dug into my hips and he slammed into me from behind like a force of nature.
“Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me,” I panted, out of my mind with the need to feel every inch of him inside me.
“Say please,” he commanded, tugging my ponytail so hard that my head tilted back to stare up at the ceiling.
“Please.”
He smacked my ass and I yelped at the sting.
“Louder,” he growled.
“Please, Cole. Please fuck me.” I couldn’t believe the words that were coming out of my mouth. I had never been like that with a guy before. And I loved it.
Just when I thought I couldn’t take any more, he rolled me over onto my back and pushed my knees up over my head with one hand, driving himself so deep into me I yelled out loud. He didn’t let up, not for a second.
I came moments later, and then he did, so intense it was like an out of body experience, our moans sounding like they were coming from someplace far away as the earth-shattering shockwaves radiated through us.
The memories have me so hot all over again that I don’t think I can stay in this bed by myself a minute longer.
As I get up and stretch, I look over at the chair by the chest of drawers to find my clothes folded neatly. I smile. So Cole. I can imagine him picking up the clothes carefully from the floor, where they’d been discarded with all the glee of Christmas wrapping paper the night before, and carefully folding them away in that precise way of his.
The intense, lush memories of carnality give way to something else now, something warmer, more intimate than even sex. The articulate and determined way he talks about food to me, as if I were an equal rather than his employee, the way he respects my opinion, even if we disagree, arguing as if it genuinely matters to him what I think. I remember the way he opened up to me at the beach, exposing his wounds and trusting me to treat them carefully.
In this hotel room, listening to the sound of hot water against his body, I realize that he’s not just my hot boss anymore. No longer just a beautiful man with whom I share some physical connection. Irresistible lust, uncontrollable hungers, and alluring seductions might have led us so far, but now there’s more to it. Something meaningful. And I know from experience that sex isn’t that good unless there’s something deeper going on.
I pad over to the window, still naked, and admire the view, the cool blue light picking out the edges of a few clouds. The sparkling city of Las Vegas empty and asleep still, dormant and recuperating until the neon will be ignited and lead thousands of people to its lavish enchantments once again.
The nagging thought that I managed to ignore throughout yesterday and last night emerges again in the clarity of the moment. Maybe I should tell Cole about Tony and our restaurant? Maybe he’ll actually be happy for me. Maybe he’ll understand that I’ve got too many ideas of my own to cook for anybody else—except no. Every time I try to visualize the moment I tell him, I can’t imagine him smiling with happiness. His story about being betrayed by his closest friend, the way he confessed he doesn’t trust anybody, the fact that I was the first chef he allowed Martin to hire for him…I can only imagine that face going as hard and as cold as it did when he pulled me out of the kitchen the first time we met.
Besides, I’m sure the new place isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, no matter how enthusiastic and optimistic Tony is about it. Nobody gets to just start their own restaurant based on a single investor’s meeting with some random guys they know nothing about. There’s no reason to stir things up just yet. I have a little more time to enjoy this thing with Cole, whatever this is.
I move through the suite to the bathroom, find the door ajar, and push it aside. Cole’s shadow plays behind the frosted glass like a kabuki show. Even in the hazy shadow the broadness of his arms as he scrubs his hair can be seen, the sculpted ‘V’ of his torso impossibly mouthwatering.
Now that I’m this close I can hear him hum, out of tune, some Rolling Stones song that I can’t quite remember, but he does it with such conviction I can’t help finding it funny. I lean up against the doorway and enjoy the show a little, until he pulls off what I think is meant to be a dance move and my quick giggle gives me away.
“Hey!” he says in surprise, sliding the shower door aside and looking at me through the steam. “How long you been standing there?”
“Long enough to know never to go to karaoke with you.”
“Is that so?” Cole flicks water from his eyes and reaches out, pulling me by the hand under the hot stream. I shriek playfully and find myself pressed up against him, the water rolling down our faces as I look up at him.
“Maybe we could duet,” I grin.
“I’m counting on it.”
“I’ll bet you are.”
Our wet lips crash together, as fluid as the water. His body hot and pumped against my sleep-cooled blood. We press our skin together, like two slow dancers in the hot rain, until I feel his desire rise, pressing between my thighs.
“Waiting for you to wake up has been the hardest part of my day so far,” he murmur
s into my ear.
“Well this has been the hardest part of mine,” I whisper back, wrapping my hand around his cock, my insides turning hot and liquid as he groans in my ear.
“Turn around and put your hands on the wall,” he commands. “It’s about to get a lot harder.”
When I arrive back in front of my apartment in L.A., in the middle of the night, even the small carry-on bag I took with me feels like it’s full of bricks. I don’t know whether it was the workload, the late flight (we missed the early one, in a post-coital slumber so deep we slept through both of our alarms), or the fact that we must have worked through half the kama sutra, but I’m shattered when I mount the steps and push open the door to my apartment.
I hear Asha’s thumping feet before I’ve even shut the door.
“Oooh!” she says, emerging from her room in a bathrobe to hug me tightly before pulling back. “Girl, I missed you!”
“I’ve only been gone for two days.”
“Sure, but I had a craving for pecan pie last night that drove me crazy.”
I stop while Asha steps back and studies me carefully from head to toe, meeting my gaze again with a raised eyebrow.
“Mm-hm,” she says as if confirming something.
“What?” I say, looking down at my jeans and T-shirt.
“Girl, you look like you’ve been fucked, fed, and flexed.”
I laugh a little tiredly.
“What?”
“I was gonna ask if it was a good time—but I can see by your face that it was. That little rosy color in your cheeks, that little sass you have now when you stand. You look about five years younger—and I know that’s not what a work trip is supposed to do.”
“Um…yeah,” I say, shrugging with a little embarrassment, a little blush at being reminded of the ‘work trip.’ “I guess you’re right.”
Asha laughs eagerly and takes my bag while I move into the living room and let my tired body fall onto a seat.
“Thanks,” I say, as Asha returns from the kitchen and hands me a bottle of water, almost licking her lips with anticipation before sitting on the couch, directing her entire body in my direction, unwilling to miss a word.