Jules sent Gus a pleading look. Please, let’s get on with this. I can’t take too much more joking about what a cute couple we make.
As always, Gus caught her drift without a word passing between them. “All right, kids, settle down. We’ve got plenty of trivia prep to do, but before we get started, I asked Jules to investigate this new judge.”
“Kane Slater,” Win said, with a smirk. “Smokin’ hot foodie rock star … and this competition just got a whole lot sexier.”
Gus’s cheeks went brick red. He cleared his throat uncomfortably, and this time he was the one turning on the pleading look. “Jules, you want to tell us what you found out?”
“Well, basically, Win’s right,” she said. “Kane Slater got his start singing in clubs in Austin, near where his mother lives. He’s into food in a big way.”
“And he’s smokin’ hot. Don’t forget that part,” Win put in. He blinked into the pause, then quirked a brow at her. “I know you’re not even going to play like you didn’t notice.”
“Okay,” Jules admitted, feeling the tips of her ears get hot. “Yes, it’s kind of hard to miss. But down, boy—there are strict rules against fraternization between judges and chef contestants.”
Win sighed. “Sadly, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t bat for my team. But hey, if you and Max really aren’t bucking for Cutest Couple on the Manhattan Restaurant Scene, maybe you can make a jump for Kane.”
A loud crack shocked Jules stiff, and she looked over to see Max sheepishly dropping the chopstick he’d been playing with, snapped into two pieces.
“Or not,” Winslow said, eyes wide.
“Getting back to the subject at hand,” Beck said, crossing his arms over his massive chest. “And leaving out the gossip-magazine stuff, what do we know?”
Jules crouched to retrieve her Moleskin notebook from her backpack. Flipping through the pages, she read, ‘He was born in a small town in the Texas hill country, but moved to Austin when he was about eighteen, and he still lives there some of the year. The rest of his time he’s on tour, or recording in his studio in L.A.’
“Apparently, he’s one of those musical people who can pick up any instrument, mess around with it for a second, and then play a song. His music is fast, irreverent, with influences from punk to hip-hop to reggae; it’s hard to pin down. And he writes his own lyrics, most of which seem to be about living life to the fullest. For instance—” She checked her notebook again. “The refrain from his latest hit starts: ‘Let’s suck the marrow from the bones of our days.’”
“A food reference,” Danny observed.
Jules nodded. “You got it. And it’s not the only one. His songs are full of cooking metaphors, kitchen wisdom, food imagery … the guy clearly thinks of himself as a major gourmet. Have any of you heard his music?”
Unsurprisingly, Winslow’s hand shot up, and after a beat, Beck shocked everyone by raising his, too.
“What?” Beck scowled, shifting defensively. “I like music.”
“Oookay, moving on,” Danny said, eyebrows at his hairline. “Jules, you’re up. Whaddaya know?”
“Well, for starters … you know that phrase ‘larger than life’? It could’ve been coined for this guy. Everything he does is big: he pulls life-threatening stunts, throws insanely lavish, star-studded dinner parties—where he actually does a lot of the cooking himself, according to rumor—and he’s adventurous.” She flipped forward a couple of pages in her notebook until she found the quote she wanted. “He said in a Rolling Stone interview, ‘I’ll try anything once. And if it doesn’t kill me, I’ll probably do it again, only blindfolded and naked.’”
“I wonder if that sense of adventure extends to his palate,” Gus said, stroking his jaw.
Jules nodded. “Apparently so. He likes to push his own boundaries, and the likelier something is to fold, spindle, and/or mutilate him, the better.”
“So maybe we should expect some questions about dangerous food items. Like … huh. Well, there’s that Japanese puffer fish, I know. What else can kill you?”
“You’re thinking of fugu, Dad,” Max put in. “Other dangerous stuff I’ve run across … hmm, bitter almonds, full of cyanide. Unripe ackee fruit, which is weird-looking stuff, let me tell you. Oh, and in Korea, they serve baby octopus raw, still squirming all over the plate. Those aren’t poisonous, but sometimes the suckers attach themselves on the way down and choke people.”
“Wow,” Jules said, impressed and slightly nauseated. “So. You’re in charge when it comes to strange, disgusting, potentially lethal food questions.”
Looking unhappy to be put in charge of anything, Max said, “Hey, sannakji hoe aren’t disgusting, and they’re not really dangerous as long as you give ’em a good long chew.”
“Meanwhile,” she went on, giving Max a suppressing look. “I’m going to brush up on the history of Texas, especially anything about Southwestern and Mexican foodways. Also, Slater’s got this thing about famous historical meals—”
“Oooh, like Czarfest 2010!” Win said, light green eyes wide, excitement darkening his cheeks until his sprinkling of freckles disappeared. “Last year, Kane Slater threw this huge bash at his house, all decorated to look like an imperial ball, and the guests had to come dressed as Russian nobility. He re-created the Romanovs’ last banquet. You know, before everything went to shit for them.”
The entire team turned to look at Winslow, who shrugged, utterly unabashed. “What can I say? I’m a fan. Plus, TMZ had pictures and oh em gee, let me tell you—you haven’t lived until you’ve seen Britney Spears in a tiara, falling down drunk and tangled in a mile of silver tulle.”
Jules exchanged an amused glance with Danny, then said, “Win, it sounds like you’re the perfect person to research Slater’s dinner parties.”
Winslow clasped his hands in front of him. “Can I? Can I really, and call it work and get paid for it and everything?”
“Yup,” Gus said. “Just like it’ll be work for Danny to go through Devon Sparks’s old menus, and for Beck to read through back issues of Délicieux from when Claire Durand was still doing restaurant reviews, before she became editor in chief. So let’s get to it.”
Everybody nodded and hopped to it as soon as they received their orders—everybody except, predictably, Max.
He leaned back against his makeshift station, more of a movable butcher block on wheels than actual counter space, eyes on his father as Gus started making the rounds of the other chefs, dispensing advice and patting backs.
Hoping to forestall another fight, Jules went over to Max. “What’s the problem?”
He raised a brow at Jules. “I can’t believe this is what they called me home for. Celebrity gossip and food magazines? They don’t need me for this. I could be learning to speak Italian right now, figuring out where I’m going to hang my hat in Le Marche. Something useful.”
Jules struggled with her temper. Apparently, sharing a hot kiss wasn’t like getting a booster shot immunizing her against any future aggravation with Max.
Keep it cool, she told herself. There’s enough heat in this kitchen already. “Maybe this isn’t the part where you can help out the most. But the trivia is only the beginning. We get points for every correct answer, and the more points we have, the better position we’re in going into the finals, which is a full-on cooking challenge, the kind we’d get if we made it to the actual Rising Star Chef competition. And even if we win the finals and are named the East Coast team, we’ll still have to compete against the South, Midwest, Southwest, and West Coast teams for the ultimate title. There’s a long road ahead of us, Max. This is only the first step.”
He studied her face, head cocked to one side as if that would help him see deeper inside of her. “You really care about this, don’t you?”
“You sound surprised,” Jules said. “You shouldn’t be. After what your parents have done for me? I’d do anything to help them.”
“Sheesh.” Max ducked his head, palming the back of his nec
k. “Way to make me feel like a tool.”
But Jules wasn’t finished. “Of course I want to win, Max. This competition might not mean anything to you and your career as a professional wanderer, but it’s a big deal to those of us hoping to make a name for ourselves in the legit restaurant industry. With something like this on my résumé, I could work anywhere. I could run a kitchen.”
His gaze sharpened on her face like a freshly steeled knife. “Like this one, for instance.”
It took everything Jules had not to freeze in place. She managed a casual shrug. “We’ll see. I’ve got options, but the point is, winning the RSC would give me more.”
Max was still scrutinizing her far too closely. “Yeah, see, that’s what I don’t understand. My parents already own their own restaurant, and run their own kitchen. What do they stand to gain if they win this competition?”
Jules glanced over her shoulder to where Gus was standing by Danny’s station, drawing the pastry chef ’s attention to a line in a thick cookbook. She couldn’t believe she was about to do this.
“Look, I’m not supposed to say anything, but if it’ll help you understand…” She stopped and bit her lip, torn between her promise to Gus and her need to make Max see how important this was.
“Tell me,” he said, concern shading his eyes to a stormy blue-gray. “I need to know.”
“The restaurant’s been slipping,” she said, keeping her voice low and her eyes on his, so he’d know she was serious. “A lot. Quality of food is the same, the menu hasn’t changed in twenty years, and yet—the number of customers keeps going down and down and down. No big names come here anymore—with so many new hot spots opening in the city every year, old classics like this place are a harder sell, and the Village isn’t the most fashionable part of town. But Gus knows if Lunden’s Tavern supplies the team that wins the Rising Star Chef competition, that’ll put us back on the map. In fact, we’ll be bigger than ever.”
Max blew out the breath he’d been holding. “Shit. I knew this was coming. I always expected to feel smug when I heard it—God knows, I warned Dad about it—but … I’m not.” He pressed a hand to the flat belly Jules knew from recent experience was ridged with muscle. “I feel sick.”
“I know. But now do you get it? All of this, the stress it’s putting on your dad, how tense Danny is, everything—it’s all about this. Because they’re terrified of losing this place.”
A bitter twist she’d never seen before took Max’s mouth. “Believe me, I know exactly how much this place means to my dad.”
There was a deep hurt there, Jules recognized. Gentling her voice, she said, “If you think Lunden’s Tavern means more to Gus than his actual sons, you’re dead wrong. He’s afraid of losing the restaurant because it’s your heritage. Your birthright, and his responsibility to pass it down to the next generation, the way it was passed down to him.”
Max paused, a new light coming into his eyes. “Huh. I never really thought about it that way before. Maybe you’re right. God, Jules. What did we ever do around here without you?”
“Don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere.” Then her mouth got the better of her brain. “That’s more your department, anyway.”
From the way Max’s face tightened, that was a direct hit. But his only response was a rueful laugh. “You got me there. I like to go and see and do and experience. I can’t believe I ever thought running this place would be enough for me.”
“Max, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said—”
“No, it’s fine,” he interrupted, eyes shifting away. “Really. Not like it isn’t true. Anyway, shouldn’t we both be getting to work? I’ve got some lethal toxins to look up. And you’ve got the great state of Texas to research.”
Okay, this time I really am taking my own advice and letting it go.
Jules nodded, still a little worried by the dark undercurrents running through Max’s normally sunny mood. “Yeah, you’re right. We only have a few days left before the qualifiers. Not a lot of time to learn everything there is to know about another human being, even if he is famous.”
“A famous dickwad, is what he sounds like,” Max muttered, turning away from her to reach up to the shelf above his butcher block for the stack of reference books he’d stashed there.
Jules moved back to her station. “I don’t care what he’s like in person; all I care about is knowing what kinds of questions he’s likely to throw at us.”
Beside her, Winslow poked her with a discreet elbow. “Not to spin your stress-o-meter into High Freakout Mode, but from what I know about Kane Slater? The only thing we can reasonably expect is the unexpected.”
That was exactly what Jules was afraid of. She glanced over at Max, who rolled his eyes and hauled a copy of Harold McGee’s scientific treatise On Food and Cooking toward him. He caught her eye and mouthed something that looked like “only for you” and bent to his task.
She caught her breath and turned back to her own work, lingering unease about Max and his father and the restaurant and the competition all swirling together in her belly.
Kane Slater better not throw her any curve balls—and that went for the other judges, too. Jules had about all the unexpected she could take in her life, right now.
Chapter 11
Max behaved himself for five long, boring days.
Five days of showing up to practice on time, dutifully leafing through reference books, helping Jules keep the peace in the kitchen, and not throwing any more woo Jules’s way.
It was harder to be good than it should’ve been.
Maybe if he believed Jules really didn’t want him, every bit as much as he wanted her, Max reflected as he pulled on his freshly laundered chef ’s whites. There were benefits to living at home again, it turned out—the Mom Laundry Service being one of them.
It wasn’t that Max didn’t get where Jules was coming from. Two people, small kitchen, same team, already complicated family dynamics—it could get worse than messy, really damn fast.
But from the way she kept watching him, with heat in her eyes and a flush on her cheeks, and still managed to keep her hands to herself, Max was pretty sure he was fighting more than logic, reason, and practicality. Something beyond rational thought was holding Jules back. The mystery of it hooked into Max’s overactive curiosity and tugged relentlessly.
Curiosity was Max’s number one favorite vice.
Jules Cavanaugh was fascinating, like a new knife trick or an innovative technique for layering flavors in dashi. Max had never met another woman who made him want to pull back her layers and learn every inch of her, inside and out, with the same hunger that drove him from city to city, continent to continent, in search of culinary adventure.
If he’d known about her, he might’ve come home a lot sooner.
Not that Max fooled himself into thinking he’d stay. Even without Italy beckoning him, he’d get tired of standing still, bored with the routine and the sameness of everyday life all in one place. He always had before, and there was no reason to believe this time would be any different.
Home was a concept that didn’t really apply to Max anymore.
But just because he knew he’d be leaving in a few weeks didn’t mean he and Jules couldn’t have something special.
It was the night before the qualifying round, and Gus had called one final practice session for the team members who weren’t working dinner service at Lunden’s.
To keep out of the way of the actual restaurant business, he’d asked them to meet in the kitchen of the apartment upstairs, but when Max sauntered out of his room five minutes after the appointed hour (okay, so he was mostly on time—nobody was perfect) the only person in the kitchen was Jules.
She was slumped over the scarred wooden table shoved into the corner of the kitchen, but when he came in, she straightened up and gave him a tired smile. “Hey. I thought maybe you forgot.”
“A date with you?” Max said. “Never.”
Her gorgeous wide mouth twitched,
as if she wanted to laugh but held herself back. She did that a lot, Max had noticed. Held back. It made him hungry to know what it would take to shake her loose.
“I realize that women have always been tragically easy when it comes to you, myself included, but you might want to rethink your understanding of the term ‘date.’”
Max looked around the empty kitchen. “You. Me. Alone. A whole night ahead of us to do whatever we want together? I’d say that sounds like a date. And for the record, you’ve never been what I’d call ‘easy.’”
Her eyes flashed with interest, but then her mouth got that stubborn set that he liked so much. “We don’t have the whole night, and we should work. That’s what this practice is for.”
“You call it a ‘practice,’” Max said, making big, ostentatious air quotes. “But I don’t see the rest of the team anywhere around.”
“Beck, Danny, and Winslow all ended up working tonight because the second-string hot line chefs got food poisoning or something. And your dad had an appointment that ran late. He called a few minutes ago; he and your mom are both there.”
Max frowned. “What kind of appointment?”
Something like alarm flickered across Jules’s face, but she shrugged and said, “Don’t know, they didn’t say. But I guess we’ll just have to wait for everyone else.”
The full ramifications of the situation sank into Max’s consciousness. Giving a silent nod to his old pal, Fate, he felt a slow smile crease his cheeks. “So,” he said. “We really are alone.”
“Yeah,” she said, then her eyes widened comically. “Hey, no—stay over there. What are you doing? Personal space!”
Max laughed as he prowled closer, one hand bracing his weight against the back of her chair so he could lean in and get a breath of that sugar-lemon scent wafting up from her hair. God, he loved that.
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