Hot Under Pressure

by Louisa Edwards

  Swallowing down the familiar, careworn surge of grief, Skye reminded herself she didn’t need Henry Beck and his Navy salary and benefits to get by anymore.

  And she had living, breathing proof that he wasn’t the only man in the world who could ever bring himself to care about her.

  Bringing an image of Jeremiah, with his dark blond hair and twinkling green eyes, to the forefront of her mind calmed her down considerably.

  Holding her head high enough to put a crick in her neck, Skye told herself she didn’t give a damn what Beck thought about her living situation. He’d given up the right to comment on it a decade ago.

  “So how are your parents, anyway?”

  It was amazing how quickly it came back to her, that old sense of caution whenever the subject of her family came up with Beck. “They’re fine,” she told him. “Peter’s got a new play up at the Royal, and Annika’s experimenting with plastics. You know, business as usual.”

  He nodded and that was it. Awkward silence dropped over them like a blanket, muffling the sounds of the market. For pretty much the first time ever, Skye wished she wore a watch, so she could check it and have an excuse to get out of this awful conversation.

  If she stayed here much longer, and she’d be in serious danger of letting Beck see everything she hoped to keep hidden—namely, that he’d ripped her heart out when he left, and she’d never quite managed to get it back.

  “Sounds like nothing has changed.”

  His voice was flat, heavy with the weight of a hundred arguments, but even through the blankness, Skye could hear his contempt.

  “Not true,” she countered, tossing her head in another attempt to get the wind-whipped hair out of her mouth. “I’m ten years older, ten years wiser, with ten years of restaurant experience under my belt. And no matter what our history is, I am going to wipe the floor with you in this competition.”

  The black arches of his brows shot up toward his hairline. “You have changed. You didn’t used to be so direct. Or so competitive.”

  Yeah, well, I didn’t used to be responsible for the livelihoods of an entire staff, not to mention my parents. And I didn’t used to know that there was any way to be happy without you.

  But all she said was, “Get used to it. We’re almost to the finals, Beck.” Unable to help the wave of excitement that crashed over her head when she thought about it, Skye grinned. “I mean, can you believe it? We started out competing against four other teams, and now it’s just your team, my team…”

  “And that asshole, Ryan Larousse,” Beck growled.

  Skye’s thrill evaporated like fog over the bay. “Can’t you let that go?”

  Shock erased the blank expression from Beck’s face. “He tried to trip you when you were carrying a pot full of scalding hot liquid.”

  Wincing, Skye pointed out, “But he apologized! I’m sure he just didn’t think his actions through. He didn’t really mean to hurt me—he was trying to get a rise out of you. And he succeeded!”

  Beck’s mouth firmed into a hard, straight line. It was the look that told Skye, without words, that nothing she said was going to change his mind. “I won’t apologize for protecting you.”

  And Skye felt it again, that strange, conflicting welter of emotions she’d thought long behind her—the softening of tenderness spiced with gratitude bumping up against the tense, coiled unhappiness at being the cause of violence in the world.

  Not only generalized, capital-V Violence, either, but violence done and risked by this familiar stranger standing in front of her.

  Well, no more. “I’m not asking you to apologize,” she said, dragging calm into her chest along with a cleansing breath. “Because I know that would be a waste of time. But I am asking you to respect my wishes. Once the final round of the Rising Star Chef competition starts, I don’t care what Ryan Larousse pulls, you stay out of it. I’m a big girl, Beck. We might technically be married, but that’s just paperwork. You’re not my husband in any way that matters. And it’s been a long time since I needed a street-tough kid in my corner to fight my battles for me. I meant what I said yesterday. I want that divorce, Beck.”

  His expression of cool detachment never faltered. “No argument from me,” he said, without any inflection at all, and suddenly the tiny, faltering, brainless spark of hope Skye had harbored collided with a rage she thought she’d long ago come to terms with, igniting a stinging, burning fire in her chest.

  “No, no arguments,” she agreed viciously. “God forbid you should show enough emotion to fight for what you want.”

  “I thought you hated fighting.” Beck arched one brow. “At least, that’s what you said when I enlisted.”

  “What I hated was being alone in every fight. What I hated was never knowing how you felt—about anything! I hated…” That you were leaving me. Skye stopped herself before she could say it, breathing harshly.

  There it was again. Hate. She didn’t want to be someone who threw that word around lightly.

  Trying for calm, she said, “This is pointless. You never understood, never even tried—you’re not going to start getting it now, after ten years apart.”

  “Why do you want this divorce? I mean, why now?” he asked suddenly. “You could’ve brought this up back in Chicago.”

  Because last week in Chicago, she hadn’t gotten that cryptic email from Jeremiah, promising her a brand-new future.

  Panic buzzed through her. Should she tell Beck the truth? Would that make him more likely to give her what she wanted?

  No way. Beck didn’t get any more of her than he’d already had.

  “I don’t understand why we’re even having this discussion,” she hedged. “I’m trying to make it easier for you to do what you do best. Walk away.”

  Her words dropped into the pause between them like ice into a glass of water. When Beck spoke again, his voice was dangerously soft, and Skye tensed all over before she’d even registered what he was saying.

  “You know what? No.”

  Her jaw dropped. “No? No, what? No divorce? You don’t get to say no!”

  “And yet, here I am, my mouth shaping the word and … huh, yeah, seems like my vocal cords are working okay, because no. Uh uh. Forget it.”

  Shock tightened her throat until she was the one struggling for words. “But you … you left me! A decade ago.” A thought occurred to her, and she poked a triumphant finger into his wide, solid chest. “I don’t need your consent! I’ll claim abandonment.”

  Looking down at her from his great height, Beck seemed to loom until he blocked out the sun, and the sky, and the crowds around them, until it was almost like they were alone, the only two people on the planet. “A no-contest divorce would be so much faster, so much simpler.”

  Gritting her teeth until her jaw throbbed, she said, “But if you won’t give me one…”

  “I tell you what,” Beck said, his dark eyes unreadable. “I’ll play you for it.”

  Skye gaped again. “Excuse me?”

  “I’m assuming our teams both get through to the final round—that dickhead Larousse is a one-trick pony who’s already played out his entire act. So it’ll be down to an East meets West matchup, in the end.” Beck crossed his arms over his massive chest. “If your team wins, I’ll give you your no-fault, no-strings, no-fuss divorce.”

  Skye’s thoughts scattered like a bucket of chopsticks dumped on the floor. Groping for a rational response, she managed, “And what do you get if you win?”

  He shrugged. “I’ll still give you the divorce, but I’ll want something in return.”

  Narrowing her gaze on his impassive face, she said, “Like what?”

  A spark ignited deep in his dark brown eyes, sending a too-familiar shiver straight down Skye’s spine. Beck leaned forward until his forehead almost rested against hers, his presence warm and overwhelming.

  “One last night with you.”

  Chapter 7

  Skye goggled at him. He couldn’t be serious.

&nbs
p; “You can’t be serious!”

  Beck straightened to his full, more than impressive height. “Why not? If I remember correctly, sex was never one of our problems. Why shouldn’t we enjoy one last night, for old times’ sake, before we vacate each other’s lives for good?”

  Because I’ve got a boyfriend, Skye though frantically. But now, more than ever, she couldn’t say that.

  She knew Beck. In this mood, he’d stubbornly do the opposite of whatever Skye wanted, just to prove he could. She understood where that impulse came from, but it didn’t make him any easier to deal with now.

  “Because we’re getting a divorce,” she tried, instead of the truth. “And I’d rather have a clean break.”

  “Guess you’d better plan to win the RSC, then.”

  “I haven’t agreed to this stupid bet yet,” Skye reminded him.

  “You will,” he said, in that simple, egoless way that always drove her bananas. He really wasn’t being arrogant or commanding. He was just telling it like he saw it.

  And the worst part was, he was almost always right.

  “You’ll agree,” he continued, “because either way, you get what you want. It’s a good deal, and you’re too smart not to take it … unless you don’t think your team can beat us.”

  “God, you’re infuriating,” Skye said, shaking her head. It wasn’t like she couldn’t see what he was doing by challenging her, rousing her competitive instincts and bringing them into the negotiations, but still. It was working.

  She took one last stab at talking them both out of it. “Are you really gonna make a bet that relies on someone else’s skill?”

  He frowned. “I don’t follow.”

  “From what I’ve seen, if the East Coast team makes it all the way to the finals, it’s most likely to be Max or Jules who goes into that final cook-off. Not you.”

  A glimmer of hope shone through. She definitely had him there—Jules Cavanaugh was the East Coast team leader, and out of everyone on the team, Max had the most competition experience. Either of them was a more probable choice than Beck.

  “Of course it won’t be me.” Beck’s impassive dismissal killed Skye’s last hope like a hand flipping a light switch. “I was hired on at Lunden’s Tavern less than a year ago. I’m not the guy. Doesn’t matter, we’re a team. Their win is my win.”

  “So…” Skye floundered a little, having a hard time reconciling this team player in front of her with the fiercely independent loner she’d married. “You’d trust the outcome of our bet to someone else’s cooking?”

  His eyes shifted away from her, fixing on something in the distance out over the bay—or maybe on something deep inside, that only Beck could see. “I learned how to function as part of a group a long time ago. It comes down to trust. My team knows I’ve got their backs. And I know they’ve got mine. We’re going to win.”

  He zeroed in on her face again, this time with an intensity that singed Skye’s nerves like a jolt from a live wire. “And when we do, you’ll be mine again for one final night before I let you go.”

  Skye’s throat closed down tighter than a fist as everything low down in her body went taut and liquid with a sudden rush of unwelcome desire. Could she really risk this?

  Her self-preservation instincts were screaming at her to turn him down—but it was so terrifyingly easy to rationalize accepting. After all, as he’d said, either way it went, she’d get her divorce. And she really believed her team could beat any other group of chefs out there.

  Plus, whispered a tiny voice inside, don’t you want to find out if the reality of being touched by Beck lives up to your memories?

  Chances were, the memories were wildly exaggerated. Who knew? If she lost, she could find out that she didn’t respond to Henry Beck any more than she did to Jeremiah. Talk about a win/win situation.

  “Okay, fine. I accept the bet. With one condition.”

  He arched a brow as if he wasn’t convinced she was in any position to make demands, but said, “Go on.”

  “This stays between us. No locker-room talk with the rest of your team, no gossip.”

  The last thing Skye needed was to finally secure her quiet, quickie divorce, only to have Jeremiah hear all about it if he managed to show up to watch the finals as he’d promised. It was bad enough that everyone in the competition knew she and Beck were still married, after that humiliating public spectacle in Chicago.

  She could only thank her lucky stars that Eva Jansen had kicked the camera crews back to L.A. The last thing Skye needed was to have the details of her marital status broadcast across the airwaves.

  “Agreed,” Beck said, satisfaction smoothing his voice to a low growl. He gave her one of his rare smiles, and Skye was dismayed by how much it still lit her up inside to see that stern, grim face crease into an expression of happiness.

  Although this time, his happiness sent a bolt of fear straight through her chest.

  What had she gotten herself into?

  *

  Beck trusted his instincts. He’d had to start relying on them when he was just a kid, and they’d kept him alive and whole this long.

  He didn’t think those instincts had ever prompted him to do something this crazy before—but as he stared down at Skye Gladwell’s soft, flushed cheeks, her determined little chin and bright blue eyes, he couldn’t regret it.

  He could, however, ignore the voice inside that suggested he might’ve arranged this bet because there was more than a culinary competition and a backlog of sexual chemistry between Beck and his estranged wife.

  Luckily, he didn’t have much time to think about what other reasons he might have for not wanting to just give Skye her divorce, because he heard a voice shouting his name over the din of the farmers’ market crowd.

  Beck turned and threw up a hand in greeting, searching the sea of moving bodies for the familiar heads of his teammates. Spotting them over by the entrance to the indoor Ferry Building concourse, Beck glanced back to say goodbye to Skye, only to find she’d already gone.

  He couldn’t stop himself from scanning the crowd once more, this time for a small, strawberry-blonde woman, but she’d melted into the eddying current of foot traffic as seamlessly as if she’d had stealth training.

  Beck made his way over to his teammates, frowning at the way people scurried to get out of his way like they thought he might go on a rampage and start cracking skulls if they didn’t make space for him.

  There was a weird, empty feeling in his chest. He didn’t like it.

  Rubbing at his sternum, Beck caught up to Jules, Max, and Danny just as Jules held up her phone and said, “Oh, a text from Win came through while I was on the phone. He’s at the Blue Bottle Coffee stand inside. Let’s go grab him and then have a conference about what we’re each planning to cook for the challenge.”

  As Beck followed everyone else into the cool interior of the Ferry Building, he only vaguely registered Max’s worried tone as he questioned Jules about the phone call from back home in New York.

  Most of Beck’s attention was on his surroundings. The Ferry Building sure hadn’t looked like this when Beck lived in Oakland.

  Even with its high domed ceiling and skylights, it felt dim after the glare off the water outside. Automatically adjusting for the decreased visibility, Beck barely listened as the rest of his team chatted excitedly about the produce they’d seen and what dishes they wanted to make.

  The words of the challenge itself kept playing themselves out over and over in Beck’s head.

  One dish that sums up your cooking style, who you are as a chef …

  So who are you, Henry Beck?

  That was a question he’d avoided answering for a long time.

  He knew what he could accomplish. He had absolute confidence in his own ability to survive, to overcome, to succeed. The Navy had given him that, and for a long time, it had been enough.

  “I’m going to make ramen,” Max announced. “With a sous-vide duck egg and barbecued pork belly. It’s
the perfect blend of ancient traditions and cutting-edge techniques and ingredients.”

  “So it’s perfectly you,” Jules said, squeezing his arm with an intimate smile. “I’m thinking about a play on steak frites, making my own skinny fries, some kind of horseradish crème fraiche. Maybe doing the beef raw, like a tartar or a carpaccio. Haven’t decided.”

  “Talk about perfectly you.” Her best friend, Danny, laughed. “Dad would bust his whites open, he’d be so proud.”

  Danny and Max were brothers, and their father, Gus, owned Lunden’s Tavern, where the entire East Coast team worked. Jules was the executive chef at Lunden’s, and she’d been working there since her teens. She liked to say the Lunden family taught her everything she knew about life, love, family, and red meat.

  Beck wondered what that would be like, to be so accepted into someone else’s family that they honestly thought of you as theirs.

  Coming up through the foster care system, Beck had seen a lot of families interact with kids who didn’t truly belong to them, and until he’d met Jules and the Lunden clan, he would’ve sworn that kind of unconditional acceptance wasn’t possible.

  It definitely hadn’t been for him.

  Danny, the team’s pastry chef, was going on about some fruity creation he wanted to try, using some of the farm-fresh produce the vendors were selling outside, and Beck forced himself to tune back into the strategy session just as Winslow appeared at his side, holding two white paper cups billowing fragrant steam.

  “Here, man,” Winslow said, offering one of the coffees. “Got you some.”

  “Thanks.” Beck was surprised, and covered it by reaching into his back pocket for his wallet. “What do I owe you?”

  “Nothing, nothing, it’s on me.” Winslow grinned that bright, hundred-and-fifty-watt grin, but it didn’t really reach his light green eyes.

  Beck suppressed a sigh, knowing Winslow still blamed himself for the part he’d played in instigating the big confrontation with Skye back in Chicago.