by Beth Bolden
And how could Miles possibly trust him when all Evan wanted to do was teach every man, woman, and child how to make world-class desserts, and he didn’t even like them?
There was an exclusivity that surrounded chefs like Miles and Wyatt and Xander, and sometimes even Kian. It was a cult that was cultivated by chefs like Bastian Aquino. And what it proclaimed, loud and clear, was that not everybody could join. You had to pass the tests. You had to prove yourself. You couldn’t just turn on YouTube and walk in. There was a blood, sweat, and tears barrier that had to be crossed first. It was what made Bastian able to charge hundreds of dollars for a single meal. If everyone could make it, then everyone might, and they would all be out of a job.
Miles hadn’t made the rules, but he was expected to live by them. And some upstart guy with spreadsheets and a marketing degree and tight khakis that made Miles’ dick ache wasn’t going to make him break them.
* * *
He’d been gone from the house they’d all shared for less than a week, but already Miles felt nostalgic as they all collapsed on the various sitting surfaces in the living room. They all had their special spot, and Miles still got the particularly comfy corner of the couch.
“Don’t worry,” Xander said with a roll of his eyes. “I haven’t appropriated it yet. I couldn’t get comfy in it because the dents in it still match your skinny ass.”
Miles never thought he’d miss Xander’s snide little comments, but he’d take Xander’s mostly open hostility over Evan’s insidious back-stabbing manipulation. Even thinking of him now and the innocent openness of his expression right after Miles had caught him red-handed burned.
“I figure this is as good a time as any to open this,” Wyatt said, walking into the living room holding a dusty bottle.
“Nate gave that to you, didn’t he?” Kian asked, because he hadn’t had that sort of boyfriend yet, and was still blissfully naïve. Miles and Xander were both too smart to bring up that Nate, Wyatt’s asshole sommelier ex-boyfriend, had given him the bottle in his hands.
“Fuck that asshole, anyway,” Xander said.
Wyatt’s expression grew wistful. “I know you all hated him, but he wasn’t so bad.”
“Quick,” Miles said, “let’s drink the wine before Wyatt changes his mind and waxes nostalgic about his relationship with Nate.”
“More like waxes nostalgic about what great wine Nate would always buy,” Xander added.
Wyatt raised an eyebrow. “Do you want me to open this or not?”
“We’ve been staring at it for more than six months,” Xander said. “And nine before that, when you were still together and you felt obligated to drink it with that dick. Open the fucking wine.”
Wyatt made a face but started opening the wine anyway.
“Kian broke our fourth red wine glass,” Xander explained when Wyatt brought out three wine glasses and a champagne flute.
“It wasn’t my fault!” Kian exclaimed, though out of a kitchen, he was notoriously clumsy.
“And the sky isn’t blue,” Xander retorted.
Miles took the glass Wyatt handed him, and did a showy little swirl. He wasn’t a sommelier like Nate, but he’d taken a few classes about wine, and he could tell from the bouquet that it was pretty good. Maybe not as good as Nate had sworn it was, he thought as he sipped, but pretty damn good.
The problem was that Nate had always oversold everything—and that included himself. It had been a very good day when Wyatt had finally shown him the door. And, bonus, he’d gotten to keep the birthday gift Nate had given him a few months before.
“Dish,” Wyatt said, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, blue eyes bright in the dim room. “I wouldn’t have opened this wine if I didn’t think it would loosen your tongue.”
Miles tipped his glass in a faux toast. “You’re a real giver.”
“Seriously,” Xander complained. “What the fuck are you doing back here?”
Miles didn’t even know where to begin. He didn’t want to talk about Evan, but everything started with him. “You know how we all really liked Nate at first, and it took us a long time—some of us a very long time—to realize he was a tool?” A round of nods. They’d all been happy when Wyatt had started dating Nate. He was decent and had access to better wine than any of them could afford. Plus, nobody else had dated anyone seriously during the time they’d all lived together. Xander was too mean to date anyone, Miles liked to keep things more casual, and from the very beginning, Kian had this unfortunate crush on their boss he continually denied but was obvious from about a hundred miles away.
“Well,” Miles continued, “that isn’t what happened with my producer. I pretty much hated him right away.” This hadn’t really been true then, and it definitely wasn’t true now. But it made for a simpler story. Definitely easier than explaining that his feelings were intense and confused. Too difficult to try to explore, even with his best friends.
Kian made an aborted shocked noise. Kian was also too young and too naïve to ever hate anyone at first sight.
“I don’t buy it,” Xander inserted cynically. “You don’t hate anyone right away. That’s me, not you.”
This was unfortunately true. Miles’ first impression of Evan hadn’t been hatred; it had been vague interest at his cute ass and velvety brown eyes. And he’d seemed nice and eager to please. Even if nothing he said had particularly pleased Miles.
“You haven’t met him,” was all Miles said. They’d already had to discuss Nate tonight; they didn’t need to rehash all of Miles’ poor romantic judgement too—and they didn’t even know the half of it.
“I can’t believe you only lasted two days,” Wyatt said with a shake of his head. It sounded like a Xander comment, and it stung.
“I’m not back,” Miles retorted. But he knew how it looked. He knew how good it felt; how comfortable and routine to sit on this couch and drink a glass of wine and bullshit with his three friends.
Like he’d slid right back into the same life he’d already acknowledged he’d grown out of.
There was nothing to do but take a big gulp of wine, and appreciate the acidic burn.
“Does this mean you have to pay back the money?” Xander asked.
Miles knew he wasn’t going to pay back a dime. He was tied up, metaphorically and legally. The rest of his glass of wine slid down his throat with none of the ceremony Wyatt’s ex-boyfriend would have required.
He got up from the comfy corner of the couch; suddenly it didn’t fit the same way it had. He walked in the kitchen, which looked a little barer without Miles’ precious copper pots. The thought stung, and he turned away, towards the sad little cabinet that contained their meager liquor collection—most of which they’d kept to be used in Miles’ desserts.
He grabbed the half-full bottle of knockoff Kahlua, and returned to the living room. This time, he didn’t take the corner on the couch, but settled on the edge of the arm.
“What are you doing?” Kian asked. Only Kian wouldn’t recognize a meltdown requiring alcohol, Miles thought bleakly.
“Getting drunk,” Miles said, at the same time as Xander added, “Trying to forget he’s already made his bed.”
Miles glared over at Xander. It was a little rawer than usual, because he’d already taken two swigs of the terrible Kahlua knockoff and if he’d thought Nate’s wine had burned going down, it had nothing on this shit.
“You can’t come back,” Xander said by way of explanation, and his casual shrug burned even more than the wine and the bad Kahlua combined.
Miles took another long drink, straight from the bottle. “Anyone joining me?”
Wyatt laughed. “We all have to work tomorrow. Unlike you, apparently.”
Miles could only imagine Evan’s affronted expression when he didn’t turn up the next morning, and then the exaggerated annoyance when he used his key to check Miles’ apartment and discovered he wasn’t there.
He could also imagine the smug edge to his annoyance. How Evan would
imagine that Miles had conceded victory.
Miles let more booze slide down his throat and snapped his fingers in Kian’s direction. “Go get your laptop.”
A wrinkle appeared between Kian’s blond brows. “I really don’t think you should be making a video now, Miles.”
Miles frowned. “I’m not making a video, I’m writing a fucking email.”
Xander looked concerned now. A sure sign that everyone was convinced Miles was melting down. Even Miles was convinced, but he didn’t give a shit anymore.
He waved with the plastic bottle. He should’ve stopped at the store and bought some half-decent booze to lose it with. “I’m not going to actually send it,” he claimed. “I just want to write it. That’s why I’m using Kian’s laptop. It never fucking stays connected to the Wi-Fi.”
The glance Wyatt gave him was galling. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”
Miles finished the bottle with a gross belch that tasted of pretty good red wine and bad Kahlua and definite regrets. “It’s the best fucking idea I’ve had in awhile.”
Kian must have been at least partially convinced—or maybe he was trying to distract Miles from the liquor cabinet—because he went and got his laptop and reluctantly handed it over.
Miles traded the laptop for the empty Kahlua bottle, which Kian took with a dubious look and an even more dubious sniff.
“You’re a snob,” Miles told him with a shake of his head.
“I just don’t get it,” Kian said earnestly. “You’re—okay, you were—a chef at one of the best restaurants in the world. How can you even stomach bad liquor like that?”
Miles was booting up the laptop and was so focused on the white-hot ball of rage lighting his way that he nearly missed Xander’s answer.
“Kian,” he said much more patiently than usual, “you wouldn’t. But sometimes you want it to burn going down.”
That was the goddamn truth.
Miles wanted to burn the whole world down, starting with his taste buds and his throat and his stomach. Next stop, Evan’s infuriating ego.
Not once, not once in his whole fucking career, had anyone—either a superior or a head chef or co-worker—ever had reason to call him unprofessional.
Miles wanted to burn Evan down because he’d dared to say it out loud and mean it. Even worse, he was right.
He opened Kian’s browser. The Wi-Fi was currently working, but it was only a matter of time before it went on the fritz. The most consistent thing in this entire house was the inconsistency of Kian’s Wi-Fi. It was something Miles was counting on, because while he wanted to mentally deep fry Evan, he wasn’t ready to deep fry his career.
Nobody, even Evan Patterson, was enough motivation for Miles to throw away everything he’d killed himself to achieve.
“Are you really sure about this?” Kian asked. He sounded worried. His voice echoed the look on Wyatt’s face. Even Xander didn’t look completely convinced. Probably because none of them had consumed half a bottle of faux Kahlua.
Knock-off Kahlua was apparently the key to saying fuck it to the world.
“Definitely,” Miles said. The adrenaline from his fight hours ago with Evan was still coursing through him. It was a physical impossibility but something about Evan kept him alight. Miles didn’t want to look too carefully at what that might be. He zoned right onto the outrage and bypassed the rest right by.
“Dear Evan,” Miles said out loud as he typed. Badly, but he wasn’t sending this, so it didn’t matter. This letter was only for him, an attempt to exorcise all his rage. Tomorrow he’d go skulking back to LA, tail sort-of between his legs, maybe not ready to apologize but conceptually ready to compromise. He wasn’t ready to face the kiss yet, but he was sure Evan would want to pretend like it hadn’t happened.
But first . . . revenge.
Kian opened his mouth to try to say something else, but Miles talked right over him. “Dear Evan,” he repeated, “I really hate your face. It’s a big fat fucking lie. Earnest and trustworthy when you’re really a big backstabber.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t repeat ‘big’ twice in one sentence,” Xander inserted.
Miles shot him a hot glare. “This isn’t a fucking essay, you idiot.”
Xander just shrugged, and Miles felt the room begin to spin as he tried to focus on his face. But he dug down deep and returned to his email.
“How about horrible backstabber?” Wyatt suggested.
“Thanks, Mr. Thesaurus,” Miles retorted. His fingers were flying over the keys, insulting everything from Evan’s stupid bow ties to fake marketing genius to his cute ass—okay maybe that last one wasn’t quite an insult. But Miles was trying. He didn’t mention the kiss, but it was right there, hidden between the lines. The one thing he wasn’t saying.
The problem was the more he wrote, the colder the fire grew, until it felt just about ready to smolder right out. This had been a fucking fantastic idea. He’d managed to exorcise the last of his anger, and he’d really be able to return and try to salvage this whole thing.
And then . . .
“Oh, shit,” Miles said, dread spinning through him faster than quicksilver. Certainly faster than the rage had spread. And unlike the rage, it made him sick. Or maybe that was the Kahlua.
“What happened?” Kian asked, scrambling to get over to where Miles sat on the floor with the laptop. Something in Miles’ voice must have told him something terrible had happened, because he could move quick when he wanted to, and he was moving fast now.
“I pressed enter,” Miles said in a small voice.
“Oh shit,” Kian said, which was unusual for him because like the Boy Scout he’d been, he almost never swore.
“What?” Xander was scrambling now, trying to join Miles and Kian as they stared unbelieving at the laptop screen.
“I think Miles sent the email,” Kian said carefully.
“What?” Wyatt exclaimed. “How could that even happen?”
“I forgot to mention, I think I fixed the Wi-Fi,” Kian said, and he sounded wretched. Not nearly as wretched as Miles felt, and in some other universe, it might have helped that Kian felt bad, but in this one, it didn’t. It didn’t at all.
His brain was one long fuzzy slow-rolling image of Evan, all peppy and morning-person, opening his email tomorrow and being confronted with one insult after another, most of which weren’t even true. Miles didn’t even want to think about the spelling and grammar errors. No doubt Evan would return it to him, marked up with a red pen. His eyes would be red too, because as frustrating as he was, he wasn’t immune or cold.
He cared. He’d wanted a Joan of Arc Julia Child, and all he’d gotten was the asshole half of Gordon Ramsay.
It didn’t feel fair at all, even if Miles didn’t really like him. It really wasn’t fair if Miles decided he did like him.
“Maybe we can take the email back,” Kian suggested, trying for hope and landing somewhere north of despair.
“Take the email back?” Xander sneered. “It’s a good thing you’re not on a career path that requires any sort of technical skills. The email is gone.”
“Gone,” Miles repeated hopelessly.
Someone shoved a bottle in his hand. He took a swig. It was worse even than the fake Kahlua, some sort of sickly sweet orange liquor, but Miles didn’t even care anymore. He wanted oblivion because maybe that would kill the shame.
Chapter Five
His mouth tasted like a Russian and a Spaniard had fought over a rotten orange and lost. As Miles gradually fell towards consciousness, he knew only one thing: he’d never be able to drink White Russians or Spanish Coffees ever again. For a split second, that was something to seriously mourn. And then it all came roaring back: the fight, the drive back to Napa, the wine and bitch session with his friends, and then the email from hell. Followed by the faux Kahlua and the fake orange liquor and what he was pretty sure was a drag of shame into the bathroom.
Yep, Miles realized, that was definitely the edge of the toi
let his face was resting on. It was a good thing too, because as soon as he got ambitious enough to open one sleep-crusted eye, he got instantly, horrifically sick.
Miles wiped his mouth and settled back on the toilet seat, which thanks to Xander’s OCD tendencies, was spotless. It was also a whole lot more comfortable than he’d imagined. And conveniently close to the toilet bowl, which might be making another rapid appearance in his life at any moment.
Why had he come here? He’d known his life here was done—even if the friendships weren’t. Had he come so his best friends could plump his ego, even though they’d never done it before? Had he come here so they could clean his wounds? Salve his pride? He wasn’t sure, though he knew the decision to get drunk and write the email had been the worst of the bunch.
Never mind that he’d never intended to send it. It was enough that he’d written it, spelling errors and odes to Evan’s ass and all. And now Evan had most likely already seen it. The thought was enough to send him back to the toilet, retching helplessly because he’d already thrown most of his stomach up already.
He was fucked, and not even in the fun way.
A brisk knock sounded on the door. He ignored it. He wasn’t in any mood for Xander’s resigned “you’ve fucked up your life” bullshit.
“What?” Miles croaked when they didn’t go away but instead knocked again, with way more determination. Definitely more determination than Miles felt. He was only determined not to die, and it was feeling pretty touch and go at the moment.
“Miles, are you okay?” It was Kian, and he sounded a hell of a lot more sympathetic than Miles deserved. As far as he was concerned, he wasn’t worthy of any of it.
“No,” he croaked. Might as well be honest.
“Open the door,” Kian said.
“You open it,” Miles retorted.
“You locked it, you idiot.” That was Wyatt, who was even more protective over Kian than Miles was. “There’s someone here to see you.”
It was probably Reed, here to fire Miles and demand all his signing bonus back. Some of which he’d already spent on a stupid rental car to come up here and bitch at his friends about how hard he had it. Miles wanted to vomit again, but nothing came. Somehow that felt like the final indignity.