Opposites Attract: The complete box set

by Higginson, Rachel

  Maybe that was giving myself too much credit and people weren’t as obsessed with me as I feared them to be. But, they were all a bunch of gossips. Every last one of them. That meant none of them could be trusted.

  Not even my former boss.

  “She has you bussing?”

  I gave him a half smile. “Last week she made me wait tables.”

  An affectionate smile stretched across his face. “She’s evil.”

  “An evil genius maybe. I think her plan is working.”

  “Yeah? You feel ready to take on Sarita now?”

  I didn’t like his tone. It suggested that I was nowhere near being ready. Struggling not to glare at him, I confessed more of the truth—truth he didn’t necessarily deserve, but apparently, I sucked at lying. “No, not yet. But she wanted me to appreciate the restaurant as a whole, experience it from outside the kitchen. I’ve seen what’s working and what could be improved. I’ve gotten to know the staff and the layout of the restaurant. If I want a chance in hell of getting this job, the more I know about it, the better off I’ll be.”

  His smile became genuine again. “Knowledge is power.”

  “Yes! It is. I want to know more about this place than Ezra.”

  He folded his arms over his chest. “I don’t know if that’s possible. Ezra is a control freak times one billion. But, you might end up impressing him and that doesn’t happen very often.”

  I chewed on my lip ring, debating over my next question until it kind of flew out of my mouth without my permission. “Do you think I have a chance at it? Be honest with me.”

  His body flexed and twitched as he took a minute to seriously consider my question. I had been expecting an immediate answer and his hesitation made me wish I’d never opened my stupid mouth. I wanted to snatch the words from the air and swallow them.

  Finally, he leaned forward and said, “You’re a hell of a chef, Kaya. That’s indisputable. You’re hotheaded though and Ezra is going to do whatever he can to avoid hiring another angry egomaniac. This job is going to piss you off. A lot. You need to know how to handle it without causing a scene and without drawing Ezra’s attention.”

  His words hit like a punch in the gut. I would have snarled something bitchy at him if it wouldn’t have proved his point.

  The thing was, all chefs were arrogant and hot tempered. At least, most of us. Hell, he was the king of cocky and angry.

  “Also,” he continued, making me cringe in anticipation for what he was about to say. “You have a tendency to overcook your fish.”

  I covered my face with my hands to hide my groan. “I shouldn’t have asked you.”

  He knocked me on the bicep with his fist. “Hey, don’t feel bad. Fix those two things and Ezra would be stupid not to hire you. I’d be happy to tell him that too.”

  His comment gave me the courage to drop my hands and brave him again. “You would?”

  He smiled. “You’re good, Kaya. In this place, you could be fucking great. But you’ve got to get your temper under control.” He pointed a finger at me. “And your fish.”

  After what he said about me in Sarita, his criticism was easier to swallow. “I can handle those things.”

  “Hell yes, you can.”

  “Thanks, chef.”

  “No prob—” He cut himself off, realizing something. “Does Wyatt know?”

  He already knew the answer. “Please don’t tell him.”

  “Kaya…”

  “Please, Killian. I want to tell him myself. And so far, I’m only playing at this job. Ezra isn’t even back yet. I have no idea if he’ll hire me or if he wants to open it up or recruit someone or what. I’ll break it to Wyatt… slowly… I need more time.”

  He frowned, and it made my stomach flutter, remembering what he was like as my boss. “If he asks…”

  “Specifically,” I quickly cut in. “If he asks you specifically about me and Sarita, I know you can’t lie to him. I’m only asking that you don’t bring it up?”

  His head bobbed back and forth. “All right, yeah. I won’t bring it up.”

  “To Ezra either.” His eyes narrowed and I added a fast, “Please?”

  His sigh was long suffering and pained. “Fine. Yeah, okay, I can respect that. I will have words with my bride to be, however. She should have said something.”

  “She was doing me a favor,” I insisted.

  He made a sound in the back of his throat and I thought for a moment he was going to argue with me, but a man stepped up beside him and clapped him on the shoulder. “Hey, man. Sorry, I was waiting out front for you.”

  My gaze turned to the new guy and I had to put a hand on my chin to keep my jaw from dragging the ground. Holy hotness, he was gorgeous. All tan skin and wavy auburn hair, rich and full and the kind of red that made you wish you were a ginger too. He had tattoos, but only on his forearms, not like Wyatt’s that reached all the way to his ears.

  To be honest, now that I’d brought up the comparison, I preferred Wyatt. I liked the full body of artwork on Wyatt. I liked that his tattoos covered almost every inch of him. And this guy had a boyish face complete with dimples full of mischief and a tousled-just-out-of-bed look.

  Wyatt’s appearance was less mischievous and more straight sin. His face wasn’t cute or boyish or adorable. Wyatt looked pissed all the time, his smiles were rare and made themselves present only after a hard fight. This guy was attractive. Wyatt was sexy as hell.

  My inner comparison finished, I now wanted to slap my hand over my eyes because I couldn’t seem to stop comparing everything to Wyatt. Get a grip, Kaya.

  “Oh, no worries,” Killian assured, turning his body so the two of them could shake hands. “I was catching up with an old friend.” He took a step back to include me in the conversation. “Will, this is Kaya Swift. She’s Wyatt’s sous chef at Lilou.” Will glanced down at the dishes still in my hand and the white dress shirt I wore instead of my chef coat. Before he could comment, Killian continued, “Kaya this is Will English. He’s the owner of Craft.”

  I’d never heard of Craft before. That meant it was either new or on the verge of bankruptcy. It was good business to know what else was in Durham. And until this moment, I had not heard one person, blog, or critic reference Craft. I didn’t say any of that though. I reached out to shake his hand and said, “Nice to meet you.”

  He smiled, his dimples striking in full force. If I was a lesser woman I would have swooned. Good lord, he was pretty. “Nice to meet you too.” He continued to shake my hand until it got slightly awkward. His eyebrows drew down in confusion and finally he spit out the question I could see tumbling through his head. “Is this like a side job? Or…?”

  “Yep.” I cleared my throat and avoided Killian’s hard glare. “For now. I, uh, like it here.”

  That was better than claiming a weird dirty dish fetish.

  “Cool,” Will said.

  “Is Craft new? What kind of cuisine do you serve?”

  His deep, raspy laugh filled the air around us. He laughed often. He had to. He was good at it. Again, I thought of Wyatt and how serious he was all the time.

  Except with me.

  More smiles.

  More laughs.

  More… more of him.

  I blinked Will back into focus as he answered, “No cuisine. We’re a bar. Craft cocktails and craft beer.”

  That explained why I had never heard of them before. My social life had died months ago. “That’s cool,” I told him genuinely.

  “You should come check us out,” he added, finally releasing his grip on me.

  I ignored the way Killian frowned at our hands. “Us?”

  “I own it with my brother and sister,” he explained.

  “Ah.”

  He smiled again.

  Flirting. He was flirting with me! My short hair was frizzy as crap thanks to sweating my ass off tonight and I was covered in soda. Either this guy had a thing for girls that looked like they’d been dumpster diving all night or
… or… I didn’t have an alternative for him. He was clearly a weirdo.

  I shook off the insecurity and decided I was prettier than I gave myself credit for. Besides, it wasn’t low self-esteem that had tripped me up. It was Wyatt. I felt surprisingly uncomfortable under another man’s attention, like I was betraying Wyatt.

  Not that we’d made anything official. Still… At any other time in my life, I would have been happy to have Will’s attention. I would have flirted back. Now? Now I was shrinking back and avoiding eye contact so he didn’t think I was interested in him.

  I blamed Wyatt.

  Killian clapped his hands together, pulling our attention back to him. “We’re here to poach Ezra’s bartender.” He winked conspiratorially. “We’ll let you get back to it.”

  My mouth unhinged. “Are you serious?”

  Smirking now, he said, “Try to keep that between us, will you? You know, unless he asks you specifically about it.”

  Was that a threat? I shook my head at him and laughed. Maybe it was insurance. I won’t tell if you won’t tell kind of thing. “Got it, chef.”

  “Keep at it, Kaya. You got a chance. Don’t fuck it up.”

  I waved him off. “Yeah, yeah.” I turned back to Will. “Nice to meet you. Good luck with the bartender.”

  He grinned at me and even on that handsome face it felt lackluster. I could tell Will gave his smiles away freely, generously. I had developed a taste for the reluctant kind. “Yeah, thanks. Maybe I’ll see you at Craft?”

  And those dimples again. They would have once inspired a fluttery response and a soft smile from me. Today I was happy to give him a noncommittal shrug. “Maybe.”

  They walked off toward the bar and I got back to work, keeping my head down the rest of the night. I didn’t want anyone else to recognize me, but I was also serious about doing a good job tonight.

  I was desperate to get back to the kitchen with Vera. That meant I needed to kill my job performance in the front of house. I needed to bus the shit out of these tables.

  And that’s what I did. By the time I put the last few dishes in the industrial dishwasher sometime near two in the morning, I was practically sleeping on my feet. Tomorrow was going to be hell. But today was so worth it.

  I was even in a good enough mood to text Wyatt when I got home. Today was a good day. Thanks for letting me have it off.

  His reply came two minutes later. It would have been better had you brought me tacos.

  Better for me or for you? I asked, curling up under my heavy blankets as a shiver spiraled through my sleepy body.

  For both of us. When we’re together it’s always better for both of us.

  There’s always tomorrow, I told him.

  Good. I missed you today, Kaya.

  My response was quick and familiar. Good.

  I found the heart flutter and soft smile that had been missing with Will English. They had been waiting for Wyatt.

  Thirteen

  My phone buzzed in my pocket, a reminder that I still had it. I was in the middle of Monday afternoon prep, and already hot and irritated.

  Hot in the literal sense of the word.

  Not hot and bothered because of the way Wyatt kept staring at me across the kitchen. That was more irritating than sexy.

  Okay, lie. It was sexy. Super sexy. And only vaguely irritating.

  But he was acting like we weren’t surrounded by my coworkers and his staff and that he could do whatever he wanted without repercussion.

  I supposed that was how he did everything. That was how I’d always known him. But now that all that bad boy rebellion was directed at me, I didn’t know what to do with it.

  The paranoid part of me wondered if he knew about Sarita and this was his way of sabotaging me. I wouldn’t put it past him.

  The smitten girl inside me couldn’t get enough of him and the way his eyes darkened every time he looked my way.

  The buzzing stopped, but started again almost immediately. I pulled my phone from my pocket, worrying that maybe it was something important.

  The phone call was my parents.

  I was on the fence if the reason they were trying to reach me was important or not. We hadn’t spoken in a week. The last time I’d answered, my mom had tried to convince me to take the freshly opened cook position at their local diner. She’d tried to sell me on it by dangling how close I’d be to home, how nice the hours were because even though I’d have to start work at five in the morning, I could be off by one. But the kicker was that Nolan stopped by there every morning for his cup of coffee on his way to work. She’d been unfairly disappointed when I turned her down on the grounds that I was a night owl.

  “You could change who you are for an opportunity like this,” she’d snapped. “Something like this doesn’t come around too often, Kaya Camille. You need to get your priorities in order.”

  I’d chosen not to remind her that positions like that didn’t come around often because there was only one diner cook position in all of Hamilton and the last guy had worked the shift until he’d died of a heart attack two weeks ago. I also carefully danced around the priorities comment.

  I had mine in order. And mine didn’t include Hamilton or giving up on my executive chef dream. It most certainly didn’t include moving home to marry the high school football coach and have all his babies in an attempt to keep the town’s population from dipping.

  I wanted babies, don’t get me wrong. I also wanted a career that set my soul on fire and a husband that made my toes curl. I dreamed of a legacy. A balance of both work and family that screamed into this great big world that Kaya Swift had tried her absolute hardest to make the very best of her one, little life.

  I wanted the entire package. And maybe that wasn’t possible. But moving back to Hamilton was about ten thousand steps in the wrong direction. More importantly, it wasn’t going to happen. I wished my parents would figure that out, so we could stop fighting over it.

  Given how things ended last week though, I decided I better take the call. I answered and shouted a quick, “Hold on!” into the speaker before slipping outdoors. The days were getting hotter and hotter as summer approached. I squinted into the blinding light, enjoying the way the sun immediately began to bake my exposed arms and face. The fragrant breeze chased the sensation, washing over me with the scent of flowering trees.

  It wasn’t exactly quiet outside. The bustle of downtown Durham buzzed and zoomed and occasionally honked. Traffic and pedestrians and the busy life of businesses booming in the plaza sang all around me. But the space was larger, more stretched out unlike the deafening cacophony of inside the kitchen.

  Not that I minded the sound. It was like the soundtrack to my life. The clanging of metal together as pots and pans were moved around. The thwacking of knives chopping, julienning, mincing. Water boiling. Sauces simmering. Music playing somewhere. Voices shouting and laughing, ordering things to be moved or stirred. It was our own brand of symphony. This was the warm up, the sound of a hundred instruments preparing for the performance.

  “Mom?” I asked the quiet on the other end of the phone. “Sorry, I’m at work.”

  “Kaya,” she sighed. “You’re at work already? Don’t you have to work late?”

  “Yes,” I replied patiently. “These are my hours.”

  She sighed again. “That job is going to turn your hair gray.”

  I tugged on a faded pink curl. My hair might already be gray. It was impossible to tell after years of dying it whatever fun color of the rainbow I was in the mood for. And my hairstylist was a genius, a true color artist. Unless I specifically asked for gray, she’d never let my hair be anything but the color we decided on.

  “I’ve got a girl, Mom.” I dodged her. “She won’t let that happen.”

  She mumbled something that sounded like, “Thank God.” I smiled at my shoes. My mom was meticulous about her looks and public persona. Growing up, she’d always say to my sisters and me, “Girls, there are only three women in th
e world you should trust enough not to let you down. Your mama, your stylist, and your manicurist.”

  Her advice had stuck. I might dye my hair the craziest shades I could think of, but my hairstylist, Veronica, was a super star.

  And don’t even get me started on Tina, my nail tech. She could work legit miracles on the fingernails I destroyed on a nightly basis.

  My mama, however, was a different story.

  “What’s up?” I asked when she’d been quiet for what I felt was long enough.

  “How are you?”

  I licked dry lips and talked myself into relaxing. It was kind of her to ask, but the truth was harrowing. I was exhausted to my bones. My feet hurt. My back hurt. I wanted a four-hour nap. But I wanted Sarita more. As a consequence, this was my life for the foreseeable future and I was okay with that. “I’m good,” I lied. “Work is busy.”

  “You’re always busy.” This was always her complaint. “Work is always like that for you.”

  “It is,” I answered. “How are you? How’s Daddy?”

  “Oh, you know us,” she tittered. “We can’t complain.”

  “Did you plant your garden?”

  “I haven’t yet. Your daddy is going to get me what I need this weekend. Although, you know I’m not any good at it. I’d love it if you came home and did it for me. We’re going to start it on Friday.”

  I dropped my head back and blinked up at the bright sky. She knew I couldn’t get away this weekend—exactly why she’d asked. She wanted me to feel guilty.

  “Work is tough right now, Mom. I can’t get away anytime soon.”

  She made a sound in the back of her throat. “Do you think it would be possible for you to take a break from it for at least a few days?”

  My body immediately bristled, readying for a fight. I was afraid to ask her why. With my luck, she’d probably arranged my wedding to Nolan and was giving me a courtesy call to inform me of where to show up and what to do.

  Keeping my tone neutral, I asked, “Why? What’s going on?”