Without taking his eyes off Frankie, Jess said, “I’m going to hold you to that promise you made. If he looks like he’s wearing out, send him home.”
“I will,” Adam said, making a sincere attempt to keep the impatient growl out of his voice. “I don’t want him chopping off anything vital or catching himself on fire any more than you do.”
Jess finally tore his gaze from Frankie to look Adam in the eye. The kid had that bruised look around the eyes from not getting enough sleep. His eyes, those so-familiar blue eyes, looked old and tired.
“I know,” Jess said. “I worry because I’m not sure I can stand to lose anyone else right now.”
It was Adam’s turn to look away. “Have you talked to her?”
“No. I told her not to call.”
“I’m surprised she listened.”
“Me, too, actually.” Jess sounded concerned rather than pleased. “I still don’t understand why she wrote those things, or why she allowed them to go public.”
“Don’t look at me, kid.” The harshness of his own words grated in Adam’s throat. “I’m the last person she would’ve opened up to.”
Jess looked startled. “But I was sure the two of you were—”
“We were. Sort of. But she never told me much of anything personal, really. I guess she figured, why expend the energy on a fake relationship?”
The kid’s eyes darkened with something that looked an awful lot like pity. Adam abruptly needed this conversation to be over.
He coughed. “I think Grant’s out front, if you want to find something to do before everyone else gets in.”
“Yeah, I’ll do that,” Jess said. “Leave you guys to get on with it. Frankie? See you later.”
“Later, Bit,” Frankie said. “Oi, wait a tick.”
He dropped the knife and whetstone with a clatter and bounded over to Jess, pressing a quick, hard kiss to the young man’s mouth.
Jess did a fair impression of a lobster on the boil, but his eyes were shining when Frankie straightened up.
“I guess I’d better . . . Grant’s probably . . . um, okay, seeyoubye!”
Frankie surveyed Jess’s flustered escape from the kitchen with smug satisfaction. “He needed distracting.”
“Nice work,” Adam commented.
“What can I say? I’m a master distracter. Matter collapser. Masturbator. Ah, it’s so damn good to be back!”
“It’s damn good to have you.” Even Adam was surprised by the wealth of feeling in his voice. Frankie didn’t miss it, either, curse him, but turned a speculative eye on Adam.
“Rough week?” was all he asked.
“You could say that. We’ve had more business than we can reasonably handle while short staffed—no, no jokes about the shortness of my staff, thanks—even with Wes to help pick up the slack, and everyone’s walking on eggshells around each other. I mean, bad enough to deal with the fallout from goddamn Rob and his pop gun, but that book . . . ”
“Yeah,” Frankie said musingly. “That was a weird night. What I remember of it, anyway. Don’t actually remember getting shot, although I’m sure I was very brave and heroic about it.”
“You whimpered like a kicked puppy,” Adam said crushingly. He’d missed Frankie a lot.
“A kicked boy puppy, though,” Frankie said. “One of those manly breeds, like a mastiff or a bulldog.”
Adam broke, snickering. “Shit, at least you didn’t cry. I think all matter in the universe might actually have collapsed if you’d shed real tears. Or at least all the matter in my head.”
“Violet cried. I remember that.”
Adam lost his smile. His chest squeezed tight. “Bitch-on-wheels, tougher-than-nails Violet.”
“Yeah. I could see her at her station from where I was standing. She didn’t sob or anything, but it was still strange. Like watching that bit in Terminator 2 when Arnold cries.”
“All kinds of wrong,” Adam agreed, knowing exactly what he meant. “Well, we haven’t had any more tears in the last week, thank Christ, but we haven’t had a lot of laughs, either.”
“ ’Course not, you were all too busy missing me,” Frankie crowed with a smirk and a twinkle in his black eyes.
“Frankie’s back!” The shout came from the door to the back staircase where Milo and Quentin were just emerging, still buttoning their white jackets.
“And better than ever,” Frankie shouted back.
“Hells yeah,” Milo said, bouncing over like a short, Italian Tigger. “You’re working the bad-boy action now, man, you’ve got a scar to back it up.”
Quentin followed more sedately, his teeth shockingly white in his dark, handsome face. “Chicks dig scars,” he said in his slow, deep voice.
“He ought to know.” Milo laughed. “He scores more than any of us. Apparently, chicks dig the strong, silent type, too.”
“That lets you out then, Milo,” Violet said, joining the throng. Happiness like Adam hadn’t seen for days was clear on her round face.
“All right, all right,” he jumped in, forestalling Milo’s heated defense. Billy Perez and Wes Murphy came up the stairs, their conversation halted by the sight of the knot of jubilant cooks surrounding Frankie.
“Gang’s all here,” Adam said. “We’re stoked to have Frankie back, but we still have a restaurant to open in, hmmm, less than two hours. So get to work. Wes, come talk to me a minute.”
Looking wary, the new guy approached while everyone else scattered slowly to their corners of the kitchen. The vibe was better than it had been in days, not completely back, but they’d get there.
Adam was painfully aware that the rest of it was his own fault. The kitchen would stay noticeably out of whack until he could figure some way to get over Miranda.
Shaking himself out of it, he said, “Wes, now that Frankie’s back—”
“I know, I know,” Wes interrupted. “I’m off the grill. Where do you want me?”
Adam paused. There wasn’t nearly as much of the long-suffering martyr about the guy as he’d expected.
“I want to be clear,” Adam said, “you saved my ass last week. Seriously, man, I don’t know how we woulda gotten along without you. I’d have had to run a station and the hot plate, both, which might have killed me. You did good on meats, really good.”
“But Frankie’s better,” Wes said simply, his hazel eyes steady on Adam’s face. “For the moment.”
There it was, that arrogance Adam had come to associate with their extern. But it was arrogance that Wes backed up with a shitload of talent and an unswerving dedication to being the best.
“Best way to improve is to watch Frankie work the grill.”
Wes lit up like a power burner. “You mean it? That would rock. I know I could be faster, more precise with the meat temperatures.”
“Frankie’s a good teacher, when he’s not goofing off.” Adam yelled that last part, catching Frankie out of the corner of his eye involved in what looked like a pitched battle with Milo, using wooden spoons as weapons.
Lowering his voice amid the giggles as Frankie and Milo got back to work, Adam added, “And it would really help me out if you could keep an eye on Frankie tonight.”
“Is he still in pain?”
Adam shrugged. “Probably, but you’ll never get a straight answer out of him about it. Which is why I need a pair of eyes on him. Let me know if he starts to flag, if you can tell his shoulder is bothering him, whatever.”
“I can do that,” Wes said. He glanced up at Adam, then down at his own black kitchen clogs. “Look. I know I come across kind of strong sometimes. But I wanted this externship. Nobody will work harder for you, because nobody wants to learn as badly as I do.”
Adam saw the stubborn flame of ambition in the kid’s eyes, but he also saw the hidden, flickering hope he’d seen in so many others who’d passed through the kitchens he’d worked in. Hope for friends, an extended family of sorts, people to accept him for who he was.
The combination of desires was
invaluable, would bind this kid to Adam for life if he could provide both the opportunity for greatness and a family to cheer him on.
“You don’t have to justify yourself to me,” Adam told Wes. “I’ve watched you work; we both know you’re good. But I also watched you stand with us a week ago, and I watched you pitch in and do what needed to be done by helping Grant get the customers out. Point is, Wes, I see you. And there’s a place here for you beyond the externship, if you want it.”
Wes simply nodded. But Adam read the sheer relief in him as easily as reading a recipe. He sent Wes over to Frankie, who welcomed him like a long-lost brother.
Adam watched his crew, humming along better than they had in a while. All the necessary ingredients were mingling and merging in the good way, coming together to make something better than the individual parts, the way eggs and flour and sugar came together to make a cake.
He should’ve been happy. He should’ve been ecstatic.
So why did he feel like a key ingredient was still missing?
Ignoring the scoured-out hole in his chest, Adam rolled up the sleeves of his jacket and immersed himself in work.
THIRTY-ONE
Nerves skittered through Miranda’s stomach like drunken butterflies. It all came down to tonight.
She’d had days to work herself into a frenzy of anticipation and dread. Devon needed the time to make all the arrangements, and she wanted to wait until Frankie was back in the kitchen.
It was a good thing she’d established a new inside source for information on the Market kitchen and its crew. Miranda hadn’t heard a word from Jess or Adam since the book was leaked. Not that she’d expected to.
That’s what this is about, she reminded herself, trying to convince her stomach it didn’t need to empty itself forcefully all over her red satin pumps. They’d worked on Devon, so they were now a talisman, of sorts. She’d plucked them out of the closet tonight without even considering any other options. They went nicely with the black knee-length pencil skirt and lipstick-red short-sleeved silk sweater. The sweater, which had started life as part of a twin set, was that rare shade of red that didn’t clash with her hair.
After tonight, Adam and Jess will have to talk to you. And one way or another, they’ll know how you feel.
“Are you ready for this?” Devon asked.
He looked ludicrously gorgeous under the harsh, unforgiving lights of the camera crew. His short sable hair was artfully tousled, his devastating cheekbones and sensual lips enhanced with subtle makeup.
Lifting his chin away from the dabbing sponge, Devon gestured the makeup artist over to Miranda, who submitted.
This was Devon’s show, after all. She was just the guest star.
“Am I ready to expose myself in front of a roomful of people with good reason to hate my guts? Sure, bring it on,” Miranda replied.
Devon’s steely blue eyes mocked her. “You make it sound like you plan to do a striptease. Oh, please, please tell me you’re going to strip!” He clapped his hands like a delighted child. Miranda had to laugh, even though she wondered if the sharp movement of her diaphragm might dislodge her dinner.
“Only if it looks like I’m not getting anywhere with the true confessions from the soul,” she told him.
“Mmm. Nice. I’m banking on Adam’s stubborn streak.”
The camera crew rushed around, setting up the shot. Devon was going to film an introductory segment on the street outside Market, then they’d head around back and go in through the kitchen door.
They’d timed their arrival to the end of dinner service. Miranda wanted to cause as little disruption as possible, and if they’d interrupted prep, the whole night would’ve been thrown off. This way, the customers had all left and so had many of the servers. The cooks would be finishing their cleanup and prep for the next day. She was certain Jess would stay late to help Grant and to wait for Frankie.
Devon beckoned Miranda with an imperious flick of the wrist. She came over to stand next to him and squint into the lights and fiddle with the wireless mic attached to her collar.
“Let your eyes adjust.” Devon frowned. “You can’t crinkle up your face like that once the cameras get going.”
The camera crew settled into place and started a countdown.
“Understood.” She breathed hard through her nose, concentrating on smoothing her features back to normal.
“It’s going to be all right, you know,” Devon said unexpectedly.
“You think so?” Miranda asked, surprised into betraying her desperate need to believe him.
“Trust me. If anyone understands the effects of high drama on human emotions, it’s me. And this is one very dramatic stunt we’re about to pull.”
Miranda had no time to respond before the camera operator reached the end of his countdown and pointed at Devon, who turned and beamed that flawless smile into the lens without pause.
“Hello there, I’m Devon Sparks. If you’ve seen my show on the Cooking Channel, One Night Stand, you know I’m an expert on the way sparks fly and tempers flare in the kitchen.”
Miranda struggled not to roll her eyes. She should’ve known there was no way of getting out of this without several plugs for Devon’s show.
“As chefs,” Devon continued, “we try to confine our shouting matches to the privacy of the kitchen—but sometimes emotions overflow into the dining room and out into public, for the whole world to see. With me tonight is Miranda Wake, restaurant critic for Délicieux magazine and author of a scandalous tell-all revealing the secret lives behind the kitchen door.”
Miranda smiled into the camera. She could tell it was wooden and unconvincing by the way her mouth pulled taut, but she couldn’t do better.
“Cut.”
“The next segment will be a voice-over of me explaining the backstory—the dare, your source inside the kitchen, the book, and how it got leaked after the hostage situation. We’ll play it over some spliced-together footage of the inside of the kitchen, which we’ll take in a minute, some outdoor shots, stills of Adam and the crew.”
“Fine,” Miranda said faintly, feeling out of her depth. This was all a lot more real than she’d bargained for. The presence of the cameras was largely symbolic, in her mind; since the nature of her offense had been so glaringly public, so should the apology be. But now that it was actually happening, she had to fight down panic at the knowledge that this segment would be aired on the Cooking Channel for the delectation of millions of people.
Swept along in the tide of the cameras and technicians and Devon’s various handlers and assistants, Miranda was shocked to find herself in the alley behind Market, poised on the back doorstep.
You can do this, she lectured herself fiercely. This is important. Maybe the most important thing you’ve ever done. Your future happiness depends entirely on the next ten minutes.
No pressure or anything.
Straightening her shoulders, she glanced at Devon, who nodded at her to go ahead. So she sent up a little prayer and pushed open the door.
She could tell at a glance that they’d timed their entrance perfectly. The stereo above the dishwashing station was pounding out some punk rock anthem, telling her that the front of the house was closed for the night. Cooks in dirtied jackets pushed sweaty hair off their foreheads and hustled through their last-minute tasks of wrapping up leftovers and wiping down countertops.
Miranda had only a split second to take it all in before the camera guys pushed her farther into the kitchen, entering behind her. The noise of a dozen people lugging heavy equipment through the narrow doorway brought every head in the kitchen swiveling to face them.
And it sent Adam, whose back was to the door, into orbit. He lunged for the magnetic strips mounted on the wall and came up brandishing a short, wicked-looking meat cleaver. His cry of “Oh hell, no, not again” died in his throat when he whirled and came face-to-face with Miranda.
She threw her hands up in surrender, the instantaneous jolt of fear mak
ing her wonder for a panicky second if Adam were really angry enough to take her head off with that knife.
Everyone paused except Devon. He cracked up, cackling like a hyena, before turning to the cameraman and saying, “Tell me you got that.”
“What the fuck is going on here?” Adam snarled. He lowered the arm holding the cleaver, but Miranda noticed he didn’t set the knife aside.
Miranda was struck speechless. All she could do was stare at Adam.
He looked good. Well, he looked like he hadn’t been sleeping nearly enough, but even with shadows under his eyes and lines of exhaustion etching his olive skin, he looked good enough to eat.
God, she’d missed him.
The feeling didn’t appear to be mutual. Adam was looking back at her with a curiously blank expression, as if he didn’t even recognize her. She was reminded forcibly of those early days when she’d been an unwelcome interloper in his kitchen.
Devon strolled into the tense moment with easy, liquid grace. “We’re here to do a segment for the Cooking Channel, Adam. Miranda, here, has promised to go on record and clear up some of the ugly rumors that have been flying around. My hosting the piece pretty much guarantees a viewership,” he said smugly.
Adam shook his head as though he were trying to clear water from his ears. “No. No, you’d have to have permission for something like this. And I most definitely do not agree, so you can all get the hell out of my kitchen.”
The cooks chimed in, Frankie vocal and loud about it, arguing with an equally loud Devon, while the camera crew, evidently used to working in war-zone-like conditions, went about setting up their lights and booms. In seconds, the entire kitchen was in an uproar.
Miranda was aware of the exact moment that the decibel level brought Grant and Jess running from the dining room, but she never took her eyes off Adam, his snarling mouth and flashing eyes and the lingering pain he couldn’t hide when his gaze hit hers.
Can't Stand The Heat Page 30
