by Aubrey Irons
His eyes are smirking at me, but when he says it again, his voice is booming across the silent kitchen. “I said get the FUCK out of my FUCKING KITCHEN.”
I can feel the heat flushing my cheeks, the embarrassment that he’s actually following up on his threat with this. “Are you fucking kid-”
“OUT!”
The kitchen is pin-drop silent, and I feel every eye on me as I tear off my apron and toss it at Oliver’s feet. “
Whatever,” I hiss, pushing past him and out the door.
In the locker room, I finally let the breath I’ve been holding inside out in a rush. The emotional charge of having a man with that sort of power - asshole stepbrother or not - yelling in my face catches up with me as the door slams shut behind me, and I’m blinking back tears and fanning my heated face with my hands as I pace the length of the room back and forth.
My thoughts are a tangled jumble inside my head as I suck in breaths of air, trying to center myself. On the one hand, yes, whether I like it or not, Oliver is my boss, and defying him like that in the way that I did was never going to end well.
But on the other hand, what an asshole! He made an example of me instead of just telling me to fuck off like he could’ve. He decided to cut me down to size as some sort of power-game in full view of the entire kitchen staff, just to make a point.
I’m bent over at the sink, splashing cold water on my face when I hear the voice behind me, “It can get a little hot in there.”
I jerk my head up and then narrow my eyes as I see Oliver grinning at me in the mirror behind me. “Oh fuck off.”
“Hey,” he shrugs, “I told you I wasn’t going to go easy on you.”
“Yeah, well, thanks for the heads up, ass.”
I turn and move to push past him, but he grabs my wrist, pulling me back. I bite my lip and I stop short in my tracks, turning to look up into his eyes; his icy, dark brown eyes. I can feel a buzz run through me from the point where his hand touches my wrists, the power in those hands searing my skin.
“You know,” he says, his lips parting in a smug grin, “All you had to do was say ‘yes, chef’.”
We’re talking about it like he means work, but I can tell just by that look in his eyes that we’re really talking about the subtext here. We’re talking about him being frustrated by the girl that won’t say yes to the man who never hears no. I shake my arm loose of his grasp.
“Well maybe I’m not that easy.”
“It wouldn’t be fun if you were, luv,” he says, winking at me.
I blush and bite my lip, swallowing the dirty daydreams of what could be and sizzling memories of what was as I meet his stare eye-to-eye, our faces inches apart.
“I’m not going to play this game with you, you know,” I say quietly, willing myself to not blink; willing myself not to yield an inch in this little tit-for-tat we’re doing here alone in the locker room.
“Oh and what game is that, sweetheart?” he murmurs, that thick accent caressing over my skin and teasing my ears.
“You know what I’m talking about, Oliver.”
“Enlighten me.”
“You playing this little power-trip of yours because I wouldn’t do certain things before,” I say quietly. “You know, before before.”
He smirks, “Things?”
“Things like sleep with you.”
He drops his jaw in overly-dramatic shock and shakes his head, grinning at me, “Wow!”
I roll my eyes with a huff and whirl to walk away from him. He stops me with a firm hand on the locker room door, “Look, let’s go get a pint and I can make it up to you.”
My brow wrinkles, “Just like that.”
“I don’t follow.”
“You’re a raging dick to me and then you want to ‘grab a pint’?”
“Chloe.” He rolls his eyes at me, making my blood boil a little, “It’s the kitchen, it’s not fucking personal.”
I tighten my lips, saying nothing in return, and he arches a brow at me.
“Look, you want this life? This is it. This is the game.”
I’m silent, just pursing my lips and glaring at him as he holds my gaze. Finally, he rolls his eyes, “Alright, you know what, fuck it. Forget about it.” He turns and starts to open the locker room door.
Just before he steps out, I finally crack. “Okay, okay,” I sigh loudly, “So how far away is this pint?”
He turns, grinning broadly at me as he brings a hand up to rub his chin, “So that’s a yes?”
“To the drink? Obviously, it’s what I just-”
“No, sweetheart, I mean is that a yes to you sticking around and learning to thicken that skin when it comes to this craziness we call professional kitchens?”
I roll my eyes, “Does it get me a drink? Fine, yes.”
Oliver grins as he slings an arm over my shoulder and walks me out the door, “Then hold on tight, luv, the ride’s just getting started.”
There’s just the smallest hint of a wrinkle in Chloe’s brow as we step into the pub. I grin to myself, watching as she quickly and nonchalantly hides it when she turns to me and shrugs casually, as if this is exactly the type of place she was expecting to come have a drink at.
The Rusty Knot is the farthest thing from an expected type of drinking establishment for a girl like Chloe; any girl, actually, and I know it. But of course, that is precisely why I’ve brought her here. The place reeks of stale beer and chips, and cheap cigarettes. Pipe smoke hangs like a mourning shroud over the mangy assortment of drunks, thieves, villains, footy hooligans, and of course, cooks.
The floor sticks to your shoes, the clientele is most likely waiting for you to pass out to nick your wallet, the bartender is a right bruiser of a geezer, and the beer is flat and warm even by British standards.
This is the last fucking place in the world a girl like Chloe would ever drink anything.
That all said, I fuckin love this shithole. And anyways, we’re not exactly here for me to impress Chloe, we’re here because I felt like testing her.
And I gotta hand it to her, she’s passing with that Paul-Newman-cool look she’s trying to sell me.
“So what’s good here?”
I smirk at her honest question “Nothing,” I say with a grin.
She’s out of her element in a place like this. Fuck, I’m not quite at sorts in a hovel like this, but she’s playing it cool and she’s playing it with grace.
Which is sort of sexy as fuck.
She’s grown up a bit since that time before; she’s grown up a lot actually. She looks worldly and more confident.
And hot.
I mean, she looked good before, but it was in this sort of “cute-sexy” inexperienced way. Now? Now she’s like woman hot; she’s just plain fucking sexy. Here’s a girl that’s just come off working a damn commercial kitchen line during service. She’s been standing in pools of her own sweat for six hours, in full fight-or-flight mode listening to the machine print tickets and me yell shit all night.
And she looks fuckin’ great. She’s in jeans and a t-shirt, she’s got her dark hair pulled back in this basic ponytail, and I feel like there’s no way she’s even wearing makeup right now. And yet, somehow, she’s possibly the sexiest fucking thing I’ve ever seen. Fuck me, she even smells good. I’ve always wondered how that was even possible when it came to girls. Like, a guy is going to smell like a fuckin’ jock-strap after a shift like the one we had. Her? She splashes some water on her face and puts on a t-shirt and she smells like Goddamn lavender and sunshine. Like how is that even possible?
“Oliver.”
“Huh?” I blink, realizing I’ve been staring at her.
“Were you just trying to impress me by how gross your regular drinking spot was or are we actually going to drink something?”
Damn. And see, there’s that, too. She’s got a bit of sass to her that’s stirring things in me a girl like this really ought not to be stirring.
Okay, I get it; it’s weird. Our parents are getting married soo
n, which sort of casts a bit of a pallor on any sort of wayward thoughts I might otherwise have for a girl who looks like this. But whatever, I’m a guy, she’s a hot girl, and it’s not like we’re actually related or anything.
Right then, keep rationalizing the fact that you’re fantasizing about fucking your stepsister, perv.
I grin, rather forcing myself back into the moment and back into my role as captain knob-head, “Oh, definitely the first. Chicks get all sorts of wet when I show them how rebel my pub is.”
She wrinkles her nose. “Oliver, if you honestly believe a single girl has ever been turned on in a place like this, you might want to start worrying about what else they’ve probably told you that you’ve believed,” she says with a sly arch of her brow.
My grin widens as I chuckle and hold up two fingers to the surly looking barkeep; there’s no point naming anything, it’s not like this place gives you the luxury of choice when it comes to a shitty pint.
He turns to grab two foggy glasses from the back shelf, and I lean down towards Chloe, “Luv, they don’t have to tell me anything,” I husk into her ear, loving the way she stiffens even as she tries to put up this smooth criminal look she’s trying to work with.
“It’s usually the gasping moans, the fingernails on my back, and the screaming of my name that does the tipping off.”
I can see her cheeks glowing bright pink and the slightest beat of her pulse right below the skin in the curve of her neck. For a second, I think I may have just outplayed my hand and pushed it too far, until she seems to catch herself with a roll of her eyes just as the bartender comes back with the beers.
“Dude, does this work for you?”
“Hmm?” I say, grabbing the shit beers from the sour bartender.
“This whole misogynistic crude douchebag thing,” she shrugs, “I’m just curious if that ever works for you.”
“Like a charm, luv,” I say, sighing dramatically, “Like a fuckin’ charm.”
She laughs and takes the beer from my hand as we move to a corner somehow even darker than the rest of the windowless, poorly lit cave we’re in.
“Well, luckily I’m immune to your dark powers then.”
“Oh, you think so, huh?”
“Oh I know so,” she says, grinning at me. “Besides,” she says quickly, “I think it just comes standard with being your stepsister and all.”
I arch a brow as she quickly looks away and sips her beer. That last bit, about being my stepsister, came out way too fast, and with way too much force; like she was throwing up a last-ditch effort defense.
“Not yet, you’re not.”
“Hmm?” She turns back, throwing a quick sour look at the beer she’s just sipped.
“I said ‘not yet’ you’re not. My stepsister, that is.”
Her eyes meet mine for a quarter second; a lingering quarter second where her gaze narrows as if trying to peer into me a little more before the moment breaks and we both look down into our beers.
“Listen,” I say, switching gears, “About tonight.”
She’s instantly changing speeds too, her eye’s darting back up to mine and narrowing a little, “What?”
“You need to leave what happens in the kitchen in the kitchen, darlin.” I take a slug of the awful beer in my pint, my eyes not leaving hers. “Grow a pair, you know?”
She rolls her eyes, and I can tell she’s about to say something back so I cut her off, “Look, you wanted to work in that environment, so I’m telling you, you better toughen up.”
She shoots me a look, “I’m plenty tough, you’re just being a dick cause I wouldn’t fuck you five years ago.”
I’m not sure which of us is more surprised that she actually says it, but her eyes suddenly go wide with surprise, her hand coming up to her mouth as if she wasn’t supposed to let it out.
I just laugh, meanwhile. “Oh is that what you think, sis?”
She wrinkles her nose, “Ew, don’t call me that, like, ever. Way too close to home.”
“Well I suppose it’s a good thing we didn’t fuck then, huh?” I grin as she rolls her eyes, that adorable flush coming back to her cheeks, “I mean, even though you totally wanted it.”
She barks out a laugh, “Please!”
“Hey, a little courtesy and some manners like that might’ve gone a long way back then, luv.”
She shoots me a look. “Oh my God, you wish. I believe it was me that told you to keep your hands off of me.”
I shrug, “Seemed to me you were begging for it.”
“Unlikely.”
“Mouth open, panties soaked, gaga for me.”
Chloe slams her beer down, and it’s only then that I realize I’ve probably just crossed a line.
“You’re disgusting, I’m going home.”
“Was that an invitation?”
I’ve certainly been slapped before, but for some reason, the one I get from Chloe is especially unexpected. And then I’m sitting there alone with a crap beer in my hand, a lack of witty comeback on my lips, and an old geezer in the corner laughing at me.
I’m shrugging my pajamas off while I wait for the shower to heat up when the pounding on the bathroom door has me whirling and frowning at the sound, “What?”
“Oy! Let’s hurry it up in there, sweetheart!”
Oliver. Jesus he’s infuriating. And disgusting. And I’m exhausted at this hour in the morning.
Why am I exhausted? Well, because that dickhead spent half the previous night watching porn in his room once he got home. With the sound on.
Loud.
I mean honestly, I thought the British were supposed to be classy. That’s the word that I kept hearing when people heard I was moving to London, at least.
“Think of all the classy guys you’ll meet!” Sarah had said when we were getting drinks a week before I left, “Oh my God, like, guys with actual culture and sophistication!”
Yeah, right. I can say first hand that there isn’t anything remotely classy about any of the things I tried to muffle out with my pillow last night.
I frown at my bleary eyes and the bags beneath them in the mirror. Seriously, a repeat performance like that again tonight and I’m on the next flight back home.
His fist pounds on the bathroom door again, “C’mon! You need some help in there or what?”
“Fuck off!” I yell, testing the water with my hand real quick before I sit on the toilet to pee.
“Clock’s ticking, princess, and I know you don’t want to be late.”
I grit my teeth as I tear off a piece of toilet paper. “I’m showering, Oliver! Fuck o-”
I screech, jerking my knees up to my chest and flinching as the door bursts in and Oliver himself just comes waltzing through. He takes one look at me and just starts to laugh.
“Are you fucking kidding me?!” I scream, jumping up from the toilet and yanking a towel from the rack around myself. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
Oliver’s just grinning at me with that cheeky, smug smile of his, his eyes openly sliding up and down my towel-clad body. “You were taking too long, and some of us take punctuality seriously,” he shrugs, his eyes lingering on the short edge of the towel across my bare thighs; “That’s what I’m doing.”
I hastily turn towards the bathroom window, away from him as I hug the towel tighter around myself and I can hear him sigh dramatically behind me, “Jesus, have you even used the shower yet?”
“Well I was about to,” I huff, gritting my teeth with my back to him. “But I’m sure not going to use it right now.”
“Oh, good, so you won’t mind if I cut the line.”
“What? No! You-!” I whirl around, but then I’m suddenly tripping right over my tongue and my words at the sight of a very perfect, very muscular, and very naked butt.
Oliver’s butt.
I quickly look away, but not before the image of his muscled and tattooed back and that hint of something I know I saw between his legs is forever etched onto my bra
in.
And I’m not altogether upset by that.
I hear the sound of the glass shower door opening and then shutting.
“You did not just steal my shower. Are you serious right now?”
“Serious as a heart attack, luv,” he calls out.
I turn back to glare at him, but then very quickly realize that there isn’t anything remotely frosted or fogged about the stall door, and I’m now looking quite directly at a completely naked Oliver in the shower stall.
It’s a solid three seconds before I realize I’m staring at the shape of his body behind the glass. I blush as I catch my eyes dipping lower, trying to catch a glimpse of what I most certainly should not be trying to “catch a glimpse of.”
It’s just hitting me that I’m just standing there naked except for a towel in the bathroom like a creep while my stepbrother showers, when the shower door suddenly bangs open.
“Oliver!” I whirl back around as he steps naked and dripping wet out from under the water, but of course, again not before I catch a peek of something I really shouldn’t.
I can hear him laughing behind me, “What?
“You’re fucking ridiculous, you know that?”
He chuckles. “Hey, it’s close quarters in the kitchen, better get used to it, sis.”
“Stop calling me that,” I hiss out of gritted teeth. “And you aren’t-” I shake my head as images of Oliver’s impressive package that I just got an eyeful of go racing through my mind; “You aren’t naked in the kitchen.”
He snorts. “Well, not that you’ve seen.” His arm reaches past me, making me bite my lip knowing he’s naked and standing right behind me as he grabs a towel from the rack on the wall in front of me, “Yet.”
I whirl back at the feel of his voice right in my ear to shoot him a look as he wraps the towel around himself. “What?” He’s grinning at me, “Luv, there are sausages in kitchens all over Britain, you know.”
He winks, “English breakfast, and all that.”
“Are you done acting like a fucking caveman?” I spit at him.
He makes a show of stepping back and bowing with a wave of his hand towards the still-running shower, “M’lady’s bath awaits her.”
