Yes, Chef! (Innocent Series Book 1)

by Kendall Duke

  “No,” I said, smiling back at him, and as I did I could practically see something unlock behind his eyes, a warmth spilling out that hadn’t been there before. “No, not at all. In fact… I’m really looking forward to this weekend.”

  “I am as well,” he said quietly, and we watched each other for a moment from our respective opposite seats in silence.

  “I have to tell you, though, that by the time we get there I might have died of hunger. You might have to schedule that flight anyway—my parents’ numbers are in my phone, Joanie and Tracy, nice couple, you’ll love them. They will have questions about how you allowed me to starve to death, though. And head’s up: Tracy has a mean left hook. Don’t judge a book by its cover.”

  “Noted,” he said, and then he laughed, and I swear to god it sounded like he hadn’t done it in a hundred years. Like he was rusty. It was glorious, this deep, raw sounding chuckle that rattled around in his chest for a minute before bursting out of his mouth. I wanted to make him do that every day, a thousand times a day. “Miss March, would mind very much if I bought you a late lunch?”

  “Not at all,” I said. “I’ll get you back tomorrow. Burgers on me.”

  He smiled at me some more, and I felt my whole body flutter, as if a swarm of butterflies ricocheted around inside of me. It was delicious.

  He asked the driver to stop off somewhere and got us tacos—the look on my face must have been priceless, because he laughed again when he saw it—and then we were back on the road.

  The time whipped by at high speed, just like the landscape; I forgot about the streaming traffic surrounding us on all sides, the crushing ebb and flow of about a million people as we all darted around each other in increasingly dizzying rallies, hitting a wall just outside of Boston.

  But I didn’t care. Because the company was excellent.

  The sky outside of our window began to darken, and it was late by the time we arrived. Quarter past six, to be exact, and you can be sure that Grant was. He was snapping his fingers at some poor soul already when I followed him out of the car—he opened the door and went out first, then turned around and offered me his hand in a painfully gentlemanly way, and I was overwhelmed with charm until I realized his other hand was psychologically torturing the thin young man by the doorway. “Cut it out,” I hissed in his ear, and to my eternal surprise, he did. The young man disappeared somewhere in the house with a grateful expression on his face, and Grant rushed me into a mammoth old house—I didn’t get a great look, but I knew it was very, very big—and settled me in a room with a solid wall of windows, just like his office back in New York… Except that this one faced a garden.

  And exceptionally beautiful garden. One of those lawns that no one has ever called a lawn, in spite of its size, because it is, in fact, a garden. Very British of him, no doubt—everything seemed like it had been designed by a sassy landscape artist who worked for the Queen or something, and the flowers were definitely happy in a cooler climate… It was so beautiful. It took my breath away. I lived in an ultra-tiny apartment, but sometimes I made it down to Central Park… I hadn’t been around so much glorious green finery in ages and ages. It took my breath away. When he returned to the room, I was standing by the windows, staring out at the twilight, the glossy sheen of each blossom beckoning me. “Miss March?”

  “This is incredible,” I said, and he walked up next to me and glanced out at the flowering trees and bushes, the bobbing, rustling heads of delicate blooms in the cool evening breeze.

  “Most notice the room, not the view, strangely enough,” he said softly, and it took me a minute to realize he was looking at me, watching me in the same soft light that made his garden so spell-binding. I turned towards him, and we were suddenly very close. Closer than we would’ve been if I’d stayed next to him in the limo. I started to move back… And stopped.

  I didn’t want to.

  I wanted him to kiss me again.

  “Miss March,” he said softly, his eyes so dark in this low light that I almost missed the flicker of movement as they raked over my face, his lips slightly parted, “you must pardon me if I stare. At the moment, I find you… Enchanting.”

  “Only at the moment?” I tried to smile and found I couldn’t; the tension was too much. I thought I could hear my own heartbeat in my ears.

  He didn’t respond.

  He just stared at me, his eyes locked on mine, and I felt him about to kiss me and I almost moved away because—

  And he kissed me, and I forgot everything else. Every flittering panic, every skidding heartbeat, everything. I forgot absolutely everything but his mouth over mine, his hands gently cupping my shoulders and then pulling me into a tender embrace, into himself. The kiss earlier hadn’t belonged to me, exactly; I’d accidentally stolen it from another woman. But this one? This one was all mine, and I savored it.

  When we finally broke apart, the room was almost dark. I was breathing hard, as if I’d just chased a bus down Park Avenue, and I couldn’t quite read his expression anymore. “Grant?” The panic that seized me seconds before the kiss reasserted itself, and I shoved it away, just in time to hear his sultry whisper in my ear. I froze and listened hard.

  “Miss March,” he said, “I hate to rush, but would I be entirely out of line in requesting you join me in the bedroom?”

  “Um—”

  “Of course,” he said swiftly, taking a step back, but I reached out and grabbed his lapels, halting him in his tracks.

  “I’ve never had sex,” I explained. “Let’s just get that out there. If you want me to leave, that’s fine, I just—”

  “Never?” His tone was incredulous; the sexy moment of yore when I was desirable, it seemed, had well and truly passed. I sighed.

  “Never. I’ve done things. Stuff.” I dropped his suit, crossed my arms over chest and realized we were standing there in the shadows. “Damnit, aren’t there lights in this mansion? Or do you hang out in the dark?”

  “I thought it romantic,” he said, sweeping away and pulling a chain on a lamp that unquestionably hailed from Tiffany’s. “I was trying to capture your undivided attention, Miss March.”

  “Ah,” I said, “I see. Well, you did that.”

  “And you have certainly captured mine.” He sat down in the embroidered chair, ankle on knee, and pushed a hand through his dark hair. He looked slightly disheveled—as far as a glitzy millionaire can, anyway—and I realized he might have been cooking. “So. Sex.”

  “Did you make dinner?” I took a step towards him, raising my eyebrow, and was relieved when that made him smile.

  “Yes,” he said evenly, then raised both of his in response. “I take it you’re interested?”

  “Those tacos happened in the dark ages,” I told him, and then I had trouble meeting his eyes. “So… Are you still interested? In me?”

  “I must admit, I’m surprised,” he said quietly. His dark eyes swept over my face. “I hope you don’t mind explaining a bit. Given the ground we’ve covered in one day, this shouldn’t be too difficult a conversation.” Still, he looked slightly worried when he met my eyes again. But he didn’t address it again in that moment; instead, he swiftly stood up, offered me his arm, and escorted me through the labyrinthine hallways leading back to a huge galley kitchen. “Shall we?” He let go of me, guiding me to a small, incongruous table tucked against a window that faced the same fabulous view as the room we’d just left. The smell of perfect, salty, fresh seafood, baked bread, and the underlying tang of various herbs filled the spacious room, and when I slid into the homey pine-wood seat and peeked past the checkered curtain out at the twilight fairy land once again, I had the overwhelming sensation that I really should be dreaming.

  But I wasn’t.

  “So,” Grant said, and when I looked back, his eyebrows were raised, his face expectant. “Sex?”

  “About that…”

  Grant

  I hated to ask her. It seemed absurdly crude—the woman I was so hell-bent on seducing
that I’d whisked her away to another state, created a meal fit for a Senator, I’d thrown away all obstacles of decorum and demeanor and self-protection during our ‘interview…’ I hated to ask her such a blunt, rude question, particularly if it gave the impression that I would somehow find any answer to be an obstacle to my own attraction. I was quite sure I’d want her, no matter what—I found myself teetering dangerously towards obsession, frankly. But, all the same, I was not a man that was known for his patience, and in this case very particularly…. I wanted her. Badly.

  I didn’t want her like I wanted the woman I’d been waiting for that morning. No. I didn’t want her in the way I wanted productivity and submission from the seething lot of employees that veered around me every day, absolutely not. I didn’t want her the way I wanted perfection in all I produced, touched, shaped, all I controlled—no, not at all. I wanted her because she was… An antidote to all of that.

  She was breath-takingly free of the need to impress me. Or anyone else. She understood herself so completely, so thoroughly, for someone her age—or any age—that it was frankly daunting. She wasn’t besieged by doubts about her worth, or her abilities; she knew exactly what they were, and how to use them. She was liberated, in the truest sense of the word, and being near someone so authentic and genuine was addictive.

  And more than that, of course, I desired her.

  I desired her more and more, every supple inch—the way her skin shone under the lights with the faintest hint of rose from the heat of the kitchen, the way her eyes glistened when she saw the meal I’d prepared. The shape of her, the promise of her curves, the taste of her delicious mouth.

  But my desires required a delicate conversation, and more importantly, consent. Because a woman who had never been touched… I didn’t know if I was the partner for her. Not for that. For what she needed and deserved. I knew I could make an attempt but—was that fair to her? An attempt?

  I didn’t think so.

  “I realize how rude this seems,” I confessed, hoping to temper the discussion. “Your sex life is not exactly any of my business, unless,” and here I found I needed to take a deep breath, an emotion I was entirely unfamiliar with invading my thoughts, “you might consent to sharing it with me. As a partner.” Anxiety, I realized, naming it. Blighter.

  She blinked. “Well, that’s forthright.”

  “Did you expect anything less?”

  “Not really.” Miss March smiled at me, then faltered. “I’m afraid there’s not much to tell. I don’t have a sex life. As I think I just told you.”

  “You have a sex life,” I heard myself say. “You’re an adult woman who exudes a criminally attractive level of sensuality. You’re wearing a hibiscus behind your ear, for god’s sake—a rather wilted one, admittedly, but given our travails today that’s to be expected.”

  “I have a dating life,” she corrected me, then sighed. “Or, I had one. But it was so awful I kind of gave it up. Or at least put it on hold.”

  “Because of the atrocious things that were said to you?” I wanted to hold her hand. Instead, I picked up my fork and nodded to her, asking for her to try my food; for the first time in a very long time, I actually gave a damn whether or not the person sitting across from me was impressed. I actually cooked for them myself.

  But I did not reach for her hand. Too… Solicitous. Too soon.

  I placed a bite in my mouth: too salty, I thought, wrinkling my forehead. Miss March smiled across from me though, and took a bite of her own before answering. She winked at me, and I felt the thrill of it shudder through my chest. “Didn’t need the added salt,” she said, surprising me. “This is heavenly. What did you do to the butter?”

  “You haven’t answered my question,” I said slowly, still fighting the urge to reach for her. I took another bite myself and waited, the slight imperfection that hadn’t escaped her palate somehow making it more enjoyable.

  “The answer isn’t any fun,” she said, and sighed. “Just the usual. Heartbreak, disappointment, life in the age of social media. What are you going to do?”

  “Date me instead,” I said, and she laughed out loud. It made me smile immediately, and then there was that feeling again: anxiety. Worry that she wouldn’t want me.

  “Well, there is that,” she said softly, her eyes flickering up to meet mine. “You use social media though—”

  “I don’t know if that site qualifies as standard ‘social media,’” I rebutted, and she laughed out loud.

  “No, probably not.”

  “But… None of your suitors ever was worthy?” Ever? Because if no one had ever qualified, how could I possibly? Given our introduction especially?

  “No,” she said flatly. “And the guys that I thought were interesting and maybe worth an investment were always taken—good for them, by the way, and their lucky ladies—or turned out to be shitheads. So I kind of put dating on hold—what’s the rush, anyway?” She glared at me for a second as if I’d asked the question, then burst out laughing at whatever expression I’d made in response. “I’m sorry, that was rude. Not your question.”

  “Well, it was certainly a bit defensive.”

  “People act like you have to pair off to be happy. You don’t. And sex definitely doesn’t make people happy,” she continued, laughing again when she saw my expression. “Come on,” she said, grinning as she slid another bite of lobster through butter and stared down at it for a second before gleefully snapping it up. “This makes people happy. No painful phone calls, no unanswered texts. No weird expectations you didn’t even know you had.” She sighed and took another bite, closing her eyes rapturously. “Just pure, unadulterated bliss.”

  “This is why you like food?”

  “I like good food,” she corrected me, raising her eyebrow. “But, of course, that does include tacos of questionable origin and the occasional cheeseburger.”

  “So good means ‘taste,’ not… Exclusivity, or reputation?” I shrugged. “Anyone with common sense would agree.”

  “As Tracy always says,” she returned, “common sense is pretty damn uncommon.” Miss March took another bite and swelled with appreciation all over again; it took an ungodly amount of effort to keep from staring directly at that sumptuous cleavage as it rose and fell. “This is really good,” she said, pointing at me with her fork. “You should make this all the time.”

  “Your table manners are charmingly atrocious.”

  “Yours are not doing justice to the deliciousness of the meal in front of you, buddy.”

  “I hardly think that’s the case.” I hid my smile behind my napkin. “I think a proper level of courteousness is admission enough to the edible nature of a meal.”

  “So British,” she said, shaking her head at me, and I couldn’t hide the smile that time.

  We ate in appreciative silence for a while; I’d tried to keep the meal simple, fresh. My temperament, for better or worse, had guaranteed that all of my rather exacting requirements were met by the vendors with whom I did business regularly, and the food was of the highest quality. I wanted to impress her, to woo her—but I realized this may not have been the way to do it, a bit too late.

  I probably could’ve taken her for coffee on the Hudson and she would’ve been equally impressed. I realized belatedly I’d been quiet for too long when I looked up and found her enormous, lovely eyes trained on mine. “Are you alright?”

  Such a strange question. I couldn’t remember the last time someone asked me that.

  “I’m splendid,” I told her. “I’m eating dinner with the most beautiful, interesting woman I’ve met in ages.”

  “Why do you look so…” She paused, twisting her mouth adorably, and watched my face. “You don’t look splendid.”

  “I wonder if I should have approached you differently,” I said, putting my fork down and meeting her gaze. “The way we met was already so unfortunate—I must seem so… So…”

  “Lonely,” she said, and that stole all the words out of my mouth. �
��You seem lonely, Grant.”

  “Well, I don’t think that’s—”

  “I do,” she said, waving her fork again in that cavalier American way. She sipped the wine in her glass—a noble vintage, cracked open especially for her, the wine older than both of us—and sighed with deep enjoyment. “This is incredible,” she said, meeting my gaze again. “I can’t thank you enough. I wasn’t planning on a vacation, but I guess I really needed one.”

  I was silent, mulling her proclamation over while she ate. She finally put her fork down. “I’m sorry,” she said softly, drawing my eyes up and towards her remarkable ones once again. “I crossed the line. It’s not my place to say that you’re—”

  “You were correct,” I said, and she bit her lip. “And I initiated this rather confrontational conversation topic, so you have nothing to apologize for.” She sighed, and I once again fought off the urge to reach for her hand, smooth and still on the linen across from my own. “I am lonely. I am alone—I have designed a solitary life, for many reasons, primary among them a constant stream of disappointments in my fellow man. And I have never sought a change from the path I chose, never saw a compelling reason to—if anything, I think I have perfected my choices to make a life of particular singularity.” I sighed. “And being lonely seems preferable to being disappointed.”

  “Or vulnerable.” She watched me, and I shrugged. “I get it,” she told me. “I totally get it.”

  “Oh?”

  “I don’t have your fancy diction and I don’t drop ten-cent words in the middle of every sentence,” she said wryly, “but I empathize with everything you just said.”

  “That must be a five cent word, at the very least.”

  “Maybe three. Couple pennies.” She gave me another smile, her eyes crinkling. “Point is, you’re not alone in this, at least. People can be… Very disappointing.”

  “And that’s why… That’s really why you have never chosen to…” I couldn’t finish the sentence, but I found the reason why troubling: I didn’t entirely enjoy imagining her considering other suitors as sexual partners. In spite of the fact that I knew the end of each story—she was here with me, after all, virginal for all her boundless sensuality—it made something in my spine clench.