A chill prickled down Colby’s spine. “He’s right behind me, isn’t he?” she muttered through a locked jaw.
Grant nodded, pasting on a sickly smile and waving over her shoulder.
“What are you doing?” she hissed. “Don’t invite him over here!”
But it was too late. A large shadow fell over Colby, blotting out the spring sunshine. And all she could think was: Thank God I put on this flannel shirt over my tank top. As casually as she could, she reached up to button the plaid flannel across her chest, letting the loose shirt camouflage the meager curves of her small breasts.
Then, with a sense of the inevitability of capital-D Destiny, Colby twisted in her chair to gaze up at into Dominic Fevre’s stern, hard-jawed face.
“Hi, boss,” she chirped as brightly as she could manage. “Out for a morning stroll?”
“I’m not your boss,” was his immediate reply, and Colby hid a wince. Way to remind the guy you’d made out with that he was technically in a position of power over her...a position he was, against all the odds, apparently too honorable to abuse.
“Right, of course,” Colby agreed, feeling her cheeks heat. “Figure of speech.”
Dominic shifted his weight and a shaft of sunlight speared through the brick townhouses lining the street, illuminating the way his gaze darted to Grant and then back to Colby.
Oh right, she thought with a jolt of surprise. The morning after said make-out session, Dominic found her at a romantic sidewalk café with another man. “Chef! Have you met...”
“Grant Holloway.” Ever the perfect Southern boy, Grant stood up and offered a bright smile and a hand to shake. “Lovely to finally meet you in person. I’ve heard so much about you.”
Colby kicked at his ankle under the table, but hit the metal table leg instead, making a loud clanging noise that had both Chef Fevre and Grant peering down at her in the middle of their handshake.
“From Eva,” Grant added hastily, pumping Fevre’s hand hard enough to distract Dominic’s attention from the volcanic blush Colby felt staining her cheeks, neck and ears.
“Eva’s told me a lot about you, too,” Dominic said. “She’s got a real soft spot for Market.”
“The expansion was one of her first investments when she was taking over the company from her father.”
“Heading up Jansen Hospitality seems to have worked out well for her. The new restaurant is an ambitious undertaking—it will need the right talent in the kitchen to make it soar.”
“That’s why I suggested Colby,” Grant said cheerfully, but his gaze was watchful. Maybe it was his early home training in the Appalachian mountains of Virginia, but Grant had a preternatural ability to read emotions and direct the flow of conversation.
“Yes. Nice of you to make the recommendation.”
“And to let him stay with me while you assess the candidates,” Grant agreed, all innocence. “I’ve known him since...well, since we were kids, really.”
That little brat—was he trying to make Dominic jealous? Colby cleared her throat. “Yeah, thanks again for that. It’s really nice of you and Christian to take me in.”
Turning a smile on for Dominic, Colby explained, “Grant and his husband have been great. I’m really lucky to have such good friends.”
The tightness around Dominic’s mouth relaxed slightly. It wasn’t a smile, but it was as close as she’d seen on him yet. Colby gazed up at him and made a silent vow to herself—she’d get him to smile, even laugh, before this thing went up in flames.
Dominic braced his legs apart and crossed his arms over his chest, looking disturbingly similar to how he appeared in the kitchen: master of his domain, surveying all he possessed.
In this case, though, all he was surveying was Colby, who couldn’t hold back a shiver of delight at the wicked echo of pleasure that throbbed through her core.
“Are you ready for your second week of dinner service at Maison?” Dominic asked briskly, like a general asking if she was ready to take the next hill. But there was something vulnerable in the way he watched her, waiting for her answer.
Did he really think Colby might quit? She lifted her chin defiantly and met his stare. “I’m ready for anything, Chef.”
I’m not going anywhere.
That spark jumped between them, an electric charge that needed only the interlocking of their eyes. Colby barely noticed when Grant retook his seat and someone came up on the other side of the table, probably the waiter—all she could do was fall into Dominic’s endless gaze and try to keep breathing.
Until the deep, masculine, lightly accented voice from behind her said, “Who are your friends, Dom? Going to introduce me?”
Because Colby was staring at Dominic hard enough to memorize every line of his face, she saw the moment he registered the man who’d joined them. She saw the way his eyes lit up with something that looked a lot like joy, and she swallowed the knot in her throat down into the pit of her stomach.
¬¬¬she slowly turned her head to stare up at one of the handsomest men she’d ever seen.
Tall, as tall as Dominic, this guy had wavy, dark hair like something out of a poem or a Gothic romance, wild and untamed. His skin was tanned, making his light gray eyes shine like a pair of stars as he grinned down at her. His smile was every bit as wild as his hair, and there was something infectious in it that would normally make Colby want to grin back...if she wasn’t so busy hating his guts.
It was a dizzy, disorienting feeling to realize that not only was she worried about keeping a man’s attention when she’d never cared about that before—but that it wasn’t just other women who might catch this particular man’s eye.
Looking at this man who called Chef Fevre Dom, Colby had to wonder if maybe Dominic was less confused about his sexuality than he’d seemed.
Maybe she had no chance with him at all, whether she was dressed as a boy or not.
“Hi,” she managed, barely remembering to pitch her voice at the low end of her register. “I’m...”
“No, no, let me guess,” the mystery man said, amusement enriching every lightly accented syllable. “From the way Dom is giving you his best executive-chef glare, I think you must be the problem child who’s been keeping him late after hours.”
He’d talked about her—about them—about what they’d done... Colby managed not to gasp, but it was a close call. Her gaze shot to Dominic, who looked irritated. “Marc,” he complained. “Do not open your mouth if it is only to spout ignorance.”
Mysterious Marc shrugged, and there was something familiar about it. “But am I wrong?”
The aggrieved face Dominic made in return was absolutely the most unguarded Colby had ever seen him—even broken open and panting for breath after their kiss, he hadn’t looked so at ease. And with a sudden snap of intuition—or maybe just the caffeine finally kicking in—Colby got it.
“You’re brothers,” she exclaimed, probably sounding unreasonably delighted but unable to help herself.
“Bien sûr, eh?” Marc circled around the table to sling an arm over Dominic’s stiff shoulders. “Both French, both chefs, both irresistible to the ladies. What gave us away?”
It wasn’t hard for Colby to dredge up a smile, although it trembled at the corners when she registered how miserably uncomfortable Dominic looked.
“Actually, it was your eyes,” she said without thinking. “I’ve never seen anyone else with that shade of gray.”
“The color of snow, our mother called it. Not very nice, when you know she lived her whole life in Paris, where the snow is dirty before it ever hits the street, but there you go.” Marc kept smiling, as if he were completely oblivious to the way Dominic had frozen to ice under his arm. “But that is a very interesting thing to notice. Dominic, quelqu’un a un béguin pour toi, ou non?”
Colby silentl
y cursed herself for dropping out of high school French when she’d run away from home, because whatever Marc said brought a furious flush to Dominic’s tawny cheek. “Stop it, Marc. Enough of your jokes. I have to be at the restaurant soon—if you want coffee, let’s get some.”
“You’re welcome to join us,” Grant said, nimbly pulling his shins and ankles clear of Colby’s kicking range.
“No,” Dominic replied shortly, turning on his heel. “Thank you. Marc, let’s go.”
Blinking at his brother’s broad back, Marc spared them an absent smile. “Sorry. It’s been a long time since we had a chance to speak together. I think he wants a chance to catch up in private. It was nice meeting you both. Especially you, the one giving him fits. Keep it up—he’s too serious.”
“Marc!”
He rolled his eyes at Dominic’s impatient bark but turned and trotted after him, leaving Colby deflating over the table as if the Fevre brothers had taken all the oxygen with them.
“Well.” Grant finished his iced coffee with a cracking suck at his straw. “At least now we know.”
“What? That Dominic has been estranged from his family, too? Or that if he is bent, his brother clearly doesn’t know about it and maybe those two things are related?”
Grant patted his mouth with a paper napkin and arched a brow. “No. Weren’t you paying attention? This is much more important, the most vital information we could have received.”
Colby’s heart kicked in her chest. She hadn’t exactly been at her best during the roller-coaster ride of that conversation. What had she missed? “Tell me,” she demanded.
“Darling.” Grant leaned across the table, his boyish face alive with interest. “We now know that hotness runs in the Fevre family.”
Chapter Seven
Dinner service that night was brutal. Dominic knew it was his fault—the mood of the kitchen tended to hang on his shoulders, and when he had a bad night, so did everyone else. His staff took their cues from him.
But tonight was something else entirely. Everything that could go wrong, did. Late deliveries from vendors put the prep cooks behind on creating the base sauces and ingredients that stocked the reach-in coolers beneath each cooking station. Manny, who broke down whole sides of beef and pigs into perfect restaurant portions, called in sick and Antonio had to step off the line to do the butchering himself rather than trust it to a less expert chef. Which meant that Dominic had to duck out of his weekly profit-and-loss meeting with Eva Jansen in order to supervise the kitchen personally—which was the last thing he wanted to do.
On some level, Dom knew his only hope of avoiding a ruinous entanglement with Colby St. James was to avoid the man in question. To rebuild his defenses and quiet the panic that had surged into his throat when his brother had taken one look at Colby’s angular, boyish body and pointed features and deduced that he had a crush on Dominic. God help him. What Dominic felt was so much more than a crush. He needed a break.
Fate, it seemed, had other plans.
“No, that’s six shrimp and two scallops,” Manning called, shuffling the tickets with shaking hands. His round face was an unattractive brick red from the welter of heat and confusion the kitchen had descended into.
Despair filled Dominic as the large man who’d been disastrous as pastry chef called back, “Two scallops all day? Or two in addition to the two you ordered a second ago?”
Thank the kitchen gods, he seemed to be much better at cooking fish than he’d been at the raspberry tarts. Dominic had been keeping a mental tally of the orders almost as a reflex, after years of expediting in fast-paced kitchens, and he knew Felix Kerman had the count right. Manning, unfortunately, didn’t seem to.
Grabbing a handful of discarded order tickets off the pass, Manning shot Dominic a fearful glance before rifling through them to try to orient himself on what had been ordered, what had been fired, and what had already gone out. It was unbearable to watch, but Dominic ground down on his molars and tried to stand by as impassively and nonjudgmentally as he could. Of course Manning was a wreck of nerves and stress—he’d had to take his turn expediting with Dominic breathing down his neck instead of with quiet Antonio. Dom knew the kind of vibes he tended to throw off on a good day, and this was nowhere near a good day. He could cut Manning some slack and let the young chef try to recover. That was, after all, the point of this entire exercise.
Still, there was only so far he could let the evening devolve before he had to step in, and when he saw two entire orders of briny, fresh sea scallops go from snowy white to perfectly seared and all the way past it to inedibly charred while Kerman waited impatiently for Manning’s answer, Dom had had enough.
Muttering a curse, he pointed at Kerman with one hand and slammed the other down on the warmed metal counter that served as the pass through from the kitchen out to the runners. “You,” he barked. “Toss those scallops and start two more orders, on the fly. We need four scallops, four all day.”
“Four scallops, heard,” the big chef shouted back, moving faster than it seemed like a guy his size should be able to manage. His movements as he flipped new scallops into a sizzling pan reminded Dom of the best boxers, as light on their feet as ballerinas, and as deadly accurate as long-range snipers.
Confident the fish station was well in hand, Dom turned back to Manning, who’d gone silent with humiliation. His white, pinched face was more sullen than apologetic, Dom noted, unimpressed.
“The people in that dining room are paying a lot of money for the Maison experience,” Dom bit out. “Some of them are celebrating birthdays, promotions, anniversaries—it’s a special night for them. And they will not go home disappointed. You, however, are going home now. Pack your crap and get out of my kitchen.”
Manning’s head jerked up, his eyes going wide with the shock of an entitled, privileged asshole who hadn’t had enough doors slammed in his face. “Chef, no. I can handle the pass, I swear. Give me another chance.”
The fact that he didn’t make excuses cooled some of Dominic’s anger. “You can come back tomorrow to try to convince me you are worthy to remain in the running for this job—but right now, you’re through.”
Cursing, Manning whipped off his chef jacket and balled it between his fists as he stalked toward the stairs. Dominic ignored him in favor of scanning the kitchen to see how everyone else was doing.
They were hushed, tense with the new knowledge that their screw-ups were being recorded and would lead to swift and certain retribution. There were a lot of sidelong glances and bowed heads as everyone scurried to find their place in the rhythm of the kitchen dance. No one made eye contact with him...except Colby.
Dominic swallowed hard as the clash of their stares hit him like a gut punch. He’d managed to basically ignore him all evening; it helped that Colby had been relegated to the pastry station, squirreled away at the back of the kitchen. Dom had barely caught so much as a glimpse of spiky-soft golden hair and sharp cheekbones when he’d accidentally glanced in that direction.
But now, here Colby was, marching right down the line behind the cowering cooks, to get in Dominic’s face. “Go back to your station,” Dominic ordered, in no mood for Colby’s special brand of sass—or the way being this close to him sent a thick pulse of want through Dom’s idiot cock.
“Desserts are plated and ready to go, except for the finishing touches,” Colby said smartly. He was going for respectful, Dom thought, and missing it by a mile. He must not get much practice at it.
“Are you here to tell me I made a mistake, sending Manning home?”
Colby blinked. “Uh, no. He was spinning, looking through all the dockets and just trying to get something out. We’re better off without him at this point.”
“Glad you approve. Now go back to your station.”
“Chef, I can take over at the pass.” Colby stood straight and u
nflinching in the face of Dominic’s sudden glare.
“I’ll be running the window for the rest of the night,” he declared, reaching behind him for the fresh batch of orders to start calling.
“With all due respect, Chef, I thought the point of this interview process was to see how we handle ourselves in the kitchen. So let us show you what we can do. I’ll take the pass, and I swear I won’t let you down.”
“You need a refresher on the meaning of respect,” Dominic told him. “And in this kitchen, my word is law.”
“But, Chef,” Colby started as back waiters and runners congregated on the other side of the window, waiting for their orders to come up so they could ferry them out to the dining room where the table captains stood ready to place them in front of the waiting diners.
“I don’t have time to argue with you,” Dominic interrupted, desperate enough to use logic, since intimidation wasn’t doing the trick. “And you can’t be in two places at once. Someone has to be on desserts.”
“Chef, I can jump on the pastry station when I’m clear on fish,” Felix Kerman rumbled even as his big hands slid a crisp-skinned salmon fillet gently onto a plate. “I know I sucked yesterday, and I’d like another shot at it.”
“I’m happy to pitch in, too,” John Qui said quietly in the midst of spooning cold butter-poached lobster and crème fraîche onto sugar snap peas for the special appetizer. “We can get this done, Chef.”
From the saucier station, the last chef candidate, Gerard Richards, nodded vigorously and only looked mildly worried as opposed to terrified.
It was nothing short of mutiny. A full-scale revolt, led by—of course—Colby St. James. And instead of firing them all and kicking their asses out of his restaurant, Dominic had to swallow hard around a lump of emotion stuck at the back of his throat.
Under Her Clothes Page 6
