by Lexi Blake
“To tell your parents to go to hell?”
It had been about more than rebellion. “And to grab some freedom for ourselves. I know it sounds like I was some poor little rich girl, but I found that life oppressive. I honestly liked the Navy. I felt like I was doing something good. Like I was making a difference. My mom tells people what kind of pillows to buy. It felt empty to me. Do you know where I spent half my off-duty time on the ships I was assigned to?”
“I can bet,” Kai replied. “Did they let you in the kitchens?”
She smiled at the memory. “Yeah, it was the first time I’d been able to learn in forever. The cook was an older guy who’d been in the service for years. He’d been just about everywhere and he was happy to teach me. I miss that old man.”
“Do you keep in touch?”
Hank. How long had it been? He’d come to see her in the hospital after the accident, but once she’d come home she’d talked to almost no one. “Nah, he’s still on a boat. And all we talked about was food. I don’t cook anymore so…”
Kai nodded her way. “And that is why I question your use of the word adapting.”
“What do you mean?”
He adjusted his glasses. “Adaptation means you shift. You find new ways to make a thing suitable to a purpose. How have you adapted, Jules?”
She shifted in her chair, the turn of the conversation suddenly making her uncomfortable. “Well, I figured out how to type with one hand. I suck at it, but I can manage an email.”
“And your dream job is to be an admin?”
“Of course not.”
“Then how is typing going to help you achieve the goal?” His questions came quickly now, as though he’d found the right line of investigation and he wasn’t about to let up.
“Who said I have a goal?”
“You can sit here and tell me you didn’t have a particular dream, but I call bullshit on that. You wanted to cook. You wanted to be a chef.”
“I was a kid then,” she said. “I’m an adult now. And I don’t have a goal except to get through this day and move on to the next.”
He stopped for a moment and she could practically feel his disappointment. “Then you’re not adapting, Jules. You’re merely surviving.”
She felt her hand fist in her lap. “Why are you on my case?”
“Because I think you’ve gotten complacent.” His tone was back to soothing, but she couldn’t ignore the words. They didn’t soothe at all. “I think if no one pushes you, in a few years, you’ll still be exactly where you are right now. Maybe you’ll move on to another job, but it won’t be the one you want.”
He didn’t understand. She’d known when she’d gotten the news from the doctor that they were amputating her hand that she wasn’t going to work in a restaurant. Not the way she’d envisioned. “I can’t cook at the level I wanted to. Isn’t it better to accept that and move on with my life?”
“Or you could fight like hell to get what you want. There’s a reason you came here. To Dallas, to work at Top. You surrounded yourself with people who had to fight their way back. That can be motivating. Let them help you. There is very little in this life that you can’t do with some adaptation and a shitload of hard work, Jules. And maybe that includes understanding that you don’t know what other people are thinking.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means we don’t always understand other people’s motivations. We filter their reactions through our own experiences and that leads to misunderstandings,” he explained. “It means you have no idea why Javier slept with you last night. Did he say it was only for one night?”
She rolled her eyes because he was being naïve. “It’s implied because he’s Javier.”
“Who you’ve spent a lot of time with and you can read his mind.”
“I say that because I watch the women come in and out of his apartment, and I’m pretty sure they’re not housekeepers or nursing his brother. No man who goes through that many women is looking for some kind of relationship.”
“You’re not willing to give him a chance?”
Frustration welled inside her. “There’s no chance to be given. Look, Doc, I get that you think I’m in some kind of limbo, but I’m trying. I’m the kind of woman who doesn’t want to even attempt to do something if I can’t give it my all. I’m never going to cook at the level Chef is. I’m not suited to even be a line chef at Top. I can’t cut veg for salads. But that doesn’t mean I don’t have projects. I’m playing around with some of my grandmother’s old recipes, trying to see if I can adapt them for what I can do.”
“How do you know what you can do if you don’t try?”
She stood up, unable to stay still a second longer. “You think I haven’t? I don’t even have my dominant hand. Do you know how sharp a chef’s knife is?”
She had the scars from trying. She’d cut herself a couple of times and what she’d managed to do to those vegetables should be a crime. It had been terrible, worse than any amateur.
He held a hand up, signaling his willingness to end the discussion. “I’ll take your word on it. I’m sorry. It’s part of my job to try to make you see things from another point of view.”
“There’s not another point of view about this. There’s me and what I can do now that I’m here. If that’s not good enough for you, then I don’t know what else to do.” She didn’t want to lose her job, but she wasn’t sure what else to say. “I do rehab twice a week. I volunteer to help people in my position. Hell, I help out at PT with other patients.”
“Jules, don’t think I don’t understand how willing you are to help a friend, a stranger even. I wasn’t talking about that. You’re good at your job. You’re disciplined and kind. You would move mountains to help a friend, but you have to love yourself, too. You have to love yourself enough to give you a chance.”
She stared at him for a moment. “I don’t know what you want from me, Doc.”
He stood up and laid aside the notepad he’d been holding. “How about we make a deal? You try one thing that scares you this week. I don’t care what it is. It could be anything from bungee jumping to touching a spider. It doesn’t matter. Say yes to one thing that scares you and next week, we’ll talk about whatever you want to talk about. Hell, we’ll play Xbox if you want and that can count as therapy for the week.”
Because her job at Top required these sessions, required her PT. She understood it. Taggart hired broken things and needed to make sure they were willing to try to put themselves back together again. Committing to PT and sessions with Kai proved the employee was dedicated to getting better, being better.
One thing that scared her. She hated clowns. She could force herself to find a clown and not kill it. She’d already figured out how to handle thunderstorms. She wasn’t thrilled with heights. Maybe she could try taking a tour of one of the high-rises around Dallas.
Or she could do the thing that scared her and also intrigued her.
“I’ll go to the play party.”
She was kind of cheating. She’d made this decision shortly after waking up next to Javier. But she wasn’t lying. It did scare her. The idea of people looking at her, being so exposed… It scared her and made her wonder.
Kai’s smile lit up his handsome face. “Excellent. I think that’s a perfect thing to do. Does that decision have anything to do with last night?”
Well, she wasn’t fooling the doc. “Yes. I guess Javier showed me that I could move on in this area of my life, too. Maybe you’re right about that. I have been stuck when it comes to reaching out to other people. Maybe I’ve been stuck for longer than you would suspect. My marriage wasn’t great even before the accident. I fell into it because we seemed to want the same things.”
“Does the intimacy scare you?”
She thought about it for a moment. “What scares me the most is that I know if I think about it for too long, the glow from last night will wear off and all my insecurities will come back. Javier made me f
eel like I was beautiful. I thank him for that. But last night was a one-off. How long will it be before I go back to questioning every moment of the encounter and whether or not I really need physical touch and affection? If I let it go too long, I’ll decide I’m an intellectual creature who can survive without anyone or some shit. I liked being touched. It made me feel alive in a way I haven’t in a very long time.”
She needed to try again. She’d been in her hole for eighteen months and it was time to pull herself together and start life over.
Without her husband or the job she’d loved. Without her mother. Without her hand.
Kai touched her shoulder. “I’ll find a good mentor for you. You’ll be there to observe, but if you decide you want to try something, talk to your mentor and he or she will facilitate the encounter.”
“He or she?”
“Unless you have a preference.”
“You told me I should do what scares me, right? Get me a Dom, Doc. In for a penny and all.” A Dom. A man who would be there to protect her and teach her and help her decide if this was something she wanted to explore. It would bring her more fully into the world her coworkers lived in. She would be going to a party at her ex-husband’s friend’s house.
It was weird. She got butterflies thinking about it
Would Javier be there? Would he have a new gorgeous woman at his side?
If he did, she would smile and high-five him.
Well, maybe not high-five him, but she wouldn’t act like the world had ended. She wasn’t going to be some clinging vine, nor would she hold last night against him. When she saw him in the hallway or at Top, they would go on the way they had.
Like he’d never kissed her as if she was the only woman on the planet. Like she hadn’t wrapped herself around him and held on for dear life.
She would be his friend and always thank him for waking up this side of her.
“A Dom it is then. I’ll think about it and select someone you’ll match well with.” He reached out and took her hand in his. “This is good. I know you’re annoyed with me, but sometimes that’s the sign of the start of a breakthrough,” Kai explained. “I’ll let Kori know you’re going. You can ride out with us if you like. And she’ll be more than happy to help you find some fet wear.”
“Fet wear?” She hadn’t thought about fet wear.
“Yes, no street clothes allowed,” he said with a wink. “Kori can explain it all to you. She lives to shop. Well, for anything kinky or anything for our dogs. Otherwise she complains about shopping. You’ll be making my wife very happy. Sometimes I’m not sure if what she’s bought is for herself or the dogs until she tells me.”
Fet wear. Kinky stuff. She took a deep breath. “Sounds good. And I’ll take you up on the Xbox next week.”
“Absolutely.” He let her hand go and started to walk toward the door.
Somehow she had a feeling the doc would find a way to turn killing aliens into some kind of life lesson because even as he was joking with his wife about taking Jules shopping, her brain was working.
Was there another point of view? Was she giving up too fast, accepting what life offered her without fighting for what she wanted?
She stopped at Kori’s desk and told the other woman what she needed. The doctor’s wife was more than pleased to accommodate her.
Jules walked out of the building, letting the sun hit her face.
She couldn’t help but wonder if Javier was enjoying the day.
Would she cross paths with him in the hallway? She wasn’t sure how to act. She needed an etiquette book. Did she say thanks again? Did she praise him for his incredible prowess in the bedroom?
Jules took a deep breath. She would handle it when it came up. After all, how hard could it be?
Chapter Four
Javier crossed his arms over his chest and frowned. “Excuse me? What did you just say?”
Eric Vail set down the box he’d carried in. “I asked if you were giving Jules a ride to the party. I figured you might come together since you’re in the same building. No? You can certainly take two cars. No one’s going to check your carbon footprint at the door. I was asking because I kind of thought you two were friends.”
Friends? He’d thought they were friends, too, but friends didn’t use each other for sex and then avoid their friendly sex partner like he had the plague. The one time in the last few days he’d managed to catch her, she’d been polite. She’d asked about his day, told him she’d been to a session with her therapist. When he’d asked if she would join him for dinner, she’d turned a perfect shade of pink and mumbled something about having plans and disappeared into her apartment.
It rankled. It also made him more certain than ever that they needed to talk, and unless she was going to quit her job, that talk was coming faster than she thought.
“I was unaware that Jules had decided to join us.” He hadn’t planned to go, either, but only because he couldn’t work up the will to play. He’d been about to tell Eric he was staying home. Between Rafe getting out the hospital and the fact that he didn’t want some random play partner, he’d convinced himself to stay in. He’d decided he would ask Jules if she wanted to catch a late movie with him, put their relationship back on the right track.
Chef had been correct. He’d thought about what had gone wrong for days. He had to show her she was different, and that meant a two-pronged assault on her senses. He had work Javier and fun Javier.
And now he had pissed-off Javier because she was going to a play party without him.
They definitely needed to have a talk.
“Who’s walking her around?” There was no question that she would be coming alone. Even though this was a private party, she was a tourist and would need someone to be responsible for her.
“Kai matched her with one of my line chefs. His name is Cal. Good guy,” Eric replied.
“Does he like his life? Because if he lays a hand on her, I’ll make sure it all goes to hell.”
Eric stopped, staring at him for a moment. “Holy shit.”
Chef stepped up and put a hand on Javi’s shoulder. “Is your girl trying to get away? I heard from Kai that she’s going to the party. I meant to ask if she was your date.”
“Nope. Apparently, she’s going with Cal, who will soon find out that he’s not needed for the evening.” This was what jealousy felt like. He didn’t like it. The thought of Jules being led around by big, strong ex-football playing Cal was one he liked even less. “Except Cal is going to be conveniently unavailable to aid her in this.”
“Nice play,” Chef said approvingly. “I suspect you have someone else in mind.”
“It’s going to be me or no one at all.”
Eric watched them like he couldn’t quite understand the conversation. “When did Javier get all caveman about a woman?”
“When he met the right one,” Chef said with a smile.
Eric shook his head. “You poor bastard. You finally meet a woman you want more than a night with and she’s giving you hell?”
“She’s being difficult,” Javier allowed. “But I think it’s because she’s afraid. I’m going to try something when she gets in tonight. If it doesn’t work I’ll back off. I’m not some asshole who thinks a woman should fall in line because I want her to. If she’s not into me, I’ll let Cal escort her and I’ll be polite as hell. I like her. I don’t mean to grind her down if she can’t care about me the way I care about her.”
“Who are you and what did you do with Javi?” Eric looked at Sean. “He’s a pod person, Chef. We’ve gotta get the real one back.”
He flipped Eric the bird. “I’m not an asshole.”
Sean chuckled. “He’s closing up his manwhore shop. You know we all do it when the right one comes along. Although he does seem to have trouble corralling her. I would be concerned, but I think Javi’s right. She’s scared of his reputation. I know she’s interested in him. I’ve seen how she watches him.”
“And she didn’t bring b
ack my shirt.” That had given him some hope.
“Wow. You’re telling me you slept with her and you’re now trying to get her to go out with you?” Eric asked. “Miracles happen. This is going to be an interesting play party. I’ll make sure to tell Cal that you intend to beat the shit out of him for offering to politely escort your non-girlfriend around.”
Fine. He was being an ass about Cal. “Or you could ask him if he wouldn’t mind helping a brother out. A brother who can’t get a woman out of his head. I would be eternally grateful if he would give me this chance with her. And I’ll talk to Kai, too. But only if she responds to our talk the way I think she will.”
“And if she doesn’t?” Eric asked.
His stomach clenched at the thought. “Then I’ll step back and leave her be and only execute part of my plan. The work part.”
Eric put a hand on the box he’d brought with him. “Ah, this is for her. I wondered why you had me pick it up. I thought she was a hostess.”
“No,” Javier said with resolve. He’d read the notes she’d made in her grandmother’s cookbook. She was trying, but he thought she was going about it the wrong way. She was trying to simplify the recipes she adored when she needed to train herself how to cook again. “She’s a chef, or she wants to be. She tweaks recipes all the time.”
“She does always have something to say and doesn’t mind saying it,” Chef admitted. “And she’s usually right. I’m with Javi. She’s a chef, but she doesn’t think she can do it. She’s holding herself back and everyone’s treating her like a victim and not what she is.”
“A survivor and a soldier,” Javier finished. He’d thought about it for days. It was where he was going wrong with Rafe. He needed to be tough with his brother. Soft hadn’t worked. Soft had left Rafe a whining needy mess. Starting when Rafe came home, he would get different treatment. “Let’s see it. I want it out in the open when she comes in.”
