by Beth Bolden
“Don’t touch those,” Miles growled. “They’re not cool yet.”
“You touched them,” Evan said, straightening, and looking him right in the eye. Always challenging. Miles wondered if he was even capable of anything else. He had a sudden, blinding idea that sex with him would be fantastic. All that drive and passion and certainness focused on him.
“Yeah, but I knew what I was doing. You don’t.” Miles acted casual, like he wasn’t reeling from the idea of sex and Evan. Frankly, he probably would have thought of it before now, if they hadn’t fought from almost the first moment. Miles knew he was attracted to Evan; it had only been a matter of time before he considered it.
“You’ve made that abundantly clear,” Evan sniffed.
“Then don’t touch if you don’t know,” Miles said, trying to keep his temper and rapidly failing.
Evan threw his hands up. “They’re just cookies,” he said.
“Yeah, and you’ve made it pretty damn obvious that I have a limited number of attempts to get them right. So,” he said, his voice growing hard around the edges, “don’t touch.”
“For the record,” Evan said, returning to his pad and pen, “you’re an ass.”
Miles knew he really wasn’t. Except maybe he was being one now, just a tiny bit. And only because if he didn’t assert firm boundaries now, he was going to lose the thing that mattered most to a professional chef: his reputation.
He shoved the spatula under a cookie and transported it to the cooling rack. He repeated this with the rest of the cookies, and then went back to the mixer. “You’re making a new batch before you even taste these?” Evan asked incredulously.
Miles refused to even look up from what he was doing. Evan was just trying to get under his skin—trying and unfortunately succeeding.
“Actually,” Evan continued, and there was the clear munching sound of a cookie being eaten, “these are actually pretty good.”
Miles turned around, to see Evan’s mouth full of chewed cookie. “I told you not to touch.”
“You did,” Evan said. “I’m terrible at rules. Sorry.” He didn’t sound apologetic at all.
Miles reached over, and grabbed a cookie himself, taking an experimental bite.
“I thought you didn’t like sweets,” he said.
“I don’t,” Evan said. “These don’t exactly make me change my mind, but they’re not bad.”
They were more than “not bad,” in Miles’ expert opinion. They had good crumb, good texture, a solid amount of peanut butter taste, and the dark chocolate was an interesting juxtaposition with the richness of the batter. He made a note to add more salt next time, and to change to semi-sweet chocolate. It had been a decent first try, but he could make better cookies than this.
Chapter Four
“How do you think it’s going?” Reed asked, leaning back in his desk chair, looking relaxed because he had no idea how it was actually going.
Evan had a feeling that if he had an inkling, his question wouldn’t have been nearly so casual.
“Uh, it’s . . . well . . . it could be going better.” Evan believed one hundred percent in being truthful and straightforward in business, but he genuinely liked Reed and wanted Reed to not only appreciate his professional skills but to like him too. And the truth about how Miles felt about him and his ideas didn’t reflect well on Evan at all.
“What happened?” Reed still didn’t look worried. Evan didn’t want to tell him he should be, but he really should be.
“We’re still trying to come to an agreement about the direction of the show,” Evan said with diplomacy.
Reed finally frowned, and sat up straighter in his chair. “The direction? I thought we talked about this.”
“We did.” Evan paused. “Miles is very committed to having complete creative control over the content of the show.”
“And he does, right?” Reed asked.
Evan nodded. “I keep telling him that there’s a very happy middle ground between the production and marketing and the vision he has, but he’s not really interested in compromise. Of any kind.”
“Do you want me to talk to him?” Reed asked, sounding very much like he did not want to moderate the discussion.
That might be the right way to proceed, but Evan didn’t want to fix his problems with Miles by just dragging him in front of their boss and pointing at the part in his contract that said he retained creative control, but had relinquished production control to a Five Points representative.
Because that wouldn’t really solve anything, and if Evan knew anything about this business, it would only lead to terrible shows that nobody ever wanted to watch.
He didn’t just want to successfully produce Pastry by Miles—he wanted it to be a fucking smash.
“No. I want to try to fix this without forcing you to intervene.”
“Okay, how about this,” Reed said, and Evan was reminded that not only did he manage sixteen employees and sub-contractors at Five Points, but that he’d very successfully run a high-end restaurant with a full staff in Chicago. “What is Miles’ point of view?”
Evan slumped back in his chair. “I’m a super special pastry chef who makes rainbows and orgasms but I won’t tell you how to make them. You need to bow down to my superior ability; I’m not going to actually teach you. You just watch my videos to bask in my cute hair and dimples and imagine you could make pastries like I do.”
Evan ignored that this attitude of Miles’ was what had attracted him in the first place. Or that he’d wanted to be the one Miles gave rainbows and orgasms to.
Reed chuckled. “I hate to tell you that nearly every chef is like that, to some extent.”
“Oh, and I forgot,” Evan added. “You must also let me follow my beautiful chef muse, even if that means baking fifteen batches of cookies. When the first batch was plenty fine.”
“I thought I smelled cookies,” Reed said, then sighed. “I warned you this is how chefs are.”
“You did. But I’ve worked with them before—you, and Quentin and even others. And nobody has ever been this stubborn and difficult.”
“You’ve never worked with me in a kitchen before,” Reed corrected warmly. “Trust me when I say that I’m probably way more difficult than Miles.”
Evan was plenty loyal to his boss, but he was also a realist. “How would I convince you to compromise?”
“Tell me your vision for Pastry by Miles.”
That was the easiest thing Reed had asked since he had sat down. Reed had seen him walking by the open door of his office and had waved him in to discuss the progress of their newest show. Evan had learned after working for Reed for over two years that he hated formal meetings and much preferred organic conversations.
Evan had been actively trying to avoid this organic conversation, but the only way to get to the break room was to walk by Reed’s office.
“I want a great pastry chef who is willing and wanting to teach the housewives and teenagers and bored retirees how to bake with skill and conviction. I want clear, easy-to-follow recipes, paring down difficult concepts to easy steps. Miles should want to help people, not condescend to them.”
Reed didn’t say anything for a long moment. “Finding a compromise there is going to be tough, Evan.”
Evan knew it. It was why he had spent the last two hours alternatively wanting to beat Miles’ head and his own against a wall.
“But I think there’s hope in even the most dire situation,” Reed continued, which Evan thought was probably total bullshit. He was probably just hoping that they didn’t kill each other in the next few months. Evan had read that leadership manual before. “But if you do need me to intervene, just say the word.”
“I will,” Evan said, getting up from his chair and feeling more frustrated than he had before sitting down. It was well and good to be able to accomplish the impossible on a regular basis because he put his head down and got shit done, but it would’ve been nice for Reed to acknowledge just how imp
ossible of a task this was.
Unfortunately, the task began with convincing Miles to consider compromising his artistic vision. And Evan had no freaking idea how to do that.
Reed wished him luck again, and Evan stepped into the hallway and right into Mr. Artistic Vision himself, thunderclouds in his eyes.
“What the fuck do you think you were doing in there?” Miles demanded, in a hushed, angry whisper that was not nearly as effective as he probably thought it was. He sounded raw, almost betrayed. Which, as far as Evan was concerned, was a serious overreaction.
“None of your business,” Evan said.
Miles gaped at him. “You really mean that, don’t you? You really mean to make me some sort of pastry Julia Child Joan of Arc, don’t you?”
Evan rolled his eyes. “The problem with eavesdropping is that you have no context for anything I said.”
“Oh, no, I heard it all,” Miles challenged. “I heard what you said about me. All about my insufferable ego. And then how you want to bring it down to earth. Bury it. That’s never going to happen.”
It had been a long day. Scratch that—it had been a long two days, and the blame for that could be laid directly at the feet of the man in front of him. Without Miles’ ego, they could’ve already been working towards filming their first episode. Instead, Evan was trying to figure out a way to placate it all the damn time. All while not trying to fantasize about what he looked like bent over the kitchen counter.
“Listen,” Evan said, grabbing Miles by the forearm and dragging him further down the hall towards the break room, which was certain to be empty at this hour in the early evening. When he reached the room, he dropped Miles’ arm like it had stung him. Touching was bad. Touching would expose what he really wanted.
“Listen,” he repeated. “I am sick of your bullshit. I’m trying to get something done here, and instead of you even trying to listen, you just keep pontificating about how fucking awesome you are. Get over your damn self.”
“Me?” Miles retorted. He pushed a finger right against Evan’s chest and pushed him back towards the soda machine. Caught off guard, Evan’s back hit the machine and he couldn’t escape before Miles crowded right in front of him.
This close, his eyes were definitely thunderclouds. It shouldn’t have been sexy; it sort of was.
“Definitely you. You’re ninety-nine point nine percent of the problem here,” Evan argued.
“You walk around like the hottest thing in chinos, all spreadsheets and calculators and stupid bow ties,” Miles muttered. “You don’t know a damn thing. You don’t even like dessert!”
“Not even yours,” Evan retorted, which was only sort of true. He shouldn’t, but he wanted to taste Miles’ dessert more than ever.
Not just his desserts if he was being completely honest.
Miles’ brows drew together like two dark slashes against his olive skin. “You’re an asshole.”
Evan found himself almost pinned and almost breathless. And only mostly because of the argument he was currently having. “It takes one to know one.”
Evan could see that he was breathing hard, fists clenched together at his sides. Evan had never considered the possibility that Miles might punch him, because Miles worked in a kitchen, for god’s sake, physical violence couldn’t be up his alley, and yet, he seemed tempted to do it.
Evan got it. He’d been punched more than once growing up because he was an asshole. Or maybe because he was smarter than his parent of the week, or this month’s brother.
“I’m not doing this with you,” Miles finally spat out. “I’m not going to let you ruin me.”
“Ditto,” Evan said. And between the two of them, he was definitely convinced that he was the more determined of the two. After all, look at what he’d forcibly put behind him. Nobody was more motivated than he was to do this job and to do it to everyone’s satisfaction.
He had already come to terms with the knowledge he’d never be able to satisfy Miles. There was no point crying over that spilt milk.
Miles had at least three inches on him, and he leaned in, expression both intense and inscrutable. “Are you even going to tell me what you were doing in Reed’s office? I heard you complaining about me.”
Complaining? Evan hadn’t even gotten started complaining. “At Reed’s request, I was giving him a fair assessment of our situation.”
“I’m not an egotistical prick!” Miles said hotly. Evan knew just how hot it was, because he could practically feel Miles’ very firm thigh pushing against his own. He didn’t know how they’d suddenly gotten so close, but he wasn’t sure he could complain about it.
Not for the first time, Evan was surprised that his own weakness for someone who did not deserve it kept cropping up. He should have been pissed as hell that Miles was attempting to use his height to try to intimidate him. The only problem was it was more of a turn-on than anything else.
Evan wasn’t usually this conflicted, and he hated it.
“Then stop acting like it,” Evan said. “You’ve been acting like hot shit ever since you arrived. I don’t care if I never went to culinary school, I’m not a moron. I know it sounds crazy, but we might even learn to like working together.”
Miles’ breath stopped short. They were so close, Evan could hear it, and feel the lack of it against his cheek. There was an awful, horrific pause of total silence, like Miles was contemplating how completely insane it was for them to ever like working together.
Or maybe he was figuring out that Evan had just let one of his closely held secrets slip. He’d wanted so fucking badly for them to be friends. To like working together. To maybe, in some faraway fantasy vision, find something even deeper.
Now Miles probably knew, and Miles was probably disgusted.
Of course, he didn’t look disgusted. He was staring at Evan, at his mouth actually, and there wasn’t a hint of disgust to be seen.
Evan tensed as Miles’ hands slammed on the wall behind him, bracketing his head. And before Evan could demand to be released, Miles’ mouth was on his.
It was probably the angriest kiss Evan had ever had. It was raw and anguished and bizarre. Miles’ lips crushed against his, moving hotly, desperately, like he had to convince himself or maybe even both of them, that there was no way in hell they could ever get along.
But we’re kissing, Evan thought helplessly.
It was nothing like Evan had imagined it would happen. Part of him wanted to slap Miles for doing it now, when they wanted to kill each other. Part of him wanted to melt into Miles, and show him just how much he’d wanted him from the very first moment of Pastry by Miles.
It was a problem.
Abruptly, it ended. Really, before it could even begin—or at least before it could begin being anything other than angry and intense. Miles’ breath was coming hard now, in fast, furious little pants. His eyes were slanted to the side, like he couldn’t even bear looking at Evan. Like maybe he was disgusted.
That thought pushed Evan over the limit and he tumbled right off the cliff. He set the heel of his hand against Miles’ chest and shoved him, hard, pushing him away. “Get your shit together and start acting like a professional,” Evan said.
Miles shook his head, blank confusion still written all over his face. His stupid, cute face. He turned and walked away, leaving Evan shook up and pissed off, his blood hot with no convenient outlet.
That wasn’t the worst of the offenses he could lay at Miles’ feet, but it sure as hell felt like the worst right now.
* * *
The accusation and his lips burned all the way to Napa.
Miles had stormed right out of the Five Points offices, and had caught a ride right to the rental car office, where he used some of his signing bonus to rent a car.
He spent the next six hours contemplating every way that he could make Evan pay for his words and trying to forget how Evan’s mouth had felt under his. He didn’t know how the kiss had even happened, only that it had happened and that his
world felt rocked by it.
He hit the town limits right around eleven, and headed straight to Terroir, where, as he’d expected, employees were beginning to drift out the back door.
Wyatt and Xander walked out first, unsurprisingly, because Bastian Aquino could never bear for Kian to be one of the first out of the door.
Miles rolled down the car window and whistled. Xander’s head turned his direction, and his jaw dropped.
“What are you doing here?” Xander asked, jogging over to the car. “Aren’t you supposed to be Julia Child-ing in LA?”
“That’s not a verb,” Wyatt said, joining them. “Julia Child is a person, not an action.”
“If you’re Miles, it is,” Xander said, and it wasn’t surprising to hear that rough edge of disapproval in his friend’s voice, but it hurt anyway.
He’d given up the camaraderie and Terroir for what exactly? Some uptight prick who wanted to make everyone a world-class pastry chef? Miles didn’t know what he’d been thinking. To be frank, Miles still didn’t know what the fuck he was thinking.
“So why are you even here?” Wyatt asked.
Miles forced himself to shrug casually. “Let’s go home, open some wine, and I’ll tell you about it.”
But as the others piled into Miles’ compact rental, he didn’t even know how to begin telling them about it. I thought I’d go to LA and run the town the moment I showed up? I thought I’d get to call all the shots, and now that I can’t, I’m freaking out and pulling the ego card? I’m going around kissing my producer when he tells me to get my ego in check?
What stung the most about Evan’s accusations was that they weren’t so far from the truth; they hit right in the tender, honest parts of himself. He was being a bratty unprofessional. He was panicking, and that explained some of it, but he was way out of his element and he didn’t trust Evan enough to let him guide them in the right direction.
How could you trust someone who made you kiss them even when you didn’t like them?
