Can't Stand the Heat - Louisa Edwards [138]
He’d never seen her at Chapel, either, the after-hours dive bar Devon and his chef friends, including Adam, frequented on nights when they needed to blow off steam after a difficult dinner service.
He looked at the woman more closely. He couldn’t quite picture her against the grimy, punk-rock backdrop of Chapel. And she had yet to betray any evidence of knowing who Devon was. Somehow, he doubted she was playing it cool.
It was weird. Devon couldn’t remember the last time he had any interaction that didn’t somehow involve or reference his celebrity status. His chef friends ribbed him mercilessly for selling out and becoming successful, all the while wishing they could find some sucker to sell their shtick to. Women mostly tended to fawn and gush, all with an eye toward getting into his Ferrari, bed, and wallet. Not necessarily in that order.
“Yup,” she said, answering his disbelief about her job status. Then she temporized with: “Sort of. It’s complicated.” She was starting to squirm again, which felt outrageously good, so Devon put her down before he got distracted and dropped her, thereby fulfilling her broken-ankle fear.
“Hmm. Seems like a yes or no situation to me,” Devon said.
Curly Sue wobbled slightly when her feet hit the gleaming hardwood, but she righted herself quickly and ran a careless hand over her shirt. It was pink with embroidered blue flowers on the collar, and it hung on her, as if she’d bought the wrong size. The cut of her baggy brown pants did very little to showcase the assets he’d noticed when he first caught sight of her swaying on the bar like a drunken co-ed. If he’d seen her across a crowded gallery opening, or at an opera gala, he might not have given her a second glance.
She turned back to the counter for a moment, swiping her palm across the shiny metal surface as if checking for incriminating evidence. Devon eyed the way the curve of her waist flowed into her hips.
Maybe he would have given her that second glance, regardless.
“You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Unfortunately, my life doesn’t really seem to work like that. I exist in a constant state of maybe, almost, and who knows. Hey, you’re not a customer, are you? Because we’re closed. I think. You’d have to ask someone who’s been working here longer than five minutes, and they’re all downstairs, havin’ a meeting about something top secret.”
Apparently satisfied with the state of the bar top, she turned back and looked at Devon expectantly. He followed the slightly meandering thread of conversation backwards in search of her question.
“No, I’m not a customer.”
“Huh. Then you must work here. Sorry, I’m so new the tags are still on me; haven’t met everyone yet.” Grabbing a large spoon from the counter, she bustled around him to check a large pot of something, bubbling away on the stove. For the first time, Devon noticed the hot, slightly bitter scent of hot oil—was she frying something? Ugh. He wrinkled his nose and tried not to cough. Maybe it was shallow, but Devon hadn’t been able to bring himself to enjoy anything resembling fast food in weeks.
To distract himself, he studied the woman before him. There was a smudge of floor along one high, pretty cheekbone. She didn’t move like any line cook Devon had ever worked with. There was no economy of motion to her, no swift moves at all. She was all elbows and leaning, taking her sweet time, as casual about whatever she was cooking as Devon was about choosing a tie. It was disconcerting; nothing about cooking had ever been casual for Devon.
“No,” he replied absently, most of his attention now centered on the pot. “What the hell are you doing with all that oil?”
She looked