On the Steamy Side - Louisa Edwards [91]
A spike of annoyance shot through him. “Why do you assume I would?” he demanded, ignoring the fact that up until a week ago, he wouldn’t have hesitated for an instant.
“Oh. I just thought . . . I know how much your reputation means to you.”
It was satisfying, the way her gaze slid down and to the side. Her hand dropped, too, though, which wasn’t as good.
He backed away from both Simon and Lilah, tucking his hands under his arms and mustering up the biggest, cockiest smirk he could manage.
Reckless exhilaration swept through him. If Devon Sparks was going down, he was going down swinging.
“Damn straight,” he said. “I worked too long and hard building this reputation to let it all go to shit over one misguided favor for a friend.”
“So you’ll do the press conference?” Simon put in, all eager beaver.
“Bet your ass I will,” Devon said. He savored Simon’s gloating face and Lilah’s disappointment for five deliciously cruel seconds before finishing, “But I won’t be announcing a stay at Betty Ford. I’ll be inviting them all to cover my first annual charity fundraiser—to be held in one week, right here at Market.”
Jaws dropped in tandem. It shouldn’t have given him such a lowdown, delighted tickle, but it did.
If assholery were an Olympic event, I could go for the gold.
“Crank up the PR machine,” he told Simon. “I want everybody who’s been preemptively dancing on the grave of my career here next Saturday for the best dinner any of them have ever tasted.”
Simon pressed his lips together so hard they were just a thin white line in his pink face, but he produced his beloved PDA from an inner jacket pocket and started tapping away at it furiously.
“We’re going to fill the place up,” Devon went on, “one hundred and ten spots, let’s say eight courses, fifteen hundred dollars a plate. Proceeds to go to . . .”
He stopped. Thought for a second, then looked right into Lilah’s too-bright eyes, drinking in the tremulous smile on her rosebud mouth.
“All money raised at the event will go to support the Center for Arts Education of New York. Every kid in this city deserves to go to a school with programs like theater and fine arts.”
“Devon Sparks,” she breathed. “You dark horse, you.”
Rocking back on his heels, Devon reveled in the moment. He intended to milk it for everything it was worth.
“Yeah, I’ve been reading up,” he said smugly.
Lilah shook her head slowly, as if to clear it from a disorienting smack.
“Since when? How? Devon, this is so . . .”
“Do you know how many charity events I get asked to cook for? A celebrity chef bumps up the fundraising power of any nonprofit quite a bit. I have stacks of requests on my desk. After that day at the Met, I had Daniel flag any charities that had to do with the arts and public schools. I was just gonna donate money or something, but this will be so much better.”
Satisfaction spread through Devon like the warmth from swallowing a shot of good bourbon. “We’ll raise awareness for a good cause, redistribute the wealth of some people who can definitely afford it, and I’ll have the chance to show all the two-bit critics and haters out there what I’m made of. It’s perfect.”
He ignored, for the moment, the question of his possibly corrupted palate, his uncooperative kitchen brigade, his apparently unappealing menu.
No one ever succeeded by focusing on the obstacles.
“I could kiss you right now,” Lilah said in a low, intense voice.
“What’s stopping you?” Devon asked, reckless with anticipation of the upcoming battle.
With a grin and an answering recklessness in her eyes, Lilah threw her arms around Devon’s neck and gave a little hop, forcing him to catch her.
He got her laughing mouth under his and kissed her hard enough and long enough that by the time they were done, every cook in the kitchen was whistling and stomping, cat-calls filling the air like a standing ovation.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Lilah closed the door to Tucker’s room and hurried back to the gleaming kitchen, where Devon