On the Steamy Side - Louisa Edwards [95]
Still feeling sleepy and dim from the aftereffects of a good food coma, Devon shook his head. “What do you mean?”
“Oh, sugar,” Lilah said, setting down the bowl and sliding the table back so she could crawl into Devon’s lap. She straddled his thighs and crossed her arms behind his neck, her pretty, round-cheeked face mere inches from his.
Devon moved by instinct to clasp her hips in his palms and hold her steady, a warm, exciting weight against him.
“Don’t you get it?” Her voice was soft but intense with joy. “Your food hasn’t been missing taste. It’s been missing that something extra, that indefinable oomph, the secret ingredient that makes those collards so yummy. We didn’t need to wake up your taste buds. We had to wake up your soul.”
The truth of it resonated down to the marrow of Devon’s bones. And when Lilah leaned forward and gave him her mouth, he felt the kiss like the sun coming out from behind the clouds, chasing away all the shadows.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Devon Sparks—the tosser so egregious that the rest of the tossers wouldn’t have him at their New Year’s Eve party—had gone potty. Screwy. Off his trolley. ’Round the twist.
Abso-bloody-lutely mad.
An eight-course meal for more than a hundred guests. In less than a week now.
Not nearly enough time to plan, and when it bombed, which it certainly would, Market’s reputation would go down the drain along with Devon’s. It was a disaster in the making, but Frankie couldn’t get anyone else to see it.
He felt like that bird who was cursed to know the future but unable to get a single bloody person to listen to her. Cassandra something. Whatever became of her? Probably she was killed in some gruesome manner. Those ancients always seemed to be killing each other off in the most creatively nasty ways.
No use musing on Greek women who came to a sticky end, he told himself. Things are going to be sticky around here, soon enough.
Worse than the Tosser’s mental breakdown was the fact that it seemed to be catching. When Devon first sprang the news on the crew two days ago, after Friday night’s service, Frankie felt himself blanch in horror—but the rest of the crew nodded like it was the best idea since lace-up leather pants.
Even Grant, who could usually be counted on to inject a dollop of gloom and doom into the proceedings, just shrugged his shoulders and gave a fatalistic “At least it’s for a good cause.”
Frankie snorted. “Right. Your Lolly got sacked by her school when they ran out of money for her drama program—you see no connection between that and Devon’s choice of charities? He’s only trying to get into her knickers!”
Grant shrugged. Infuriating.
“Come on, mate,” Frankie complained. “Used to be you were always first in line to slag off the Tosser. Fuck me, you practically arm-wrestled Adam and me into leaving Appetite.”
“I’m trying to give Devon the benefit of the doubt,” Grant said, but he couldn’t look Frankie in the eye. Something off, there.
Frankie didn’t have time to puzzle out Grant’s drama, though. Not when he was consumed by the need to suss out exactly what form of insanity Devon Sparks exhibited.
And speaking of exhibitionism, that kiss! In front of everyone, the kidlet included. Full-on, sweep-her-off-her-feet movie kiss, it was. No one could accuse the Tosser of subtlety.
Jess said Frankie was overreacting. Actually, Jess called him a paranoid, grudge-tastic cynic. Frankie grinned, thinking of it.
The grin faded, though, as his wayward thoughts moved on to the rest of that conversation, which consisted mainly of yet another attempt