Hot and Bothered (Hot in the Kitchen) (26 page)

That garnered her a pointed look from Monica. Perhaps the words had been tinged with sarcasm.

“The owner not here tonight?”

“He’ll be in later. I’ll give you a couple of moments to look over the menu while I get your water.”

At the bar, Reuben was unmoved by her plea for the natural spring water of the Gauls. They had San Pellegrino.

“It’s water,” he said in the same ironic tone she would have used if it suddenly hadn’t taken on far more importance than it should. She knew how crucial it was that Monica Grayson’s review reflect Vivi’s at its best. Tad had worked so hard and he needed this night to go without a hitch.

Back to the table she went with the bottles and glasses filled with ice.
(We didn’t ask for ice.)

“Do you have any questions about the menu?” Jules asked after her return trip minus ice cubes.

Two sets of eyes snapped to hers. Monica’s bore all the hallmarks of a lioness about to take down her prey while her companion’s shone with amusement. Clearly, Monica’s evisceration of servers was a familiar spectator sport for her eating buddies.

“What can you tell me about the Chakana?”

Chaka-cat! It must be a sign.

“Well, like all the Argentinian Malbecs, it’s robust and earthy with a nice acidity. Goes great with the meatier smears on the menu and the harder cheeses. The Wisconsin reserve cheddar is a good match.”

Monica looked unimpressed while her friend radiated disappointment. He leveled Monica with a gaze of,
Try again, dear.

She flipped a few of the pages, cutting brutally through the French reds, viciously past the Italians, before coming to rest on… agh… the Germans.

“How about the—?” She tossed off something unrecognizable.

A cold shiver of sweat trickled down Jules’s spine. “Sorry, the…?”

“This one,” Monica pointed impatiently at the menu with a sharpened claw.

“I’m afraid I’m not as familiar with the German wines. I could ask Reuben at the bar.”

Monica raised an eyebrow so far it threatened to unhitch her scalp. “It’s Greek.”

Jules’s heart sank to the hardwood floor. “G” was one of her favorite letters because it started off some of her favorite words: Gorgeous (Tad). Gape, gawk, gawp (all things she liked to do at Tad). Gelato (Tad substitute). She had made out the “G” on the wine menu page but the rest of it was well… Greek to her.

There was still time to salvage this. “If you have particular food items in mind, it might be easier to recommend a wine.”

“I’d prefer to choose the wine first. This is a wine bar, is it not?”

No argument from Jules there, just that swamp of dread in her stomach at being found out for the fraud she was.

“If you told me what you’d like, perhaps I can come up with a few options.” Something jammy, perhaps, that Jules would happily jam down this bitch’s throat.

“What about this? Or this?” Monica pointed at a Lord-knew-what entry and the words blurred, not because they were incomprehensible but because Jules’s eyes were filling. What had she been thinking? It was like trying to teach a pig the clarinet.

Don’t cry, idiot.

Monica made a sound of exasperation. “Good grief, it’s right there. The pinot.”

“Monica, lovely to see you. How are you this evening?”

Jules cranked her neck a few inches, not that she needed a visual to verify Tad’s arrival. All that male spice and testosterone transmitted directly to every hair on her body, now standing on end.

“I’m surprised, Tad. I’d expect your staff to be better trained,” Monica said sharply. “Hard to get good help, I suppose.”

“We had an emergency and Jules stepped in, but she’s more than capable.” He turned to her with a smile, his blue eyes glittering his gratitude and affection. “Thank you.”

Jules nodded dumbly. Tad placed a hand at the small of her back, a gesture at once intimate and possessive, and not lost on Ms. Grayson, whose gaze widened at how close Tad was standing to the help.

“Now what can we get you?” he asked politely.

“Just a waitron who can rub two brain cells together.”

Jules felt Tad’s body turn rigid beside her. “I hope you’re not insulting my staff, Ms. Grayson. They work too hard to be on the receiving end of that sharp tongue of yours.”

Her gray eyes tilted up. “To succeed in this business, you have to have at minimum a staff who can understand what they’re trying to sell to the customers. She’s pretty, I’ll grant you, but not a lot going on upstairs.”

Jules’s heart sank to the floor, and not just because Monica’s words struck hard in her breast. Mostly, she felt awful because she had let Tad down when he needed her and now he had to cover for her ineptitude.

“Monica, Monica, Monica.” His voice was soft and persuasive, and while normally she loved that sexy tone, the fact he was using it to appease Monica killed her. She knew why he had to do it, she just hated that she came out of it the loser.

He continued. “I recognize that all your visits to Vivi’s have ended in profound dissatisfaction, so I’ll assume that’s your disappointment showing its ugly. I wouldn’t sleep with you and now you’re feeling frustrated. I have that effect on women.”

Oh, snap.

Monica’s companion had been in the middle of a sip of his San Pellegrino, but started coughing hard when it went down the wrong way. Tad gave him a healthy slap on the back, propelling the guy so far forward his nose almost dipped in the olive oil saucer. An ugly shade of red bloomed from Monica’s half-exposed chest all the way to the tops of her cheekbones.

“I’d be very careful about how you finish this conversation, Tad.”

“Only one way to finish it, Ms. Grayson. The management reserves the right to throw your bony ass out on the street. And your little dog, too.”

“Tad,” Jules warned, though it was too late and her heart was cheering like the Cubbies had won the World Series.

He turned his back on Monica’s furious expression and any chance he had of getting a good review in
Tasty Chicago
. Smoothly, he steered Jules in the direction of the kitchen.

“You just shot yourself in the arse, Tad DeLuca.”

“Never mind that. Tell me how your night has been,” he said, his eyes sparkling like beautiful blue jewels. Not a moment’s regret lived in their depths.

“Except for Derry having the worst meet-cute with a chef’s knife, the pizza oven being on the blink again, and you just screwing yourself over, not bad. Not bad at all.” She shook her head. “You didn’t have to do that. I can defend myself just fine. In fact, I’d just been congratulating myself all night on how I didn’t need rescuing.”

“I know, but that’s what friends do.” He inclined his head and whispered, “I’ve missed you.”

Oh. “I’m right here.”

He ran a finger along her jaw. “But for how long?”

Lost in the emotion of what he had just done for her and what he was now doing to her, all she could do was stare into his handsome face.

“Speechless, Jules? That’s not like you. Gonna have to take advantage.”

He lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her softly, tugging on her lips in a way that was not in the least bit friendly.

He finished the kiss with a smile. “I didn’t have to do that, either, but it’s just one of those nights.”

* * *

Like champs, they got through the rest of the night and sent the throng home happy.

After Tad had returned from walking Bella to her car a block over, he took a moment to enjoy the sight of his savior wiping down the stainless steel counter in the kitchen. Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky” was on the iPod and the fluid back-and-forth swiping motion rolled her hips in a sexy sway.

A fun memory snuck up on him. “Remember when we used to go dancing?”

Stopping her body rock—so not his intention at all—she turned and smiled that disgracefully sexy grin. “
I
used to go dancing.
You
used to go into some sort of body fit.”

“I’m an excellent dancer. Unique.”

She cocked her shapely hip, then tilted her head in the other direction like that could even it up. “You had a tendency to blind people within a ten-foot radius with your flailing. I do miss it, though. The dancing, that is.”

He missed it, too, and he had a not-so-sudden urge to get down with her again. In every way. It took him a lust-dazed moment to realize she was saying something.

“Uh, what’s that now?”

“Derry’ll live. Kennedy called to say he had to get seventeen stitches but there was no nerve damage.”

He nodded, hoping it might cover the green tinge of jealousy that was likely shading his cheeks.

“Glad to hear it. Derry’s a good guy.” So his knife skills weren’t quite up to the level Tad would expect from a chef of his stature, but he was solid and dependable and—

“So you really like him, don’t you?”

Surprise at his directness crimped her brow. “Sure. Talking to him is like conversing with your dodgy pizza oven sometimes but he’s a decent bloke.”

“Have you introduced him to Evan yet?” He swallowed, feeling like an idiot but needing to know. “I mean, officially.”

She stared at him for a few heart-pounding seconds before breaking into a raucous laugh.

“Oh, Tad, you are too much.”

“I am?”

She covered her mouth, then decided it was pointless and let rip with another boisterous laugh.

“I am not interested in Derry and even if I was, he would not be interested in me.”

Relief flooded him. “You’re not? He wouldn’t?”

She shook her head slowly, pulling her grin wider with every return. “Derry’s gay.”

“No fuckin’ way.” Derry Jones?
The
Derry Jones? “How do you know?”

She threw a wet towel at him. “I know.”

“Does
he
know?”

“He’s not shouting it from the rooftops but he knows what he is.”

Well, well, well. He had never been so thrilled to hear about the sexual orientation of another human being. Weird, but it had been a weird few weeks.

“I owe you a drink for all you did tonight,” he said, unable to keep a grin from conquering his face. Brilliant. Get her smashed.

His little head was trying to call the shots as usual. Showing it who’s boss, he took a leisurely stroll out of the kitchen toward the bar. So leisurely he should be whistling.

She followed, her lush sway undulating in his wake, or that’s how he imagined it with those gluttonous eyes in the back of his head. He didn’t need eyesight to know the glorious line of those hips or how the swell of her breasts filled her blouse. Lucky him! He had memories.

This leisurely thing wasn’t cutting it so he removed himself behind the bar where the evidence of his raging attraction to her could be shielded.

“Forget the drink, you owe me a bottle,” she said.

“Okay, take your pick.”

Her eyes widened. He may as well have offered her the world. He wanted to do just that.

“Anything?”

“If it’s on the menu, we’ll open it.”

“Boo.”

“Boo?”

“Boo. Hiss. I know there’s better stuff
off
the menu. Secret bottles in the cellar.” She nodded to the wall of glass behind him—the window on the world of wine.

He felt the beginnings of a smile. “And how would you know that?”

She leaned over the bar, her breasts settling like lush pillows on the cherrywood.
Madre di Dio.

“The list you gave me doesn’t tally, my friend. There are strange things afoot in there.” She looked around as though she didn’t want anyone to hear her. “Bumps in the night. Clanging chains. Very suspect.”

Mirroring her, he did the fake shifty thing. “So, I keep a couple of special bottles there. It’s no big deal. I can stop anytime.”

She grinned and he felt an odd lurch in his chest.

“I’ve been meaning to build a cellar at home but I haven’t gotten around to it. Which means, I need to cellar my own stuff here.”

“What’s so special about these bottles, then? Are they worth a lot of money?”

“Come on, I’ll show you.”

He led the way to the Cavern, the name he had christened the cellar in honor of the Beatles’s first big club venue back in Liverpool. Better than calling it Bob, he supposed. With a name like that, the space should have been dank and dreary but that was so not the case. Encased in glass, it displayed his stock to perfection and made a stunning counterpoint to all the dark wood in the bar. The temperature controls were state of the art and the walls were pocked with bottles that formed a pleasing, logical grid. In here, he could see everything happening out in the bar and further into the street.

Gently, he removed one of the bottles: a Chateau Pavie Bordeaux from 2000. One hundred points—the maximum—from
Wine Spectator.
Unlike the others, it was sheened with eleven years of dust though the streaks told him it had been drawn out of the nest lately.

“My father knew a lot about wine and he gave me this when I got my offer from the University of Chicago.”

A wash of guilt softened her face. “Oh, I’m sorry. You can probably tell I looked at it. I was nosing around last week.”