17. Lennon
17
LENNON
T he restaurant kitchen had been eerily quiet since the moment I set foot in it this morning. I would have given anything for Julian to complain about my leadership or for a guest to gripe about their meal. Apparently, things were just too good.
I blamed it on the storm.
The lodge was nearly empty until the weekend, which meant the restaurant had been slow. Usually, I would have enjoyed the reprieve. It was always a chance to work out friction points in the kitchen or test out new menu items.
But the silence today made me uneasy.
No one had brought up the incident with CJ when he came barreling in with my employee file. On the bright side, my vitriolic reaction seemed to make everyone think twice about crossing me.
“Chef, the Griffith table would like to send compliments,” a server said.
Of course they did.
I nodded. “I’ll go right up. Thank you.”
I did my best to keep my face neutral in front of the cooks as I untied my apron and uncuffed the sleeves of my chef’s coat.
At least I wouldn’t have to face CJ again. I’d sneak to the bunkhouse, hop in my car, and leave when I was done.
I didn’t want to think about the conversation that CJ had forced me into this morning. How I had bared my wounds. But I couldn’t shake it. And as much as I wanted to, I couldn’t forget how safe I’d felt sitting beside him or the feeling of his arms wrapped around me.
I couldn’t shake the way I had wanted to fall into them and never leave.
But I had to ignore it. I had already slipped up somewhere, enough for the redhead to find me. I couldn’t make another mistake.
The restaurant was nearly empty as I made my way up. The last reservation of the night was enjoying coffee and dessert. We’d be out of here soon.
I hurried up the stairs and crossed my fingers, hoping that the Griffith family wouldn’t linger too long, and we could close up.
The glow of the standing heaters met me as I rounded the corner on the landing. The rooftop dining room was empty, save for a single seat at the Griffith family’s table.
I paused in my tracks.
CJ, the man who refused to set foot in the restaurant, sat at the head of the table. The sharp angles of his face glowed in the dancing candlelight as he wiped his mouth with his napkin.
This had to be a joke, right? I was being pranked. I had to be. But if I called him out on it, he’d deny it, so I played along.
“How was your meal?”
CJ pushed away from the table and laid his napkin beside his spotless plate. “Excellent.”
I eyed the spread. “You got the corn chowder again. I hope it was a better experience for you than it was the first time.”
CJ’s lips twitched with amusement, but he held it together. “It was significantly easier to eat this time since my mouth wasn’t on fire.” He paused. “But I think it’s my favorite thing on the menu.”
“Noted.”
“Lennon—”
“We don’t need to talk about it,” I blurted out, cutting him off. “Thank you for pulling my car out. It won’t happen again.”
“Come back to the bunkhouse.” It was an order masked as a request.
“I’ll be fine.”
“I have no doubt,” he said as he stood and pulled a few bills out of his wallet to leave a tip for the server. “But I also know you didn’t find somewhere to live in the last twelve hours.”
“But I?—”
I stammered as CJ rounded the table and stopped in front of me. His lips brushed the corner of my mouth as he leaned in. My breathing stopped when he reached out and traced the Griffith Brothers Ranch logo that was embroidered over my heart.
“You’re wearing my last name on your uniform.” Green and gold swirled in his eyes as they met mine. “Pretty sure that makes me your boss.”
I tipped my chin up. “That’s not what you called yourself that night at the bar.”
A slow smile hitched at the corner of his mouth. “Do what I say, trouble. Come to the bunkhouse.”
“Or what, daddy ?”
He chuckled softly. “What’s that old saying?”
“Play stupid games, win stupid prizes?”
CJ chuckled. “I was thinking more along the lines of ‘fuck around and find out.’”
His palm was warm against mine as he brushed past me. As his boots thudded down the stairs, I looked down at the place where our hands had touched and found a daisy between my fingers.
The flower had wilted by the time I turned the lights off in the kitchen. Everyone had gone home after the staff meal, but I had found every excuse in the book to keep piddling around in the kitchen.
We needed to reorganize the walk-in cooler. The Cambros came out of the dishwasher a little greasy and needed to be hand-scrubbed. The hood over the grill needed wiping down. I needed to organize and file the invoices on my desk.
Finally, all I had left to do was leave.
It crossed my mind that I could sleep in my office. I could probably sneak out before the opening shift came in tomorrow morning, but I knew he would come for me.
Something impassable burned in CJ’s eyes when he summoned me to the rooftop. Something that I knew I couldn’t escape.
Either I had to go back to town and find somewhere to sleep, or I had to go to him.
My choice was made the moment I locked up and walked to the parking space where I had left my car after I left the bunkhouse this morning.
It was gone.
Shadows danced over the empty spot from the restaurant’s buzzing exterior light, But it wasn’t completely empty.
I walked closer and bent at the knees, taking in the bouquet of wildflowers tied off with a piece of twine around the stems. A bronze key dangled from the bow.
The walk to the bunkhouse wasn’t nearly as long as I needed it to be to work through the warring thoughts racing through my mind.
My car had been parked beside an obnoxious-looking truck. I skipped attempting to get into it and headed for the door. A shadow watched from the window of the upstairs bedroom.
I untied the key from the bouquet and tried the lock. It slid in easily and turned without so much as a hitch. The door cracked open, and I peered inside.
The living room was dark. A light glowed from the kitchen, but it appeared that the house was deserted.
I stepped inside and shut the door as quietly as I could. The subtle click of the lock might as well have been a gunshot. I floated up the stairs on silent feet, cutting through the darkness like a wraith.
The strip at the bottom of CJ’s door glowed like the neon lights at the bar the night we had met. I held my breath as I turned the knob and slipped inside.
CJ lay stretched out on his bed with his ankles crossed. He was shirtless and wearing sweatpants. A book rested upside down on his thigh, saving the page he was on.
“You stole my car.” I pulled my keys from the pocket of my uniform pants. “Do I even want to know how you did it?”
He laced his hands together behind his head, hazel eyes flicking up and down my body. “Hot-wiring a car isn’t that hard.”
“I wouldn’t know.”
He smirked. “Then you’re not the criminal I thought you were.”
“Found this in the parking lot.” I tossed him the spare key that he had tied to the flowers. “Better be careful. Someone might find it and break in.”
CJ picked it up from where it had landed on the mattress and set it on the nightstand. “It’s yours.”
“I don’t need a key to the bunkhouse.”
“You do since you’re going to be sleeping here,” he said.
“In one of the empty rooms your guys told me about this morning while I was making them breakfast,” I countered.
I thought that little bit of bacon-bribed information would be enough to throw him off, but CJ wasn’t fazed.
“Those rooms aren’t available,” he said calmly as he picked up the book he had been reading, dog-eared a page, and set it on the nightstand.
“Really? Because they look pretty available to me.”
“Keep your voice down, trouble.” His feet hit the floor. “Everyone’s sleeping.”
“CJ—”
“You want somewhere to sleep? You’ll sleep right here.”
“And where are you going to sleep?”
“I usually stay on the left side, but I don’t mind sleeping on the right.”
I rolled my eyes, swore under my breath, and turned for the door. I’d go find somewhere discreet to park on the ranch and figure out a new spot tomorrow.
Heat pressed against my back, and pressure pinned me to the door.
“Lennon.” His voice was complex and full like fine wine.
“What?” I hissed.
“Take your clothes off.”
I guffawed at his brashness. “Wanna try that again, cowboy? I will?—”
His hand wrapped around mine, gently tugging the flowers from my grasp. “Get in bed.”
“First you try to get me fired, then you steal my car, and now you think I’m going to spend the night beside you and not kill you in your sleep? Get fucked.”
Something long and thick pressed against my ass.
“To be honest, I hoped you’d be there for that last thing,” he said. He raked a hand up the back of my scalp.
It sent pinpricks of heat dancing across my head and down my spine.
“Put your claws away. You don’t need them with me.”
A larger part of me than I wanted to recognize wanted to crawl between those covers. I wanted to curl up to him and close my eyes. I wanted to wake up without my neck killing me. I wanted to sleep through the night and not jolt awake at every ambient sound.
“I’m not so sure about that,” I said as my head tipped back onto his shoulder.
“That’s fine. I don’t mind getting scratched up.”
“Why are you being nice to me?”
He chuckled. “Because I may have realized that I have a lot of groveling to do, and groveling while also being an ass usually doesn’t work.”
“I don’t like you.” I turned and faced him. “You and I? We’re not anywhere near good.”
“That’s fine. At least I know where I’m starting. Do you need a shower?”
The speed at which he dismissed my concern was, frankly, irritating.
“Yeah.”
CJ stepped back and tipped his head toward his bathroom. “Go on, then.”
I probably looked a little manic as I rushed into the bathroom and locked the door behind me. When I flipped the light on, I paused.
My toiletry bags were arranged neatly on the right side of the sink. I pulled the shower curtain back and clapped my hand over my mouth.
Bottles of color-safe shampoo and conditioner—a very expensive brand—were perched on the ledge of the shower beside CJ’s soap. That hadn’t been there yesterday.
A daisy rested on the lids.
It had been so long since I had indulged in an ‘everything’ shower. But with the door locked, the house asleep, and no one but CJ waiting for me, maybe I could break that one little rule...
A fancy shower steamer puck was arranged on top of a folded washcloth and towel. I turned the water on as high as it would go before dropping the steamer into the bottom of the shower. The rising tendrils of eucalyptus and lavender leached the stress from my muscles.
I took my time, partially to indulge and relax, but also to give myself space to grapple with CJ’s posturing.
By the time the water turned cold, I wasn’t any closer to figuring out what his angle was than when I had gotten in.
I showered, shaved, moisturized, and applied a hair mask, but my heart still felt muddy.
CJ was back to reading on his side of the bed when I tiptoed out with a towel wrapped around my body. “I’m assuming you also brought my clothes in since you went through my bags to get my toiletries? Or was this just your master plan to get me naked?”
He chuckled and pointed to the chestnut dresser against the wall. “Top two drawers.”
Warily, I crossed the room and peeked inside. The clothes I had kept in my duffel bag were neatly folded and arranged beside his.
“And the uniforms I had on coat hangers?” I asked.
“They’re in the closet.”
I held the towel a little tighter. “You just decided to move me into your room?”
Shadows eclipsed the warmth of his daylight gaze. “Time to cut a fire line, right?”
So that’s what this was. Penance for his petulant antics. It wasn’t anything more.
“I don’t think cohabitating is what your brother meant.”
“I know exactly what he meant,” CJ said as he stood. “Sharing my space with you isn’t a sacrifice, trouble. Far from it.”
I tilted my chin up to meet his gaze as he stood toe-to-toe with me. “Then what’s your fire line?”
“My pride.” His eyes lowered to my mouth. “Admitting that maybe I was wrong. And maybe we need to go back to the beginning and try again. And that I have a lot of work to do to make up for the way I treated you.”