Epilogue Genevieve
Epilogue
Genevieve
The kitchen at Dante’s is nothing like the Round Table.
For one thing, it’s clean. Not surface clean, not wipe-down-before-the-health-inspector clean, but genuinely, structurally clean.
Stainless steel that actually gleams. A walk-in that’s organized by protein, produce, and dairy, the way God intended.
A prep station that has enough room for me to actually prep without bumping elbows with a line cook who smells like Marlboro Reds.
For another thing, it’s mine.
My name is on the menu. My recipes. My mise en place, my plating, my call.
When I say “behind,” people move. When I say “fire table six,” it fires.
When I say “that risotto needs thirty more seconds,” nobody argues, because I’m the head chef and this is my kitchen and I’ve waited my entire life for this.
It’s been two weeks since Paxton handed me the keys and said, “Don’t burn it down.”
I told him no promises.
Tonight is soft opening night. Friends and family only, which in Rosebrook Falls apparently means half the town, because the Calloways don’t do anything small. My father’s not here, because he’s neck deep in the Badon Hill case, but everyone else will be.
I’ve been here since six a.m. The menu is set: a five-course tasting that’s half French, half me.
Roasted bone marrow with herb gremolata to start.
Butter-poached lobster with saffron risotto.
A deconstructed cassoulet that my dad would cry over and that I’m secretly terrified of because if the duck confit isn’t perfect, I’ll never forgive myself.
Pan-seared lamb with a red wine reduction I’ve been perfecting for three days.
And for dessert, a dark chocolate fondant with salted caramel and Maldon flakes.
I taste the risotto for the fourth time. It’s perfect. It’s been perfect since the second time. I taste it again anyway.
“Chef.” Marco, my sous-chef, a quiet guy with steady hands and a dry sense of humor, nods toward the dining room. “They’re here.”
I wipe my hands on my apron and push through the kitchen doors.
The long table in the center of the restaurant is already full.
Paxton is at the head, in a navy suit with no tie, a glass of something expensive in his hand.
Tiffany is beside him, her brown hair pulled back, her smile polished and careful.
She’s beautiful in the way that expensive things are beautiful.
A little maintained, a lot deliberate, and somehow still looking lonely.
Juliette is across from them, tucked into Roman’s side. Roman’s arm is draped across the back of her chair, and he’s grinning like a man who can’t believe his luck.
And then there’s Alex.
He’s sprawled in his chair like he owns the restaurant. His light brown hair is artfully messy, and he’s gesturing with both hands while telling a story that has Juliette rolling her eyes and Roman trying not to laugh.
Felicity is next to him.
She’s in a red dress that makes her blond hair look like spun gold, and she’s listening to Alex with the patient expression of a woman who has heard this story before and will hear it again and has made peace with that.
Her legs are crossed, one heel dangling from her toes, and there’s a cocktail in her hand that she hasn’t touched.
“…and then I told the professor that Kierkegaard would have wanted me to turn it in late, because anxiety is the dizziness of freedom, and if he couldn’t respect that—”
“You failed that class,” Felicity says.
“Yes, but I did it with philosophical integrity.”
Felicity scoffs. “You told me it was because you slept through the final.”
“Semantics.”
Paxton pinches the bridge of his nose. “Alex, please.”
“What? I’m setting the mood. Ginny’s big night deserves ambiance.”
“Your academic failures are not ambiance,” Felicity says, but her mouth twitches.
“Everything about me is ambiance, Fee.”
“That’s not the flex you think it is.”
Alex leans toward her, his arm stretching along the back of her chair. “You love it.”
Something flickers across Felicity’s face. Her eyes dart sideways, and her lips tighten, but then she covers it with a smirk and a hair flick.
I file this away and decide it’s none of my business. I have a kitchen to run.
“Ginny!” Alex spots me first and leaps from his chair, crossing the restaurant in three strides to sweep me into a hug that lifts me off my feet. “The woman of the hour! The culinary queen! The—”
“Alex, put me down.”
He does, grinning. “I’m so proud of you. I barely know you, but you’re hot, and you’re nice, and you’re also fucking my brother, which makes me feel a little incestuous for thinking you’re hot.”
“That’s…sweet?”
“I’m a sweet guy. The elite Calloway. But you’ll learn that in time.”
“He’s not,” Juliette calls from the table. “Don’t believe him.”
Lance walks in behind me from the kitchen, where he’s been sneaking tastes of the bone marrow when he thinks I’m not looking.
He’s in a black button-down with the sleeves rolled up, and his hair is pushed back.
The bruises are gone and the scars are fading, and he looks like a man who’s learning what it feels like to breathe without clocking the exits first.
He still checks. I’m sure he always will. His eyes scan the room when he enters, the way they always do, cataloguing doors and windows. But the tension in his shoulders is softer now. Dr. Chavez says it’ll take time. I believe her.
Alex releases me and turns to his brother. “Lance. You look almost human tonight.”
“Thanks, Alex.”
“I mean it. There’s color in your face. Is that what happens when you stop being a recluse?”
“It’s what happens when someone feeds you properly,” Lance says, nodding toward me. “You should try it.”
“I eat fine.”
“You eat gas station sushi.”
“And? Have you tried it? It’s phenomenal.”
Juliette groans. “Can we please sit down and eat actual food prepared by an actual chef?”
We sit. Lance pulls my chair out and settles beside me with his hand on my thigh under the table. His thumb traces slow circles on the inside of my knee, and I try to focus on anything other than the heat spreading up my leg.
“So,” Paxton says, lifting his glass. “To Genevieve DeGrance. Head chef of Dante’s. The best thing to happen to this restaurant since the plumbing upgrade.”
“Romantic,” Felicity deadpans. “Real captain of the people, this one.”
“I’m a businessman, not a poet.”
“Clearly,” Tiffany murmurs, and there’s something in the way she says it that makes the table go quiet for half a beat before Alex fills the silence.
“To Ginny!” He raises his glass. “Who is far too good for my brother, and who we’re all going to pretend deserves this because we’re polite.”
Lance kicks him under the table.
“Ow, dude. I’m just saying.”
Glasses clink. The first course goes out. I watch from my seat for that perfect, terrifying moment when people take their bite and you hold your breath because your entire worth as a human being somehow hinges on whether the ratio is right.
Juliette moans. Actually moans.
“Oh my God,” she says. “Roman, taste this.”
“I am tasting it. I’m having a religious experience.”
“If it’s always this good,” Alex says, “I’m moving in.”
“You’re not moving in,” Lance says.
“I’ll sleep in the kitchen.”
“You absolutely will not.”
Felicity catches my eye across the table and raises her glass slightly. A quiet acknowledgment, separate from the noise. I raise mine back. She’s been oddly silent tonight, but I don’t question it.
“Oh, I forgot to tell everyone,” Roman says. “My sister’s thinking of applying to Verona University.”
“Your sister’s coming to Rosebrook?” Felicity lights up. “Finally. I need another girl on my side.”
“Hey,” Juliette says. “That’s offensive.”
“I could show her around,” Alex offers. “Give her the full Rosebrook experience.”
“You will stay away from my sister,” Roman says, his grin dropping.
“What? I’m a gentleman.”
“You eat gas station sushi and flirt with anything that moves. And you’re fucking ancient compared to her. Stay away from my sister.”
“Relax, Roman. I’ve already found my star.” He tips his glass toward Felicity without looking at her.
“You’re reducing me to a ball of gas?” Felicity asks. “This is why no one takes you seriously.”
“No. You’re right. You’re not a star. You’re the whole sky.”
She grins. “Better.”
“Does that mean you’ll spend more time with me now that your parents banned you from volunteering at Second Circle?” Alex asks.
“What?” I blurt. That explains the quiet.
Felicity shoves Alex in the arm. “You mongrel. I said not to tell anyone about that.”
“You got fired?” Tiffany asks.
“I didn’t get fired, sweetheart, but thanks for the second degree.”
“She’d have to actually be worth hiring for someone to fire her,” Paxton says.
“You know, if you need a job, Fee, I could always use an assistant at WayMont,” Roman says.
“Um, hard pass, thanks. Listening to you spray-paint things in your office while you pretend to know how to run a company sounds like torture.”
“Pax needs a new assistant,” Alex says.
“Alex.” Paxton’s fingers tap the table. “Quiet.”
“What? You just told me the other day she quit.”
“She didn’t quit,” Paxton says. “She was reassigned.”
“They quit,” Tiffany corrects, taking a sip of wine. “One of them cried.”
“She had allergies.”
“To you,” Felicity says.
Paxton’s jaw tightens.
He’s looking at the wine list again.
Tiffany is looking at her phone.
And Alex is looking at Felicity like she hung the moon.
Courses come and go. The lobster gets a standing ovation from Alex, which is excessive but appreciated.
The soup makes Juliette tear up again because she’s extra emotional tonight, and when I tell her it’s my father’s recipe, she demands my dad’s number so she can thank him personally.
The lamb is, if I’m being honest, the best thing I’ve ever cooked, and watching Lance close his eyes when he takes the first bite is worth every hour I spent reducing that sauce.
By dessert, the table is loud and full, and I’m standing in the kitchen doorway watching these people, this family that adopted me through violence and chaos and love, and I feel something I haven’t felt since I left Boston.
Home.
My phone buzzes in my apron pocket. I pull it out.
It’s from my father.
Mon chou. I hope tonight was everything you dreamed. I’m proud of you. Always and in all ways.
And then, a second message:
Call me when you can. There’s something about the case we need to discuss.
The base of my spine tingles. Just enough to remind me that somewhere out there, Brutus Myrddin and his sister Cassandra are running, and the board isn’t clear yet.
But tonight, the kitchen is mine. The people I love are fed and laughing. And Lance Calloway is walking toward me with chocolate on his lip and a look in his eyes that says we won’t be staying for after-dinner drinks.
“Hey, Half-Pint.”
“You have chocolate on your face.”
“Do I?” He doesn’t wipe it off. He just leans down and kisses me, smearing it purposefully across my cheeks.
When he pulls back, he’s smiling. That real smile. The one I earned.
“Best meal I’ve ever had,” he says.
“You say that every time I cook.”
“And I mean it every time.”
Alex shouts, “Get a room!” and Juliette throws a napkin at him, and Roman laughs, and Paxton sighs the sigh of a man surrounded by people he’d die for and will never admit it.
I look at Lance. He looks at me.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.
Seven seconds for my seven minutes.
This is the moment I’m keeping.