Chapter Four #2
Not for the first time, Evan was surprised that his own weakness for someone who did not deserve it kept cropping up. He should have been pissed as hell that Miles was attempting to use his height to try to intimidate him. The only problem was it was more of a turn-on than anything else.
Evan wasn’t usually this conflicted, and he hated it.
“Then stop acting like it,” Evan said. “You’ve been acting like hot shit ever since you arrived. I don’t care if I never went to culinary school, I’m not a moron. I know it sounds crazy, but we might even learn to like working together.”
Miles’ breath stopped short. They were so close, Evan could hear it, and feel the lack of it against his cheek. There was an awful, horrific pause of total silence, like Miles was contemplating how completely insane it was for them to ever like working together.
Or maybe he was figuring out that Evan had just let one of his closely held secrets slip. He’d wanted so fucking badly for them to be friends. To like working together. To maybe, in some faraway fantasy vision, find something even deeper.
Now Miles probably knew, and Miles was probably disgusted.
Of course, he didn’t look disgusted. He was staring at Evan, at his mouth actually, and there wasn’t a hint of disgust to be seen.
Evan tensed as Miles’ hands slammed on the wall behind him, bracketing his head. And before Evan could demand to be released, Miles’ mouth was on his.
It was probably the angriest kiss Evan had ever had. It was raw and anguished and bizarre. Miles’ lips crushed against his, moving hotly, desperately, like he had to convince himself or maybe even both of them, that there was no way in hell they could ever get along.
But we’re kissing, Evan thought helplessly.
It was nothing like Evan had imagined it would happen. Part of him wanted to slap Miles for doing it now, when they wanted to kill each other. Part of him wanted to melt into Miles, and show him just how much he’d wanted him from the very first moment of Pastry by Miles.
It was a problem.
Abruptly, it ended. Really, before it could even begin—or at least before it could begin being anything other than angry and intense.
Miles’ breath was coming hard now, in fast, furious little pants.
His eyes were slanted to the side, like he couldn’t even bear looking at Evan. Like maybe he was disgusted.
That thought pushed Evan over the limit and he tumbled right off the cliff. He set the heel of his hand against Miles’ chest and shoved him, hard, pushing him away. “Get your shit together and start acting like a professional,” Evan said.
Miles shook his head, blank confusion still written all over his face. His stupid, cute face. He turned and walked away, leaving Evan shook up and pissed off, his blood hot with no convenient outlet.
That wasn’t the worst of the offenses he could lay at Miles’ feet, but it sure as hell felt like the worst right now.
The accusation and his lips burned all the way to Napa.
Miles had stormed right out of the Five Points offices, and had caught a ride right to the rental car office, where he used some of his signing bonus to rent a car.
He spent the next six hours contemplating every way that he could make Evan pay for his words and trying to forget how Evan’s mouth had felt under his. He didn’t know how the kiss had even happened, only that it had happened and that his world felt rocked by it.
He hit the town limits right around eleven, and headed straight to Terroir, where, as he’d expected, employees were beginning to drift out the back door.
Wyatt and Xander walked out first, unsurprisingly, because Bastian Aquino could never bear for Kian to be one of the first out of the door.
Miles rolled down the car window and whistled. Xander’s head turned his direction, and his jaw dropped.
“What are you doing here?” Xander asked, jogging over to the car. “Aren’t you supposed to be Julia Child-ing in LA?”
“That’s not a verb,” Wyatt said, joining them. “Julia Child is a person, not an action.”
“If you’re Miles, it is,” Xander said, and it wasn’t surprising to hear that rough edge of disapproval in his friend’s voice, but it hurt anyway.
He’d given up the camaraderie and Terroir for what exactly? Some uptight prick who wanted to make everyone a world-class pastry chef? Miles didn’t know what he’d been thinking. To be frank, Miles still didn’t know what the fuck he was thinking.
“So why are you even here?” Wyatt asked.
Miles forced himself to shrug casually. “Let’s go home, open some wine, and I’ll tell you about it.”
But as the others piled into Miles’ compact rental, he didn’t even know how to begin telling them about it.
I thought I’d go to LA and run the town the moment I showed up?
I thought I’d get to call all the shots, and now that I can’t, I’m freaking out and pulling the ego card?
I’m going around kissing my producer when he tells me to get my ego in check?
What stung the most about Evan’s accusations was that they weren’t so far from the truth; they hit right in the tender, honest parts of himself.
He was being a bratty unprofessional. He was panicking, and that explained some of it, but he was way out of his element and he didn’t trust Evan enough to let him guide them in the right direction.
How could you trust someone who made you kiss them even when you didn’t like them?
And how could Miles possibly trust him when all Evan wanted to do was teach every man, woman, and child how to make world-class desserts, and he didn’t even like them?
There was an exclusivity that surrounded chefs like Miles and Wyatt and Xander, and sometimes even Kian.
It was a cult that was cultivated by chefs like Bastian Aquino.
And what it proclaimed, loud and clear, was that not everybody could join.
You had to pass the tests. You had to prove yourself.
You couldn’t just turn on YouTube and walk in.
There was a blood, sweat, and tears barrier that had to be crossed first. It was what made Bastian able to charge hundreds of dollars for a single meal.
If everyone could make it, then everyone might, and they would all be out of a job.
Miles hadn’t made the rules, but he was expected to live by them. And some upstart guy with spreadsheets and a marketing degree and tight khakis that made Miles’ dick ache wasn’t going to make him break them.
He’d been gone from the house they’d all shared for less than a week, but already Miles felt nostalgic as they all collapsed on the various sitting surfaces in the living room. They all had their special spot, and Miles still got the particularly comfy corner of the couch.
“Don’t worry,” Xander said with a roll of his eyes. “I haven’t appropriated it yet. I couldn’t get comfy in it because the dents in it still match your skinny ass.”
Miles never thought he’d miss Xander’s snide little comments, but he’d take Xander’s mostly open hostility over Evan’s insidious back-stabbing manipulation. Even thinking of him now and the innocent openness of his expression right after Miles had caught him red-handed burned.
“I figure this is as good a time as any to open this,” Wyatt said, walking into the living room holding a dusty bottle.
“Nate gave that to you, didn’t he?” Kian asked, because he hadn’t had that sort of boyfriend yet, and was still blissfully na?ve. Miles and Xander were both too smart to bring up that Nate, Wyatt’s asshole sommelier ex-boyfriend, had given him the bottle in his hands.
“Fuck that asshole, anyway,” Xander said.
Wyatt’s expression grew wistful. “I know you all hated him, but he wasn’t so bad.”
“Quick,” Miles said, “let’s drink the wine before Wyatt changes his mind and waxes nostalgic about his relationship with Nate.”
“More like waxes nostalgic about what great wine Nate would always buy,” Xander added.
Wyatt raised an eyebrow. “Do you want me to open this or not?”
“We’ve been staring at it for more than six months,” Xander said. “And nine before that, when you were still together and you felt obligated to drink it with that dick. Open the fucking wine.”
Wyatt made a face but started opening the wine anyway.
“Kian broke our fourth red wine glass,” Xander explained when Wyatt brought out three wine glasses and a champagne flute.
“It wasn’t my fault!” Kian exclaimed, though out of a kitchen, he was notoriously clumsy.
“And the sky isn’t blue,” Xander retorted.
Miles took the glass Wyatt handed him, and did a showy little swirl. He wasn’t a sommelier like Nate, but he’d taken a few classes about wine, and he could tell from the bouquet that it was pretty good. Maybe not as good as Nate had sworn it was, he thought as he sipped, but pretty damn good.
The problem was that Nate had always oversold everything—and that included himself. It had been a very good day when Wyatt had finally shown him the door. And, bonus, he’d gotten to keep the birthday gift Nate had given him a few months before.
“Dish,” Wyatt said, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, blue eyes bright in the dim room. “I wouldn’t have opened this wine if I didn’t think it would loosen your tongue.”
Miles tipped his glass in a faux toast. “You’re a real giver.”
“Seriously,” Xander complained. “What the fuck are you doing back here?”