Chapter Eight #2
“Yeah, it’s Wyatt’s ex. Good sommelier. Terrible boyfriend.” He hesitated as he pulled a partially baked pie crust from the oven, which explained the deliciously buttery smell in the apartment. “Got us some great wine though. Not that this one is spectacular, but he was connected, you know?”
Evan had learned really fast that some people—okay, most people—didn’t want to know about how he wasn’t connected at all.
Or about his shitty childhood. Or about how he’d clawed his way up the ladder to success.
He’d been on a handful of very terrible dates where he’d been at least partially honest when asked, and afterwards, he’d figured out that when people asked, they weren’t asking because they actually wanted to know the truth.
Miles poured the contents of the bowl into the crust and sprinkled some sort of cheese over the top.
“What are you making?” Evan asked, because changing the subject seemed like the best plan he could come up with at such short notice.
“Veggie quiche with some really good fontina I picked up at the farmer’s market,” Miles said, like everyone came home from a trying day and whipped together a gourmet meal.
Sometimes it felt like too much for Evan to dial the number to the local Chinese restaurant.
Miles must have caught Evan’s eye roll because he smirked.
“Are you going to tease me now about the good fontina from the farmer’s market?
” He was leaning over the counter, eyes sparkling under the lights, looking too delicious for words, even with the flour dusting his t-shirt.
Especially with the flour dusting his t-shirt.
“It just was such a cliché. You’re like a walking chef cliché ninety-four point six percent of the time.”
He didn’t look concerned about Evan’s accusation, though, and Evan couldn’t help but be a little surprised. Two weeks ago, that comment would have gotten Evan a sour lemon expression and some biting remark back.
“Why are you being so nice?” Evan wanted to know. He wanted to know even more, like what Miles wanted from him, but he thought he’d start small. Simple.
“To you? Especially when you seem to enjoy making fun of me?” Miles shrugged, clearly unconcerned by the sudden shift in their relationship. “I’m not sure. Why does it matter?”
“It matters because it matters.”
“Some things don’t require you to overthink them. Just like some pastries shouldn’t rise too much. Or that a dessert can be too sweet, but can never have too much chocolate.”
“Life advice from Miles Costa. You should change career paths.” Evan knew he got bitchy when he got defensive. “Finding Your Best Self by Miles.”
Evan ignored the twinge of hurt in Miles’ eyes.
“Hey, I never promised I was some sort of expert. I sort of fall into most things,” he said, voice still easy, “and when I got out of my own way, this seemed pretty obvious.”
“I can’t do that. I don’t do that.” Evan hesitated, confessions teetering on the edge of his tongue, but he held them back.
“If something isn’t going to work out, if something looks like it’s going to fail, I make sure it doesn’t.
” He didn’t want this to fail, but he also didn’t know how to make it a success.
Show me how, he wanted to beg Miles, but his pride would have stung far too much to ever admit that out loud.
“You know," Miles said casually, "that explains a lot about you. About how you are with your job."
Evan turned away, twisting the stem of his wine glass. “I thought I was the luckiest person in the world when I got a paid internship at Five Points my senior year of college. It was the best opportunity I was ever going to get, and I jumped at it.”
“And you worked your ass off,” Miles finished. When Evan glanced up, he was smiling ruefully.
“What?” Miles asked with amusement. “Don’t tell me you’ve changed that much.”
Evan flushed and nodded. “I haven’t. I did everything they asked me to do.
And it wasn’t glamorous stuff, we didn’t do any videos back then.
Not like now. The culinary department didn’t even exist. Most of the staff writers had assistants.
I was an assistant to the assistants. And that makes it sound even better than it was. ”
“How did you end up working for Reed?” Miles asked. “He’s never struck me as the sort who would get a new job and demand an assistant.”
“Oh god, no,” Evan breathed out. “That didn’t even become official right away.
I had started helping out here and there on the Dream Team set, this was right before I graduated from college, and I really wanted to transition from a paid internship to a full-time paid position.
And I thought if I made myself an expert, the guy you went to for everything related to that show, I might make myself a job. ”
“So you helped Reed when he came on.”
Evan leaned over the counter, wondering how, in a week, he and Miles had gone from hating each other to reluctantly working together, to conspiratorially trading work stories and sharing a bottle of wine as Miles cooked.
For the very first time he let himself think, I want more. I want this all the time.
“You and Reed have more in common than you realize,” Evan confessed.
“We’re both brilliant chefs?” Miles’ incredulous look left Evan feeling warm inside. Too warm. He took a gulp of wine before belatedly realizing that was not going to help at all.
“Other than that,” Evan said. “When he started, he was fucking lost. Jordan helped, of course, especially with his Dream Team producing duties. But the rest of it? I found myself doing a lot of stuff he asked me to help him with.”
Miles leaned over the stove, pulling the oven door open a crack to check his quiche. Evan tried to ignore the way his t-shirt rode up his back, exposing a tempting slice of bare skin.
He failed. He wanted to reach over and touch that skin. He wanted to know what it tasted like under his tongue.
“So how long did you officially work as Reed’s assistant?”
Evan hesitated. “Are we really having the conversation we should have had the first day you showed up? Right now?”
“You just knocked on my door. We’re having a nice glass of wine. I kissed you today and we both liked it.” Miles shrugged unrepentantly. “It makes sense to start over, as much as we can.”
Evan couldn’t believe his nerve, but Miles did seem to do that: float through life, unconcerned and not heavily bogged down by regrets or complicated situations.
He was a surface person; Evan was desperate for roots.
They were probably not the most obvious match, and Evan knew that, but sometimes fate was crazy like that.
You wanted the wrong person, even if you knew he was the wrong person.
And then, suddenly, like a light flashing on, it didn’t even matter.
Evan reached over and grabbed the hem of Miles’ t-shirt and jerked him closer. “Then let’s start over,” he said, and kissed him.
It probably wasn’t the best line ever. It wasn’t even the most successful line, but that didn’t matter because Miles’ mouth was on his. Pleasure roared through Evan like a freight train. He hadn’t even realized how much he’d wanted until he could just take, so he did.
He fisted his hand in the hair that he’d been watching and wanting for eight months, and it was just as soft and necessary as Evan had imagined it would be.
It also proved handy to use as a directional force because Miles went just where Evan wanted him, sliding right back against the counter, his mouth a hot brand against Evan’s.
It turned out that seduction was easy when you just took what you wanted. Evan took Miles’ mouth, his hair, and then his body as his other hand slid right down his back, fingers testing and touching every lean inch of muscle the way his eyes had for the last week.
It was also easy when you didn’t think, when you let the fire of desire consume everything—every fear, every worry, every quietly murmured doubt.
Evan flipped up the hem of Miles’ t-shirt, and slid his hand right up the skin of his back.
It felt even more incredible than he’d imagined, and then Miles moaned, something wild and free and unhinged, like he was torn apart by Evan kissing him, by Evan pursuing him.
It wasn’t like Evan didn’t think he was worth wanting; it was more complicated than that.
And Evan didn’t want to do complicated right now.
He’d done complicated his whole damn life, and right now a really cute boy was kissing him and beginning to sort of grind against his thigh, his hard cock definitely mirroring Evan’s own.
It was so easy to just say, fuck it.
When Evan broke the kiss with a gasp, Miles’ lips were red and wet, the same color as the raspberry strawberry tarts he’d made that had started everything.
And it was so easy to tangle his fingers deeper into Miles’ curls.
Evan had barely even begun to push when Miles tore the floor right out from under Evan and sunk to his knees.
Yeah, Evan definitely wanted that, but he’d also never conceptualized that it was a thing that could actually happen.
He watched as Miles unbuckled his belt with legitimately trembling fingers.
Something Evan had always been sure only happened in overwrought porn.
But his own fingers didn’t feel so steady either, so it could definitely happen, especially when the moment felt like this and you were so close to the edge you could tumble right off with only a gentle nudge.
There was no time to worry. No time to second-guess. Miles already had his cock out, pleasure spiking as he stroked it expertly with those long, slender fingers that Evan had already been fantasizing about for months.