Chapter 48 Eliana
ELIANA
plat·ing: /?plādiNG/: verb
May arrives with unseasonably warm weather and the kind of optimism that makes even a cynic like me start to think everything’s going to work out after all.
Because Project Olympus is finally, finally coming together.
Frank’s disaster list has been whittled down to almost nothing.
The freezers are freezing. The gas lines are gassing.
The HVAC system is HVACing. The fire suppression system got signed off by the inspector with zero notes.
Even the custom bakery ovens—which arrived damaged and became the bane of my existence for a hectic little while there—have been replaced and are working beautifully.
It’s enough to make a girl believe in miracles.
Bastian and I have been working overtime, which sounds miserable but honestly isn’t. Most nights, we’re the last ones in the office. He’ll order takeout from whatever restaurant he’s currently obsessed with, and we’ll munch at the conference table while we work side-by-side.
Sometimes, he reads aloud to me when my eyes get too tired to focus on the screen. In his honey-edged voice, even supplier invoices sound like Shakespeare.
Other times, we don’t talk about work, or at all. We just sit there in the quiet, his hand on my thigh, my head on his shoulder, and pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist.
It’s nice. Really nice. Which is why, when Frank texts on May 8th asking if we can do a final walkthrough of the site, I actually feel excited instead of anxious.
This is it, I think as I pull on my boots and grab my wide-brimmed hat. We’re actually going to pull this off.
Bastian meets me at noon by the Range Rover, looking annoyingly put-together in dark jeans and a crisp white button-down with the sleeves rolled up. His usual flawless uniform. I, on the other hand, am wearing my rattiest pair of jeans and a Hale Hospitality t-shirt I stole from the test kitchen.
“You look good,” he croons when he sees me emerge from the elevator.
“In this?” I ask incredulously. “Sometimes, I think you might be the one who’s going blind.”
He laughs and reels me in for a kiss when I get close enough to where he’s holding the passenger door for me.
And if that kiss gets a little sloppy and a little moany and the hands do a ton of roaming beneath the belt—well, sue me. There are no cameras in the parking garage, anyway.
When we pull into the construction lot, Frank is waiting by his trailer, clipboard in hand. He looks tired. More tired than usual, actually. There are dark circles under his eyes, and his shirt is wrinkled like he slept in it.
“Everything okay, Frank?” I ask as we approach.
He startles, like he didn’t hear us coming. “What? Oh. Yeah, yeah. Just been a long couple of months, you know?”
Bastian pats him on the back. “Tell me about it. But we’re in the home stretch now. Should be smooth sailing from here.”
Frank gulps and nods. “Right. Smooth sailing.”
I exchange a glance with Bastian. He shrugs, and I can read the thought on his face: Frank’s just exhausted. Aren’t we all?
“Anyway. Shall we?” Frank gestures toward the building.
We follow him inside.
The transformation is stunning.
Last time I was here, maybe two weeks ago, the space was still a chaotic construction zone. Disconnected wiring, unfinished floors, scaffolding everywhere.
But now? Now, it actually looks like a restaurant. Twelve restaurants, to be precise.
The main entrance spills into an atrium that steals the breath from my lungs—acres of marble flooring polished to a mirror-like sheen, three-story-tall windows that make me feel like an ant, gargantuan chandeliers dangling from forty-foot gilded chains.
The Korean concept, Somssi, sprawls to the left.
To the right sits State & Madison, Bastian’s love letter to Chicago cuisine, which is one of the ones I’m most excited about.
I even forced him to put an elevated, deconstructed deep dish pizza on the menu.
He still hasn’t forgiven me for it, though he did admit it was delicious.
And straight ahead, a grand staircase with ivory railings curves upward like an exposed spine, leading to the second level where the rest of his empire awaits.
“Holy shit,” I breathe.
Bastian’s hand rests on the small of my back. “Not bad, right?”
“‘Not bad’?! Bastian, this is—” I turn in a slow circle, trying and failing to take it all in. “This is incredible.”
Frank clears his throat. “We’re still finishing up some details. Trim work here and there. Light fixtures. But the bones are solid.”
“The bones are better than solid,” Bastian corrects. “This is exactly what I envisioned. Better, even.”
Frank walks us through every detail—the custom tilework in the sushi bar, the imported wood paneling in the steakhouse, the open kitchen design at the Italian concept. He’s thorough, almost obsessively so, pointing out things I wouldn’t have noticed in a million years.
Everything is perfect.
Too perfect, maybe. I catch myself looking for problems out of habit, because until Bastian, there’s never been anything good in my life that I didn’t immediately overanalyze until it crumbled to ash in my fingers.
I don’t even know exactly what I’m looking for—a loose tile? A flickering light? Just something.
But there’s nothing to be found. Just clean lines and beautiful finishes and the faint smell of fresh paint floating over everything, like a spritz of perfume right before a big night out.
“You okay?” Bastian asks as we pause in the wine bar.
“Yeah. Just… it’s surreal, you know? After all the disasters, seeing it actually done… I don’t even have words.”
He grins. “I know exactly what you mean.”
We round a corner and step through a set of double doors into one of the kitchens. There isn’t a fingerprint out of place in here. It’s all gleaming chrome, spotless and breathtaking.
Bastian walks toward the range slowly, almost reverently.
He runs his hand along the stainless steel surface, and I can see the longing in his face.
This is what he was meant for. Not board meetings and investor calls.
This. The heat and the chaos and the creation of something beautiful from raw ingredients.
“You ever think about just saying ‘fuck it’ and becoming a line cook again?” I ask.
He laughs. “Every day.”
“So why don’t you?”
“Because someone has to keep the show running.” He glances back at me. “And because I’d miss you too much if I spent every night in a kitchen.”
My heart does a stupid little flip. “Kiss-ass.”
Frank coughs awkwardly to break up our moment of prolonged eye contact before it dissolves into its usual touchy-feely grab-assery. “So, uh, everything look good to you, Mr. Hale?”
Bastian tears his gaze away from me. “You did good, Frank. This is outstanding work. Truly.”
Frank’s shoulders relax one notch, but the tension still doesn’t leave his face entirely. “Glad to hear it. There’s just—there’s one more thing I wanted to show you. Upstairs. In the office space.”
“Lead the way,” Bastian says.
We take the service elevator to the fourteenth floor, where the administrative offices are housed. Frank unlocks a door at the end of the hall and ushers us into a corner office with huge windows overlooking the city.
“This’ll be your office,” Frank tells Bastian. “When you’re on-site, I mean.”
Like everything else here, it’s beautiful. Bastian does a slow circuit of the room and finishes at the window. He gazes at Chicago laid out below.
“Perfect,” he says under his breath. Then he turns back to face us. “Frank, I know I’ve been hard on you. Probably harder than I should’ve been. But you delivered. You really fucking delivered.”
Frank’s face does a complicated spasm. For a second, I think he might cry. But then he just nods again and says, “Thanks, Mr. Hale. That means a lot.”
But something still feels off. I can’t put my finger on it. Maybe it’s the way Frank keeps glancing at the door, like he’s expecting someone to walk through it any second.
“Frank,” I prod gently, “are you sure you’re okay? You seem stressed.”
He looks up at me in alarm. “What? No. I’m fine. Just tired, like I said.”
“You’ve been working yourself to the bone,” Bastian adds. “Maybe take a few days off once we’re through the launch. You’ve earned it.”
“Yeah. Maybe.” Frank tucks his clipboard under his arm. “Anyway, I should let you two get back to it. I’m sure you’ve got a million things to do before the gala.”
“Nothing that can’t wait,” Bastian says. But he checks his watch anyway and grimaces. “Actually, I do have a call with the limited partners soon. We should probably head out.”
We say our goodbyes and make our way back to the car. As we’re pulling out of the lot, I glance back at the building, rising above the city.
It’s done. It’s really, actually done.
“What are you thinking about?” Bastian asks me.
I turn back to him. “Just how far we’ve come. How much has changed.”
“For the better, I hope.”
“Jury’s still out,” I tease.
“Objection,” he says, reaching over to lace his fingers through mine. “The jury has reached a verdict. Guilty of being an incredible project manager. Guilty of making my life significantly more enjoyable. Guilty of looking unfairly hot in that t-shirt that I’m just now noticing has my name on it.”
I snort. “Only you would be seduced by decades-old cotton with grease stains just because it has your name on it, Mr. Egotistical.”
He brings my hand to his lips and kisses my knuckles. “I’ll plead guilty to that one, Your Honor.”
I laugh as he drives us back to the office.
This is what I’ll miss most when it’s all over, I think.
Not the grand, sweep-me-off-my-feet gestures, the private movie screenings and lakeside sunrises and all the items he’s been crossing off my list, though of course I’ll remember those for the rest of my days.
It’s these small moments. His hand in mine. His voice in my ear.
With seven days left, all I can do is enjoy them while they last.
“So,” I say, forcing fake brightness into my voice, “tell me about this call with the partners. Any kneecaps I need to go break?”
Bastian launches into a story about Handsy Harold Fitzgerald, and I let his voice wash over me, anchoring me to this moment as the light races toward its inevitable end.
Anchoring me to now.
To him.
To this.