Chapter 11
SEBASTIAN
“So what do you think? Have I covered the bases?”
I should have been paying full attention to Felix at a time like this, sitting in my office with an array of resumes spread across my desk.
They symbolized weeks of work on his part to ensure my new kitchen was adequately staffed.
He’d managed to pull some incredible talent, and I had to applaud his diligence when it came to recruiting.
“I’m impressed,” I concluded, noting what seemed like relief from him. “I would like to meet them, of course, but if they’re half as good in reality as they are on paper, I think we are in great shape.”
Great shape like the woman who moved past my open door with a sack of flour balanced across her arms. My impulse was to help her.
I was almost halfway out of my chair when I stopped myself, remembering she was a grown woman doing her job.
There were other people in the kitchen who could have helped her, anyway.
“Hello?” Felix rapped against the desk with his knuckles to gain my attention. “I know you’re easily distracted, but try to give me your attention at a time like this, buddy.”
I gave him my attention, all right, scowling until he grimaced like it hurt. “Give me something interesting to listen to, and you won’t lose my attention,” I snapped.
“I was saying we need to put together a timeline of getting these people in here to train before they move into the new kitchen.” He pulled up the calendar on his tablet, scrolling through dates. “We’re looking at another four weeks until the soft opening.”
Only four weeks. It was unnerving how time had flown.
That meant it had been almost four weeks since Claudia came into my life and effectively ended my ability to concentrate on anything but getting more of what I had already touched and tasted.
There was no denying the pull she had over me or how fucking frustrating it was to see her in the days since we’d had sex and pretending like nothing happened.
I knew it was for the best, but I didn’t have to be happy about it.
“I would like to go into this with everyone on a friendly basis, at least,” I mused, pushing thoughts of her aside for a minute.
Felix groaned. “I never thought I would say this, but maybe we need to do a—”
“Don’t say a group activity,” I warned.
“I know, I know, but it doesn’t need to be corny. We’re not doing team-building exercises and shit like that,” he promised.
“What would we do, then?” I dreaded the answer.
“Actually, I have an idea.” The gleam in Felix’s eyes told me I might not like this, but I didn’t stop him from getting up from his chair and sticking his head into the kitchen. “Claudia? Can you come here for a second?”
“What does she have to do with this?” I asked, playing down the fact that I liked the excuse to speak to her.
We’d been going out of our way to avoid each other since Monday—not out of discomfort, though I was quite uncomfortable thanks to the semi I sported most of the time nowadays. I couldn’t get her out of my head.
Seeing her now, looking nervous as she approached, meant playing pretend in front of Felix.
He was oblivious to the way we deliberately avoided looking at each other, asking, “You know how when you were doing Best Baker, they had those scenes where you all would go out and do things together as a team?”
What a shame I hadn’t known he had this in mind. I would have told him she didn’t like talking about the competition. She wanted to be known for more than that. Now, she was a deer in headlights, blinking hard, looking at him in disbelief. “Sure. We had activities and stuff.”
“Did it help? Getting to know each other, I mean?”
This, she seemed to consider seriously, folding her arms and leaning against the doorframe while gazing pensively up at the ceiling.
“I think so,” she decided. “Though it actually kind of sucked in a way because we got to be friendly and then had to compete against each other. You get close to people, and you end up having to say goodbye to them. It wasn’t easy.
” The glance she threw my way held genuine sadness that stirred my sympathy.
That wasn’t what this was about. Felix looked triumphant when he turned my way. “I think that’s what we need to do with these new people. Get everybody offsite, engaged in some sort of activity or another, let them get to know each other.”
Claudia exchanged glances with me. “It’s not a bad idea,” she admitted.
“Fine, but what do we do?” I hated the idea. Still, nobody was asking me to go on a scavenger hunt, and if they did, they could go fuck themselves because I didn’t do shit like that.
“Off the top of my head?” Felix asked. “What about going to The Strat and doing the whole thrill-ride thing?”
A laugh burst out of me before Claudia had the chance to groan loudly. “I’m being haunted by that place.” She sighed. “The universe will not be satisfied until I go on that damn coaster.”
“It’s not a coaster,” he pointed out. “It just dangles you over the edge of the building. There’s also The Bigshot. That’s the one where you get strapped into a chair, and they shoot you up a hundred and sixty feet at, like, forty-five miles an hour.”
Claudia gulped. Even I felt a little nauseous by the time he finished describing it. “Nothing brings people together like fear and trauma,” he concluded with a shrug.
The thing was, I couldn’t argue with that. One of Felix’s many talents was understanding the way people thought. It was what made him excellent at his job—staffing my restaurants, managing the investors, and maintaining relationships with vendors and suppliers. I couldn’t have done it without him.
“Wow, that should be the tagline for the restaurant,” Claudia mused. Felix burst out laughing, and I joined him, leading her to offer a grin. “I’m just saying. It would really bring people in.”
“If it makes you feel any better…” I offered, “… we could wrap the day up with a show at Planet Hollywood. A good friend of mine cast and rehearsed the new show over there. He could score us a block of tickets with a few days lead time.” I’d owe Jackson a favor after this, but it would be worth it.
“That would be fun!” Claudia looked much happier about that idea. “I could almost make it through that Bigshot thing if I knew I’d see a show afterward. I’ve been meaning to see what’s out there at the different hotels, but my job sort of takes up a lot of my time.”
“Your boss sounds like a real tyrant,” I murmured with a smirk.
“Yeah, he can be a real bastard when he puts his mind to it,” she agreed. “He has this thing about reacting before he thinks.”
Sitting up straighter, I replied, “I heard you have a habit of bringing up issues that have already been resolved.” I wasn’t joking anymore, but then neither was she.
“Uh, I’ll see myself out…” Felix grimaced comically, pulling me up short. What was I thinking, letting her get to me while we were in front of him?
“Thanks for your insight,” I choked out, ignoring the way he eyed me while forcing a brief smile for the sake of playing nice.
“No problem.” She wandered off, her voice ringing out with a question for Stella, and I reminded myself not to follow her progress with my gaze.
Felix, on the other hand, had no problem openly watching her walk away. “She’s got a great ass,” he said. “She can’t be sampling a lot of what she bakes with an ass like that.”
“I know you’re not talking that way about the pastry chef you were dead set on bringing here to improve our image.
” Folding my arms hid my hands, now balled into fists.
I did my best to affect a joking tone despite the tightening of my jaw and the sudden thudding of blood in my ears.
“Because you let the wrong person hear you say something like that, and we have a whole other shit ton of problems on our hands.”
And I already had enough problems. The ultimate cliché—a boss fucking his employee here in the kitchen, no less.
It meant crossing countless lines and should have meant me avoiding the woman like I’d avoid the plague, but the concept was unthinkable.
There was no choice but to clock her every move, to pick up on her every word, even in the midst of a dozen overlapping voices.
Never had a woman challenged, fascinated, or tempted me the way she did.
The fury she stirred in me had a way of exploding into undeniable passion.
It was addictive. Dangerously so.
“Gotcha. I’ll keep my thoughts to myself. Good thing, too,” he added as he stood. “You wouldn’t want to hear them.”
I held up a hand to stop him from leaving right away. “Everything’s smooth with the construction? No more permit issues?”
“Smooth sailing at the moment, but let’s not forget, we weren’t aware of any issues before they reared their ugly heads, either. There was no warning.” Scratching the back of his neck, he added, “I still can’t get a straight answer on how it all went down.”
Neither could Grayson, according to his latest update earlier that day.
“We’ll figure it out,” I decided because there was no other option.
“So long as construction is rolling again.” In the end, we hadn’t lost more than a day of work before everything was settled, but I very much had the feeling the goal wasn’t so much setting us back as it was getting inside my head, making sure I knew everything could crumble at any time. There was nothing I could do about it.
It was not a pleasant thought to carry with me throughout the day as I drove down to the new site and watched the men at work. I needed to confirm for myself they were still at it. That things were moving forward.