24. Wrenley #2
He slams in once, twice, and I feel the hot pulse of him as he finishes, buried to the hilt, his whole body vibrating with the effort to stay silent.
We stay tangled like that, both of us panting clouds into the air.
Then he grins, still breathless, and kisses me, slow and deep.
“You’re trouble,” he murmurs, still inside me, still holding me up like a rag doll.
“You’re the one who pulled me in here,” I say, but my voice is fuzzy, blissed out.
He pulls out gently, tucks himself away, and helps me stand, steadying me when my knees give out.
Saint licks his thumb and wipes a smudge of mascara from under my eye, grinning like an ass.
“You’re a menace,” he says. “You’re going to get me fired from my own restaurant.”
“You’re the boss of your own restaurant,” I retort.
He snorts and tugs my skirt down, but there’s pride in the way he smooths my hair, straightening what he mussed. “Come eat something before you pass out.”
I try to look dignified with my tights balled in his fist and the taste of him still on my tongue .
The kitchen is a loud engine that runs the restaurant, but Saint slices through it with a glance, steering me to the storage closet off the pastry station.
He grabs a clean apron, snaps it around my waist with a practiced flick, and after we both wash our hands, he sets a stool in front of the prep table.
“You could just let me go home,” I tease, hopping onto the stool and swinging my legs. There’s a delicious, worked-over ache between my thighs when I sit.
“You’re not going anywhere until you’ve eaten.”
Saint pulls a loaf of sourdough off a rack and sets to slicing it, then grabs a tub of the whipped honey butter Ivy loves. “You didn’t have breakfast, did you?”
I don’t answer because he already knows.
A moment passes where I’m sure he wants to say something real, but he just slides the plate toward me. “Eat.”
“I have a weird request,” I say, picking at the bread to buy time. “But you have to promise not to make fun of me.”
Saint leans in, resting both arms on the stainless prep table, eyebrows raised. “I don’t promise anything. But you have my attention.”
I nibble a corner of sourdough, then roll my eyes at myself. “I want to make a video. Of you making me lunch. No names, no faces. I promise.”
His mouth quirks, equal parts challenge and disbelief. “You want to film me?”
“Just your hands,” I repeat, realizing how weird it sounds when I say it out loud. “People are obsessed with food prep videos. It’s… soothing. And your hands are, um. Photogenic. I’m starting to get more confident posting again, and I’d love to do this.”
Saint glances down at his own knuckles, which are battered and tattooed and currently dusted with flour. “You want my hands to be internet famous. ”
“Don’t act like you don’t know you have the hands of a dark kitchen god,” I say, and he laughs, a real one this time, low and warm. “Plus, I want to show people what actual skill looks like. Not those TikTok hacks where someone microwaves a cup of ramen and calls it lunch.”
Saint considers this, then shrugs. “Fine. What are we making?”
“Dealer’s choice,” I say, suddenly nervous. “But it has to look good on camera. And, uh, you have to let me direct you.”
He gives me a look that could curdle milk. “You’re going to direct me in my own kitchen?”
“Don’t worry. I’ll be gentle.”
Saint gives a slow, sexy smile. “Set up your shot, then.”
I get up, still feeling the aftershocks of a thorough fuck in my thighs, and prop my phone against a flour canister so it frames the work surface. I flick to video mode, but don’t hit record yet.
“Okay, stand right there,” I say, pointing a few feet to his right.
He smirks, but does as told, baring strong forearms with the faintest bloom of red where my nails caught him earlier. The sight is so distracting I nearly forget to tell him what to do next.
Shaking myself out of it, I step behind him and guide his hands into the center of the frame. “This is where you’ll prep everything, so the camera can see you. What are you going to make?”
“Carbonara,” he says.
Naturally.
Saint moves around me, making sure to brush up against my tender nipples before grabbing eggs, pancetta, and a wedge of pecorino from the fridge, setting them down in whatever order makes the most sense to him.
I see the switch flip in his head: the Saint who dominates a kitchen, who can fillet a fish in thirty seconds flat and break a line cook’s spirit in less.
His hands move so fast I have to adjust the camera angle to keep up.
He notices.
“You want me to go slow?” Saint asks with so much innuendo my underwear is instantly wet again.
“Painfully slow,” I manage to say, then press record.
I pan the camera to follow, catching the sinew of his hands, the flex of his wrist, the faint twitch in his thumb whenever he’s about to break his own rules and speed up.
Edging closer, trying not to let my voice betray how much I want to climb him right now. “Crack the eggs. Separate the yolks. Go slow .”
He obeys, but only to mock me, exaggerating every move. He cracks an egg one-handed, letting the white slip through his fingers in a slow-motion ooze. Then he holds the yolk in his palm so the camera can drink in the slick gold.
“Happy?” he asks.
“Not yet,” I say in all seriousness, and then circle around him, eyeing the angle, my own reflection ghosting in the spotless steel.
Saint holds the yolk between thumb and forefinger, pinching just hard enough that the gold membrane bulges at the seam. I zoom in as he bursts it, the liquid sun spilling down in slow, gorgeous ribbons.
“Dammit, you’re a natural for the camera,” I say. “Is there anything you’re not good at?”
“Not a thing,” he says, but there’s laughter over the arrogance.
He breaks two more eggs, each one with a little more showmanship, and then stops to look at me sidelong, shirt stretching across his back. “What’s next, boss?”
“I don’t know. This is your recipe. I have no idea how to cook carbonara, I just know how to eat it.”
My stomach rumbles in agreement.
“Ah, but you’re the director. I don’t do anything without your say-so.”
Uh. What?
This bastard is testing me. He’s well aware that I don’t know the first thing about cooking.
“Okay, um…” I start to bluff. “Can you do it where you let the cheese rain down in slow motion? People are obsessed with cheese pulls and cheese snow. It’s a thing.”
He scoffs. “Cheese snow. Christ. We’re not at the cheese yet,” he adds patiently. Too patiently. “What comes after eggs?”
“The ... pasta”
“No.”
“The meat?”
“Getting warmer. But what do I do with the pancetta?”
I squint at the ingredients like they’ll tell me their secrets. “Cook it?”
“Brilliant. In what?”
“Oil?”
His jaw ticks. “Pancetta renders its own fat.”
“Right. That.”
“So I put it in the pan...”
“Yes?”
“When?” he asks.
“Now?”
“Is the pan hot?”
“I don’t know, you’re the one cooking! ”
“You’re the director.” His patience is fraying beautifully. “Should I heat the pan first?”
“Obviously.”
“Obviously.” He turns on the burner with more force than necessary. “And while that’s heating?”
“You ... wait?”
A vein in his temple throbs. “Or I could prep the?—”
“Pasta! You prep the pasta.”
“By?” He draws out the word.
“Putting it in water?”
“What kind of water?”
“The wet kind?”
“Wrenley.”
“Boiling! Boiling water. I knew that.”
“Did you?” He’s gripping the counter’s edge and trying not to lose it. Oh, I love this so much. “And when do I add the eggs to the pasta?”
“After it’s cooked?”
“Temperature?”
“Hot?”
“No. Christ, no.” He abandons all pretense of letting me direct. “You add the eggs off heat, or they scramble. The residual warmth cooks them gently. You temper them with pasta water first. You?—”
“Just make the damn carbonara.” I laugh.
“You think?”
But he’s already moving, hands flying through the steps with barely contained violence. “Plate. Pepper. Done.”
The whole thing takes him maybe three minutes, and he narrates each step like he’s teaching a particularly slow child.
Which, culinarily speaking, I am.
“Now swirl it together. Gently,” I direct, and he gives me a look. “Pretend you’re not the boss of the entire world for one second, Saint.”
Saint’s mouth twitches, but he does as told, stirring in a slow, sensual spiral.
I catch the motion on camera, the glisten of gold, the flecks of pepper.
My breath hitches. I’m not even pretending to be in this for the content. I just want to watch him work.
“Do the thing with the pepper grinder. The one that makes you look like you’re about to threaten someone with it.”
He laughs, but the sound is low, and his grin is all teeth.
Saint grabs the oversized grinder from the shelf, then leans his weight onto the table, bracing it with one palm while he twists.
The pepper rains down in heavy, abrupt bursts.
I film the motion, tight on his hands, then pan out to catch the muscles bunching under his forearm because I just can’t help it.
Noticing what I’m doing, he leans out of the shot. “Is this for your followers, or for you?”
“Both,” I admit.
“How many followers do you have again?”
“About two million.”
“Jesus fucking Christ. And they just watch you … live your life?”
“I give them advice,” I correct, taking a forkful.
When I take a bite, the moan I make is indecent.
His eyes darken. “Keep making sounds like that and we’re going to have a different kind of video on our hands.”
“Saint!” I laugh, but my cheeks burn.
He picks up my phone, still recording, and pans onto my face. “You missed the best part. Do it again.”
“What? Why? ”
“So I can show you what it’s like to watch you fucking that fork.”
I nearly choke.
Saint sets my phone down and moves behind me. His hand covers mine on the utensil and guides it into the mound of pasta, swirling another bite onto the tines. “Open.”
He brings the loaded fork to my lips, but doesn’t feed me right away. Instead, he hovers it just out of reach, making me chase the taste. When I lean forward, he draws back, a smug tilt to his mouth.
“Beg,” he says.
I roll my eyes, but play along. “Please, Chef.”
That’s all it takes. He slides the fork between my lips.
“Chew,” he orders.
I do.
“Swallow.”
Saint watches me with a fire that liquefies my insides. I want to say something clever, but my brain’s been replaced with a tangle of hormones and the word yes . I can’t help it. Another soft moan escapes.
“There it is.” His eyes eat me alive. “That’s what two million people want to see. Not me. You.”
“That’s not?—”
“True?” He takes the fork, loads it again, and holds it just out of reach. “Tell me you don’t know exactly what you’re doing.”
I reach for the fork, but he pulls it back.
“Say please.”
“You’re being ridiculous.”
“And you’re being filmed.” He nods at my phone, still recording. “So what’s it going to be, Wrenley? You going to be good for me?”
The question shoots straight into my underwear. “Please. ”
He feeds me slowly, deliberately, making me work for every bite while his other hand rests on my hip, thumb stroking bare skin where my shirt’s ridden up.
“Ivy’s at Noa and Stone’s tonight,” he says against my ear. “Sleepover.”
I swallow hard. “And?”
“And nothing.” He sets the fork down and reaches around me to stop the recording. “Just information.”
But his hand is still on my hip, and I can feel how hard he is pressed against my back.
The kitchen door slams open. “Chef, we need?—”
“Out.” Saint doesn’t move, doesn’t even look. “Now.”
The door swings shut immediately.
“You’re terrorizing your staff,” I say.
“They’ll survive.” He spins me on the stool to face him. “Nine o’clock. My place.”
It’s not a question.
“I don’t know. I have to edit your very talented hands and post this by tonight.”
“Nine. O’clock.” His thumb traces my bottom lip. When he pulls back, it’s slick with olive oil. “Don’t make me come get you.”
Then he’s gone, leaving me sitting there with sore thighs, wet underwear, and my phone now containing food sex footage I’ll never post, already counting the hours until nine.