Guilty Pleasures (2 page)

Lindsay bit her lip, then nodded. “Well, if he accepts base pay, then I'll add him to payroll.”

“Don't worry,” Mari said, feeling a knot of tension she didn't realize she was holding loosen in her chest. “I'll persuade him.”

“If anyone could, it'd be you.” Lindsay smiled, but Mari could still see concern haunting the corners of it.

“Lindsay,” Mari said, in a low voice. “How bad is it, really?”

The smile slipped away. “If things don't change,” she said, in an emotionless tone, “I give us four months. And that's on the outside.”

Mari blanched. “I knew things weren't going well…”

“The lease is going to need to be renewed then, and there's a good chance rent will go up. And we were hoping more business would come in, now that spring's here and summer's coming,” Lindsay said. “But we need to do something. I don't know. Promotion, maybe.” She looked at Mari, her tone hesitant. “I know a restaurant critic with the
Chronicle…
”

“No critics.” Mari's reaction was swift and reflexive.

Lindsay took a deep breath. This was one point Mari could never really get across to her. “Mari, it's the cheapest form of promotion….”

“Yeah. And you can't guarantee the results.” Mari closed her eyes, remembering the critics' response to Le Pome:
The culinary equivalent of “Bonfire of the Vanities”, Le Pome is an overpriced, overhyped, pretentious nightmare of a restaurant.
She winced. “We
get a critic who decides to make his name by tearing us to shreds with some humorously deadly review, and we're nailing the coffin shut, Lindsay.”

Lindsay put her hands up. “Okay. I'm sorry.”

Mari closed her eyes. Lindsay meant well. But her restaurant was her life—and talking to critics had killed her last dream, and she wasn't eager to rush out and go through that again. “Let me think about it, at least.”

Lindsay took the concession, and quickly rushed on. “I don't know. You might want to work on a new menu, too. Tweak it a little.”

Mari nodded. She'd thought about doing that, anyway. “Will do.”

“Maybe get that new chef to help you?”

Mari thought about it. Nick, with his expensive suit and his slow smile…and those very hot gazes of his. He knew he was good. Back when she was in school, they called guys like Nick “celebrities.” He wouldn't be happy with being a sous-chef for long, and she got the feeling if she gave him a chance to work on the menu, he'd parlay it into a chance to take over her kitchen.

She glanced at the door that led to the kitchen, smiling at the din of pots, pans and yelled conversations.
Like hell.
The kitchen, the restaurant, was hers…and hers alone.

“Let me just see if I can get the guy to accept base pay,” Mari said. “We'll worry about the rest later.”

Mari washed her hands, taking the time to collect herself. She had the feeling that Nick could be a bless
ing or a curse for Guilty Pleasures—or both. Even if she could afford to hire Nick, she wasn't sure she could afford the distraction. When she got a glimpse of him, her senses seemed to go into erotic overdrive. And as much fun as it might sound, making a sensual feast of her sous-chef was probably the
last
thing she needed.

The only guilty pleasures she indulged in at the moment were on her menu.

It was eleven, and the crew was cleaning up to close for the night. She had to admit, the kitchen looked cleaner and more organized than it had in a while, even if her tight-knit crew looked more surly than usual. Nick was calling out orders, but not in a supercilious way, and the whole time, he was a blur of motion, straightening something here, putting something away there.

She must've been staring for some time, because she didn't even hear Mo come up behind her. “Isn't he delicious?” Mo whispered.

Apt description. “Yes, but is he competent?” she whispered back, sounding blasé.

“I'll bet he is,” Mo purred.

Getting his connotation, she smirked. “I meant in the kitchen, Mo.”

Mo stood next to her, winking. “I'm sure he's competent
wherever.
”

“At
cooking,
you imbecile,” Mari said, laughing.

Mo snorted. “All work and no play…”

“Keeps us solvent.” She shooed Mo away, and walked up to Nick. “So. Looks like you're as good
as you say you are,” she drawled, grinning at the sauce stains and splotches on his previously immaculate shirt.

His tawny eyes looked like brandy and banked fires. “I'm better,” he said, in a low, rough-husky voice. “But this was only one night.”

She ignored the shiver his statement sent up her spine.

“So did I pass the test?” he asked.

She noticed that the crew had quieted and was listening to their exchange with interest. She remembered Lindsay's question in the back room…about whether he'd been fired or was an embezzler.

She needed to interview him. In private.

“Grab your coat.” She gestured to the back room, then looked at Tiny, her grill man, and Mo. “I want the logs and checklists ready when I get back to lock up, okay? I'm just going to talk to Nick over at my office.”

They nodded, although Mo was grinning like a fiend.

He walked out, putting his coat on, and she grabbed hers as well. “Where is your office?”

She shot him a quick smirk. “Across the street,” she said, and waved a quick goodbye to the crew, who were grinning too.

She was taking him to her home office…to her loft, across the street.

I am going to be alone with a gorgeous man who makes my hormones do back flips. At eleven o'clock at night. In the middle of a rainstorm.

She felt her pulse rate raise a little.
In the general vicinity of my bed.

No, no, no.
She stepped out into the rain, letting the cooling waves of it turn her temperature down a little. She was just going to hire him…and convince him to take the salary she offered. She got the feeling it was going to take every ounce of charm and persuasion she possessed.

This was for the restaurant, she told herself sternly as she opened the door to her building. Sex would only get in the way.

 

N
ICK FOLLOWED
M
ARI
to the industrial-looking brick building across the street. It looked like it held lofts…or those work spaces.

Is she taking me to where she
lives,
then?
Is that what all the grinning in the kitchen had been about?

Not that he would have minded accompanying this particular woman home. It had been months since he'd broken up with Janelle, it hadn't lasted long, and he really hadn't had the time or the inclination to be with a woman since. And Mari was woman with a capital
W.
He could tell from the easy stride of her gait that she moved with determination and a very seductive grace.

Still, she could move like an exotic dancer and look like a sexual goddess, he thought as he walked up the two flights of stairs that led to her place. The fact was, she'd made him “try out” to work at her dubious restaurant. Now that he'd proven how capable he was, it was her turn.

As the movie said, she had to show him the money. And he might be available, but if he ever wanted to get his place back in the restaurant world, he wasn't going to come cheap.

She unlocked the door, and turned on a light. He followed her inside.

He didn't know what he was expecting, but the roomy loft wasn't it. It was painted in rich autumn hues, although the ceiling still showed exposed steel beams. The main “room” was painted in a warm pumpkin tone, rich and exotic. There were colorful forest green and burgundy tapestry pillows on an over-stuffed couch. He walked to the center of the living room while she went to a large oak desk strewn with paper. There was a small but well-appointed kitchen, he noticed, and suspended over it was a “floor,” about seven feet up, with a ladder leading up to it. While someone probably had used it for storage before, from his vantage point, he could make out some gauzy type material, curtains and pillows.

That's where she sleeps.

He felt the slight stirrings of an erection,
not
what he needed to go into a negotiation with. He turned, and looked out the huge floor-to-ceiling windows instead. The neighborhood wasn't much to look at, but it had a view of the sign's wink and grin.

When he felt he had his body under control, he focused on the live model instead…and almost promptly wished he hadn't.

She reached up and pulled her hair from its restraining rubber band, letting it tumble across her shoulders
in unruly ebony waves. The purple streak seemed to fit the room, he noted, and matched the violet-blue of her eyes.

She was a powerfully beautiful woman.

“So.” She leaned back against the desk, her long legs crossing at the ankle. “Why won't anybody else hire you, Nick Avery?”

He took a deep breath. A beautiful, no-punches-pulled kind of woman.

“I told you. I need a change.”

Her eyebrow arched up. “I didn't just come in off the bus from the country, Nick.”

He sighed. He knew it wasn't going to be that easy—it hadn't been anywhere else. And with a woman this sharp, he shouldn't have tried. “I left Le Chapeau Noir in less than ideal circumstances.”

“I'd gathered,” she said dryly. She paused. “Embezzlement?”

“No.” The word was harsh, but the idea of it punched him in the gut. He thought about sitting, but didn't want to get too comfortable. “There were no legal charges filed.”

She narrowed her eyes now, crossing her arms. And he saw the look that he'd been getting in every other interview that he'd been in for the past month.

“What exactly did you do?”

I trusted my best friend. I got screwed.

He clenched his jaw, forced himself to relax. He was at the end of the line. “I supposedly stole from the restaurant—thousands of dollars worth of food,
comped meals, equipment. Somebody suggested I had my hand in the till, but wouldn't go that far.”

That somebody being Phillip Marceau—his business partner and best friend.

“I see.” Her expression changed, but he couldn't read it. He waited for more, for judgments, but none came. She simply studied him silently.

“I didn't do any of it.” Once the words were out, he winced. He hadn't defended himself against Phillip's whispered allegations, hinted at by people he interviewed with, because he knew the fraternity of high-society, four-star restaurants would take the word of the powerful Marceau restaurant family over the word of a one-time poor kid from Covina.

So why had he wanted her to know he was innocent?

“They didn't press charges?” she asked instead.

“No. They didn't. He—my old business partner—said they were doing it to protect my reputation…because I'd meant so much to his family.” He didn't mean for that much bitterness to creep into his voice, but couldn't seem to help it.

“And you tried here.”

“Because of Leon,” he reminded her. He smiled, thinking of the conversation, and she picked up on it.

“What?”

He shrugged. “He said this was a good place for me to get a second chance, that's all.” Leon had been a tough teacher, but he had to admit, the man was a good friend. Right now, Nick had a short supply of those.

The look on her expressive face was something to see. “He said that? That part about the second chance?”

Nick nodded, puzzled.

She started laughing, although her brilliant violet eyes didn't reflect the humor. “That crafty old bastard.”

“Sorry?”

“Okay, Nick Avery.” She rumpled her hair, took a deep breath. “You're hired.”

He smiled, feeling his shoulders release their tension. “You won't regret it.”

“See that I don't,” she said, then stood up, smiling at him almost flirtatiously. “Of course, I can only offer base scale.”

He blinked. He took a step closer to her, keeping a leash on his anger. “I think I'm worth more than that,” he said, his voice low and reasonable. “Give me a few weeks, and I'm sure I could convince you that I am.”

She took a step to meet him, her smile not wavering. “Oh, I'm sure you're worth more than that.”

His body was responding again, but he ignored it and focused on his anger instead. “But you know I can't get a job anywhere else, so…?”

That managed to irk her. “I don't do that,” she said, her voice sharp and her eyes snapping with electricity. “I wouldn't do that. But facts are facts: I'm taking a risk here. I want to give you a second chance. But I've got to protect myself—and my restaurant.”

He grimaced at that. “Maybe we could negotiate,” he said, in his best charm-the-owner voice.

“Well…maybe we could. Hmm.” She got a look of innocent thoughtfulness, and his guard immediately went up. “But I'd have to be
sure.
Say, a three-month trial period?”

Another trial period. Just when he thought things couldn't get any more insulting.

She leaned forward slightly, her mouth curving into a very sweet, sexy smile. “Three months in my kitchen. That's not a very long time, is it?” She winked. “I'll even go easy on you.”

He found himself mesmerized by her body language, and shook it off. “Ms. Salazar,” he said, pitching his own voice low and husky, “are you trying to con me?”

She blinked, then let out a warm laugh. “No. But I'll put it this way. I want you, Nick.”

Now his body clenched, tightly.

She shut her eyes, and to his surprise, he saw the dull stain of a blush high on her cheeks. She turned back to the desk. “For the restaurant,” she hastily amended. “I think that we could be very good for each other, Nick. I want to help. But I can only hire you at base pay.” She looked at him over her shoulder, her posture unconsciously provocative. “Take it or leave it.”