Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 81113 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81113 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
But I couldn’t just leave him alone in there to argue with that woman.
I took a deep breath and knocked on the door.
There was a pause on the other side, and then I heard Michael saying, “I’ll call you back.”
A moment later the door was opened and Michael was staring down at me.
He looked so tired. It was horribly unfair - why should his wife get to run off with some pretty boy and strip Michael dry when he’d been doing all this hard work with the restaurant all these years?
“Everything all right, Stevie?” he asked.
Shit. I needed to think of a reason for knocking on his door and comforting you after I heard you arguing with your ex-wife is probably not going to cut it.
“…I was wondering… since it’s a special occasion and all… could we have a bottle of champagne?” I gave him my most winning smile.
Michael laughed in a startled kind of way. “Last I checked, people graduated high school at age eighteen, not age twenty-one.”
God, the low gravel of his voice was just - the hottest thing ever. I dared to take a small step closer and look up at him through my lashes. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”
Michael shook his head. “No way, your parents would kill me.” He put his arm around my shoulders. “And don’t you give me one of those pretty pouts, either, it’s not going to work.”
Pretty. He thought it was pretty when I pouted. It felt like my entire chest lit up in response.
“C’mon, I think it’s time we cut the cake,” he said, and led me back to the main room - still with his arm around my shoulders.
The warmth of him pressed against my side, the weight of his arm, the firm muscles I could feel against me - I thought all about it later that night as I was lying in bed. Oh, God, yes, I imagined him picking me up and lifting me against the wall easily, making me whimper and moan for him, telling me to spread my legs for him…
But I couldn’t just waltz in and seduce him like I’d originally planned. No. Michael still saw me as too young, as a child, and he was still dealing with the loss of his ex.
Well, that was fine. I could be patient.
I didn’t know the whole story about his wife, but I did know from the phone call I’d overheard that she’d been with Michael’s protégé. I’d met him a few times—Theo Simmons, almost ten years younger than Michael, early thirties, handsome, tattooed. You know, the works.
With the man he’d been training gone, Michael would need a new protégé, wouldn’t he? Someone who could be relied on, someone he could come to trust and care for.
But of course, that protégé would need to have gotten through culinary school - and how convenient, that’s what I would be doing.
Once I was a professional with training, once a couple of years had passed, after there’d been some time apart where he hadn’t seen me… Michael would come to see me as an adult. As someone he could care for, and someone he could be attracted to. Not a child, not anymore.
I was going to go after what I wanted, and I wasn’t going to give up.
Chapter One: Michael
It had been three years since Virginia and Theo had left me, and it hadn’t gotten any easier.
It was Tuesday, which meant time to balance the books. Once, that would’ve been a no brainer. My restaurant was ranked one of the top ten in the bay area, and I had clients from literally all over the world. This would’ve been a breeze.
But ever since Theo and Virginia…
It was the worst night of my life, coming into the house to find them fucking in my living room. Theo had tried to make some excuse about stopping by to see me, as if I hadn’t just walked in on him fucking my wife, as if I was stupid, or blind.
Well, I had been both stupid and blind, for months, not realizing what was going on between them. I had noticed that Theo was coming over to the house a lot more often, and that Virginia suddenly had a much bigger interest in the restaurant than before. But how was I supposed to - how was any person supposed to - I trusted both of them.
I wasn’t the kind of person who was paranoid about things. Not like that.
And now, ever since they’d left, things at the restaurant had been in the toilet. Now, I told Virginia to leave the restaurant alone during the divorce proceedings and she did, she was a woman of her word with that. But even so, Theo had managed to do everything possible to screw my business over.