There were raisedvoices when I got back to the hideaway late in the evening. Since Kai was by my side, I couldn’t blame him for this one.
That left two people.
We saw them as soon as we entered, standing in front of, but ignoring the fire as they snapped at each other. Ash looked like lightning bolts were about to fly out of his eyes, and Zoe looked ready to take a swing at him. Kai and I stopped dead, trying to figure out what was going on.
“You’ll get it when you get it,” Ash growled.
My twin, with his perpetually horny, pea-sized brain, opened his mouth to say something dirty about that, but I elbowed him, hard.
“She wants it now,” Zoe insisted.
“I’m the head chef,” Ash insisted. “I call the shots in the restaurant.”
“You’re only the head chef one month out of twelve. Mrs. Greer is in charge year round.” Though she had to look up to meet his eye, Zoe stood as tall as she could, standing her ground.
“Not in the restaurant. She doesn’t know the first thing about what it takes to run a high-end restaurant like that, and neither did you.”
I winced. That seemed like a low blow. True, Zoe wasn’t a chef, but her major was hospitality, so it wasn’t like she knew nothing about the food prep side of things.
I elbowed Kai again, but this time in a completely different way. When he looked over, I jerked my chin in Asher’s direction. He knew what I meant.
He strode over to Asher, getting between him and Zoe. I followed and tugged at Zoe’s arm. “Come sit down,” I said softly to her.
Kai was less gentle, giving Ash a shove toward an armchair. Then, like a true bartender, Kai went over to get some bottles out of the fridge.
I led Zoe over to an armchair on the opposite side from Asher, who’d reluctantly sat and accepted the beer Kai brought him. I half hoped my brother had shaken it a bit. Ash deserved it for yelling at Zoe.
When Kai brought over the other beer, Zoe shookher head. “I’m going to my room.” Kai and I both shook our heads as she stood up.
“We’re roommates for what, three more weeks? You two need to work this out,” I said, making sure Asher could hear me as well.
She wanted to refuse. She’d told me earlier about all the stress she was under, and Asher’s inexplicably bad attitude around her wasn’t helping. But she also wanted to excel at her internship, and for that, she needed to get along with the head chef
“Please sit,” I said softly.
Kai cocked his head at her. “How can you resist him with those big blue eyes?”
I rolled the aforementioned eyes. “They’re just like yours.” I didn’t point out that Zoe had already proven that she could resist him. Eventually.
“Yeah, but on me, they’re smoldering. On you, they’re more like sad puppy-dog eyes. And what girl can resist a sad puppy?”
That was taking things a bit far, but apparently, it was working on Zoe. She sat down, a little stiffly, pulling her feet up and tucking them next to her on the oversized chair. As Kai handed her a bottle, I gave her a blanket, in part to keep Kai from looking at her legs.
Which, of course, I’d been looking at too. It was hard not to. Zoe was beautiful with her creamy skin, wavy hair, and dark, flashing eyes. With her hair often in a bunand a stern expression on her face, it was like she was doing her best to hide her looks, but that wasn’t possible. And I knew I wasn’t the only one who thought so.
I sat on the couch between the dueling interns, and Kai joined me after plucking fresh beers out of the little fridge. It was turning out to be a good thing that we had access to a well-stocked bar.
“So, what the fuck is the problem with you two?” Kai began, in the worst possible way. Except he’d said it good-naturedly, in what he evidently thought was a charming voice. And over the years, I’d seen far too many women and even a few men fall for that charm.
Ash answered succinctly. “Her.”
“Him,” Zoe replied, almost as quickly.
“Great, we’ve got that cleared up,” Kai said.
“You’re both here for the same reason,” I began. “You should be allies.” Jesus, now I sounded like a baby boomer discussing WW2. I needed to get back to Colorado where I sounded like a normal twenty-six-year-old. Usually.
I turned to Ash. “I’ve seen you show incredible patience when training brand new chefs. Why can’t you show any of that patience to Zoe?”
