PROTECTIVE
I was in a tizzy in the kitchen at SC.
Lucia, our head chef, had shown about half an hour ago to start prep on whatever works of art she was going to put on the menu that day (that said, she lugged in a bunch of stuff she’d already prepared at home—the woman was a machine!).
In the short time we’d worked together, we had a good sync going, because she wasn’t a talker.
Not even a little bit.
I had never seen anyone with so much pure concentration in my life.
Our kitchen was not The Bear. No one was shouting at each other or locking themselves in the freezer or telling raunchy stories.
In fact, Lucia didn’t even have a sous chef.
It was all her.
And she was so Zen, at first when I was working with her, it weirded me out.
Now I just fell into that space with her.
And it was a good space to be after sleeping next to Gabe last night (even not knowing I was at the time), and all that had already happened this morning.
But all of that had happened this morning, so I was way behind on getting the case filled.
And I should have known what was to come before it came.
Then it came.
The kitchen door crashed against the wall.
And tall, humongous, flannel-shirted, jeans-clad Tex was there.
Lucia barely looked up.
I jumped out of my skin.
“Tex! God! You nearly scared me to death,” I cried.
“Angels Confab the minute the girls are in,” he declared, then jabbed a beefy finger at me. “You women are gonna put the word out to your informants, they don’t corner you in dark parking lots.”
See?
He was grouchy, but a good guy.
And…ugh.
Would everyone stop saying I was cornered already?
“He didn’t corner me, Tex.”
“Shut it!” he boomed.
Then again, everything he’d said so far was a boom. The man boomed. That was what he did. It was just him telling me to shut it was boomed louder.
“It’s good you’re with Gabe now,” Tex announced, and such was that announcement, Lucia looked up again. “He’ll get your head straight.”
“My head isn’t crooked!” I exclaimed. Then added, “And I’m not with Gabe.”
