“It would take absolutely nothing,” I voiced. “I’m already mentally there.” As I realized how ridiculous I sounded, I let out a laugh.
James laughed too. “Girl, I like you. I’ll grab your number after everyone leaves, and we’ll set something up.”
I nodded far too hard and fast. “Perfect.”
She waved to us and left the kitchen, and I clung to the counter, holding on as though I was about to fall. “Did that just happen? Or did I dream that? Because if that was a dream, I do not want to ever wake up.”
“That was no dream.” Walker leaned across the stainless steel that separated us. “When you said to me you were never going to cook for James, I told you I disagreed. Do you need to hear me sayI told you so? Or do you believe me now?”
“But …” Words once again escaped my mind. I literally didn’t even know what to say. What to think. And I desperately wanted to replay the last several seconds, but I swore I’d blacked out and didn’t remember a thing. “I guess … I just didn’t expect it. And never saw it coming. And?—”
“And you need to have a little more faith in yourself. Alivia, you’re fucking incredible in the kitchen. You should have seen yourself tonight. You need to believe me when I say this, and you need to know that, one day soon, you’re going to be even more well-known than me.” He walked around the counter and stood in front of me, his hands going to my waist.
I went to back up to put distance between us so the pastry chef wouldn’t see us, and his grip tightened.
“Walker,” I whispered, doing everything I could to stop her from hearing us. “I thought I was going to cry when James came in and drowned you in compliments, but now I’m really going to cry. That’s one. Two, what if she goes back and tells the whole restaurant that we’re, you know, touching?” I nodded toward the other chef.
“It doesn’t matter if she does. You’re no longer in a relationship with the head chef of Charred.”
My entire body froze. “What do you mean? You’re breaking up?—”
“I’m breaking up with Charred, baby.” He kissed me. “Not you.”
TWENTY-NINE
Walker
Before I got in my car and drove to our company’s corporate office to attend a meeting I’d requested a few days ago—the advance notice to ensure all my siblings would be there, including Beck—I sat in my home office. I didn’t come in here as much as I wanted to. Charred monopolized so much of my fucking time. Therefore, I spent more hours in my office at Charred. The accomplishments that hung on the walls there were specific to Charred LA. But in here, the wall art spanned my entire career. Articles that had been written in the top publications. The royalty I’d cooked for. The Michelin stars my restaurants had been awarded.
My brain went straight down memory lane as I scanned each of the frames. There were so many that I could no longer see the wallpaper my interior designer had chosen in here.
But out of all of them, there was one I couldn’t take my eyes off. One that captured my attention and wouldn’t let go.
And itwasn’t on the walls.
It was sitting on the back side of my desk.
Where the canvas lacked in size, it made up for in the message. It wasn’t just the only present I’d ever received; it was the best present I could have ever received.
Because it brought me back to the foundation. Where it had all started for me. Why I did what I did.
James’s charity event had only been a few days ago, and the morning after, when I reached out to the family to schedule our meeting, this painting was what had confirmed my decision. This painting had been in my hands seconds before I texted my family.
Its meaning had been swirling through my head nonstop.
Its purpose was a reminder that I needed to change paths.
For a long time, I’d forgotten the art of cooking. What it felt like to want to create. The burning desire to step foot in a kitchen was gone.
In its place was a fucking hate.
A resentfulness so goddamn deep that nothing was safe in my hands. Fingers that couldn’t scream, so they threw whatever they were holding.
Alivia had slowly changed that.
She rekindled a desire I never thought I would get back.
She made me feel.
