Stupid me.
I ducked inside. The cooks were stocking their stations, slicing, chopping, joking, yelling, but as I entered the narrow work aisle, the kitchen fell suspiciously silent. A trio of back waiters nudged one another, one of them slipping his phone into his pocket in an elaboratelycasual gesture. I looked at Constanza for guidance, but our motherly garde-manger was deep in conversation with the dishwashing crew. Tomas caught my eye and winked.
“Chula!”Constanza bustled over. “Howareyou?”
“Fine. Why is everybody acting so weird?”
But I thought I knew. Gossip traveled like cockroaches through the kitchen. No matter how professionally Eric behaved, no matter how hard I worked, sooner or later word would get out I was sleeping with the boss.
“Not weird. No weird,” Constanza said. “Jefe, he wants to see you.”
“Thanks. I heard.”
I wanted to see him, too. Anyway, I needed to change into my chef’s coat.
I headed for the office, ignoring Lucas’s sympathetic look as I passed. Ray was just leaving Eric’s office. Ray handled routine staff matters—requests for overtime, advances, and days off. He was probably in there reminding Eric that women were trouble in the kitchen and I was a lawsuit waiting to happen.
He nodded stiffly. “March.”
I gave him a dead-eye stare. “Chef.”
Eric was standing at his desk, his back to the door.
“Hey.” I smiled. “You wanted to see me?”
He turned. No answering smile. “Close the door, please.”
I complied. He didn’t move to kiss me. Didn’t quite meet my eyes. Didn’t acknowledge in any way that we’d been together last night. Which was fine, I told myself. Even with the door closed, the restaurant was no place for Public Displays of Affection. I’d never been touchy-feely anyway.
I angled my head. “What’s up?”
He shifted, giving me a clear view of his desk, and nudged the computer so the monitor was facing me. “You tell me.”
My heart moved into my throat. I looked at the screen. Oh. Ohcrap.
There was my banner,Hungry, with its familiar apple-missing-a-bite graphic. (So far, Snow White and the computer people hadn’t written a cease-and-desist letter demanding their logo back.) The headline was from two days ago:Dumpling Love, A Taste of Home Wherever You Are.
I’d written about mothers and comfort food, about the combinations of protein and noodles that spelled and smelled like home—Asian dumplings, Italian ravioli, Momma’s chicken and dumplings, and... Yeah. There it was. A recipe for sweet potato pierogi. My own recipe, okay? No red cabbage. But still... Pierogi.
My stomach sank. When I checked this morning, I had thirty-two comments and almost a dozen shares on social media. Not my best-performing post, but close. Now there were eighty-one comments.
No, eighty-two. I blinked. Eighty-three.
Crap. “How did you...” Of course. “Ray.”
“He follows this...Hungryon Instagram. Naturally, he didn’t know it was you.” Eric looked at me briefly.Neither did I,his eyes accused.
“Yeah.” I swallowed. “Look, Eric, I...”
“I didn’t believe him,” my lover continued evenly. He reached for the keyboard, careful not to touch me, and scrolled down. “Until he showed me this.”
Monday’s post filled the screen.Low and Slow: How to Make the Best Scrambled Eggs Ever!I’d done my best to follow Eric’s technique, beating and folding the eggs myself, staging a photo to go with each step of the instructions. The final shot, though, I’d taken earlier in the day. Those were Eric’s eggs, fluffy yellow and perfectly smooth. That was his arm, holding the plate. And... those were his very recognizable tattoos.
I felt sick. I’d cropped that photo. I knew I had, to hide his identity. But maybe, in my hurry to get the blog done before our date, I’d uploaded the uncropped photo by accident.
“There are no accidents,”Momma used to say. Or maybe that was Freud.
“You wrote about me,” Eric said. “About us.”
