Some Like It Hot (16 page)

She reared back as if he’d slapped her, a pang of something flashing through her eyes so quickly, Danny couldn’t read it before she recovered her balance as gracefully as a dancer.

“It was fun,” she echoed, expressionless and bland, as if they were talking about a trip to the zoo or a walk through Central Park. “Of course, that’s what I’m known for. The original Good Time Girl, that’s me. Well, playtime’s over, babe. See you in the kitchen.”

Danny frowned at the sour note that curdled her voice, like a cup of buttermilk spilled into cake batter, but he was frowning at her back because she’d already turned away, on to the next challenge.

She shut the door behind her with a careless kick of her heel, leaving Danny staring at the blank white wood paneling and wishing it could be so easy for him to move on.

Eva took a moment, with Danny’s good-bye punctuated by the click of the door latch still echoing in her ears.

Fun.
Why did that suddenly sound like an indictment? It was all she’d ever wanted or offered, before. But somehow, when Danny Lunden said it, her soul shriveled up like a sun-dried tomato.

Blowing out a breath, she ran her hands through her hair, fingers snagging on the tangles. She had to pull it together; her life had gone far enough to shit already without letting her father see her lose it over some guy.

As he’d be very happy to tell anyone who’d listen, Theo Jansen had never allowed emotions to get in the way of business.

Half an hour after his wife’s funeral, he’d been in a business meeting with the realtor who’d eventually found him the property that became his first three-star restaurant.

Claire liked to sniff and say that Theo Jansen hid in his work, like a small boy afraid to face his bedtime, but Eva had never seen where that was such a terrible thing.

So what if Dad could teach a master class on repression? It gets the job done.

Working to control her own wayward emotions, Eva counted her breaths and fumbled in the pocket of her robe for her phone.

Flicking a quick finger over the screen, she scrolled past the voicemails to the frantic text message from her assistant, Drew.

Eva’s heart stopped, every extraneous thought and feeling cramming down to make room for the enormous bubble of panic expanding in her brain.

Whipping the phone up to her ear, she dialed Devon Sparks’s number, but it rang through to voicemail.

Tapping her toe, she waited for the beep and blurted out, “Devon, oh my God. I’m so sorry, I just heard. Please let me know what’s going on with you and Lilah. Take care of each other!”

“Getting up to speed, are we?” Theo asked as Eva thumbed the phone off and staggered over to drop down on the couch.

“Is it something with the pregnancy?” Eva couldn’t imagine the terror of that. She didn’t even know Lilah, really, had only met her a couple of times, but she’d seemed sweet and funny and down to earth, completely unlike the women Devon usually dated.

“She fainted. Her blood pressure spiked, from what I understand. I’m sure bed rest will take care of it.”

Eva’s heart sank, even as she sent up a prayer of thanks that it wasn’t something more serious. “But the reality is, it doesn’t matter if she’s all better tomorrow—after a scare like this, Devon’s not leaving her again. It took every ounce of persuasion I’ve got to talk him into it the first time. Which means we’re down a judge.”

Theo leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “You’ve still got Claire as the voice of authority, and you’ve got your token color commentator, that musician who throws the wild parties.” He shook his head, clearly baffled by Kane’s popularity, and Eva bit her tongue. Now was not the time to defend her friendship with Kane Slater. Theo had agreed that including him as a judge would increase the mass appeal of the competition, so there wasn’t really any more to say.

“But Devon was our celebrity chef judge, our best link to the restaurant world.”
And our famously good-looking chef that thousands of women swoon over every time his show comes on the Cooking Channel,
she added silently.

Eva slumped over, running a hand through her tangled hair. The night’s lack of sleep was catching up with her. She felt sluggish and slow, mired in doubt and fear. “How are we going to find someone to replace him on such short notice?”

She looked at her father, so calm and collected, so in control, and felt a quick spurt of gladness that he was here to get her through this.

Of course, she hated herself for it—this whole thing was supposed to be about proving how capable she was on her own, damn it—but the feeling was there all the same.

Her father, riding to the rescue, taking over, having his opinion about her abilities confirmed … She could feel everything she’d been working toward slipping away, her father’s respect draining through her cupped hands like water.

No.

Stiffening her spine, Eva sat up straight and yanked her brain into focus. God, she needed coffee.

“Our new judge needs to be someone the Cooking Channel will see as a big draw,” she muttered, flipping furiously through her mental contact list. “But the problem is, most of those chefs are booked solid, months in advance.”

Theo’s silvery brows drew down in a frown of concern. “Are you still having trouble convincing the Cooking Channel of the RSC’s television appeal? Eva, we’ve been over this and over this—”

“I know,” she cried, the sharp, sickening tug of failure getting a stranglehold on her. “It’s under control! Or at least, it was. Before Devon left.”

Theo sighed his Eva-is-so-dramatic sigh and reached out to pull her against his side. Kissing the top of her head, he said, “Okay, honey. It’s going to be fine. We’ll find a great new judge, and in the meantime, I’ll fill in, so we can keep the competition going.”

A flicker of hope warmed Eva’s chest. “That might work. As a stopgap solution, of course—not that you don’t have the potential to be a big Cooking Channel star, Daddy.”

She grinned up at him, her world coming back into balance, but Theo didn’t smile back. Instead, he let her go and stood up from the couch, pacing a few steps back and forth in front of the coffee table.

“Eva. You’re not going to like this, but it needs to be said.”

Clutching the bathrobe more tightly around her, Eva struggled to present as upright and business-like an image as she could. Considering she was barefoot and naked under the robe, and her hair probably looked like someone had stuck her head in a blender.

“Go ahead, I can take it,” she tried to joke. “It can’t be worse than everything else that’s happened today.”

“Well, it’s early yet.” Theo gave her a quelling look, pressing his lips together tightly. “Look. I know I’m the last person who should be lecturing anyone on the subject of romantic entanglements…”

Eva’s stomach sank down to her knees. “Dad—” she protested faintly, but he held up a hand to stop her.

“I know,” he repeated forcefully, eyes snapping with determination. “I’ve slept with my share of RSC contestants over the years.”

Her father, Eva reflected with a shudder, had a weakness for pastry chefs, too. He enjoyed the female variety, but still. Ugh.

“And it’s a damn stupid double standard,” he continued, “but the fact is, this year’s competition faces an unprecedented level of scrutiny. It’s what we wanted, what we worked for—but it means that the eyes of the world are watching everything we do.”

Eva shot off the couch. “So let them watch! I haven’t done anything wrong. I’m not a judge; nothing I say or do has any bearing on which teams advance to the next round.”

“I understand that.” Theo shook his head impatiently. “But it’s not about actual wrongdoing. It’s about the public’s perception—and you have to admit, Eva, from the outside, it doesn’t look good for the panel moderator to be carrying on with one of the chefs.”

I don’t care,
she wanted to shout.
I don’t care how it looks, or what people think! I just want Danny!

But … all Danny wanted was a night of fun, and he’d had that already. He couldn’t get out of there fast enough, eager to get back to his team, his friends, the people who mattered to him.

What, exactly, was Eva fighting for here?

As if sensing her wavering, Theo put a comforting hand on her shoulder. “We agreed, Eva. This is our year. The year when the RSC finally gains the recognition it deserves.”

The year when Eva finally got the chance to extend the reach of her mother’s legacy.

Eva closed her eyes briefly, but nodded. “I know. You’re right.” She tried out a smile. Shaky, but passable. “This is our year.”

My year.

“And look,” Theo pointed out, “it doesn’t have to mean you can never see him again. Once the competition is over—”

“No.” Eva cut him off, unable to listen to any more. Shaking back her hair, she started the process of steeling herself for the long day ahead. “It’s fine. Last night was just … stress relief. Nothing serious.”

Fun.

Ignoring the clutch of pain in her chest, Eva smiled again, and this time she felt the familiar security of her polished, professional mask slip over her face.

“Not to worry, Dad. It’s over. I’ve got everything under control.”

The mood in the competition kitchen was tense that morning, although it was impossible to know if that was due to the timer ticking relentlessly down toward the moment when the judges would sample the final dishes, the knowledge that one team would be going home after today’s elimination, or the lingering looks of hatred aimed in Beck’s direction by a bruised, infuriated Ryan Larousse.

Or maybe it was just Danny, who felt tense because he’d walked into his team’s hotel room to find all four of them pissed off at him.

And when he’d tried to apologize for not checking on them and making sure they were okay, they’d gotten even more upset.

“For fuck’s sake, Daniel,” Max had finally growled. “We didn’t need you here propping us up and calming us down. We just needed to know you were okay.”

Taken aback, Danny hadn’t known exactly what he was supposed to say. “I was fine.”

“None of us saw you or heard from you after you did your white knight thing and caught that pot of boiling stock,” Jules pointed out, arms crossed stiffly over her chest. “For all we knew, you had to go to the hospital or something. And you didn’t have your phone, so we couldn’t even call you!”

Part of Danny had wanted to lash out, hit her back with a sneer and a sarcastic “I’m surprised you even noticed I was missing.”

Jules had been pretty out of it ever since she and Max got together, and as for Max, himself—well, Danny had learned not to count on his brother years ago.

But that would start a whole big fight, and what would it accomplish? All it would do would get everyone riled up and at each other’s throats right before they went into the biggest culinary challenge they’d yet faced.

So instead, he’d ground his back teeth until his jaw clicked, and smiled as he spread his hands out to the sides, trying not to wince at the stretch of his red, blistered palms. “Obviously, I’m fine.”

In the end, the only way Danny could get them to shut up and quit acting like he was some fragile little invalid who’d needed nursemaiding was to promise to break competition rules by carrying his cell phone into the kitchen, in the pocket of his black jeans.

He figured as long as he didn’t actually use it to look up a recipe or a technique or something, and it didn’t go off in the middle of the challenge, it was probably okay.

Winslow hadn’t said anything in front of the rest of the team, but the minute everyone trooped out of the room to head down to the kitchen, Danny had found himself staring into his friend’s arch, slyly amused face.

“So … Miss Eva took care of you, did she?”

Danny’d stiffened, ready to stonewall, but it didn’t matter. Win patted him on the shoulder and said, “No need to confirm or deny, sweet thang. I got your number, and my lips are sealed.”

“There’s nothing to keep quiet over, and nothing to deny,” Danny insisted. “It was just a thing that happened, a one-time-only type of deal, and now it’s back to real life. Back to reality.”

Reality, in Danny’s case, meant the meticulous, careful, safe, comforting world of pastry. Although baking on a challenge deadline, with judges waiting and a television crew taping, admittedly took some of the comfort out of it.

Forcing down a snarl of pain when one of his raw palms accidentally scraped over the rough edge of his marble pastry board, Danny cursed himself for the millionth time this morning for running out of Eva’s suite without grabbing that magic lotion the paramedic had used.

Beside him at their team’s allotted pair of gas burners, Winslow sent him a worried glance, his hands never slowing in his measured, steady stirring of the vanilla bean custard. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” Danny couldn’t help but grin at the pains Win took to speak out of the side of his mouth, as if he was terrified the camera might pick up on his comment. “How’s that custard coming?”

Lifting his wooden spoon, Win watched critically as the warm creamy liquid dripped from the back of it. “Not quite set yet. Few more minutes.”

Winslow was their swing guy, a jack-of-all-kitchen-trades, from butchering to delicate pastry work. He’d flitted from station to station today, helping out wherever he was needed. They were damn lucky to have a chef as multi-talented as Win on the team, and Danny knew it.

He felt especially lucky right at the moment, as Winslow took the tedious, finicky job of stirring the custard in its double boiler, making sure it didn’t scorch over the very low flame, and left Danny free to deal with caramelizing the plums he’d macerated the day before in sugar, lemon juice, and fresh thyme.

Running to the coolers, Danny checked on his yeast batter for the buttermilk waffles that would serve as the base of his breakfast-for-dinner dessert. He’d planned a sort of breakfast sandwich of waffles enclosing caramelized plums suspended in custard, but when he peered into the huge stainless-steel bowl holding his waffle batter, his heart seized with panic.

It was a mess. Watery and separated, with ugly clumps of what looked like congealing flour, and it sure as hell hadn’t looked like that when he put it away the night before.

Grabbing the bowl from the cooler, Danny hauled it over to his team’s table and peeled back the clear plastic wrap to get a better look.

“Christ, what happened there?” Max asked as he jogged past holding a bunch of grapes.

“I don’t fucking know.” Danny scrabbled for his wire whisk, dragging the balloon shape through the odd, chunky batter and whipping the whole thing into a furious froth.

“Are you going to be able to salvage it?” Jules huddled close, pausing in her construction of miniature towers of perfectly blanched, thinly sliced potatoes. Her version of home fries was going to be the essence of refinement, Danny had no doubt.

He did, however, have his doubts about this freaking batter. “I don’t think so,” he replied, giving it another good whisk and watching bubbles of stubborn flour balls break the surface sluggishly. “Something’s off, maybe the yeast was bad, or the bowl wasn’t perfectly clean and had some vinegar or lemon juice in it that soured the batter. Impossible to say, and it doesn’t matter now, anyway, because this whole dish is fucked.”

Danny resisted the urge to fling the bowl of nasty stuff across the kitchen, like his father in one of his temper fits.

Turning to face his worried teammates, who’d gathered around like mourners at a funeral, was the hardest thing Danny had ever done. “I’m sorry,” he said, almost choking. “I let you all down.”

“Hey, no. Don’t say that. The custard’s still good,” Winslow pointed out desperately, still stirring like a machine. “And those plums are the bomb, man, I can’t stop swiping tastes of ’em.”

“Yeah, seriously. Shut the eff up, Danny,” Jules said. “You haven’t let anyone down.”

“It’s just time for a little reconceptualizing.” Max’s eyes had that same twinkle he used to get when they were kids and he was about to lead his hero-worshiping brother into some terrible mischief or other.

“Oh no,” Danny moaned, bringing one hand up to cover his eyes. Peeking through the gaps between his fingers, he glared at Beck. “What, you’ve got no advice or platitudes for me?”

Beck paused, his expression grave. “Never give in,” he finally said. “Never surrender.”

Winslow snorted. “What is that, a
Star Trek
reference?”

“No, man,” Jules shook her head. “Wasn’t it in that
Star Trek
spoof movie,
Galaxy Quest
?”

“Winston Churchill,” Beck told them, turning back to his own work of stuffing forcemeat into sausage casings. “I’m paraphrasing, but…”

For a moment, the silence was punctuated only by the shouts and cooking noises of the other teams.

“The point is,” Max said, “all is not lost. Far from it! Come on, we’ve got these awesome components, the custard and the plums, and about—” He glanced at the ticking timer. “Geez. About an hour left. Holy crap. I’ve got to get back to my red wine sauce. Danny, you’ve got this, man, right?”

“Yeah, I’ve got it,” Danny said, waving them away.

He so didn’t have it, but the last thing they needed was to go down for all three of the main dishes being incomplete because everyone was standing around kibbutzing about Danny’s failed dessert.

“Um, what should I do?” Winslow asked hesitantly.

“Just keep stirring.” Danny regretted his terseness, but Winslow hopped to the job anyway, moving that spoon through the thickening custard as if the fate of the world hung on it having a perfect, silken texture.

Poor kid, he could probably read Danny’s uncertainty in every line of his body, but what could he say? Danny had never been the creative one, the man with the plan. He was a foot soldier. He executed. He didn’t come up with ideas.

The kitchen doors opened with a bang that drew Danny’s attention. He was jumpy, distractable, that’s all—it certainly wasn’t that he’d been wondering where Eva was, or that he was hoping to see her now.

Danny knew he was lying to himself the instant his heart lifted into his throat when she stepped through the doors. She was immaculate as always in a pair of soft, tight-fitting pants the color of a perfectly ripe Italian eggplant and a creamy confection of a shirt that wrapped around her slender form, revealing nothing, but somehow leaving nothing to the imagination.

He’d never known any woman as effortlessly sensual and seductive as Eva Jansen. A rush of desire and he was hard in his jeans, aching with the need to touch her.

So he was nothing but a convenient sex toy to her. Maybe he could live with that.

The guy who walked into the kitchen after her, however, put a very effective dampener on Danny’s libido.

“Shit, what is
he
doing here,” Danny muttered.

“Who?” Win wanted to know.

“The old guy,” Danny said, jerking his head toward the new arrivals. “That’s Theo Jansen.”

“And where’s Devon Sparks?” Winslow’s sharp eyes had noted the one absence from the normal crew of judges as Claire Durand and Kane Slater marched in, followed by no one.

Danny shrugged, watching from the corner of his eye as Eva finished her consultation with the TV producer and stepped forward, hand raised. “Looks like we’re about to find out.”

“Chefs! Can you gather around for a second, please? We’ll stop the wall clock, so you won’t lose any time.”

Danny followed the gaggle of sweaty, red-faced, food-stained men and women up to the front of the kitchen.

It was stupid—these were his people. He was just one of the crowd, and he blended in with them perfectly in his chef’s jacket smeared with ruby-red plum juice and with a drying patch of batter crusting down one sleeve.

Still, he stood in front of Eva and her distinguished father, and felt like digging his toes in the ground and brushing at his dirty clothes like some urchin off the street.

“As some of you may already know, the man to my left is my father, Theo Jansen. He ran this competition for twenty years, and he’s here to lend us his expertise, so please welcome him!”

There was a polite round of applause, but looking around the room at the other competitors’ faces, Danny was pretty sure the prevailing reaction was impatience to get back to cooking.

Theo Jansen stepped forward, smiling like a benevolent uncle. “This is the first year I’ve stepped back and let someone else take control—my daughter, Eva. And from what I can see, she’s doing a fantastic job!”

The false heartiness of his voice grated in Danny’s ears, and he thought he saw a quickly suppressed wince from Eva. But her face stayed smooth and pleasant, camera-ready, even when Theo continued, “But I have to say, I’m glad to be here, so I can keep an eye on things.”

Plastering on a smile that Danny knew was fake the same way he could tell imitation vanilla from pure vanilla extract, Eva moved up to stand next to her father and took a deep breath. “Chefs, I also have some upsetting news, which is that Devon Sparks has had to leave us.”

Interest rustled through the room as chefs glanced at one another, eyebrows raised. “He and his wife are expecting their first child together,” Eva explained, “and there have been some complications. Nothing life threatening, but Devon feels that he needs to be there for his family at this time, and of course, we understand.”

“So who’s going to be the new third judge?” Jules muttered, just loudly enough for Danny to hear. “Crap, we did all that research on Sparks, his likes and dislikes, and now it’s for shit.”

“I know you’re wondering who will take Devon’s place,” Eva said, still wearing that imitation vanilla smile. “In the interests of moving forward, not losing any time or momentum with the competition, we need to get someone in that third judges’ chair quickly, so … my father will be stepping in as a judge.”

A shiver of dread worked its way down Danny’s spine. Somehow, this didn’t feel like good news.

“I’ll still be running the competition, and of course I’m the panel moderator, so I’ll be tasting your food right alongside my father and the other judges.” She glanced over at Danny as if she couldn’t help it. He stared back, unsure how he was even supposed to react.

“Okay. Playtime’s over,” Eva concluded, swallowing hard, and Danny had to work to contain his flinch. Flexing his fingers, he concentrated on the pain of his burned hands, using that focus to keep his face blank and emotionless.

Theo Jansen stepped forward, his hearty voice booming out over the assembled chefs. “So get back to cooking—you’ve got less than an hour left on the timer!”

Everyone scattered, grumbling about sauces that had been left on the stove too long, but Danny lingered for a moment, his guts clenched into a knot at the way Eva’s throat moved convulsively as she swallowed, her eyes shadowed dark gray with what looked an awful lot like regret.

Her hand grasped the sleeve of his chef’s jacket, a quick, glancing brush of the fingers that was enough to stop Danny in his tracks.

“Danny,” she said softly, flicking a glance at the television camera against the wall, filming the action by the ovens.

No one gave a shit what they were doing, Danny was sure—all anyone cared about was the relentless ticking of the timer as they rushed to get their dishes finished. Still, he jerked his head in the direction of the walk-in cooler.