issues?” he joked.
He gave his friend a look that was reproachful before shaking his head. “A one-night stand has had me in a loop for the past month,” he admitted.
“Ah. The one-night stand that’s really not just one night,” Lorenzo said, looking wistful. “I’ve had a few of those in my lifetime.”
“Yes, but it was just one night,” Gabe confessed.
Lorenzo winced and then released a short whistle. “Then at the very least have one more night, bro,” he said.
One more wild night with Monica?
Maybe, just maybe, that would quench his desire for her. Or make him want her even more.
No. Monica Darby was off-limits. They couldn’t risk it again. It was just the thing to get her fired.
And me hooked.
“Sometimes you make me very envious, Zo,” Gabe said, purposely changing the subject.
“Why? Because I have three inches of height on you?” Lorenzo asked, shifting his bone-straight, waist-length hair back behind his broad shoulders.
Gabe chuckled. “I have the extra inches where it counts,” he said before pouring himself half a glass of the golden champagne.
“Way more info than I needed,” Lorenzo drawled. “But what’s on your mind? Or should I guess?”
“We talk. It wouldn’t be hard to guess. Not for you,” he said, turning to face the large window into the kitchen, usually bustling with activity.
“You miss cooking,” Lorenzo said with a brief glance over his shoulder.
Gabe nodded. “Sometimes more than other times,” he admitted. “Don’t get me wrong. I am so proud of the legacy we are building for Cress generations to come. These last three years at Cress, INC. has been eye-opening and challenging, but...”
“There is nothing like the adrenaline rush of heading a kitchen. Right, Chef?”
Gabe glanced over at his friend and then fixed his gaze back on the kitchen. “Correct, Chef,” he returned.
A sudden surge in laughter caused both men to look over at the waitstaff having an impromptu dance contest.
“And what of the race for CEO, then?” Lorenzo asked him, leaving the staff to their fun.
“I want that, too,” he stressed.
“In this not-so-perfect world, you can’t always have everything you want, Gabe.”
True.
Lorenzo nudged Gabe’s arm and then slightly jerked his head in the direction of the double doors leading into the kitchen. As soon as they stepped inside the massive space, he grabbed two aprons from the stacks of clean ones on polished wooden shelves by the door. He tossed one to his friend with ease.
Gabe caught it with one hand and a curious look.
“If you could make any dish in the world right now what would it be?” Lorenzo asked as he tied the strings around his waist.
Gabe did the same. “You have an entire buffet of food out there.”
“We are open six nights a week, and this is the first night I had time to celebrate my new cookbook, and tonight I would like Gabriel Cress, esteemed chef, my former head chef, two-time–James Beard Award winner and my best friend since culinary school, to cook a meal for me,” Lorenzo said, waving his hand toward the huge walk-in cooler in the corner. “What can I get you, Chef?”
“And you’ll be my sous-chef? Interesting,” Gabe said as he moved to one of the sinks to wash his hands.
“Yes, but it will be like your mystery woman...one night only,” Lorenzo said with a laugh as he gathered his hair at his nape with a black elastic band and then washed his hands, as well.
“Do you remember the dish that made Chef Roderick give me dish duties for a week?” Gabe asked.
“Do I!” Lorenzo said, shaking his head as he began retrieving pots.
For the next thirty minutes, Gabe allowed himself to think of nothing but his love of food, from prep to completion. Even as the music and the laughter of the staff filtered in to them, he was in a zone. It was an adrenaline rush, and his friend was the perfect sous-chef following every command and at times having the next item prepared for him even before he requested it. To Gabe it was the perfect symphony.
Soon the scent of his goat-cheese-and-roasted-butternut-squash bisque rose strong in the air. He used his hand to waft the aroma closer to his face and took a deep inhale. His cell phone vibrated in his back pocket, but he ignored it. With a plastic spoon he tasted the bisque before adding a large pinch from the bowl of pink Himalayan salt.
Moving with a rhythm that was fluid and precise, he cut the kernels from the cobs of corn Lorenzo