Can't Stand The Heat Page 5

  There was something strange about a restaurant before opening. Like a classroom after school was out, familiar surroundings where every item has its place and purpose, but none of it’s meant for you at the moment.

  Miranda hadn’t noticed much about the décor last night, but by day Market was a welcoming little place. She glanced down the tree-lined Upper West Side block, noting the cozy, bustling feel of the neighborhood even at ten o’clock on a Sunday morning. There was a school across the street, the large, fenced-in paved area in front entirely taken over by the weekly farmer’s market she assumed had given the restaurant its name.

  Young families mingled with old ladies carrying cloth shopping bags, all of them poring over fresh produce. The air had a beguiling warmth to it, the first harbinger of New York’s sultry summer heat.

  Claire had called, as promised, and delivered the exciting news that the magazine’s editorial board had arranged matters with Market’s financial backer, a woman named Eleanor Bonning, and Miranda would be spending an entire month in the kitchen there. A whole month! And that was just to start. Claire had mentioned something about the Cooking Channel being interested. The possibilities were endlessly exciting.

  Jess whistled, low and appreciative. “Sweet setup. I like this neighborhood.”

  “Location isn’t everything,” Miranda said. “Let’s see if the inside lives up to the promise of the exterior.”

  Bursting with anticipation, Miranda pushed open the front door and led Jess into the dimly lit restaurant. The soft gold-green of the walls and burnished golden wood of the bar glowed in the late afternoon sun. And wow, how far gone was she last night that she hadn’t even noticed the lovely, open flow between the main dining room and the smaller, more private room? The U-shaped bar held court between the rooms, the mirrored backsplash reflecting the green-gold walls and making the space feel even more open.

  Before she had a chance to berate herself over missing the tasteful copper wall sconces shaped like abstract Art Deco leaves, she was distracted by noise and movement from the main dining room to the right.

  Peeking around the bar, she could see that the back wall of the main room had an open pass through to the kitchen, which was teeming with activity.

  She glanced back at Jess, who shrugged and motioned her forward. Music was pouring out of the kitchen, a pounding bass beat layered over with screaming guitar. It was the kind of music the bad boys she went to high school with had blasted over the speakers of their souped-up muscle cars.

  Moving closer, she saw the mastermind behind this little jewel of a restaurant nodding his head to the beat and mouthing along with the lyrics. Something about being an anarchist.

  A young blond man she vaguely remembered from behind the bar the night before stepped up to the pass and caught sight of Miranda and Jess. Eyes widening, the bartender grabbed at Adam Temple’s sleeve to get his attention, gesturing toward the dining room.

  Adam looked over his shoulder, locking eyes with Miranda, and she had to gulp in a quick, discreet burst of air.

  Damn. She’d really been hoping that was a cocktail-induced hallucination. If there was anything worse than the ego of an executive chef, it was the ego of a good-looking executive chef.

  Most chefs had women throwing themselves at them like groupies tossing their panties on the stage at a rock concert, especially in these fallen times, with the rise of the popular television Cooking Channel. Chefs were celebrities, even the ones who didn’t have their own show. And unbelievably sexy specimens like the one in front of her?

  Well. The only sensible option was to stay as far away from him as possible. Which shouldn’t be a problem, since he was looking about as pleased to see them as if she and Jess were a party of twenty women with infants in strollers, showing up for a Mother’s Morning Out brunch.

  Miranda held her head high and marched forward, Jess trailing behind.

  Adam met her at the kitchen door, wiping his hands impatiently on the towel tucked into his apron. His mouth was set, his dark eyes flashing caution, but Miranda wasn’t about to let him intimidate her.

  “Chef Temple,” she said breezily, holding out her hand.

  “Miranda Wake,” he replied, putting his hands on his hips. He glanced down to her outstretched palm, then back up to her face. “We’ve met,” he said. “You may not remember.”

  Heat scorched her cheeks, but Miranda refused to acknowledge it. “Of course,” she said, dropping her hand to her side. “But you haven’t met my brother. This is Jess Wake.”

  Jess stepped up, and Miranda felt a momentary glow of pride in his manners. “It’s an honor, sir.” He grinned. “My old boss would have kittens if he knew I was standing here with you.”

  Okay, glow-of-pride moment over. “Jess,” she hissed.

  But Adam laughed, the hardness melting from his features as if it had never been. “Hey, it’s always good to meet a fan,” he said easily. “Or someone who once worked for a fan. Your boss, he was a foodie?”

  “You could say that,” Jess replied. “He owned the self-proclaimed fanciest restaurant in Brandewine, Indiana. I waited tables there for two years. When Miranda told me the news, I couldn’t resist the chance to tag along.”

  “Right. The news,” Adam said, his voice noticeably cooler. He slanted a glance at Miranda. “That your sister’s got herself a job peeling potatoes in my kitchen for the next month.”

  “Speaking of jobs,” Jess said brightly, “are you still hiring front-of-house staff?”

  “Jess recently moved back to the city, and he’s looking for work this summer before he goes back to school,” Miranda said.

  Adam’s eyes widened. “Jesus, what is it with your family? Every Wake in the country have a hard-on to work at Market? Should I expect your mother next?”

  Jess flinched a little, but stood his ground. “Nope,” he said. “Our parents died when I was a kid, so you don’t have to worry about them.”

  Miranda held in a gasp with some effort. What was Jess thinking, offering up such a personal thing to a stranger?

  Adam looked taken aback, the annoyance in his eyes morphing into the shocked pity Miranda’d seen and despised in the face of everyone who found out about her family.

  Miranda braced herself for semisincere platitutes or stammering sympathies, but Adam said, “I’ll have to check with the restaurant manager. Grant’s taking care of hiring the wait staff. Hey, Grant, can you come out here for a sec?” That last bit was shouted through the pass.

  The blond man Miranda had mistaken for the bartender appeared a moment later, and Adam introduced him as Grant Holloway. Adam filled him in, and Grant offered to take Jess down to the office for an interview. Miranda watched them go, trying to be grateful that Adam had allowed the awkward moment Jess created to pass without comment.

  The gratitude evaporated when Adam turned on her, eyes snapping. “I’m not crazy about the idea of hiring your kid brother. Bad enough I’ve got you for a month—if we hire that kid, you’ll have an excuse to be around even longer.”

  Miranda’s temper kicked into high gear. She snatched her reporter’s notebook from her purse, unscrewed the cap on her favorite tortoiseshell fountain pen, and flipped to a blank page.

  Writing in the shorthand she’d developed over the years, she spoke the note aloud. “Makes hiring decisions based on personal and evidently volatile emotions, rather than fair, open-minded business practices.”

  “What the hell are you doing?” Adam was practically snarling.

  “My job,” she told him. She made another note. “Appears to hold a grudge. Unable to see the benefits of increased publicity for a new restaurant?”

  “I’m not a moron,” he said, barely moving his lips. “Publicity is a good thing. I just don’t happen to think having a critic in my kitchen is worth it.”

  “Journalist,” she corrected him. “I’m embedding myself in your kitchen like a war correspondent embedded with the troops. Although I’m hoping this assignment won�
��t be quite that bloody.”

  Adam arched a brow. “Don’t count on it. Things get nasty in the kitchen; it’s inevitable. Tensions run hotter than boiling water and sometimes the testosterone overflows. I don’t need some pretty little scribbler getting her panties in a twist over bad tempers or rough language. I’m not censoring myself for you.”

  “Excellent!” Miranda wanted to clap her hands. He was too perfect. She couldn’t wait to write about him.

  He stared at her. “Shit. That was exactly what you wanted to hear, wasn’t it?”

  She nodded. “I need to get an accurate impression of what it’s like in a professional kitchen.”

  “So you can crap all over it in your magazine.”

  And a best-selling book, if I’m lucky. “I’ve been given to understand that I’ll have unrestricted access to you and your staff for the next month. Whether you like it or not, Chef Temple, this is happening.” She gripped her pen and notebook a little harder, only noticing when the spiral rings cut into her palm painfully. “Look, this isn’t exactly how I imagined it would be, either, getting my big break. I should apologize for the way I behaved last night. It was unprofessional and insulting.”

  Adam crossed his arms over his broad chest. Miranda tried not to notice how that made the corded muscles in his tanned forearms bulge.

  “Yeah,” he said, not blinking.

  “Yeah?” Miranda repeated. “That’s all you have to say?”

  “I’m agreeing with you,” he said. “Unprofessional. Insulting. You should apologize. I can’t wait to hear it.”

  Miranda clenched her jaw so hard she was afraid her teeth would snap. “You’re an ass,” she seethed.

  Satisfaction glittered in his dark eyes, as though she’d confirmed something for him. “Maybe, sweetheart,” he said. “But for the next month, I’m also your god and king.”

  He leaned down until she felt his hot breath brush her cheek. “When you’re in my kitchen, my word is fucking law. Be sure to write that in your little notebook.”

  Miranda shuddered, his nearness affecting her in unwelcome ways. But she refused to step away. She held her ground, and when Adam straightened, she looked him directly in the eye. She thought she caught a fleeting glimpse of something like respect, but she couldn’t be sure, because in the next instant, he was clapping her on the back and saying, “Come on, scribbler. Let’s go introduce you to the crew.”

  SIX

  A professional kitchen was almost never completely abandoned; there was always prep to be done. But things were at a low pitch, Miranda could see through the open pass; only three or four cooks worked industriously at their stations. They glanced up at her curiously, but mostly they stayed focused on what their hands were doing.

  Adam led her into his large kitchen, saying, “We’re still finalizing the menu for the opening next weekend. Tasting and tweaking, getting it all down so it’s perfect every time. Restaurant cooking isn’t like throwing a dinner party at your apartment—it’s not just about how good the recipe is, or how well you execute it that night. It’s about consistency. Being able to do it perfectly, over and over, so if a guest comes in and loves a dish, he can come back and order that same thing every time and always get exactly what he expects.”

  Miranda made a few notes. Her heart pounded with excitement. In spite of Adam’s hostile reception, this was already fascinating.

  The cooks were mostly men, dressed uniformly in the standard-issue white jackets and loose, black-and-white-checked pants. They wore leather or rubber clogs on their feet, and they moved past each other in the small confines of the kitchen space like football players on the field, instinctively knowing where everyone else was.

  The exception to all of that was leaning over the huge range, holding the lid of a red enameled cast-iron pot. He whooped loudly before turning and throwing a long arm around Adam’s neck.

  “Adam!” The voice was raucous and rough, with a Cockney edge. “It’s done, come taste. Hello, hello, what have we here?”

  Miranda looked up . . . and up, into a pair of knowing black eyes. Tall, skinny, shock of black hair, muscular bare arms, and a ripped T-shirt sporting a coy, half-naked cow-girl and the words THE NEW YORK DOLLS. She looked back to see Adam close his eyes briefly, as if praying for patience. “Miranda Wake, this is Frankie Boyd. My second in command.”

  Frankie grinned, a quick flash of teeth and the tip of his tongue, and said, “Know who you are already, luv. But it’s ever so nice to meet you, all formal like.”

  He extended a hand, and Miranda took it cautiously, not sure what to expect. “So . . . you’re the sous-chef?” she asked.

  “Sous-chef, informer, enforcer, first mate, punk rocker,” Frankie said extravagantly, “and worshipper at your divine altar, oh, gorgeous one. May I kiss your hand?”

  His eyes laughed down at her. Miranda lifted her chin, completely unwilling to be overawed by this tornado of a man.

  “Pucker up, buttercup,” she said, and watched Frankie’s eyes widen in comical surprise as he dropped his arm from Adam’s shoulders. Adam laughed, and Frankie bowed low over Miranda’s hand, pressing a soft kiss to her knuckles.

  “Oh,” he breathed. “I see why you lost your head over this one. I wish you luck, mate; I think you’re going to need it.”

  Miranda flushed, acutely aware that it was half embarrassment, half accomplishment, the thrill of holding her own.

  Frankie gave her one last cheerful leer, before turning to his boss. “Hate to interrupt, and for once I really mean that, but that braised pork belly you started isn’t getting any nicer sitting in its sauce, going cold.”

  “Go on and get it plated, you hooligan, I’m coming.”

  Frankie leaped for the stove, grabbing his pot with the towel tucked in the waistband of his black jeans. Adam shook his head, obviously used to Frankie’s ways.

  “I’ve got to taste this,” Adam said, gesturing over his shoulder. He cocked his head suddenly and his eyes brightened for the first time since she arrived. “Hey, you wanna taste it, too?”

  Miranda raised both brows. “Really?”

  “Shit, yeah. You know, maybe this doesn’t have to be all bad, having you around. You can be like our ringer; we can get the critic’s take on something before it ever hits the menu.”

  “You don’t think that’s cheating?”

  “All’s fair in love and cookery, sweetheart. I’ll do whatever it takes to make this place a success.” He pointed both index fingers at her like guns and pulled an ironic face. “Case in point.”

  Rolling her eyes, Miranda said, “Fine. But just so you know, I’m not going to censor myself, either. Whatever I think of your food, I’m not going to mince words. So be prepared to deal with it.”

  The insufferable man grinned, lazy and devastating, teeth glinting white and even in his handsome face. “Looking forward to it.”

  Adam led her over to the pass where Frankie was plating a slice of pork belly. Even after last night and everything she’d said about gimmicky greenmarket restaurants, Miranda wasn’t sure what to expect of Adam Temple’s food.

  She’d left the party without trying any of the hors d’oeuvres, too eager to sit down with Claire for a late-night conference about the incredible opportunity that had just opened up.

  He was so damn cocky about his cooking, she almost hoped it was terrible.

  Adam tried the pork belly first, lifting the spoon to his mouth with a considering air that for some reason struck Miranda as unreasonably sexy. He savored it for a moment, his mouth moving slowly, then he and Frankie were off to the races, talking at each other a mile a minute about braising times and the relative merits of clover versus wild-flower honey. But Miranda couldn’t really follow the discussion; she was too busy having an orgasm through her mouth.

  Adam had passed her the spoon when he was done, and she’d innocently, unknowingly, dipped it into the seared, tender creation on the plate before her. Nothing in her experience—and she’d reviewed
more than a hundred restaurants in her four years as a food critic—prepared her for what she was about to taste.

  Pork belly—humble, fatty uncured bacon—was the current darling of the Manhattan restaurant scene. Every customer wanted it, so every restaurant served it. Mostly, it was oily and tasteless, slippery with pork fat and stringy, meager meat. It was paired with a variety of spices and vegetables, from anise to zucchini, but this.

  This.

  Was something altogether different. Smooth and dark, thick with meat and juice, tangy with the bittersweetness of apple cider and the round nuttiness of ginger-glazed walnuts. The pork belly was crisp on the outside, the browned top a delicious contrast to the unctuous richness of the braised meat. The sharp notes of acid, the brown sugar on the back of her tongue, forced a sound like a moan out of Miranda’s throat.

  Miranda opened her eyes to find Adam regarding her with a look of deep satisfaction.

  “I know I said last night you should keep your opinions to yourself, but I’d love to know what that noise meant.”

  Miranda swallowed slowly, not allowing herself to be hurried through the moment. When she’d rolled the after-flavors of caramel and cinnamon across the roof of her mouth, she said, “I’m hoping that if I have to eat humble pie, you’ll at least serve it with that sauce.”

  “Is this going to be your first time working in a kitchen?” Adam was trying to play it cool, but inside, man, he was giving himself the big high five because this gorgeous, prickly woman with exacting standards liked his food.

  It never got old, no matter how many guests he’d sent home with happy smiles on their faces. Nothing was more guaranteed to send Adam into the stratosphere. He’d never get sick of that look, that blissed-out moment of transcendence when someone tasted a dish he’d thought up and prepared with his own hands (or the hands of his crew, because really, those guys were basically an extension of him) and just freaking loved it.

  Always a genuine kick, but somehow, the rush this time was even more intense. And he didn’t kid himself; he knew why. It was because it was her.