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“Um. I will. Later.”
Caspian narrowed his gaze, and a confident smirk lifted the corners of his mouth. “Ah, later. Right.”
He knew. Darn it. How had he guessed so easily? Espresso was my secret ingredient.
I’d done my research before arriving for the interview, so I’d seen his photograph on their company website. However, nothing had quite prepared me for the utter beauty of the man. He had the aura of an artist but interlaced with a red-hot manly sexiness.
One look into his light blue eyes and my stomach fluttered. His disheveled dirty-blond hair seemed kissed by the sun and basically begged my hands to explore. A full mouth and a five-o’clock shadow fit well with his slightly edgy vibe.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to make you a second cup?” Caspian asked, interrupting my appraisal of his visage. “In case you decide you want another later?”
I returned his facetious smile. “That won’t be necessary. Thank you.”
“Would you like a lesson?”
My thighs tightened, and not from the workout I’d done that morning. I swallowed, wishing I had a fan, because it was five thousand degrees behind this bar. “A lesson? In what?”
One eyebrow raised, and he smirked again. “The espresso machine. What else could I be referring to?”
“Right. Obviously. No, I don’t need a lesson. It’s a similar model to the one we had at my last job. I’m sure I can figure it out.”
“You let me know if you change your mind, okay?”
“Yeah, sure,” I said.
The languid, unhurried way he spoke and moved made me want to stretch out in a spot of sun and simply watch him. Or curl myself around him for warmth. His smiling eyes were an open door right into a pool of blue. One I’d have loved to swim around in for a while. A gentleness about him moved me. I imagined him holding a baby or helping an old lady cross the street.
Still behind the bar, Caspian gestured out to the dining room of the restaurant. The tables had already been set for the dinner service, with white tablecloths and small vases spilling over with mums. Booths lined both walls. The atmosphere was elegant with a hint of ruggedness from the exposed beams and dark wood.
“This room’s lovely,” I murmured.
“Thanks. Hard to believe it once housed a bunch of ranch hands, right?”
I smacked my forehead. “That’s why it’s named the Bunkhouse. Duh. I don’t know why that hadn’t occurred to me.”
“No reason it should,” Caspian said. “My family wasn’t totally convinced that our guests would care about fine dining, but I was right. People who come here for an escape from their busy lives still want elevated meals. Thankfully, or we would have sunk a lot of money into this place for no reason.
“We serve a buffet breakfast, very simple, and a lunch with only five items on the menu to choose from.”
“Do you cook those too?” I asked, surprised.
“No, I have a breakfast and lunch crew. Locals actually. I don’t come in until three in the afternoons to prepare for dinner. And Leo takes the head spot on Mondays and Tuesdays so I can have a few days off a week. That’s a recent change, ordered by the queen bee herself, Mama. She was worried I would burn out without some downtime and as she always is, she was right. I’m a new man ever since.”
“What were you like before?”
“A more rumpled, tired version of the man you see before you now.”
The rest of the staff had not yet arrived, since it was still hours away from the dinner service, but Caspian explained he had a hostess, two servers, and a bartender for every shift. “You can meet them later. All good folks. Mostly local, so they might give you a hard time about being from out of state.”
“That’s all right. I can take a little teasing.”
“You have to be tough in this business,” Caspian said. “Without a sense of humor, working in a kitchen would be rough.”
We headed back into the kitchen, and he showed me around and introduced me to Leo, the sous-chef, who had just arrived.
“Howdy, sorry for being a few minutes late,” Leo said. “Late night.” He appeared hungover, given his bedhead, stubbly chin, and red eyes. Regardless, Leo greeted me with a friendly, albeit clammy handshake and sweet smile. Small in stature, he couldn’t have been more than twenty-five. Stealing another quick glance at him as he slipped an apron over his head, I was reminded of one of those hyper, nervous dogs that wished only to remain close to their owner but were forced to run with the big dogs in the park.
“Don’t make a habit of it,” Caspian said.
