Page 11 of Pretender

The man can annoy the hell out of me, but I refuse to melt at his feet like everyone else.

Except—of course—the one day I’ve got my hair up, and my traitorous ears exposed, he gets a reaction out of me. All from a silly innuendo in a bassy voice. I don’t want to play games with him, anyway, so why the hell am I reacting?

That was the only time. Won’t give him the pleasure of that again.

We arrive at the restaurant. It’s currently closed, the outside eating area empty, but the faux-flower canopy is still colourful and inviting. He leads me down the side of the building.

“But to answer your question,” he continues as if I didn’t get all awkward at his previous comment. “My favourite card game is bridge.”

“Bridge?”

“Yes.” He gives a small shrug. “I play with my mum and her partner. Sometimes she invites friends.”

“Huh.”

He unlocks the side door to Millefleuré with his keycard and opens it, allowing me in first, but I quickly step aside to let him lead the way. He gestures for me to follow him through a fire door and to a narrow hallway I recall leads to the main part of the restaurant.

“Bridge is one way to weed out the people she tries to set me up with. If they can’t figure out bridge, it’s a hard no.”

“She does that a lot, then?”

I follow him through another fire door to the left.

“Yes, it’s been relentless since she met her partner last year.” His voice reverberates off the stainless steel kitchen surfaces in the vast space.

“That sounds tiring,” I say quietly, feeling like we just walked into somewhere we shouldn’t be.

“You could say that. What about you?” Aiden asks, stopping by the cold-room, his eyes still on me.

“My parents are in Oslo. They couldn’t care less about my love life.”

I shake my head and wave it off. Total overshare.

“Oh.” He pauses for a moment. “I meant, what’s your favourite game?” He pulls the large door open, and it releases with a hiss. I’m grateful he doesn’t ask me more about my parents.

“Umm… Not a card game, but I love croquet.”

He scans me up and down before stepping into the cold-room.

“What?” I ask.

“It confirms a hunch I’ve had about you.”

“What do you mean by that?” I ask, but he’s out of sight now.

He returns with a board of cheeses and cured meats and places it on the smooth surface by the serving hatch. I follow his moves as he locates bread on a shelf, squeezes it, and shrugs, returning with it and a bread knife. He’s clearly well acquainted with this kitchen.

How many women has he brought here for an impromptu breakfast?

“You look like a tennis player, but you play croquet,” he says with a smirk, glancing at me from under his thick eyelashes while he cuts the bread.

“I don’t understand.”

“You’re tall, lean, graceful, and elegant, but you have a playful side.”

I narrow my eyes at him, wondering if he’s giving me a compliment or taking the piss. Elegant? Am I missing some kind of joke? He just flashes me that easy smile he does sometimes, and I hate how I don’t hate it.

He gets a couple of cheese knives from a drawer and gestures for me to dig in.