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“So, I’m working at Aleena—
“Bullshit!” I bark, then slap my hand over my mouth, hoping the kids didn’t just hear that.
He laughs. “Seriously. I’m in group with one of their sous chefs and she set me up. Anyway, I’m working at Aleena’s and in walks Carl Raines. As soon as he sees me, he recognizes me—
“That’s strange.”
“I know! I’m back of house, but he came to your place right after we opened and I was still waiting tables back then, because we weren’t fully staffed, remember?”
Blinking at the flowers, my mouth drops open. “Good god, man, how much of your memory has come back since you stopped using?”
He laughs again. “A shocking lot. Like I’m remembering all sorts of shit I wish I could forget that I did, but also some good stuff. Anyway, he comes straight to me, talking about you.”
“Me?”
“Yeah. He swears up and down that he had the best meal of his life because of you.”
I’m touched. “That’s so sweet of him. Thank you for telling me—
“That’s not all, Lily. He’s opening his own restaurant. That’s why he quit Chandelier Group. They weren’t moving in a direction he liked—too stodgy, too old school. He wants to move into a style of cooking he calls ‘Lily Olson’.”
I laugh once, sharply. “What?”
“He’s obsessed, and since the accident, he hasn’t been able to track you down. He even hired a PI to find you, but the guy swears it’s like you fell off the face of the Earth.”
“I’m staying at my parents’ place in Somerset Harbor. How is that falling off the face of the Earth?”
“Somerset Harbor is not in Manhattan.”
I huff and roll my eyes. I remember being that myopic, too. “So, what’s up with Carl?”
“He wants to hire you. Let you have full control of the entire restaurant. He’d be the owner, but everything else is yours. He wants you, Lily. Bad. And he’s willing to make it worth your while. He’s scared someone else will scoop you up before he can, so his offer is…extensive.”
My mouth goes dry. It’s not the same as my own place, but it sounds damn nice. “How extensive, Pax?”
“Aside from salary, you’d get part ownership.”
I almost drop my phone. This is better than I could have hoped for when I picked it up. By a lot. “Tell me you’re tweaked out of your mind, and you did not just say that.”
“I’m not and I did.”
This could change everything. My career, back on track. My life, back in Manhattan. I could be myopic again, focused entirely on the thing that makes my blood pump. The rush of kitchen life, the fire.
But is that what I still want?
The hours, the back pain, the screaming—
“So, what do you say?”
I take a breath. “I’m not sure.”
“What?” he shouts.
“I’m not sure, Paxton. Things are…different now.”
“Lily, you have the gift. You can’t let that go to waste in some town no one has ever heard of. You’re practically in a fly-over state—
“I’m in the fucking Hamptons. I'm still in New York!”
