AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No one’s good enough for me, according to you.”
“True, but especially him.” The disgust in his tone surprised her.
She put down the trowel and leaned back on her haunches, luxuriating in the stretch to her back muscles. Between the gym (all right, one time at the gym), gardening, and her acrobatic sexploits with Tad, her muscles were singing songs that were usually out of their tonal range.
“What is with you and Tad? You’ve invested in his business and you always seem to be civil to each other, but there’s this weird vibe between you.”
Jack sighed. “I invested because he’s good at what he does, which is the ability to sell anything and charm anyone. Those are good skills in food retail and getting skirt but I don’t see much else beyond the surface.”
She suspected Tad was as adept as she at putting on faces. Sometimes, she caught him off in another world at the DeLuca family lunches, his face straining for smoothness whenever his parents came up in the conversation. When they spent time together at Vivi’s kitchen, she saw how he went inside himself to a place filled with painful memories.
The joy left him.
“He’s my friend, Jack, and I think you’re wrong.”
“I’m not saying he isn’t a nice guy, Jules. We get along just fine and he and Lili are close, so I recognize that he’s not all bad. But I don’t see much depth there. He was a bartender forever before he decided to break out on his own. He plows through women like a Frenchman guzzles cheap table wine. Everything is a game to him.”
He held her gaze boldly. “And deep down, I think you know that because so far, you’ve had the common sense not to fall for him. Your spidey senses recognize he’s bad news and no good for the long term. He’s not what you need.”
Bad news, no good, shallow-as-a-puddle Tad. Jack’s words made sense but it didn’t stop her from musing on what might have been, much to Good Girl Jules’s annoyance. Bad Girl Jules was always on board where Tad DeLuca was concerned.
Uncertain if she was annoyed with Jack, Tad, or herself, she turned back to her lovely radishes and used her frustration to dig a big, deep, unnecessary hole.
Twenty-Six
“So, guys, thanks for coming in early for a spot of staff training.” Tad arced his gaze around half of Team Vivi, his bright young staff members, who sorely needed an education about the finer things.
“You’re paying us to drink on the job, boss,” Kennedy said, a petite redhead who was permanently “on” in that way actresses had. He had been leery of hiring her as his manager, worried she’d bail as soon as she got a juicy stage role, but they’d hit it off during the interview so he gave her a shot.
“Everyone got their Vivi bibles?” With not a small amount of satisfaction, he watched as Kennedy lay her collection of laminated cheat sheets on the bar. It had been Jules’s suggestion to turn the binder into something brief, portable and—most importantly—spill proof. Now, he was using it as a training tool for the staff.
“Hmm, I forgot mine.” Bella, his hostess, wouldn’t be serving but it was important that she be able to converse intelligently about the bar’s lifeblood. Unfortunately this might be a problem because she was not the brightest bulb—more like halogen. During her interview she had detailed her disappointment that Cupcake Vineyards Red Velvet hadnottasted like red velvet cupcakes. But she had an easy way with her that the customers seemed to appreciate.
He passed her a spare bible from behind the bar.
“Oh, hey Julia.” Another annoying thing about Bella was that she insisted on calling Jules “Julia.”
“Hiya, Bella.” Jules looked a little flushed—and as beautiful as ever—as she strode quickly from the kitchen with a plate of crostini, her contribution to tonight’s menu. “Tonight’s special appetizer. Goat cheese, bacon, and onion finger-panini with amatriciana jam.”
“Thank God, I’m starving.” Kennedy scooped up a slice and shoved it in her mouth before catching Tad’s eye. “Um, this was for us, right?”
Tad sighed. “Yep. We should all try the special.”
Usually amatriciana was a standard sauce with bucatini, but Jules had used it as base for her panini. He loved how she wasn’t afraid to try new things. He also loved that she was using some of Vivi’s recipes and adapting them as her own, though they had yet to discuss it.
“Mother of Mary, this is fantastic,” Kennedy said around bites of the toasted goodness. “Great job,Julia.” She added a conspiratorial wink.
Jules’s expression jumped from hesitancy to relief to a particular brand of smugness that chefs had a patent on. Every cook Tad knew lived for the moment someone went into an orgasmic meltdown on tasting his food. Turning someone on to wine was gratifying in its own way, but not quite as much as cooking.
“So, see you tomorrow then,” Jules said after she had taken a moment to absorb Kennedy’s clear appreciation.
“Want to stick around for a few minutes and taste with us?” he asked.
Jules narrowed her eyes at the bottle of Chablis, the label facing away from her. “Is it Chardonnay?”
“No,” he lied. Chablis used the Chardonnay grape but Jules hadn’t reached that part of her education yet. She did have a particularly virulent hatred for the oaky, overly-toasted flavors typical of American and Australian chards but Chablis with its subtle flavors of green apple and pear had escaped the bad rap.
She took a seat at the bar. “Pour away.”
