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I bent down, narrowly missing the second one before it banged into the brick over my shoulder.
“Evelyn won’t be happy that you’re ruining her prized skillets,” I remarked as if he had only dropped one on the ground.
“My cook’s concerns are the least of my list of worries. My son’s blatant and complete disrespect is at the top.”
“Well, good for you, Your Grace, getting your priorities in order at last,” I said, feigning nonchalance over the anger simmering. The anger that was always simmering. Like a pot ready to boil over if he turned up the heat a bit too much.
“You will go back to university, Xavier. Do you have any idea what kind of favors I had to call in to ensure you a spot at St. Andrew’s, after what happened at Christ Church? They say the prince of Denmark shall never have the same nose again.”
“That’s really too bad, since no one asked you to do it,” I told him as I pulled another thread of dough across the plait. “I already told you, I’m not going. Not to St. Andrew’s or Cambridge or any other of these posh schools you want to force me into. I want to learn to cook properly. And I don’t need your help to do it. I’ve already been accepted to the London Culinary Institute, as it happens. And under the name Sato too. Without your fucking favors.”
I continued plaiting as if he wasn’t fuming on the other side of the counter. Rupert watched until it looked like a vein at the top of his forehead might burst.
“Ungrateful little bastard,” he snarled. “That’s what you are. If I hadn’t—”
“Hadn’t what?” I snapped. “If you hadn’t what? Shagged the cook?”
“Your mother and I met at university first, as you well know—”
“Got her pregnant?” I went on. “Eloped in an impulsive wedding? Or maybe it was abandoning your family for fifteen years until you suddenly grew a conscience, eh? My God, if only you hadn’t done that, we wouldn’t be here at all, would we?”
“My son willnotbe no better than a kitchen boy, and that is final!”
Seething and swollen with anger, Rupert Parker opened and closed his mouth like a blowfish. Blowfish could be poisonous. They were delicacies in Japan, but if you didn’t remove certain parts, they could also be deadly. A delicious game of Russian Roulette.
Sort of like fighting with my dad. Five out of six times, he kept his cool. Get that last bullet, though, and you got a cast iron pot thrown at your head. Or maybe a priceless heirloom, depending on which room of the house we were in.
Apparently, I was looking to play.
He watched me for a few more minutes with those annoyingly blue eyes of his. The ones I inherited. The ones I fucking hated.
“I’ve really tried, you know,” he muttered, more to himself than to me. “The polo. Took you to Scotland. Sent you to the finest schools, did everything to help you learn to be a part of society. You can’t tell me I didn’t.”
“Yes, you have tried,” I said, picking up the edges of my plait once more. “Tried to shove a square fucking peg in a round hole, Rupert. But some things just don’t fit.”
He stared at me for a long time, then shook his head. “He really can’t tell me I haven’t tried.”
Great. Now I was being talked about like I wasn’t even fucking there.
“You call this trying?” I demanded. “Forcing me into your life and throwing tantrums when I don’t fit?”
“You ungrateful—”
“Wretch. Brat. Bastard. I know, I know. Don’t bother, because I’ve heard them all. Just more reasons I’ve no desire to be the Duke of fucking Kendal. And let’s be honest, you wouldn’t know real effort, real hardship if it bit you in the arse.”
Rupert stood up hard enough that his stool went toppling to the stone floor and left the room with a bang of the door against the stopper.
“Don’t let it hit you on the way out,” I called and went back to my plaiting.
“Don’t let what hit me?”
I looked up to find Henry coming in. I jumped at first, thinking it was Rupert again, back for another round. They looked alike from afar, nearly as tall as one another. As tall as me. But where Dad had steely blue eyes and an expression to match. Henry’s was softer, somehow. Not kind, per se. No one in the Parker family was ever really kind. But at least he didn’t throw pans at me. Maybe a jibe or two, but that was it.
“You can’t imagine this is really about whether or not you want to make bread, of all things.” Henry looked at the plaited dough as if it might jump out and attack him. “It’s about your future. About his future, really.”
“Oh?” I said, finishing off the plait and tucking the ends under the loaf before scooping the whole thing up and gently setting it into a proofing basket. “Please tell me why my desire to cook has anything to do with his future. Dad can be a self-righteous twat, whether or not I’m working in a kitchen.”
“Well, for one, he’d miss you,” Henry said. He bent down to grab the stool Dad had knocked to the floor and set it upright for himself.
