Recipe for Persuasion Page 13

  The chef might be big, but Rico could totally take him.

  Whoa, time out! No one was taking anyone. What the hell was wrong with him? If any of his friends had said something so ridiculous, Rico would have smacked them upside the head. Reaching back, he squeezed his rolled-up ponytail.

  “You holding up okay?” DJ asked Ashna, pulling away and making some sort of nauseatingly understanding eye contact.

  She nodded, soulful eyes shying away from DJ’s gaze, and gave him another hug. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  Ah! So this was why she was doing the show. To be close to her boyfriend.

  Well, good. That made everything easier. Rico stepped away, giving them space as they chattered away, a little too intimately for public, if you asked him. But what did he know?

  “You really lucked out with your star, love!” DJ said suddenly, and turned to Rico before Rico could make his escape.

  Walking up to Rico, DJ held out his hand. “Huge fan, sir, huge fan! That run you had in the ninetieth in the final when you went top corner, bloody hell! The keeper had no chance! Wait till I tell my sister I met you, she’s going to clean pee her pants.”

  Rico let him pump his hand. So the man knew his sport, so what?

  “DJ Caine.”

  “I know.” Rico shoved his hands into his pockets, his tone somewhere between stiff and downright sulky. “I was there for the introductions.”

  Ashna glared at him and he felt like a piece of shit. He hated when someone was a prick to fans.

  “I’m sorry,” he said into the awkward pause, because what was he doing? He could not let her take away his decency. He’d lost enough of himself to her. “I meant you’re our host, so I know who you are.” He reached out and squeezed the man’s bicep. Holy shit! He’d been going for his shoulder. DJ looked alarmed. Rico had never felt like a bigger ass. “Very impressive credentials. Excellent. Excited to work with you. Fabulous,” he gushed like an overcompensating moron.

  DJ and Ashna exchanged confused looks and Rico excused himself before he embarrassed himself even more.

  He headed back into the competition area, hating how idiotic he felt. Suddenly the atmosphere in here resembled a high school dance. Everyone seemed to be immersed in the business of impressing one another. Song, the Korean drama star, caught his eye and gave him a self-conscious wave from across the room. She was the only person in the crowded studio standing by herself. Her partner, an impressively tattooed Mexican American chef, was off talking to the mystery writer.

  Rico turned around to see if his own chef had followed him. Not that he needed to check. Rico had always somehow known if she was in a room.

  That was more than ten years ago, you knob.

  He made his way toward Song.

  She gave him a grateful smile when he stopped next to her and it felt like reclaiming his dignity.

  “Pretty wild setup, huh?” He threw a glance at the six fully functional kitchens under one roof.

  “My mother used to give me a hard time about never entering one kitchen—now I’m inside six at once!” she said brightly, eyes shining with humor.

  For a moment, they absorbed their surroundings in companionable silence.

  “So this is for her then, for your mother, you being on the show?” He leaned back into the counter, trying to take the weight off his leg.

  Her smile dimmed. “My sister lives in San Jose, I wanted to spend some time with her. Haven’t seen her in years. We . . . well, I’ve been working nonstop for the past ten years and she’s got a family, children, a dog, you know, a real life.” She blinked at him and waited for him to respond, but he knew she wasn’t done. “That sounded a little regressive, didn’t it? Sorry, I guess I’ve heard my mother repeat it too many times. She must have gotten inside my head.”

  This time the smile she gave Rico was so stoic, he patted her shoulder, not her bicep, thank God. “Isn’t that how it’s supposed to be, that all women eventually turn into their mothers?”

  She looked mock-horrified, “Please tell me that isn’t true.” Her voice had a happy lilt to it that made everything she said sound enthusiastic.

  “Well, based on what I’m seeing, if you have turned into your mother, she must be quite lovely.”

  The research Rico had done on each contestant indicated that after him Song was the biggest star here in terms of fan following. How entirely unaffected she seemed by it was even more impressive than her stardom itself.

  “Thanks!” she said with that enthusiasm she couldn’t seem to contain. “Actually, my mom is spectacular. Raised my sister and me by herself. So, I guess it’s not such a bad thing to make her happy by finally learning how to cook, ha?” She threw a look at her chef, and Rico wondered why she had picked him. Sure, the network wanted everyone to believe that the pairings were surprises, but one of the biggest television stars in the world wasn’t going to leave who she got as a partner to chance.

  “Mexican food is my favorite,” she said finally. “My sister’s too, and of course our mother’s. My sister already makes the most amazing tacos.” Then she grinned her first real grin, not the one perfected for the cameras. “We’re a teeny bit, um . . .”

  “Competitive?” he supplied. “My guess is everyone here is.”

  “—or we wouldn’t be here,” they both said together and burst into laughter.

  Her flashbulb smile dimmed again. “But my sister makes me look easygoing. She’s a human rights lawyer. Works for the ACLU. She’s at the border right now, trying to make sure the children separated from their parents are reunited.”

  “That’s amazing work to be doing.” Rico hated what was happening in America right now. The inhumanity of it was baffling. He’d been taken in by this country when he’d had nowhere else to go. For that he would always be grateful and loyal. He hadn’t even been a refugee, just an orphan in need of a home. “People who have no empathy for refugees are soulless. No one who’s forced out of their home has any interest in anything but embracing the land that gives them another chance. It’s been proven over and over again, that refugees—and their children—go on to do great things for the countries that become their new homes.”

  “I just heard one of the guys who’s running for governor of California say exactly that on the radio this morning. I think he’s the guy my sister is working with on the border crisis.”

  “No way! She works with Yash Raje? I’ve been following his campaign and the man is amazing. I can’t believe the bigoted nonsense that piece of shit Cruz has been saying against him.”

  “You’re interested in politics,” she said with exaggerated disappointment. “That means you too are going to like my sister more than me.”

  “Do you make all your friends choose? Between your sister and you?”

  That made her laugh. Unexpectedly, she threw her hands around him and gave him a hug. “Honestly, I’m crazy proud of her,” she said sincerely. “I’m so glad you’re here. This is going to be so much fun!”

  Her buoyancy was contagious, and for the first time since he had come back to California, the deep restlessness inside Rico relaxed. The room was filled with talented, interesting people. Song was right, this could be fun.

  When he pulled away from the hug, he noticed that his lovely partner was back in the room. Yes, he felt it, shoot him.

  A bitter little smile danced around her red, bee-stung lips—a combination of smugness and annoyance. Rico had no patience for it. And no, the fact that her chef boyfriend was right behind her, his body language all protective of her, had nothing to do with Rico’s lack of patience.

  Rico turned back to the sweet person he was talking to.

  Song was watching him with awe, which made him extremely grateful right about now. “You guys are guaranteed to get through the first few rounds. Given the, you know . . .”

  “The video.” His eyes found Ashna again as she made her way across the studio toward him—not by choice but because DJ was heading this way and she h
ad her hand hooked into his arm as though he were an overinflated life raft and she were swimming against a current gone wild.

  Song gave him another hundred-watt smile, and he chose to mirror Ashna and cling on to it. “That was such an amazingly brave thing to do. You’re a hero!” Song said.

  And yet, he had barely received a grudging thanks for his heroism. “It’s the curse of being a football player; you see a flying object and you automatically leap toward it.”

  She loved that, laughed heartily at it. Rico loved that he didn’t have to work for her laughter, she gave it easily and he was as grateful as a starved puppy. As if he didn’t like her enough already, she turned the conversation to his last World Cup final, one of his favorite topics. They had come so close to losing that one. If not for that goal in the ninetieth minute, they would have gone to penalties. Song wasn’t kidding when she said she was a fan. She knew every detail of all the major games he’d ever played.

  By the time Ashna and DJ made their way over, Song was in full-blown superfan splendor. The first thing she did when she saw Ashna was tell her how very lucky she was to have Rico as her partner. “Could you believe it when you found out?”

  “No,” Ashna said, voice dripping sweetness even as she threw all sorts of eye-daggers at Rico. “I still can’t believe how”—or why, her eyes added just for him—“it happened.” Then she ruined things by adding kindly that Song’s chef was lucky to have her too.

  Song beamed. “I’m so happy to be here!” she said delightedly before going off to join her chef.

  “How is that knee?” DJ—yes, he was still stuck to Ashna’s side—said, sounding annoyingly concerned. “Ashna just asked Jonah to bring you a chair until we start shooting.”

  Ashna studied her toes. They were covered by sneakers today, but the need to know if they were still painted bright pink stirred inside him.

  “My knee is perfectly fine now, thanks. I don’t need a chair.”

  “That’s great news,” DJ said with more of that sincere concern. “My girlfriend saw it the day you hurt yourself. She said it was a good thing you were so close to a hospital. Believe me, she never thinks anything is serious.”

  “Doesn’t she?” Rico looked pointedly at Ashna, who looked back at him as though she’d like to kick him in his knee. “I guess she wouldn’t have dropped the knife if she thought it was serious.”

  This seemed to throw DJ. “Trisha dropped the knife?” He looked to Ashna for confirmation. “I’m pretty sure Ashna dropped the knife.”

  You know those realizations where you’re faced with your own stupidity? One of those zinged inside Rico’s medicine-addled brain, for the second time that day. But the damage was done. He’d kicked the ball right at Ashna.

  She slapped her hands around it with panache. “You’re right, DJ. I was the one who dropped the knife. Your girlfriend, my cousin Trisha”—yes, she stretched out that last part like well-chewed gum—“she was just kind enough to look at Frederico’s knee when he hurt it.” All of this she said while looking at DJ, but of course, every overenunciated word was meant only for Rico.

  “Ah.” All sorts of understanding dawned on DJ’s face, and on Rico’s own face too, no doubt.

  Before this painful conversation could drag on any longer, China Dashwood, bless her, called them to order and requested that DJ join her at the front of the room.

  “Go,” Ashna said to DJ, with all the warmth of a dear friend.

  As soon as DJ left, Ashna turned to Rico, anger brightening her too-large, too-dark eyes. “There’s still time. The first episode hasn’t aired yet. You can ask for any other chef and they’ll give you what you want. I don’t think I can do this.”

  “The habit of walking away from things must be a hard one to break,” he said, when the last thing he wanted to think about right now was that particular moment from their past.

  She’s just a girl I dated in high school.

  Her long, incredibly delicate fingers squeezed her temples, her jaw clenched, every inch of her screamed how badly she did not want to be doing this with him.

  If she wanted to walk away, she was going to have to be the one to do it. Again. “As for how I behaved with DJ,” he said when the silence had stretched out long enough that he knew she wasn’t going to respond, “it was an honest mistake.” None of this was about DJ.

  “Dropping a knife from shock, that’s an honest mistake,” she said, the new shell she’d grown melting like ice around pine needles after a winter storm. “Being rude to someone because you’re angry with someone else? That’s just being spoiled and self-centered.”

  Fire burned in her eyes as their gazes locked. Just like that she was the girl who had gone to war for him, kept the coach from pushing him into playing when he couldn’t. The girl who had blazed at a world he couldn’t deal with and held him close until he’d learned how to again.

  Eyes locked with hers, he was that boy again, the one who could handle waking up in the morning only because she was out there waiting for him.

  China’s voice rang out through the speakers. “All right then, people, it’s time for the first cooking challenge.”

  Rico was about to join in the cheering that exploded around them when the girl who had been his shield, and then a sword through his heart, crumbled before his eyes. The fire inside her dissolved into panic. She imploded even as she stood there tall and proud for all to see.

  Chapter Fourteen

  After all these years of trying to put into words what an impending panic attack felt like, today of all days, Ashna finally had crystal clarity. A simultaneous unraveling and tightening swirled inside and around her. Ten tons of pressure compressed her into solid rock even as she dissolved into amorphous, weightless air.

  The words self-centered and spoiled lingered in her mouth like the taste of particularly strong bitter melon doused in too much truffle, acrid and overpowering. The need to spit it out before she exploded with it gathered inside her. Then his hand was on her back, pressing into the curve where sensitive divots dipped into her skin on both sides of her spine. Like filings to a magnet, her scattering parts pulled toward his touch.

  Walking through the kitchens felt like wading underwater, with the last of her breath running out fast. His hand stayed there, a too-heavy oxygen tank.

  The unfairness of that, the anger at it, was the only thing that made it possible for Ashna to break the surface as they emerged at the front of the room and lined up next to the other competitors. DJ’s lips moved. With a lag of just seconds, his voice followed.

  “Our challenge today is . . .” Ashna squeezed her eyes shut. “. . . Omelets.”

  Until that moment Ashna hadn’t noticed that Rico’s thumb was stroking her. The second she came back into herself he dropped his hand. She stepped away, too furious at him for glimpsing her panic, too relieved at this incredible stroke of luck.

  When a laugh escaped her, that relentless frown—probing at her innermost thoughts—folded between his brows, taking her back in time, grounding her deep in this moment.

  “It’s omelets!” she said with the kind of exuberant delight one might display when saying “I feel a pulse!” or “Yes, that’s my glass slipper!”

  He backed away from her, quickly putting distance between them. A good thing, because his hand still burned on her skin and because, well, they had omelets (omelets!) to make.

  Ashna shook her arms out. Eggs were a brilliant, brilliant choice for a first challenge. They were seemingly easy to work with, but also an accurate test of culinary skill. More importantly, Ashna served spicy, curried omelets at the restaurant. Which meant she could make them exactly the way she did at Curried Dreams. It was one of Baba’s most popular recipes.

  “Oh, one more thing,” DJ said, and the runaway truck in her brain teetered again. “You each have to cook your omelets separately. The chefs on one side of your station and the stars on the other. No helping each other. Everyone comes up with a dish that showcases who they ar
e on their own.”

  Ashna’s shoulders were shaking, relief again, laughter again. She had to work hard to not skip on her way back to their station. By the end of this day she was going to need a massage, from the bipolar locking and releasing of muscles.

  “You’ll be fine,” she said to Rico when they got back, because he was still studying her and trying to make sense of her bizarre swings. “Cooking eggs is a standard test of basic cooking skill.”

  “I know I’ll be fine,” he said, the full blast of his focus mapping her relief. The emeralds in his eyes were too bright. The way they had been that first time they’d met under the bleachers. The need to see what no one else cared to see inside her, intense and naked. It had disarmed her then.

  Today, it infuriated her. Made her brain forget the camera. Made her hands fly. She broke the eggs in a clean one-handed crack, whipped them ruthlessly into a thick froth, chopped the onions, cilantro, and green chilies in an unrelentingly brutal rhythm. All without breaking a sweat or sparing him a glance.

  With minutes to spare from the mere twenty they were given, she turned out a fluffy and perfectly moist omelet with garlic-infused oil rolled into a crisp, flaky paratha.

  Until they stood in front of the judges, she had forgotten where she was, who she was with.

  The only place the livid energy inside her seemed to have manifested itself was in what the judges declared “abject underseasoning.”

  This made Ashna smile. When she looked at Rico, he was having the same reaction. For one quick meeting of their eyes, the ridiculously overdramatic statement joined them together with shared humor. His lips tilted up on one side. For the first time since they’d lined up to hear the challenge, she took a full breath.