Page 98 of Masters of Pleasure
Funny enough, Delia and Josie had teamed up.After Jonathan broke up with Josie, almost overnight, they’d gone from mortal enemies to supportive sisters.Everyone in the restaurant had born witness to all of it, and all had opinions about it, which were often shared loudly.
Yeah.No, thank you.Avery did not need or want people watching her romance succeed or fail and didn’t need to hear their opinions about it.Especially since she and Nick had the slightly more complicated position of him being her boss.When the servers hooked up, they were on equal footing.Things would be a lot more problematic if one of them got involved with a manager.
Yeah, maybe stop thinking about that.
She and Nick were different.They’d already agreed to keep work and relationship separate.There would be no between-shift bathroom sex with this chef.The very idea made her shiver.Marquis’ bathrooms were kept pretty clean, but still.Not for her.
Knocking on the door, she opened it.Another reason nothing would happen in this office.She was hardly the only one with that habit, and locking the door would be suspicious as hell.
Sitting behind the desk, Nick looked up and grinned when he saw her.Avery shut the door behind her.
“Hey there,” he said, getting to his feet and coming around the desk.Her eyes widened as he approached.
“What do you think you’re doing?”she asked, putting her hands up in front of her when she realized he was coming in for a kiss.
Dark eyebrows rose quizzically.“Well, I was going to give you a kiss.”
“Nope.”She crossed her arms over her chest, shaking her head.“We said we weren’t doing that.”
“I’ve kissed you in the restaurant before,” he pointed out, a smug smile playing on his lips.“It’s not new.”
“Nice try.”Avery couldn’t help smiling as she shook her head again.Maybe if she hadn’t just walked by Jonathan and Alanna doing exactly that… but she had, and nope.It had been okay before she and Nick talked about keeping their relationship out of Marquis, but they’d had the conversation, and she was sticking to it.
“What did you want to meet about?”
Nick
Would a real Dom insist?Or sweep her into his arms and kiss her, anyway?
Nick didn’t know, so he decided not to risk it since she seemed serious, despite the smile on her face.Ah, well, it had been worth a shot.He would have liked a kiss, but he understood.
“I wanted to see if you want to get together tonight...outside of the restaurant.”He winked at her.
Avery’s cheeks turned pink, which was damn cute, as her hand swept along her hair as if trying to smooth down the flyaways from her blonde ponytail.They flattened for a moment before drifting back up again.
“Oh, um… Yes.If you want to.”
“Oh, I want to,” he murmured, letting his gaze move up and down her body.It didn’t matter that she was still wearing her baggy chef pants and coat.He knew exactly what was under them.“Your place or mine?”
“Mine.”Pursing her lips to hide her smile, she turned around, shaking her head and muttering, “We’re taking a shower first this time.”
That sounded good.Get nice and clean, so they could get down and dirty.
“Works for me.”Then he did something he’d wanted to do for months—he reached out and smacked her ass.
Avery jumped and spun around, her lips popping open in shock.Nick grinned at her and waited as they faced off for a long moment, Avery’s cheeks getting pinker and pinker.
He wasn’t sure what she would have eventually said, but he never found out because the door opened, and Gareth, the front-of-house manager for the evening, stepped into the office.The oldest of the managers, probably in his fifties, had salt-and-pepper hair with a grey beard, dark brown eyes, and a bit of a belly, though he was still in pretty good shape.
“Oh, hey, guys,” he said, glancing up from his phone for a second before turning his attention back down to whatever he was looking at.Thankfully, his distraction meant he didn’t see anything weird going on between Nick and Avery, even though Avery had jumped about a foot in the air and was bright red.
“Hey, Gareth.How are things?I mean you.I mean, how was tonight?”
Wow.Avery was terrible at this.Nick stared at her.Even Gareth finally lifted his head, his forehead wrinkled in confusion.
“Uh, excuse me, I gotta go.Exhausted.”Avery darted out the door, swiftly closing it behind her.
Slowly, Gareth turned his head to look at Nick, his eyebrows raising.Their gazes met, and Nick crossed his arms over his chest, keeping his expression blank.He had absolutely no idea what he could say.It felt like anything would only make Avery’s behavior seem more suspicious.
