Page 47 of Bite Me

“All I want to hear is a ‘Yes, Chef.’ I don’t have use for people who can’t follow directions.”

Verity snickers next to her, while Luther watches from a few feet away. This is better. I can’t have him or anyone in the club think I’m showing favoritism. What happened at initiation changes nothing—making her hate me is easy. Now, making her hate cooking shouldn’t be that much harder.

“Yes, Chef.”

She recovers quickly as she rolls out another ball of dough and starts to cut squares for the ravioli.

This time, I stand over her while I watch her hands work. Those beautiful, delicate hands.

“You’re making me nervous.”

“Good. How can you expect to work with people in a kitchen if you’re not being monitored?”

“Well, when I imagine it, I’m in charge . . . Chef.”

My own insidious laughter echoes between us.

“Yeah? And who do you think wants to work under someone who can’t successfully shape pasta dough? Someone who doesn’t care about putting in work, taking shortcuts? Then again, you know all about that, don’t you, thief?”

She can’t hide the bunching of her brows or the nervous way she switches her feet.

“I don’t think you should be able to call me that here, Chef.”

“Why does that name bother you so much? Is it because you know you did a bad thing? That, instead of working for those recipes, you stole the notebook from the lounge. You stole from everyone else who came before you, and that’s what you’re doing now, too. You didn’t earn this spot, and you know it.”

It’s not true. She could have gotten in herself if I hadn’t been in her way. But I am.

I need to get everything back in its rightful place. I need her to hate me so much that she can’t think of anything else when she sees me, so that even her scent changes in my proximity. That’s never been clearer to me than now.

Caring for her, if that’s even possible, will do nothing for her or for me.

“Nothing to say?” I ask when she remains silent.

“No, Chef.” There are no tears.

That familiar fire of burning hatred is back, and everything is back where it needs to be. Emma should stay the fuck away from me. That’s the only way she makes it out of the web being woven around her in secret.

“Good. Now start from the beginning.”

Chapter Fifteen

Emma

Dacre is the most confusing man I’ve ever met. It’s been more than a week since initiation night, and Dacre hasn’t spoken a word to me that isn’t a command, which would have been perfectly fine with me before. But now I have to live with the knowledge that Dacre helped me during initiation. What do I do with that? I didn’t make that up, and I wish I could just forget it happened like I said I wanted. It’s just hard not to remember when he was the softest I’ve ever seen him.

It was as if seeing him for the first time. I thought we had made progress, and I was starting to understand him a little. So why am I getting the cold shoulder?

My memory of that night is hazy. I don’t think I’ve ever drunk that much. But there is a memory I can’t forget, because it replays over and over. Dacre’s lips on my neck, my ass in his lap, and his thumb rubbing against my leg as he comforts me.

I could have forgotten the whole thing if it weren’t for that stupid thumb thing. I’d have chalked it up to a lapse in judgment on his part. I have no idea how much he was drinking that night, but maybe instead of being a drunk asshole, alcohol has the opposite effect on him.

I scroll through my messages to Mom:

Dacre did the thumb thing Dad always used to do for you when you were scared. I can’t believe it.

Under that is a wall of text. I wrote down every thought and feeling about the initiation. She’s the only one I could tell. Somehow, though, Parker found out about it and told Olivia, and I got an earful about the dangers of Doxlothia the next day. As if I needed another lecture.

My parents and their romance have always been the blueprint for me. They spent every moment together when they weren’t working on their respective passions. All my favorite memories involve simple days with them, sitting in the kitchen, laughing and bickering with coffee in their hands.