Page 34 of Devoured By the Forbidden Mountain Man

He looked toward the kitchen, mentally moving the pieces.

“You’d split the prep list by service time instead of menu item.”

“Yes. The kitchen needs to know what has to be ready at six and what doesn’t need to exist until eight-thirty. Otherwise everybody works urgently on everything, which usually means the wrong thing becomes urgent first.”

The owner laughed. “I’m starting to understand why your old place ran so smoothly.”

The compliment landed more deeply than he could have known.

For weeks before losing my job, I had sat through meetings with people who discussed operational efficiency as though the restaurant had functioned through software and optimism instead of hundreds of small decisions made by people who understood the room.

Here, no one needed me to translate my work into corporate language before believing it existed.

“I had a good staff,” I said.

“I’m sure you did. They also had a good manager.”

Before I could decide how to answer, someone called him from the kitchen.

He handed the clipboard back to me. “Make whatever changes you think we need. Show me before you leave.”

It wasn’t a job offer, but it was trust, and that felt better.

For the next ninety minutes, I moved through the Lantern House with a sense of purpose that settled into me as naturally as breathing.

I adjusted the prep sheet with the kitchen lead, checked the wristband count against the current online sales, and found a place for the additional dry goods that would not interfere with dinner service. When one of the servers came in for her shift worried about the altered party assignments, I walked through the division of sections with her until she understood where the late crowd would flow.

The details were ordinary restaurant work, and I had missed them with an ache I had refused to name.

Rex stayed nearby without turning himself into part of the management team. When a delivery of glassware arrived earlier than expected, he helped the barback carry cases to storage. When I needed a folding prep table moved away from a refrigerator vent, he took one end after I asked and followed my direction without telling me where it ought to go.

At one point I looked across the room and found Rex talking to Case beside the bar. Case said something that made Rex laugh, and the sight stopped me for half a second.

Rex had always seemed contained when I knew him through Gavin’s case, a man built around work and responsibility. Even now, his humor was usually quiet enough that I noticed the change in his eyes before the sound. Seeing him relaxed in the middle of my world did something strange and warm beneath my ribs.

Then his gaze found mine across the restaurant, and whatever Case had been saying ceased to matter. Rex looked at the burgundy dress I had changed into and did not disguise the fact that he was looking. My nipples tightened beneath the knit fabric. I had dressed for myself before Meredith’s call, but that did not mean I objected to the appreciation.

I held his gaze until the kitchen lead asked me a question and forced me back to work.

By the time the dinner rush began thinning, the Lantern House felt different from the frantic room Case had called me into that morning. The service paths stayed clear. The bar had enough glassware where it belonged. The Halloween prep plan no longer depended on one impossible burst of work before the doors opened.

I stood near the service station reading the final sheet when Case slid a mug toward me.

Steam curled from the cider.

“You’ve had water,” he said. “This is for morale.”

I wrapped both hands around the mug, grateful for the heat. “Is that an official management policy?”

“It is now. Also, you fixed the food problem, which means I no longer have to distract hungry guests with charm.”

“Your workload has decreased dramatically.”

He leaned one elbow on the bar, but his expression softened before the conversation could turn into a string of jokes.

“You look better than you did when you left.”

“I know more than I did when I left.”