Page 30 of Delicious

He realized a second too late he shouldn’t be making these sounds here—and that it had been far too long since he’d made them in relation to anything but food.

Because Andrew was gazing at him, those gorgeous blue eyes pinned to him, and Marco knew, maybe because he was a Moretti, or maybe because he was a man, that if he walked over and kissed him, Andrew wouldn’t push him away.

“It’s incredible.” Marco set the plate on the countertop. “You shouldn’t be here, working for me.”

“Why not? Because I push you? Because we’re?—”

Marco interrupted him before he could say,because we’re attracted to each other,because frankly it was hard enough keeping his hands off without knowing for sure it was mutual. And if hedidknow it was mutual . . .well.

“Because you’re really fucking talented,” Marco said instead. “And my dessert menu isn’t anything special. You said it yourself.”

“Maybe so. But there’s Daniel. He does need training. Because he’s going to be good. Perfect for you.”

Marco realized then that Andrew had heard the whole ugly story about Izzy and the pomegranate. “I don’t—I wouldn’t?—”

“You don’t need to excuse yourself to me.” Andrew chuckled under his breath. “Daniel’s young and impressionable, and I know you wouldn’t.”

“I didn’t with Izzy, and she wasn’t youngorimpressionable,” Marco said, gripping the edge of the counter and trying to resist the pull to divulge the whole story. Though frankly, there wasn’t much to tell.

“You wouldn’t overstep,” Andrew said with confident certainty.

Sounding a little, though, like he wanted Marco to, with him.

Because like Izzy, Andrew was neither young nor impressionable either. He was the same age, and not only had he been working in restaurants for twenty years, same as Marco had, he’d had everything fall apart on him.

“Not like your ex?” Marco asked quietly.

A flash of hurt crossed over Andrew’s features. He turned away, to rinse out his sponge. “Caught him getting a blowjob from our very young intern, late one night, in his office.”

Marco let out a breath. It was even worse than he’d expected.

“We broke up, of course,” Andrew continued, and there was a very well-earned bitterness in his tone. “I continued to work there. It was my dream. Had beenourdream, of course, but I thought, I’m not going to give it up just because François couldn’t keep it in his pants.” He sighed. “But it got too hard. My eyes were opened. He did a lot of things I suddenly couldn’t stomach. Threw his weight around—or didn’t, sometimes. And I couldn’t take it any longer. So I left.”

“What are you doing here, now?” Marco had to ask it, even as he took a step closer. Drawn by the mingled sadness and hope in Andrew’s eyes. “What arewedoing?”

Andrew shouldn’t want to get involved with another chef ever again. Not one he worked for. Even temporarily. But here he was, flirting with Marco. Not pretending that their attraction was nothing.

“Damned if I know,” Andrew said wryly. “I asked you to meet me for coffee thinking, I’d tell you . . .I don’t know, notno, butsomething. Not yes. I even had this crazy thought of asking you out, instead, but then you looked like that at me, and I just kept saying yes.”

“Kept negotiating in your favor, you mean,” Marco teased roughly.

He was five seconds away from leaning in and kissing him. Andrew didn’t look like he’d hate it. The opposite, in fact.

“Hey, I did do that, at least,” Andrew pointed out.

“You did.”

Andrew reached out, palm first, pressing it to Marco’s thundering heart. Didn’t touch him anywhere else, but it didn’t matter, because he felt iteverywhere.

“And I should have left well enough alone, I know that. But I couldn’t, and you just keptlookingat me like that, and I did want you to stop. But I didn’t want you to, even more.”

“You’re driving me insane,” Marco said softly. Aware he was only a few seconds away from just sheer begging.Kiss me. Ask me out the way you were going to. Anything. Just give me a shred. A crumb.

But Andrew didn’t. He didn’t pull away either.

Not until there was a sudden gasp behind them, and of course, that was when Daniel returned to the pastry kitchen, his arms full of clean dishes.

Dumping cold, hard truth all over Marco.What the fuck are we doing?

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