Page 4 of Don't Remind Me
“Jase,” Jillian said. “Meet Dani Mills, your new partner in crime.”
My stomach dropped at his name as recognition slammed into me with the force of a speeding car.
No.
“Dani, meet my executive chef…”
This is not happening.
“Jase Beauford.”
All the air fled my lungs as I held his startling blue gaze, and for a second, I was looking into the eyes of my past.
Beauford.
As in Alec Beauford.
As in my ex-boyfriend Alec Beauford.
My ex-boyfriend who I could not stop dreaming about and who happened to have an older brother named—you guessed it—Jase.
This is not happening.
But it was. Because looking back at me was none other than Alec’s brother.
Alec, who I wanted nothing more than to shove to the furthest recesses of my mind and forget all about so I could stop being haunted by his smile and his handsome face and the perfect cut of his jaw. A jaw that was apparently some sort of arousal trigger for my brain because here I was, staring at the very same and equally handsome jawline of his brother, imagining running my hand along its edge.
If I could have smacked myself in the face without raising alarm bells for the other three people here, I would have. There could be no imagining. No anything.
This was Alec’s brother.His brother, who I now had to work closely with for the next three months if I had any shot of pulling this event off.
How is this happening?
Any semblance of ease I’d managed to find over lunch disintegrated as my anxiety roared back to life more violently than a hurricane.
Three months of Alec’s brother.
Shit.
Chapter Two
Jase
A beautiful womanwas staring at me, and I couldn’t tell if she was pissed off or terrified.
At first, I thought maybe she was checking me out, but then her whole body went tense, her fair skin growing paler as her blue-green eyes went huge, and…was she shaking?
“Nice to meet you,” I said with a nod to her and the other woman beside Jillian, trying to come across as both professional and nonthreatening. Not a balance I usually had to achieve, but then again, I couldn’t remember a woman ever looking at me like I’d kidnapped her beloved pet goldfish, filleted it in front of her, then served it to her as sushi.
Maybe the women were unsatisfied customers Jillian was trying to win over. My shoulders tightened at the thought. If someone’s experience here had been terrible enough to warrant the owner make it up to them, I’d failed at my job.
Dani lifted her mouth into what could only be classified as a smile in the broadest sense of the term and gritted out, “You too,” before dropping her eyes to the barstool in front of her.
I swung my gaze to Jillian for an assist. Or a clue as to what the hell was going on. “Partner in crime for what?” I asked.
My boss lifted her chin a fraction, a glint in her eye, and I knew right then I would hate whatever came out of her mouth next.
“Talia and Dani work for the Healthy Birth Coalition of Philadelphia, and they’re putting together a fundraiser. I’ve volunteered us to cater it.”
