Page 42 of The Billionaire's Secret Desire
My throat tightens even more. “Yeah, I’m doing okay. It was… scary. But I’m bouncing back. I've got a new gig in restaurant consulting, and I’m now catering a wedding. A big one.”
“Hot damn. That’s my girl,” he says, voice thick with pride. “I just had to hear your voice for myself. Make sure you weren’t going down with the flames.”
I smile, the knot in my chest loosening. “I’m good, Rusty. Better than I’ve been in a long time.”
There’s a pause. “I still think about that night you showed up, rain-soaked and furious, with nothin’ but a backpack and a grudge,” he says, pride swelling in every word. “You had fire in your eyes and zero patience, but damn if you didn’t walk into that kitchen like you belonged there. I knew then—you were gonna raise hell and make magic doing it.”
I laugh. “You let me sleep in the supply closet.”
“One pot of gumbo and my regulars were ready to rewrite you into their wills,” he says with a laugh, pride unmistakable in his voice.
“You taught me how to dice an onion without crying.”
He snorts. “Lies. I still cry every damn time.”
We talk a few more minutes—easy, comfortable. When I finally hang up, I’m smiling, my chest a little lighter. And when I glance up, Sawyer’s watching me.
Hard.
I raise an eyebrow. “What?”
“Who was that?” Sawyer asks, his tone low and almost too nonchalant—like he's trying not to sound like he's fishing but failing miserably.
Uh. Oh.
He can’t be jealous. Can he? I mean, he’s Sawyer-freaking-Gallo—gorgeous, broody, billionaire. The kind of man women trip over themselves for. The idea that he might actually be jealous over a sixty-five-year-old chef from Pelican Point? That’s... absurd. Right?
I blink. “That was Rusty. My old boss. From the Rusty Anchor over in Pelican Point.”
He tilts his head, an unreadable expression. “The way you were smiling…”
I laugh softly and close my laptop. “You are jealous.”
He doesn’t answer. Just keeps watching me like he’s trying to solve a particularly irritating puzzle.
I set the laptop aside and crawl closer, kneeling beside him on the couch. “Rusty is like… my mentor. My culinary fairy godfather. I showed up at his restaurant the day after my dad kicked me out on my eighteenth birthday. No money. No plan. Just me and a whole lot of rage.”
Sawyer’s eyes soften as he listens to my story.
“He gave me a cot, a knife, and a lesson in humility,” I say. “That man saved my life and taught me to cook. But trust me—there’s nothing romantic there. He’s at least sixty-five and still calls me ‘kiddo.’”
Sawyer’s shoulders ease, but only a little. He leans back, jaw tight, voice low and brooding. “Still. I’ve never seen you light up like that, talking to anyone but me.”
“Jealous looks good on you,” I murmur, sliding into his lap. “But you don’t have to be.”
He wraps his arms around my waist. “I know. But I kind of like the idea that you’re all mine.”
I smile and press a kiss to his jaw, lingering there for a breath before trailing my lips slowly toward the corner of his mouth. “I am,” I whisper against his skin, savoring the warmth of him, the way his arms tighten slightly around me. Then I kiss him again—deeper this time, slow and sure, my fingers sliding up to tangle in the back of his hair. He responds immediately, mouth meeting mine with a quiet hunger, a low sound rumbling from his chest as I shift in his lap, pressing closer. It’s not rushed, not wild—just heat and connection and something that feels like a promise, wordless and sure. When we finally break apart, our foreheads rest together, breath mingling between us.
Outside, the rain keeps falling, but inside, everything feels warm and perfect.
Chapter 17
Sawyer
It’s barely past nine, and I’ve already blown through two coffees and one heated phone call with a supplier who somehow managed to send twenty industrial light fixtures to the wrong construction site. Again.
My office building sits on prime real estate overlooking the Atlantic, the place developers beg to get a slice of. Floor-to-ceiling windows frame a postcard-perfect view of the ocean—sunlight bouncing off the water in waves of gold and blue. The quiet hum of the AC mixes with the muffled sounds of the city below, a distant buzz that barely registers. I lean back in my chair, fingers steepled, and take in the view most people would kill for. But the only thing I can focus on is her.
