“On the contrary,” he said politely.

“That’s sex. I like sex.” At least, I’d liked sex with him. Something to think about later. “I’m not very good at . . .” Relationships? We didn’t have a relationship. He was my boss. “The part that comes after.”

“This part.”

“Yes.”

He regarded me thoughtfully. “Sex is like food, yeah? Something the body needs. Maybe a dish is not prepared to your liking, but if you are hungry, you eat. Maybe next time you make it a little differently. Or you choose something else.”

I nodded. What was he trying to say?

“But sometimes . . .” His hand curved around my neck, drawing me close. Closer. “You try something so much to your taste, you would not change a thing. So good,” he whispered against my lips, “you don’t want anything else.” His thumb stroked the side of my throat, making my skin prickle to attention. “I have such a taste for you, Jo.”

Everything inside me melted: my brain, my knees, my spine. He kissed me, warm, openmouthed kisses, coaxing my response, making me hungry for him all over again.

“I’m going to be late for work,” I warned several minutes later.

He glanced over my head at the clock. “It’s only noon.”

Right. Because he came in later, after the rest of the staff, when the bulk of the prep work was done.

“I have to be there by one,” I reminded him.

Reluctantly, it seemed, he released me. “Then I will take you.”

“Um. I don’t think we should go in together. I don’t want everybody thinking I’m one of your . . .”

He raised an eyebrow. “One of my . . .” Definitely a question this time.

Well, shoot. In all fairness, he didn’t have a reputation for shagging the staff—no more than I made a habit of inviting men up to my apartment. But I didn’t want him to think I was angling to turn our hookup into, well, anything else.

“I don’t want to put you in an awkward position,” I mumbled, my gaze anchored to his chest.

“Jo.” His voice was patient. “People will see what they want to see. Whether we walk in together or not.”

“But they’ll talk.”

“Let them. If I walk down the sidewalk wearing a hoodie, to some eyes I look like a thug. But that’s on them. I don’t have to be limited by their vision. Who I am, what I choose to wear or do . . . That’s on me, yeah? I am myself, whatever they choose to see.”

“Easy for you to say.”

“You think so,” he said without inflection.

Oh God. Had I actually just told him that it was easy for him to be himself when other people—strangers, customers, cops—judged him by his appearance?

My face flamed. “I only meant . . . You’re Chef.”

“Eric. And you . . . You are yourself.” I looked up. He met my gaze. The curve of his mouth almost undid me. “Jo.”