“Sophie?” I say, more to myself than to the person in the restaurant with me, but there’s no answer. Fuck it.

On the table in the staff room there’s an old, dirty fork. I grab it, holding it over my head. If it’s not Sophie—the only other person with a key—I’ll throw this crusty old fork at them and run like hell.

“Sophie?” I call again, as I creep down the hall. Something sizzles in a pan, utensils clank. More humming. Smoke sits in a haze along the ceiling. The hood fans aren’t on. A clear safety violation. My heart pounds in my throat but there’s no fear. Maybe that makes me stupid. I’m just so sure, more sure with every step, that I’ll see Sophie when I turn this corner, and I am excited. After an evening spent with my father’s stagnant apathy, Sophie’s sighs, heavy through her nose, rolling her eyes when she thinks I don’t see, her small retaliations, thrill me. Here, one on one, I can apologize and listen and find out why she’s so against the show, what happened to make it so unbearable.

I round the corner. Sophie faces the oven range, her back to me. Her hips sway to the music, the denim clinging to the firm globes of her ass. Her hair is piled on top of her head. There’s so much of it and for a moment, a flash in the pan, I imagine it fanned out on my pillowcase. The way the sun would turn it a thousand different hues, dark brown to burned copper.

I tuck the thought away. It’s not for me.

“Sophie. Hollywood,” I say, finally loud enough for her to hear me over the music.

She jumps, spins, screams, all at the same time. Her long-sleeved black T-shirt clings to her curves in ways her standard white chef’s jacket never could.

“You scared the shit out of me,” she screeches. Her eyes jump from my face to the fork that I’m holding like a knife over my head. I drop my arm.

“I thought you were Chad,” I say dumbly.

“Chad?”

“I thought you were disgruntled.” I toss the fork onto the counter, the clatter on the metal counter muted by her loud music.

She shrugs, a slotted spoon in her hand. “I’m normal. I’m gruntled.”

My rib cage feels like it’s filled with hummingbirds. “Good,” I say. “I’m glad. That you’re gruntled.”

“Where’s your car?” I ask, pointing toward the back of the restaurant, where my car sits alone. This whole mortifying ordeal could have been avoided if she’d parked her boat with four-wheel drive in her designated parking spot.

“I parked out front,” she says. “It’s...” She frowns down at the food. “Scary back there at night.”

Great. Now she’s hot and a great cook and smart and also fucking adorable. “Do you want me to put more lights up back there?”

“No. No, it’s fine.”

“Clearly, it’s not fine. I can fix it.”