She doesn’t turn but bobs her head in a curt nod.

I take a few steps deeper into the freezer. “I’m not upset. I shouldn’t have given him a second chance in the first place. I’m sorry that you had to deal with him.”

“You don’t have to apologize to me,” she says. There’s no accusation in her voice. None at all. I hear it nonetheless. Sophie wanted Chad gone the first time Carly came to her asking if she could be scheduled on the days he wasn’t working. But we’d lost so many staff already, I panicked and fought to keep him against my better judgment.

She turns to face me, her chef’s coat undone, her nipples, hard from the cold, visible through her white tank top. Sophie and I blink at each other and quickly look away. Her cheeks turn a darker shade of red.

So, great. Not only have I failed Carly, I’ve made Sophie uncomfortable, too.

“Sorry,” I say quickly. “It won’t happen again.” Second chances or checking her out. “And you were right about taking credit card numbers.”

I start to rearrange stacks of individually wrapped dough on the shelf beside me for something to do with my hands. I hate it when other people are right. I hate admitting it more. I’d scoffed when she’d suggested it at our last meeting. Actually scoffed. Because taking credit cards wasn’t something we’d ever done at the restaurants I’d worked at before.

“I don’t want our guests to feel like we don’t trust them,” I’d said.

Sophie sighs so audibly Carly can probably hear her. It’s the only pushback I ever seem to get from her anymore, this sound she makes when she’s frustrated but won’t say anything. She takes the dough from my hands, putting the frozen disks back where they were. This close, I watch as her chest rises and falls with each breath. Underneath her foundation, dark purple rings her eyes. This close, she’s so warm, even in this dark freezer. When she’s close like this, I get caught up in her and forget my own frustrations with my head chef or that my restaurant is slowly crumbling around me or that I feel lonely at the end of the night and for once I don’t like it.

Sophie’s jaw is rigid and she is conspicuously not looking at me.

Sometimes I want to grip her shoulders, under her coat, skin to skin, and tell her—beg her—to fight with me. Tell me I was an asshole for giving Chad a second chance. Tell me if my ideas are bad. Or good. Anything.

Whenever I get this urge, it’s time to eighty-six myself from the conversation.

“Let’s talk tomorrow,” I say, backing out of the freezer, too warm after being so close to her. “About the new menu. Ten?” I ask.

“Actually,” she says. “There’s...” She presses her lips together.

“Spit it out, Hollywood.”

She narrows her eyes. She hates that nickname, she is so totally done with me.