Page 37 of Culinary Chaos (Hotel Bombshell #1)

Chapter

Twenty-Seven

H ope scratched the back of her head as she finished going through security and collecting all of her items. It’d been a quick trip to San Francisco and Los Angeles to check on her restaurants there while they had an extra day, and it hadn’t been very satisfactory.

San Francisco still had a problem, and she still couldn’t figure out what it was.

Which irked her.

She grabbed her satchel and started to walk toward the gate. She had about an hour before takeoff, and she really just wanted to sit in the hustle and bustle of the airport and put her thinking cap on. Because her mind was reeling over what could possibly be the problem.

She was going to need more time, unfortunately.

And it’d have to be her first stop once they were done filming for the season.

It was a good thing they only had two episodes left and four more weeks of this.

After buying herself a water, Hope rounded some of the chairs and moved toward the gate, stopping short.

“Angel?”

Angelica’s chin jerked up, confusion on her features before she masked it.

“What are you doing here?”

“Same thing you are.” Angelica looked back down at the laptop balanced on her thighs. “Working and waiting to go to work.”

Hope frowned slightly at Angelica’s cold greeting, but she slid into the seat next to her, settled in, and then asked, “Mind if I join you?”

“Mind? Don’t you usually ask that before you just assume?” Angelica flicked Hope a glance, her lips betraying her tone. She wasn’t mad. She was, in fact, enjoying this.

“We didn’t get much chance to talk while you were gone.” Hope shifted her bag and pried open the top on the bottle of water.

“I had a full schedule.” Angelica typed on her computer quickly, her gaze barely moving from it. “Was there something you needed to discuss?”

“Nothing in particular.” Hope pressed her lips together hard.

She’d caught Angelica masturbating. She was damn sure of it, but she hadn’t said anything outright to ask, and she certainly wasn’t going to now.

But there seemed to be no change in their relationship because of it, which was odd.

Usually someone would be embarrassed and ashamed of that.

But Angelica didn’t seem to have that air about her. “Maybe about our last night in Estes…”

Angelica tensed at that. This time she did raise her gaze to meet Hope’s. “What about it?”

“You left the wrap party early. Josef was concerned.”

Snorting, Angelica rolled her eyes. “About himself, not me.”

“What is it between you two?” Hope furrowed her brow. “You seem to hate each other and yet you work together on multiple projects.”

“The enemy you know…” Angelica trailed off. “I’ve known Josef a long time, and he wouldn’t be where he is without me, and I wouldn’t be where I am without him.”

“But when does it stop being mutually beneficial?”

“I’ll let you know when I figure that out.” Angelica sent off another email before she closed the lid on her laptop. “We’re boarding soon.”

“Are we sitting together?” Hope furrowed her brow and pursed her lips. “Not that I want to avoid you… but after that last night in Estes…”

“Are you teasing me?” Angelica asked, leaning fully back in her seat, her eyes locked on Hope’s.

“Perhaps.” Hope’s cheeks burned. Why was she doing that? What the hell was wrong with her?

“How are your restaurants doing?” Angelica asked, changing the topic deftly.

Hope hummed and then frowned. “Honestly? I have an issue I’m trying to figure out.”

“Happens from time to time, I’m sure.”

“Yeah, if only I could figure out what the problem is. Then I could actually resolve it.” Hope stretched her legs out in front of her, pointing her toes before moving them back in. “It’s been a few months, and I still can’t get a handle on what’s going on.”

“You probably need to do some unannounced visitations and stay there for longer.”

“Probably.” Hope looked back at her. “After filming.”

“Good plan.” Angelica slid her laptop into her bag and glanced toward the gate agent. “We’re almost up.”

“Did you know we were flying together?” Hope asked.

“Maybe.” Angelica smiled at her fully this time. “I’m a producer on the show, Hope. I do have quite a bit of knowledge about what’s going on behind the scenes of my show.”

My show .

Those words rang through Hope’s head and into her heart.

Angelica still didn’t see this as their show, did she?

When would that change? When would they start to be on more equal footing?

She really wanted to know, but she certainly wasn’t going to ask.

Angelica probably wouldn’t even be able to answer that, or if she could, it’d be that it would always be Angelica’s show and no one else’s.

“Did you find a new manager?”

“Two potentials,” Angelica answered, settling back in. “One for my hotel here in LA and one for Mountain View, if they take me up on the offer. I need to do a few more interviews before I’ll officially give them the offer.”

“Haven’t heard from Tatum yet?”

“No.” Angelica shook her head. “But it’s not a bad idea to hire two and train them up in case someone else resigns or I have to fire them.”

Hope hummed. She never would have thought about that, at least not in terms of an actual plan. She’d hire when she had a need, which perhaps was a downfall in how she ran her businesses. Maybe she could learn a thing or five from Angelica in the long run.

Their conversation died down while they boarded and found their seats, but as soon as Hope settled, she couldn’t stop herself from talking to Angelica. Something about this woman intrigued her so much, and she had to know more—always more.

“How old were you when you figured out you were a lesbian?”

Angelica stilled, her eyes wide and lips parted. “That’s a bold assertion.”

“Well… tell me I’m wrong.”

“You’re not, but Hope…” Angelica looked around at the people around them. “This really isn’t the time for this type of conversation.”

“When else are we going to have it?”

“Never.” Angelica sighed heavily. “Everyone has their own story of figuring it out and coming out. It’s mine and mine alone.”

“Sorry,” Hope murmured. She hadn’t realized that would be such a personal question.

She was more looking for the process that Angelica had used to figure it out—if there was one.

Because the fact that she couldn’t stop thinking about kissing her, that she couldn’t stop dreaming about it, had to mean something, right?

Angelica didn’t say anything else, but she did open the window by her seat and look out of it briefly before circling back to Hope. “We won’t have much downtime in Seattle like we did in Estes.”

“No, we won’t,” Hope agreed. She’d already looked at the information they’d been sent when she had some downtime last week, and this hotel looked to be a disaster on crack. “Mountain View was a nice break from the chaos, don’t you think?”

Although it’d only introduced another kind of chaos into Hope’s world.

One she hadn’t been able to sort out yet.

She folded her hands together in her lap, or else she’d be tempted to reach over and touch Angelica during the flight.

There was a definite divide between them now, or perhaps it was a wall that Angelica had put there on purpose.

“It was,” Angelica agreed. “At least some of the chaos.”

Had Angelica read her mind?

Hope blushed, dropping her gaze again down to Angelica’s lips.

They’d been so close to kissing that night, and Hope wanted to ask so many questions.

Was Angelica interested in her? Because it was so hard to tell sometimes.

She was cold one second and hot the next.

She was damn confident in just about every aspect of her life, and she certainly didn’t seem ashamed of the sexual side of things.

“Hope?”

“What?”

“Do you want a drink?” Angelica nodded toward the flight attendant.

“Oh! Um… no.” She had her water, but the only thing she could think to drink right now was alcohol, and she really didn’t think that was going to be a good idea with the direction her thoughts had gone on lately. “Thank you,” she added.

Angelica waved the flight attendant off and focused back on Hope. “I’ll help Tatum if he wants it. He deserves to be able to have time to worry about his parents instead of just worrying about the hotel.”

“He does.” Hope looked at her directly. “You really do realize that no one would expect that from you.”

“Of course not.” Angelica’s lips quirked upward.

“It could have changed the tide of the show if you’d allowed them to air that conversation, you know.

Or hell, even film it.” Speaking of which, everything Angelica had done while in Estes had gone against what Rex had said about her.

She hadn’t been hungry for the camera. She hadn’t been mad when they’d rescheduled.

And if she really wanted the attention to feed her ego, then she would have insisted on a conversation like this being filmed.

Angelica nodded slowly. “I’m confusing you, aren’t I?”

“You’re not confusing me,” Hope answered. “But what everyone else is saying about you and what I’m seeing is confusing.”

“I’m usually really good at pretending with people.” Angelica sighed, again looking around the plane as if someone else was going to jump out at them that Angelica knew and she was going to shut down again. “But I can’t seem to do it with you.”

“Pretending?” Hope frowned. “Why would you want to do that?”

“It’s part of my job.” Angelica dashed her tongue across her lips in thought.

“I’m the boss, and I’m a woman. Some people want me to be in charge, and others want me to never succeed.

In order to do what I need to do, I have to play the games that people expect to play and the ones they don’t expect to play. ”

“How lonely,” Hope commented, giving in and reaching over to grab Angelica’s hand. She squeezed Angelica’s fingers and then let go. She couldn’t hold on for too long. It’d mean something else, wouldn’t it?

“It can be.” Angelica folded her hands together, ignoring the fact that they’d just touched. “And it can also be completely freeing.”

Hope shook her head. “See, that’s what I don’t understand.”

“The contradictions? Life is full of them.”

“You’re full of a lack of details.” Hope pointed at her, but she used her tone to make it come off more as a tease than the fact that she was calling Angelica out.

“Details?” Angelica’s cheeks took on a shade of pink that Hope hadn’t ever seen before. “You want details?”

“Yes. Who wouldn’t?” Hope turned to lean in closer, the conversation growing in intensity. “Who are you, Angelica Shields? And why do you hide?”

Angelica hummed, her lips pulling tight before her gaze turned from one of contemplation into one of mischief. “Yes, I was touching myself that night in Estes Park. I haven’t done it in a very long time.”

Heat rushed through Hope’s body, filling every single inch of her. She hadn’t expected that. She hadn’t thought that Angelica would drop that on her without any further explanation or understanding.

Angelica’s lips parted, her breathing increasing. Hope realized far too late that she was once again staring at them. That she couldn’t find words even if she tried right now. That she was pushed into silence because she wanted nothing more than to hear Angelica continue to speak.

“Yes, it felt good,” Angelica added, her voice dropping to an even lower level.

Hope had to lean in just to make sure that she was hearing everything correctly.

“Yes, I’m a lesbian, and yes, I like women.

No…” Angelica trailed off, pausing just long enough to have Hope’s entire body tuned in to hers.

“No… I don’t like women,” she corrected.

“I love women. And that isn’t always welcomed by other people, so I don’t welcome other people into my personal life. ”

“Because you’re a lesbian?” Hope asked.

“It’s not the only reason,” Angelica responded. “Just one of many.”

Hope stilled. Why was this turning her on so much?

Not the topic of conversation, but the intensity of it.

The vulnerability. The secrecy. The… she stopped.

It was Angelica. It wasn’t the fact that Angelica was a woman or that she had once previously thought she was straight, it was the fact that this was Angelica—a closed-off woman who was giving her a glimpse into who she truly was under all that armor.

That’s what was doing it.

And Hope loved it.

She needed more of it.

Hope leaned in even closer, tilting her head down as she picked up the sound of Angelica’s breathing. “I think that you want people to dislike you.”

“Why would you think that?”

“Because you do. The real question is why you want that.” Hope flicked her gaze up to meet Angelica’s. “And I have a few theories on that one.”

“Do tell,” Angelica whispered.

“No.” Hope grinned broadly, pulling back.

Angelica seemed shocked by that, her eyes wide and lips parted, ripe for the taking. But Hope wasn’t going to do that either. “No?”

“No.” Hope pushed her lips together in a smile that she was really bad at hiding. “I think I’ll let you prove or disprove them to me.”

Angelica scoffed and shook her head. “We have four more weeks together, Hope. You’re going to have to work fast.”

“Entirely possible.” Hope grinned at her brightly this time. She liked Angelica, not just because she was attracted to her, which was something she was fully willing to admit now, but because Angelica wasn’t like anyone she’d ever met before.

Laughing, Angelica settled back into her seat. “Keep it in your pants, Hope. I’m not free for the taking.”

“Wasn’t thinking anything about that.” But now she was. Fuck Angelica for sinking that thought into her brain. Now all Hope could do was remember the feel of Angelica’s lips against hers, the scent wafting off her when she’d opened that door and looked so disheveled, so satisfied.

Why Hope had ever thought she was straight before was a joke. She had been hiding herself from herself, and that was a disappointment. She wasn’t straight, and she just needed to accept the fact that she was so damn attracted to Angelica.

And she wanted to kiss her again.

Now she just had to figure out what she was going to do with that.

No.

Not what she was going to do, because she wasn’t going to kiss Angelica again.

But they could flirt. They could tease. And she could safely walk the line of attraction and not cross it.

Because she still loved Rex, and she wouldn’t risk her entire family for nothing more than a quick kiss in the moonlight and under the stars.