Page 10 of Shades of Ruin (Sharp Edges Duet #2)

Chapter Eight

ANGéLICA

C hef Greyson wasn’t lying. Hell would be an underwhelming description for the kind of hazing I’ve endured the past six months while living under his iron-fisted rule.

I was so excited he wanted me in his kitchen that I didn’t think to ask what position he’d deigned to give me.

And when I arrived extra early the following Monday, I wasn’t the only new chef in attendance.

Chef Henley, a rigid, completely unimaginative, French-trained man was Grey’s new pastry chef. And I was merely a commis chef hired at a far lower wage to cook and learn under his “vast experience.”

I nearly threw my apron on the fucking floor and walked out the door when Greyson told me the crushing news.

I thought someone had finally believed in me, but I was passed over for a chef who fit the cookie-cutter mould just like every other time.

This job was supposed to save me. Instead, I feel more trapped than ever.

I work long, rigorous days at a pay rate that hasn’t even allowed me to escape my terrible roommate.

Every hour of my life is either spent cooking, practicing, or suffering under the many little insults Chef Greyson likes to pay me when he remembers I even exist.

That small spark of something between us during my interview has fermented into bitterness and acid.

I don’t know what I ever did to draw Greyson’s hatred, but he acts like I’m the bane of his existence anytime we happen to breathe the same air.

It’s almost enough for me to forget the good manners Mamá taught me and say vete a la mierda to his stupid, gorgeous face.

To be honest, it’s more of a need for a job than virtue that keeps me from dishing back exactly what our arrogant executive chef deserves. I just regularly think about stabbing him or slipping arsenic into his morning café crème to get me through the day.

No one ever said the kitchen was made for the sane and sensible. We play with knives and fire for a reason.

Greyson is overseeing the kitchen today, and my nerves feel like they’re balancing on the edge of a blade.

It doesn’t help that my shitty roommate locked me out of the apartment last night.

I spent half the night asleep by the front door before her dealer boyfriend had to make a drug run and left the door open.

My eyes will barely stay open, and I’ve had to pinch myself to stay awake since getting here at six in the morning.

My extra hour in the morning is one of Greyson’s newest torments.

One day, he studied me as I prepped a batch of crème brulée and decided that my technique wasn’t perfect enough to suit his standards.

Since then, I’ve been ordered into the kitchen an hour before anyone else to train.

Every morning, there’s a handwritten note detailing what I should work on during my hour of penalty practice.

It’s not always torture, but after being sleep deprived for several days this week, coming in early is just another strain on my already limited focus.

“Pull it together, Flores,” comes a searing hiss from behind me when I sway a little too out of balance with a large tray of puff pastry in my hands. “This is a Michelin star restaurant, not a fucking trade school. At least act like you know how to handle yourself in my kitchen.”

I turn back to find a pair of brilliant blue eyes boring into mine.

And I can tell that Greyson is in a particularly bad mood today.

“Yes, chef.” I’m just barely able to refrain from rolling my eyes.

It used to bother me when he would tear me apart in public, but now, I’m so used to it that it barely stings more than a bit of lemon grazing an open cut.

He’s right, though; if I want to keep my job, I’m going to have to find a way to push past my three hours of sleep and deliver on this dinner service.

“Flores, get that in the oven and come work on this piping,” Henley orders. In the order of people in the kitchen who drive me crazy, Henley ranks right after Greyson. He doesn’t have the flair for cruelty that our executive chef has, but he’s stoic and unfeeling and generally a pain in my ass.

“Yes, chef.” I swear sometimes those two fucking words are the only thing I speak all day. I’m on repeat like a maldito periquito .

I manage to slide the tray into the oven without any mishaps and rush over to help Henley with plating.

The recipes are all his—boring and dull—but I handle most of the plating.

It’s the one small thing I’m allowed to control in this kitchen, and I love it more than anything else.

I get lost in my work, creating perfect, buttercream swirls with a repetitious flick of my wrist.

“Flores—pastry. Now!”

I glance up from my work to see that the oven went off a couple minutes earlier.

The delicate pastry may have burned already.

“Yes, chef,” I answer Henley, running straight to the hot oven.

Of course, he couldn’t be bothered to take the damn things out.

There’s a heavily male-dominated hierarchy in this kitchen, and that means Henley doesn’t do grunt work.

I’m so frantic to remove the puff pastry that I forget to put on heat-resistant mitts, reaching for the burning metal tray with my bare hand and sliding it from the oven rack.

Instinct has me pulling away a second too late, and the pan, along with everything on it, clatters to the floor with a loud crash .

“ Mierda ,” I shriek, clutching my burned hand to my chest. It’s not a terrible injury; I’ve had far worse.

But looking down at the crumpled mess of pastry remains, I think I might have made the most detrimental mistake of my entire career.

Greyson has found little things to torture me for in the past, but I’ve never thrown an entire batch of a main dessert component on the floor.

And I just know he’s actually going to kill me this time.

“Fucking Christ, Flores, what the fuck did you do?” Henley snarls, his bloated face turning a deep, furious shade of red.

He advances on me, his heavy steps weighted with what appears to be an intent to tear me apart like a fresh baguette.

I brace myself for the rage I deserve, my body frozen in place.

“Stand down, Henley,” Greyson snaps, his arms crossed over his muscular chest and a look of severe displeasure on his face.

“I’ll handle her.” Judging from the fierce tempest in Greyson’s crystalline eyes, I think I’d rather take my chances with Henley.

At least I know Henley isn’t creative enough to devise some cruel and unusual torture to punish me.

“Stand down?” Henley splutters. “The bitch just ruined tonight’s dessert, and you want me to stand down ?”

Greyson bristles, and I get the distinct impression I’m not the only one he’s angry with.

“Things don’t always go according to plan in the kitchen, Henley.

A true chef knows how to improvise.” He glares at the stout pastry chef a moment before turning his gaze on me.

“Flores, what did you work on last week when I instructed you to explore herbal flavors?”

If every chef’s attention wasn’t fixed on me after I loudly demolished a sheet of pastry, it certainly is now.

My sentencing of morning practice wasn’t exactly a secret, but it wasn’t common knowledge either.

Not until now. And now half the chefs in the room are judging me with jealousy in their eyes—like I want to be on the receiving end of Greyson’s special, sadistic attention.

“Brown butter and rosemary ice cream, chef,” I answer, focusing on the pain in my left palm to keep from cowering away from the sudden spotlight I didn’t ask for. “There’s a quart of it in the freezer.”

Greyson nods his head, his blue eyes a little less icy than they were before. “Good.” He turns back to Henley. “Use that.”

Henley scoffs. “That will never be enough for one hundred dishes.”

“Keep the portions small. What else, chef?”

It takes me a moment to realize Greyson is addressing me, not Chef Henley. I have to think quickly, a thousand different combinations running through my head at once. “Fresh fruit from our morning produce delivery? Balsamic seared strawberries would give it a nice balance.”

“Good. And a third element?”

I see it in my head so clearly, it’s like I’ve made the dish already. “Spiked chocolate curls. White chocolate with Elderflower. Dark chocolate with Grand Marnier.”

“Perfect.” And I swear there’s a smile on his lips, though I haven’t the faintest idea what the fuck put it there. “Henley, can you get that pulled together in time?”

Henley splutters like he can’t imagine a greater humiliation than having to prepare a dessert I’ve created. As if I haven’t dutifully assembled his shitty little cakes and mouses every day for the past six months. “I can try,” he snaps. “But our diners will be très décus .”

I roll my eyes at his sparse use of French.

Even though Greyson is the only one in the kitchen fluent in French, some of the others like to throw it in here and there to make themselves feel superior.

It’s a power tactic that I’ve hated since my first week here.

Mind you, I regularly slip with a few Spanish phrases of my own, but that isn’t to make myself feel more exclusive—it’s to tell these two bastards to take it up the ass without them knowing.

“Tell them they’re getting an exclusive, off-menu experience,” Greyson orders with a careless wave of his hand. “It’s gourmet dining, chef—the smaller the food, the higher the luxury. If we gave our elite patrons a crumb, they’d rave about it to no end. Trust me, they’ll eat this shit up.”

I glance up at Greyson, my brows furrowed in confusion.

This whole time, I thought he belonged with the elite clients he served.

Given his French background, I expected nothing less.

But I’m reminded that I know nothing about Gavin Greyson before he earned his fame in Paris.

He grew up somewhere in Chicago, but I couldn’t say where.

And his scathing words regarding gourmet dining and his rich patrons make me think that maybe his background isn’t so different from mine after all.

“If you say so, chef,” Henley grumbles. “You’re the boss.”

“Indeed I am.” His blue eyes turn on me, and any trace of that rare smile has disappeared. “Flores, take care of that burn on your hand then wait in my office. Now.”

Shit , I’m in so much trouble.