He moves in closer until his mouth is covering mine and all I can do is mold myself to him. He wraps his arms around me, pulls me into him and completely dominates me. My surrender betrays me and I am powerless to fight it.
I faintly hear my name in the background, but it doesn’t sink in until Joanne is too close. I only feel Rocco’s body against mine.
“Maddie?”
Rocco moves away from me and picks up his clipboard, pointing at something I couldn’t read and talking gibberish as Joanne walks in. “So, this is where you would write down the inventory we have in stock,” he says. I look up at him and then back at the clipboard. Everything swirls together until I realize he is trying to make the situation look like we are working.
“What are you doing?” Joanne asks, her eyebrows furrowed.
“Teaching Maddie inventory.”
“I don’t want her learning inventory. That is your job. I need her to focus on the menu. Jesus, Rocco, she has only been here a few days.”
I look at Joanne, still spaced out from the quick change of pace. She asks me something but I only hear mumbling. I follow her out of the stockroom and back to my station where I am putting together several pie crusts for the evening’s dessert menu.
“These are what I want for tomorrow evening, Maddie. I know they are a bit difficult to make, but I wanted to get your opinion on them.”
I stare at the recipes before me as reality begins to seep back in. Crème brûlée, lemon meringue pie, baklava and baumkuchen. Is she kidding? Is this some kind of test?
“Um,” I stammer still trying to clear my head. “You want me to make these for tomorrow evening?”
“Yes.” She was curt and expecting me to say yes. “Can you?”
“They are all quite difficult to make and time consuming. If the rest of the menu is fairly simple, I think I can pull it off. I have never made baumkuchen before, but one of my classmates did while I was watching. I think I could do it.”
“That is what I want to hear. I’ll leave you to it then.”
I wait for her to leave before examining the recipes a little closer. “This is going to be impossible.” I look around and see Rocco coming out of the stockroom.
“We should continue our conversation later this evening.”
“No, Rocco. This is a mistake.”
He walks to me, causing my breath to catch in my throat. “This is not a mistake,” he says sounding desperate. “I don’t feel like this if it is a mistake.”
I fight it. I keep my head down and I grit my teeth. “I don’t want anything to do with you unless it pertains to my work. I expect you to honor that.” My body aches for him to touch me again. I want his lips pressed into mine. I want so much more.
“Please go.” I whisper as I grip the counter until he walks out.
Later that evening, Joanne introduces me to a new face.
“This is Nancy. She is starting here with us this evening.”
“Hello, I’m Maddie,” I tell her as I hold out my hand. She is soft spoken but she holds my gaze. She is strikingly beautiful yet holds something behind her toothy smile. “Welcome to the team. I just started a few days ago, myself.”
I don’t like her, but I’m not sure why. I try to let it go. My father always told me to give everyone the benefit of the doubt and that first impressions are almost always wrong. I smile and offer my help if she needs it.
Finishing my shift, I clean my counters and put away my ingredients. I look in the display cases at the lemon meringue pie and the crème brûlée and I smile at a job well done. My hopes are high for the other recipes that I plan to conquer tomorrow.
I walk out of the kitchen and my heart begins to race when I see Rocco standing at a table in the corner. I stop and quietly walk backwards to the kitchen. If I go out the back, I can avoid him. I start to turn around and I hear a woman’s voice giggling from the same corner. He steps back and reveals Nancy, the new girl. I slowly move back in the shadows as I feel my heart drop. She glances over to me and unbuttons the top of her blouse. I force myself to think he is just a playboy rather than face my jealousy and I turn too quickly to go back through the kitchen but I somehow find a way to collide into the wall instead. Rocco looks directly at me and turns away from her.
“Don’t stop on my account. I was just leaving,” I spit and quickly disappear into the kitchen and out the back door. When I finally climb into a cab and have time to think about what just happened, I mentally kick myself in the ass for stopping in the alleyway in hopes that he decides to run after me instead of staying with her.
I shake my head and pray for this stupid crush to pass.