Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 81113 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81113 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
She had done so much in so short of a time. She was an amazing chef. I knew that she would go far. It was probably my fault that the restaurant had failed. Or was failing. It wasn’t on her. She’d proven herself to be more than capable.
And you know what? Fuck it. Fuck it all. Fuck the critic, fuck Theo and his menu, fuck all of it. I wanted Stevie on my team. We could work through the rest.
I got up, letter crushed in my hand, and rushed out the door. I told the cooks to handle the close down and went straight to Stevie’s house. The restaurant would be fine with just the floor manager for one damn night. This was more important.
I drove like a fucking maniac to get to her apartment, rushing up the stairs and banging on the door. “Hello? Stevie? You there?”
Fuck, I should have called ahead of time, or sent a text. I wasn’t thinking straight, not at all. She did this to me, more than any other person, she just sent me for a loop.
The door opened as I banged, revealing not Stevie, but Andy. He looked a little confused, and exhausted. “Michael, hey.”
“Hey, is Stevie in?” She probably didn’t want to see me but I had to talk to her.
Andy winced and opened the door further. “You should come in.”
“That bad, huh?” I asked, walking in. “I know that she’s upset about the restaurant but we’re going to make it wor—”
I stopped.
The living room was slightly rearranged from when I’d last been here. And the door to Stevie’s bedroom was open, revealing a completely empty room.
Holy shit.
“She’s gone,” Andy said. “She moved out this afternoon.”
“Afternoon? But she was working in the restaurant yesterday. She just let me her letter of resignation.” I held it up to show him.
Andy shook his head. “It was a quick decision but she said it was the right one. She’s gone up to Sacramento to work at a restaurant there. Apparently she had the offer when she first graduated but she wanted to give your place a shot first.”
He didn’t sound accusatory or angry at me. I was surprised. Andy cared a lot about his sister. They were close and I assumed that if she was upset and moving out on short notice that he’d have quite a few feelings about it.
She must not have told him much.
I shoved the letter into my back pocket. “So she really just up and left in an afternoon?”
Andy nodded. “Yeah. I hate to say it but, she’s gone.”
She’s gone.
That was the mantra that kept running through my head over the next few days. I kept expecting Stevie to be in my office, or in the kitchen, or even at the host stand checking the reservations. But each time I would have to remind myself - she’s gone.
Every day I missed her more. I missed her foul mouth, her flirting with me, how she would sit on my desk and not in the chair, her presence in the kitchen. She steadied everyone around her and just grounded us, brought the whole atmosphere up.
I felt like I hadn’t appreciated her enough while she was here. Not just professionally, but personally. I felt like an asshole for telling her that I didn’t want a relationship. I should’ve seen the good that was in front of me and seized it. Sure I didn’t want a relationship in general, but from the first, Stevie had been an exception.
I’d welcomed her right into my life like she’d always been there. And all right so she’d been there before but it was different now. She was an adult, and fitting into the missing part of me like she’d been made for it. She was sexy as hell, she made me laugh, she was determined and educated and whip smart.
If I had described my perfect woman to someone… Stevie would’ve checked all the boxes. And that included her ability to stand up to me and argue with me on points where I was wrong.
Clearly my feelings for her were deeper than I’d thought. Or planned. Having her gone physically hurt, like an itch that I couldn’t scratch, an ache that refused to go away. I had miscalculated, and badly. Over the next few days I had to stop myself from driving up to Sacramento to find her.
I couldn’t do that, of course. I couldn’t intrude on her life. She was going off to greener pastures and good for her. It was what she deserved, to be out there, at a proper restaurant that would give her the experience and recommendations to start up her own place someday. She’d want to start up her own place, I was sure, and she deserved to. Her menu was inspired, to hell with what the critic had said.