Free King of the Kitchen by Bru Baker Page A

what Duncan needed on occasion. And they never talked about Beck. It was rule number one after Campbell had nearly taken Duncan’s head off for casually insulting Beck once.
    Duncan grabbed his phone and started searching Spotify for boy bands, but Campbell cut his plans for a welcoming serenade for Beck short by clapping his hands together and heading for the kitchen. “Frittata?”
    Duncan gave his phone a longing glance but put it aside. He had a firm rule about electronics in the kitchen. It was unsanitary, for one—most people had no idea how dirty their phones and other gadgets were, but as a microbiologist, Duncan had seen for himself how much disgusting shit phones picked up, sometimes literally. For another, it wasn’t a good place to be distracted. And the likelihood of dropping an expensive piece of technology into the sink or soup pot was too great.
    He knew a lot of chefs who liked music when they cooked at home, but he wasn’t one of them. He liked the quiet, since it was a nice respite from the noisy professional kitchens he spent so much time in.
    Campbell understood that. It was another of the reasons he was allowed in Duncan’s kitchen.
    They worked together silently, with Duncan raiding the fridge for leftovers he dutifully handed over to Campbell, who had set himself up at the cutting board with one of Duncan’s favorite knifes. That was true friendship, right there. Letting someone else in his kitchen was big, but he wouldn’t even let his own mother touch his knives.
    He hadn’t been home much over the last week, so the pickings were pretty slim. Luckily frittatas were a very forgiving medium. He’d seen a King of the Kitchen where Beck called it refrigerator Velcro, and even though Duncan was loathe to admit a TV chef could be right about anything, Beck absolutely was in this case. Wilted veggies? Throw ’em in. Almost expired dairy? It’s all good. Frittatas were amazing. There were a few different foods that could successfully help you clean out your stash of leftovers, but frittatas were Duncan’s favorite.
    Campbell made a face when he opened up a container that had gone fuzzy inside. Duncan wrinkled his nose and tossed it, Tupperware and all, into the garbage.
    “You should—”
    Campbell quieted when Duncan narrowed his eyes. He recycled when he could and did his best to minimize waste of all sorts in the restaurants he worked in, but he drew the line at cleaning out moldy things. He’d forgo a plastic bag next time he stopped in at the convenience store on the corner and call it ecologically even.
    Campbell shrugged and went back to chopping the ham Duncan had brought home from his mother’s earlier in the week. He’d inherited every ounce of his cooking prowess from his father. His mother could barely boil water, and she’d exist on Lean Cuisines if Duncan let her. So whenever he was in town, he made the hour-long trek out to her place once a week to cook her a good meal and set up some easy-to-microwave meals for later in the week. She hadn’t liked the wasabi-soy rub he’d put on the ham, though, so he’d brought it home with him.
    Duncan grabbed the eggs last and started cracking them into a bowl, beating them with a fork until they were nice and frothy. He seasoned them lightly—one mistake cooks made all the time was too much seasoning in eggs, since it was so easy to overpower the flavor of the eggs themselves—and put them aside so he could get a pan heating on the stove.
    Campbell scraped the onions and garlic he’d chopped into it as soon as the oil began to shimmer, and the smell of sautéing aromatics filled the small kitchen. Duncan was pretty sure heaven smelled like sautéing onions. Or bacon.
    Speaking of, he’d better get that started too. He liked it crisp, which was sacrilege in some circles. He’d once almost brought a restaurant reviewer to tears—not the good kind—by making a bacon-fat foam and calling it bacon on the menu. It hadn’t gone over