Free Lucky Flash: A Lucky O'Toole Novella (The Lucky O'Toole Vegas Adventure Series) by Deborah Coonts Page A

tenant’s garish pizza joint still surprised me.   Brick walls with drippy mortar, green leather banquets and chairs, white tablecloths, and the soft illumination of brass sconces created an elegant, yet welcoming, environment.   A bar in warm wood imported from Scotland and fronted by green leather barstools circled from the right-hand wall.   The kitchen worked behind a wall of glass on the left-hand side.   I paused to watch my chef.   Resplendent in his chef’s whites, he toiled, his back to me, over a grill full of rounds of meat sizzling over glowing coals.   Jean-Charles put an ahi burger on the menu, which I thought was an insult to all the meat-lovers everywhere, but it’s been a big seller.   Again, I was gracious in defeat, although he did like to rub it in a bit too often.
    He didn’t break stride as I eased in behind him, circling his waist, then planting a light kiss on my favorite spot just behind his right ear where his hair curled seductively over his collar.   “I have missed you last night.   Christophe wanted you to read him the Very Bad Bunny story again.   He was most … how do you say it?”
    “Put out?”   I nibbled on his ear because it was there.   Christophe was Jean-Charles’s five-year-old son who both charmed and terrified me.
    A shiver chased through my chef.   “You must stop that.   I cannot concentrate.   Yes, put out, this is it.   He tells me I do not get the voices right.”   He muttered a curse as he flipped one of the patties into the waste trough and then tossed a fresh one on the grill.   “You see?”
    I wasn’t feeling the least bit sorry.   “I’ll read it to him tonight, if I’m invited.”
    Jean-Charles leaned to the side and turned to get a look at me with those baby blues.   “Ah, this is a joke.”
    I tried not to stare at his lush lips.   So, to avoid any awkwardness, I did the only thing I could—I kissed them.   Long and deep, tasting, savoring.   Another shiver, this time mine.   “Mmmmm, I do love the taste of hamburgers.”
    “So I am just another meat on the hoof for you?”   Jean-Charles loved American idioms, even if most of the time he got them charmingly mixed up.   “This is how you say it, non? ”
    “Innuendo.   I love it when you do that.   Sexy as hell.”   Which, of course, he always was, but no need to stoke his already healthy ego.
    Rinaldo, Jean-Charles’s executive chef, elbowed us aside.   A mountain of a man with thick black curls, three chins, and a ready smile, shot us one.   “You two, go find a room.   The meat requires delicate handling and undivided attention.”
    A smile ticked up the corner of Jean-Charles’s mouth, his eyes still glued to mine.   “Special handling, indeed.”
    “Me first.”   I grabbed his hand and pulled him to the bar.   “Pour me a glass of Schramsberg Brut Rosé and talk dirty to me.”
    I watched him as he released the cork with a mouth-watering pop; then, with a thumb in the bottom of the bottle, he cradled it in his hand as he poured a frothy flute for me.   A French chef who thinks I’m the tastiest dish and a flute full of bubbles, nothing better.   “How’s the restaurant coming?” I asked.   “I haven’t made it over there today.”
    “We will be ready for the opening December 21 st .   A Christmas party to remember.”   He leaned casually on the bar.   He preferred that to sitting next to me.   Easier to look at me that way, he’d told me.
    I relaxed into his recitation of the progress that had been made, what still needed to be done, and what needed my particular brand of attention, making a mental note of those items.   Despite my very real misgivings, Jean-Charles had crawled into my heart and stayed there.   Our relationship had grown and matured.   We enjoyed business, good food, his son, and each other.   So why did I have this niggling worry that once he decided to shift the spotlight of his focus elsewhere, once he decided I