Page 112 of Heart of a Villain

Chef Erik Bergh was good-looking and likable, and Adrían wouldn’t touch her. It was as if her revelation had made him repulsed by her. So, if she wasn’t misreading that gleam in Erik’s eyes, maybe she would become more than a sous chef.

“How about a fika?” he asked. “A little coffee? We can just talk. I will tell you more about the restaurant, and you can tell me about cooking in South America. Colombia, you said?”

Hopefully, he didn’t ask too many specifics about her time in Colombia; she hadn’t had time to research much of her lie.

“Sure, I’d like that.”

He had her take a seat in his office while he retrieved their drinks. Now that she wasn’t being drilled by questions and for clarification on her resume, she could safely look around. It wasn’t the largest office space, but it was the kind of small that whispered cozy rather than screamed cramped.

Awards lined a shelf behind his desk chair. Propped between the trophies and plaques were his very own published cookbooks on stands, facing outward.

His face graced every cover.

Having her own cookbook had once been a long-time dream of hers, but her face could no longer be part of something that would be distributed worldwide. The dream of the restaurant, however, she refused to defer. A food truck, to start, would do so long as it was her recipes being served and her name on the ownership documents.

“Querida?”

Frowning, she turned toward the partially cracked door. That voice sounded just like…

“Querida, I know you’re here!”

She left her seat and went to the front. Adrían, holding Theo, stood with Josiah next to him, Theo’s face scrunched and the corners of Josiah’s mouth drooping toward his chin.

“Adrían?” She hurried over to him, dodging empty chairs that hadn’t been shoved under their table. “What’s wrong? Is it Eesh? Is she okay? Did something happen? Is it Tiare?”

Erik pointed to Adrían. “So, you do know this guy?”

“Yeah, he’s a…friend.”

Adrían took a half step backward. “Friend? Friend? Try again, querida. You think a separation means I don’t love you?”

“Sepa…ration?”

“We took vows.”

“Wait…vows?”

“If not for me,” he adjusted Theo in his hold, “for the boys. Let’s fix it for the boys. I want us to be a family again.”

She didn’t know how she knew, but this display had either Joel or Ayesha written all over it. Knowing those two, it was both. Knowing the entire family, every last one had a hand, especially with the way they tortured poor Joel.

“Come home, Mom,” Josiah said.

She had to give it to him; he managed to suppress the smile that tried to crack like a pick to ice on his adorable face.

“Yeah, come home, Mommy,” Theo echoed. “Don’t fight with Dad anymore, please?”

Josiah took her hand. “We miss you. Dad, he’s miserable without you. We all are.”

Theo sniffed, setting his cute, conniving head on Adrían’s shoulder. “Don’t you love us anymore, Mommy?”

The minute she was done laughing about this later, she would skewer them all, even the tiny heart-melting one who’d stole her eyes and wore them better.

“You didn’t tell me you had a family,” Erik said.

That was because she didn’t know she had one herself until a few minutes ago. Likely, it wouldn’t have been a problem had he not asked during the interview, and she’d mentioned being single and childless.

While Erik and Adrían were the same height, they were in two completely different weight classes. It wasn’t until that very moment that she realized just how much Adrían looked like the work he did for a living—toned muscles, tattoos, scars that only made him more appealing, and an abrasively sexy aura.

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