Page 17 of Get Lost

“Vous, les Américains, êtes tous pareils. Rien n’est jamais assez bon pour vous. Vous n’aimes pas le gâteau? Amende. Ce gâteau est une poubelle!” His voice rose as he shouted at her in a language she should have been able to pick up on but couldn’t.

Because middle school was, like, a thousand years ago, and living in Southern California meant she should have learnedSpanish, notFrench. Her friends often made fun of her over this little fact, but even with a hot French chef shouting at her now, she still thought it was a really, really sexy language.

Especially when sharpened with anger. Ugh. She really needed to get laid. Just one more day at this estate and she could head back to L.A. and hit up any number of her frequent flyers.

“Ce vert est trop vert pour toi? Bien!” He roughly dragged his fingertips through the icing on the side of the cake and Kelsey gasped. There wasn’t enough time to create a whole new cake. What if he did more than just wreck the hideous frosting? They’d beoutone wedding cake andina heap of trouble, with a pissed off client she couldn’t afford to piss off.

Like she’d just pissed off this chef.

Kelsey groaned and raised her hands in an attempt to surrender, or calm him down, or something. Anything. She should have kept her damn mouth shut about the cake. Were all French people so quick to fly off the handle? Or was it just this man? This alluring, fiery man with a temper almost as hot as he was.

Kelsey breathed deeply. “Chef, please…”

She just had to get through this wedding and pull it off without a hitch.

A vomit-green, three-tiered hitch.

“S'il vous plaît? Peut-être que vous devriez faire le gâteau, tu pensez que tu êtes tellement meileur en cuisine que moi,”he continued angrily. “Veuxe tu faire le gâteau, belle Américaine? Peut-être que je vais recul et me montrer comment faire un vrai gâteau, non?”

Kelsey’s pulse sped as Jean-Luc stepped around the table toward her, an angry set to his jaw and those midnight eyes boring into hers. He untied his apron, then pulled it off and dropped it to the floor, stalking toward her like a lion approaching its prey. His sleeves were rolled up to almost his elbows, exposing sinewy, muscular arms.

Maybe from all that kneading.

She had something he couldknead.

Noooooope. Focus.

His white chef’s coat was unbuttoned enough to show a sneak peek at his muscular chest, but that wasn’t what made her nearly lose her balance. Jean-Luc’s black and white plaid chef pants were snug in all the right places, taut against the thick thighs that matched his broad shoulders and muscular arms, and showcasing the massive cock she’d felt—and fantasized about for the past twenty-four hours.

Is that a rolling pin in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?She nearly laughed at her own ridiculous thought, but laughter was the last thing this man elicited from her in this tense, charged moment.

She should step away, leave the kitchen, hurry off to do something else, anything else, rather than get reamed by this man, but she found herself stuck in the intensity of his gaze.

As he slowly stalked toward her, the anger in his eyes morphed into something esle. Still dark, but now lustful. He stopped just a foot away from her, chest rising and falling heavily. “Préférez-vous me montrer comment faire correctement le gâteau, Kelsey, ou devrions-nous passer directement à lafucking?”

Her cheeks and chest were hot, the summit of her legs even hotter. He could have just asked her to do any number of things—good, bad, or otherwise—but his words were lost to her past the way his French accent formed the wordfucking. His deep voice slipped down into her core, twisting her insides into a churning coil of desire.

They stood silently, his chest rising and falling heavily and her insides heating in response to his dark gaze, then he took another step forward and Kelsey drew in a shaky breath. This was so very wrong, but something about Jean-Luc made her want to break

Every.

Single.

Rule.

Especially her self-imposeddon’t fuck the staffrule.

He licked his lips and his gaze dropped to her chest, which now rose and fell in rhythm with his. “Nous avons dansé autour de ce désir, n’est-ce pas?” he reached out and gripped her chin, sending a tremor through her body at his firm, commanding touch. She only vaguely registered the fact that her face was now covered in green icing. “Tu réagis si facilement à mon toucher,” he whispered. He rubbed his thumb over her bottom lip and his intense gaze zeroed in on her mouth. Her lips parted reflexively, and Jean-Luc dipped his thumb between them. The frosting may have been hideous to look at, but the pronounced vanilla buttercream flavor was damn near sinful. Or maybehewas downright sinful.

The chef dragged his dark eyes back up to meet hers, raising his eyebrows in question.He gripped her chin firmly, then leaned forward and claimed her mouth.

He didn’tgiveher a kiss; hetookone.

He could take them all.

The door opened and Kelsey jumped back, quickly putting as much space between her and the pastry chef as she possibly could. He smirked, then turned slowly to face whomever just interrupted them.

The delivery man’s eyebrows crept up his forehead—probably because Kelsey was covered in frosting—but he quickly made his expression neutral as he asked, “Delivery for Kelsey Sutton?”

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