BITE ME
KITCHEN GODS BOOK 1
BETH BOLDEN
M/M ROMANCE
RELEASE
DATE: 02.12.17
BLURB
Talented pastry chef Miles
Costa is bored. Working at the celebrated Napa Valley restaurant Terroir is
supposed to be the cherry on top to a promising career, but instead it's a
creative desert. So when he gets an offer to turn his online video series into
a career, he leaves his three best friends in Napa and swaps Terroir for Los
Angeles.
With the resources now at
his fingertips, turning his pastry series into a hit should be easy. Then Miles
meets his producer, Evan Patterson, and realizes he’s screwed. And not even in
the good way.
It's not a meet-cute . . .
Evan lives to work and
loves every minute detail Miles loathes. Not only that, he seems hell bent on
micromanaging every aspect of Miles' show despite the fact he knows nothing
about the culinary arts. Evan doesn’t even like sweets—until Miles seduces him
with a rainbow of delectable confections he can't resist.
. . . it's a collision.
With every confrontation,
the intensity between them flares even hotter until they're not sure if it's
hatred they feel . . .or something else. Is it possible for two people with
nothing in common to discover common ground and romance?
EXCERPT
Miles looked up to see his brand-new partner standing in the doorway of his cubicle. He still wasn’t sure how he felt about the cubicle thing, but he definitely knew how he felt about Evan. Miles gave himself a little mental pat on the back for the annoyed edge in Evan’s voice, and then another that he was ignoring how incredible Evan’s ass looked in those tight jeans.
Maybe
it was petty or childish, but it felt so satisfying. Miles had spent time
around lots of egotistical perfectionists over the years, but none of them had
ever had a stick up their ass quite the same way Evan Patterson did.
“I’ve
been sitting right here. For at least an hour.” Miles leaned back, and enjoyed
the way Evan’s face struggled to find control. He also just plain enjoyed
Evan’s face, but those gorgeous brown eyes or his blond hair, and not even the
slim, cute body he was showcasing in those skinny jeans could entice Miles to
get in bed with someone so uptight.
Evan
walked into the cubicle, and glanced down at Miles’ laptop screen. He pointed
to the left of the laptop, where a neon-green Post-it note read, “Join me in
the kitchen when you get here,” in what must be Evan’s neat handwriting.
Miles
thought Evan could have sold his handwriting to some font website, and hipsters
would be falling all over themselves to buy it.
“Oh,
I didn’t see that.” Miles didn’t even attempt to sound convincing. Anyway, they
both knew he was lying.
Evan
crossed his arms and his eyes shot bullets. It made him look cuter—and also
more terrifying, if you were into that sort of thing. Which Miles was not. Definitely not. He’d told himself last
night that he wasn’t going to try to seduce Evan to control him. This morning, the
prospect looked a lot more appealing.
Or
maybe that was just Evan.
“What
have you even been doing?” Evan asked.
This
was the opening Miles had been dying for. “I’m so glad you asked. I decided to
do a little show-and-tell experiment.”
Evan
didn’t look convinced. Or amused. Which only amused Miles further. He wasn’t
usually such an asshole, but he wasn’t going to share control of Pastry by Miles with anyone, especially
a marketing “expert” like Evan. He’d only had to be in his new partner’s
presence for approximately ten point two seconds to realize that Evan was the
kind that didn’t give up easily. Thus, Miles’ attitude shift to being as
annoying as possible. Miles had a little sister; there was no way Evan could
hold out against the pain and suffering Miles could bring him.
Miles
clicked on the video he’d been working on. Evan watched it soundlessly and
Miles watched Evan. Other than a very subtle eye twitch, Miles gave Evan a
handful of points for reigning in his explosion of annoyance.
“You
filmed an episode of your show in your apartment last night,” Evan stated.
“I
did,” Miles said unrepentantly.
“You
made a Twinkie.”
“Actually,”
Miles drawled, “it’s better known as a Ding Dong. And it’s a homemade Ding Dong. I don’t know if you’ve
ever tried the store-bought version, but this one is infinitely better. Tastes
a whole lot less like cardboard.”
Evan’s
eye was twitching harder.
“A
Ding Dong,” he repeated in disbelief. “How did you even film this? With your
phone?”
“Yep,”
Miles admitted happily. “Rigged it up on one of those fake house plants with
some duct tape. Had to drop by Reed’s office this morning and let him know how
much I appreciated such a stocked apartment. And not just the fridge.”
“That
was me,” Evan said. “I stocked your apartment.” He was looking like he’d love
to march right over and un-stock it. Miles was delighted. He’d anticipated how
this might go, and it was going better than even his wildest expectations. He
ignored the little voice that said just how much he’d enjoy it if Evan lost it
and threw him down on the desk.
He
also ignored what came next in that little fantasy.
Miles
shot Evan his most charming smile, but the recipient did not look particularly
charmed. “Oh, thank you. It all came in handy, as you can see.”
“I
can definitely see that.” Evan leaned down, and Miles caught a whiff of his
cologne. Something tart and lemony. It suited him. “Now you’re going to come
with me to the kitchen, and we’re going to figure out how to work together. On
a video of you doing something impressive that isn’t a Ding Dong.”
“You
don’t think that would be cute?” Miles asked, and thought maybe he’d taken it a
step too far because the look on Evan’s face was suddenly not playing around.
Having worked in very tough kitchens and then Terroir, Miles was used to people
wanting to kill him. He was not used to people who looked like they wanted to
kill him slowly, and might enjoy it the whole time.
“Okay,”
Miles added. “I can do that.” He was still chalking this up as a win because
anything that put that look on a man’s face was worth the effort it took to rig
up a phone on a fake ficus tree.
Beth Bolden lives in Portland, Oregon with her
supportive husband. She wholly believes in Keeping Portland Weird, but wishes
she didn’t have to make the yearly pilgrimage up to Seattle to watch her Boston
Red Sox play baseball. She’s a fan of fandoms, and spends too much of her free
time on tumblr.
Beth has been
writing practically since she learned the alphabet. Unfortunately, her first
foray into novel writing, titled Big
Bear with Sparkly Earrings,
wasn’t a bestseller, but hope springs eternal. She’s published eight novels and
two novellas, with Catch
Me, the next novel
in the Kitchen Gods series, releasing in May 2018.
SOCIAL MEDIA
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