LITMIR.BIZ

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right moment, demonstrating how efficient and supportive she was while soaking up his brilliant skills. None of her daydreams involved the equivalent of prepping the patient, making beds, disinfecting the theatre or swabbing down the wards.

      ‘Hello, Nina. Are you listening?’

      Nodding fervently, she sat up straighter. Concentrate, Nina.

      ‘I’ll get my usual suppliers to deliver the fresh ingredients, eggs, butter and cream but there should be plenty of the basics – flour, icing sugar, caster sugar – in the kitchen already. You’ll need to get the more specialist items from a wholesaler I know. We won’t need them on the first day as we’ll be covering the basics. I’ll give you the account details. We’ll need things like rose petals, pure vanilla extract, crystalized violets, pistachio paste, freeze dried strawberry pieces and mango powder later on.’

      She perked up. This was more like it. The fun stuff. Baking for the farm shop wasn’t exactly challenging, she could rustle up a Victoria sponge or a coffee and walnut cake in her sleep. You could make some amazing things with the ingredients Sebastian had just listed.

      ‘Er, hello. You still with me?’ Sebastian’s irritated voice cut through her daydreams.

      ‘Sorry, it’s—’ she nibbled at her lip again ‘—patisserie dirty talk. I can’t wait to see what you do with all those ingredients.’ She’d watched the pastry chef at the restaurant for months, intrigued and delighted by her creations but too shy to ask too much about how they were made.

      ‘It’s like all these secret spells you have to master, you have to be a sorcerer with sugar, a wizard with chocolate and a magician with flavours and fillings.’

      ‘It’s just science,’ said Sebastian, his eyebrows drawing together in puzzlement.

      ‘No, it’s not,’ retorted Nina, at first thinking he was teasing for a minute, but his face was deadly serious. ‘It’s magic. Making wonderful special sweet potions of sugar and all things nice. Like baking alchemy, spinning sugar into edible loveliness.’

      ‘Still fanciful then, Nina,’ said Sebastian turning back to his laptop. ‘To be perfectly accurate, like with most cooking, patisserie is more about chemical reactions, where precise combinations of one or two substances react together to become another substance.’

      She stopped and stared at him. ‘But…’ At eighteen she’d been inspired by his passion, his descriptions of the food he wanted to cook and his pilgrimages to visit new suppliers in the search for those special and unique ingredients.

      ‘So what’s with the sudden interest in patisserie?’ he asked, his gaze sharpening.

      ‘I … want to learn how to make proper patisserie. I’ve been watching the pastry chef at work for a while and … well, she’s amazing and I love baking, so I thought—’

      ‘Nina.’ He shook his head with a rueful mocking laugh. ‘You’re living in cloud cuckoo land. Seven weeks here assisting me isn’t going to train you. It takes years to become a pastry chef. You have to train properly.’

      Nina felt the flush race along her cheekbones. ‘I realise that,’ she snapped back in a bid to hide the rush of mortification. ‘I’m not stupid. But I want to learn … and this is … a start.’

      ‘What? And you’re thinking about training? Or is that another…’

      Nina wanted to ask, another what, but she had a pretty good idea what he might say. It was alright for him, he’d always known what he wanted to do. He’d been driven from day one and had had to fight against parental disapproval to pursue his goal, whereas her parents were always supportive, no matter what she did – and she had to face it, she’d done quite a lot of things. She’d worked in a garden centre when she thought she might be a landscape gardener, applied to the bank when she thought she might try a serious career, helped out at the children’s nursery when she thought about being a teacher. It wasn’t that she wasn’t a hard worker or prepared to put in the effort, it was just that none of them ever quite turned out to be what she thought they would. But she really wanted to learn how to cook the amazing confections she’d seen Sukie making over the last year.

      ‘Right, we’d better get started. There’s a lot to do. I’ll give you a set of keys, although Marcel, the manager, will be there. He’s a miserable sod, so ignore him.’

      ‘I guess that’s because he’s about to lose his job.’

      ‘Once the new bistro is opened, there’ll be work for him. I’ll need waiters. Right, if there’s anything missing or where there are particularly low supplies, you’ll have to go out and buy them. You can use the company credit card.’ He strained forward to reach a battered leather wallet on the table. ‘I’m still working on the set up lists and recipes, I’ll email them through to you. Check that the kitchen has all the right equipment and enough of everything for the three people on the course.’ He looked down at the notebook on his lap. ‘Anything missing, you’ll need to go out and buy it. Thank God, it’s only three of them. With any luck a couple will drop out and then I might be able to cancel the course. Here’s the basic shopping list.’

      She blinked at him. ‘You want me to go shopping?’

      ‘Is that going to be a problem?’

      ‘No, but there’s a lot more involved than I thought there would be.’ She bit her lip.

      ‘Say now if you think you’re not up to the job.’

      ‘Of course I am. I just didn’t realise there’d be so much to do.’

      ‘I’m not paying you to twiddle your thumbs. You wanted to come, it’s not going to be a picnic. I’ll expect you to work. And work hard.’

      She straightened and ignoring the flash of fury inside, she said calmly, ‘I’m not afraid of hard work.’

      ‘Excellent.’ ‘He wriggled again, poking a finger down the top of his cast before he checked his notes. ‘I think that’s everything, then. Although I will pay you an extra day this week as there is more to do than I’d originally anticipated to get started. It’s Thursday today. You’ve got four days to get yourself organised and set up. I’ll see you on Tuesday, we’ll go over to the patisserie and run through things ready for the course starting on Wednesday.’

      He pushed the empty soup bowl over to her side of the table and put down his notes. ‘You can put the plates back on the tray and leave them outside the door when you leave.’

      ‘Do you want me to … well, do you want any help?’ She nodded to the top of the cast which was dangerously close to his crotch. Realising what it might look like she blushed furiously. ‘You look like you’re itching. But I meant, like, help with washing your hair or anything.’

      His ferocious glare could have frozen her at sixty paces. ‘I employed an assistant, not a carer.’ There was a lengthy pause. ‘And what’s wrong with my hair?’

      She widened her eyes with innocence. ‘Nothing.’

      He pulled his laptop onto his knees and started tapping at the keys.

      ‘I take it I’m dismissed then,’ said Nina, unable to keep the snarkiness at bay any longer.

      He pursed his lips. If he’d worn glasses, he would be giving her one of those over the top of his specs sort of looks.

      ‘I’m gone.’ She picked up her bag, gave him a jaunty wave and headed towards the door. ‘Bye.’

      ‘Bye Nina. See you on Tuesday.’

      As she strode down the corridor, relieved to escape, she shook her head. She was so over the crush she’d once had on him.

       Chapter 5

      She almost walked

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