Total pages in book: 135
Estimated words: 128211 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128211 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
Over the last two years, I’d had the privilege of watching him grow Pygo into something more magical than I ever could have dreamed. I knew he was a brilliant chef. I knew his food was special. But I didn’t know what it was like when he was set completely free, when there were no guests telling him what they wanted or what they couldn’t have, when it was just his creativity leading the way.
What started with him and his sous chefs playing in the kitchen as I designed and decorated the front of house slowly transformed into what we had today: a sensory-rich culinary experience. From the time the customers secured their reservation on our website all the way until they were escorted out of the restaurant, they were taken on an adventure.
It was mesmerizing to behold.
As I watched him now, I found my chest a little tight with longing. I was so thankful I got to be a part of this journey with him, but I still longed to know what he’d been like at the restaurant in Dublin. I wondered if this one was different somehow, or just a more polished version of what he’d already created there.
But those years we were separated allowed us both to grow. We endured heartache and pain, but we found our way back.
And that was where my focus would be: on the here and now.
Two years had flown by in a blur of designing and planning and dreaming. If I’d thought being a chief stew was rewarding, it was nothing compared to how it felt to build Pygo with Finn. Just like he had full control of the menu, I had full control of the experience — the mood, the atmosphere, the way every detail worked together to make someone feel as they ate.
From the forest green velvet booths and the mosaic of broken wine bottles and sea glass to the rustic light fixtures and local art, I put thoughtful care into every inch of space. I curated the playlist, pored over fonts and linen textures for the menus, and selected each dish and glass like a stylist would choose everything to make up a red-carpet look.
Everything guests saw, touched, or felt — I touched first. I thought it through. I made sure it said what we wanted it to say.
Every service was a performance.
And Pygo was the stage I built.
If I were the set designer, then Finn was the main actor, the man everyone came to see. Our team of chefs and waitstaff were supporting actors of the highest caliber, but it was he who made the tickets sell.
“You seriously just made a duck confit croquette after a fourteen-hour shift?” Tobias asked Finn, blinking at the plate like it personally offended him.
Finn shrugged, flicking sea salt over the top like it was fairy dust. “If it’s wrong to decompress with luxury, I don’t want to be right.”
“It’s excessive,” Tobias muttered.
“Everything good is.”
I smirked into my wine glass.
Tobias turned to me. “You enabled this, didn’t you?”
“I’m his wife in everything but paperwork,” I said. “You’ll have to be more specific about which crimes I’ve enabled.”
I didn’t miss how the word wife made Finn’s ocean eyes flick to mine. The corner of his mouth curled, the heat in his gaze enough to make me want to notch the A/C down a degree or two. We’d been living together ever since the show ended, working side by side day in and day out, sharing every ounce of our lives with one another.
And somehow, I’d only fallen more in love with him. Maybe it was because our love was born in tight quarters, but it never bothered me, the fact that we were nearly always together. We thrived when we were connected.
Of course, Leah wouldn’t stand for letting me spend all my time with Finn and the restaurant. Blessedly, she’d moved her offseason home to Fort Lauderdale, and whenever she wasn’t on charter, she was dragging me out with her or kicking Finn out so we could rot on my couch.
After the reunion, we’d reconnected, both of us profusely apologizing and lamenting that we’d missed so much time together already. She was my best friend now — with Bernard edging his way in to be our third wheel whenever he was in the States — and I couldn’t imagine my life without her.
She and Cameron had never recovered from the chaos at the end of the season, but I knew she’d find her person one day. When she was ready.
Right now, she was more focused on her first charter as chief stew coming up.
I knew she would blow them all away.
“I’ve seen drug cartels operate with less chaos than the two of you,” Tobias said, still assessing Finn’s creation.
“Speaking of crimes—” I set down my glass. “Show him the picture, Finn. The foie bao with the candied figs.”