Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors (The Rajes #1)(26)

He picked up a finger of okra and pointed it at the fryer. “I was thinking, let’s fry it with a light batter and then try a hot yogurt kadhi sauce with it.” Extracting his smock from one of the bags, he tied it on.

“What kind of crust?” She turned on the fryer and adjusted the temperature.

“We could try a rice flour batter? We want it papery—thin and crisp.” He started to mix spices into the flour, a spoonful of powdered cumin, a pinch of powdered cloves.

“I heard the good news about Emma,” she said, watching him, and his hands froze for a moment.

“And I think just a dash of gram flour like a pakora batter?” He forced himself to walk to the pantry shelves and grabbed the box of besan.

He couldn’t discuss Emma right now. Silence stretched between them as he added splashes of buttermilk to the dry ingredients, working the batter with his hands, feeling it turn silky between his fingers.

He couldn’t let the silence get awkward. “Seriously, Ashna, thank you. For everything. For the referral to your cousin, and to your aunt. Thanks to her, I’m booked up solid for a month.”

She didn’t call out the awkward topic change or push about Emma and he loved her for it. Instead, she simply dipped a teaspoon into the batter for a taste and made an approving sound. “All those bookings have nothing to do with me or with Mina Kaki. It has to do with what you do in the kitchen, DJ.” She raised the spoon and offered him a taste. “You more than deserve it. You know that, right?”

Deserve was such a strange word, throwing out both blame and accolades with equal mercilessness. Society’s skewed scale for assigning a value to human beings. How many times had he been judged and found lacking? Was there ever a way to measure what anyone deserved? Or was it just another way to pretend that the randomness of the universe made sense?

“Uh-oh, did I turn DJ Caine all brooding?” Ashna laughed, patting his arm with one hand while using the spoon in her other to signal him to open his mouth.

Her unguardedness felt like a gift. Getting her to overcome her usual reserve and trust him lifted some of the worthlessness he’d been carrying around since Emma threw him out.

He took a taste from the spoon she was holding up. “It’s a good start. Let’s try it this way, then we can tweak it.”

“Got it, Chef.” A drop of batter dribbled from the spoon onto his chin making her giggle. “Sorry,” she said and quickly used her thumb to wipe it off.

A loud gasp sounded across the kitchen. “Holy shit! I’m so sorry! I didn’t know you had company.”

DJ looked over Ashna’s head at a woman with her hand slapped across her mouth, her eyes so round one might think she had just walked in on them shagging on the kitchen floor.

Ashna stepped away from him. “Hey, Trisha! Come on in.”

“I didn’t mean to interrupt, I swear.” Her flushed cheeks were so high they practically swallowed up her eyes as her gaze flicked here and there as though trying to avoid looking at Ashna and him.

Where had he seen those eyes before?

Bollocks! It was that woman who had almost destroyed his caramel. Those flame-colored eyes, glinting with all those uppish airs, were burned into his brain.

“Seriously, I’m sorry,” she said again. And that voice, it made a million feelings run up and down his spine. Every one of them uncomfortable.

“You’re not interrupting anything,” Ashna said with her trademark patience. But there was an edge of reprimand in there as well. “DJ and I were just working on some recipes.” It was clear from Ashna’s tone that overreacting was nothing new with this one.

Her mortification morphed into suspicion. She looked as though she smelled something dodgy in the air, and threw DJ the most reluctant smile he’d ever been at the receiving end of.

“This is DJ Caine, Trisha. Emma Caine’s brother. Haven’t you two met? DJ, this is my cousin Trisha Raje, Emma’s doctor.”

What on earth was Ashna talking about?

This was Dr. Raje?

Bloody sodding bollocks on toast. The luck he’d been having recently, of course she’d be Emma’s doctor.

“Oh.” She swallowed a few times, highlighting the fact that she had the longest neck he’d ever seen. “No, we’ve never actually met,” she said finally. “But I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.” She dropped a handful of Tupperware containers on the countertop, then stuck out her hand. There wasn’t a flicker of recognition on her face.

So the hired help wasn’t worth remembering then. His heartbeat elevated in that way it did when anger rose inside him too fast. He tamped it down.

“I thought you guys had met,” Ashna said, looking thoroughly puzzled. “DJ’s the chef who cooked that fabulous dinner at Yash’s party last night.” There was pride in Ashna’s voice and it seemed to totally befuddle her cousin.

“The hired help with the nonsurgeon hands, remember?” he wanted to say, but of course he stayed silent and moved to rinse the batter off his hands in the sink.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry.” Her gaze slid across his shoulders, lingered there for a bit, then came back to his eyes. Now she remembered. “I had no idea who you were. Nice to meet you.” She extended her hand again, and if she was embarrassed by her behavior the other evening, she hid it well.