Rockabye

Chapter 1

“No!” Malcolm stared in horror and ran for the door. “Are you insane?”

He yanked the tray from the hand of the stunned server and tossed it with disgust on an already overflowing counter. “Seriously, where did you get that tray from? Who gave you that?”

The server shrugged, blank-faced and unfettered. What did he care? His biggest concern was getting back in the crowd and being seen: mingling, smiling, coercing. Finding someone important and beautiful to leech on to so he could begin draining and drawing power, prestige and potential. It made Malcolm sick.

“No fruit,” Malcolm hissed at the vacant expression of the surfer-styled blond brat that had the nerve to call himself a waiter. “We specifically sat down and discussed this before anything left the kitchen. While you were all sitting there, tying your ridiculous little bowties and making sure your hair was perfect, remember? No fruit, no chocolate. So why, oh, God in heaven why, are you walking past me with a tray of f*****g pineapple in your hand?”

Almost nonexistent eyebrows rose up an unlined forehead. “Dude, do you need, like, a pill or something?”

Malcolm fought, and failed miserably, at containing the sneer rising on his face. “Dude,” he hissed back. “Do you, like, need this job or not?”

“All righty then.”

Malcolm’s spine stiffened at the voice behind him. He clenched his fists at his side. He didn’t lift his eyes to catch those of the man who clapped a heavy hand on his shoulder. Reynolds was a damn good personnel manager. However, he annoyed the hell out of Malcolm with his can’t-everybody-just-get-along attitude.

“You.” Reynolds pointed at the server. “Go get another tray and get back out there.” He tightened his grip on Malcolm’s taut muscles and forced Malcolm to turn towards him. “And you relax. What is with you lately?”

Malcolm rolled his eyes and shrugged out of Reynolds’ hold. “Other than the total lack of consideration any of these morons give to the people that are paying their salaries?”

Reynolds frowned. “Don’t be jealous of the pretty boys, Mal. Worry about your own job and I’ll worry about the rest of them.”

“Then keep your eyes open!” Malcolm glared back at the impatient look Reynolds offered him before grabbing the tray of fruit skewers and dropping the entire thing in the large garbage bin at the end of the prep table.

Ridiculous, he thought to himself, storming back towards the grill and taking a quick peek at the shrimp searing underneath it. Nobody gave a damn about what they did anymore. Nobody tried. He watched the shrimp begin to blacken, counted to four and then yanked the baking rack out of the machine. “Prep!” he called, spinning with the finesse of a dancer and dropping the hot tray in front of his harried prep girl. “Quickly now,” he told her. “And if I see another mess like that last one of these that went out, you’re fired. And I don’t give a damn what Reynolds says about it.”

He snagged one of the sizzling creatures in fingertips that barely felt the heat, skewered it on a plastic pick and laid it in the middle of a lined silver plate. “Circular items get laid in circles. Curl them out from the center. This isn’t your local fish market, Pina. These men spent more on this one event than you will be worth your entire life. Show a little flair for God’s sake.”

Pina laughed out loud; one of the few people in Malcolm’s kitchen that didn’t get upset with his temper. “Malcolm love, flair is not my specialty. You got the exclusive on that. Comes with the preference.”

“So not only are you blind artistically you are a sexist witch now?” He reached forward and began to adjust the food she was setting down. He nodded at the plate and waved over a server. “The nineties called, Pina. They want their orientation stereotypes back.”

She offered another chuckle, grabbed a towel and curled her nose at him while she wiped butter from her fingers. “If you don’t want to be stereotyped Mal, then stop acting like a dramatic, posturing bitch.”

“Insisting on perfection does not a stereotype make, Pina,” Malcolm said in the drollest voice he could muster.

“No,” she waved her finger. “The drama queen part does.”

She tossed the towel at him and he growled at the display of recklessness. “Why do you still work for me?”

“I’m the only one that can.”

He would have argued. If there wasn’t so much truth to it. From the moment Malcolm had taken the position of head chef A.K.A. kitchen manager at Burgeon Manor, long-term employees had been a rarity. He liked to write it off to the fact that most of his staff were fly-by-nighters as opposed to his overbearing attitude though. The women were there to meet rich, powerful husbands—the men to meet rich, powerful producers. He’d had his fair share of up and coming actors, screenwriters, artists, playwrights, set designers, stylists and publicists all scrubbing shellfish and washing lettuce. It wasn’t their fault for the most part. Burgeon Manor was, after all, well known for attracting the finest of guests and visitors.

He also would have argued that he was just annoyed by the process and not jealous. But that would have been more of a bald-faced lie than the first argument.

Malcolm had learned a long time ago that he wasn’t the kind of guy that was going to get by on his looks. He wasn’t unattractive by any means: dark and tall, with a good thick head of hair and pleasant smile when he saw fit to use it. He was just incredibly unspectacular. He was what his mother used to refer to as “good stock” and what she now called “rugged” or “well-weathered.” Apparently, he’d been known to say friends, he was a racehorse that had been driven hard and put away wet too often. A single glance in the mirror had only to confirm that he was nothing any of the men around this particular scene were looking for in another man. Under no circumstance could he be confused for a pretty boy, and he was far too young and poor to be anyone’s daddy.

He was, however, a damn good chef. So, for the groups that came to celebrate and the elite that stayed, he was important at least. If for nothing else than to ensure that people like the pompous little rock prince that was known as Darien Flint didn’t have to see a single piece of fruit or, God forbid, be presented with chocolate. Nothing ruined a good old bout of c**k-rock like fruit, after all.

Malcolm rolled his eyes at the impression he already had of the superstar that was holding his release party in their banquet hall. As Malcolm was probably one of the few folks in North America that couldn’t recall Darien’s face, let alone get weak-kneed and swooning over it, he could only rely on the genre to base his assumptions. He imagined self-important but not too bright, a man that thought with his d**k and not much else, in too tight jeans and V-necked T-shirts. He saw belt buckles and bike boots, a goatee and a grin, and someone that started every single sentence ever spoken with the word I. A paradox singing about true love and broken hearts whilst boning every star-struck teenager he came across.

“Gross,” Malcolm whispered, and the word had nothing to do with the bowl of squid that had just been placed in front of him.

* * * *

The door was still swinging closed behind the kid that washed the dishes when Malcolm dimmed the lights and dug out the bottle of Gewürztraminer from the bottom rack of the cooler. He yanked out the only chair in the kitchen, a ripped, worn and tilting office antique left there for one purpose and one purpose alone: the end-of-the-day, kitchen-is-sparkling-and-everything-is-done moment when he could sit, relax and enjoy. No one but Malcolm sat in his kitchen. Ever. It was a working kitchen and damn it, if someone was going to be in it, they were going to be working. There were dining rooms and lounges, private rooms and suites that could host any other activity. These moments of silence and leisure were for him and him alone.

He poured a tumbler full of liquid sunshine, took a long sip of the wine and tossed his smock into the dirty laundry hamper. He shuffled freshly scrubbed palms over the encroaching stubble on his face, doing his best to encourage exhausted skin to relight. He flopped into the chair, fiddled with levers to engage the tilt release and, as an afterthought, flipped off the T-shirt that he knew would reek of sweat and food; scents he was far too familiarized with to actually notice himself. Another toss netted him another win as the cloth was reunited with the abandoned smock.

Malcolm sighed heavily, clasped his hands behind his head and leaned as far back as the chair would allow. Perhaps it was crazy that he found it so serene to be in an environment that he spent so much time in, but it was the change in atmosphere that Malcolm found so calming. The room was quiet; the air lightly scented with Clorox and pine cleaner, the heat from the grills and burners dissipating into a tolerable temperature. Dim light had replaced harsh clarity; silence taken over calamity, and stillness and peace had stepped in where hustling and chaos knew no bounds. It was like battling and conquering a new war every day.

The party still continued somewhere to the east end of the manor and would, no doubt, until the late hours of the morning. On more than one occasion, Malcolm had found himself rising to begin the next breakfast and come face to face with the glassy-eyed, cocaine-riddled guest of a previous night’s parties. More often than not Malcolm would find someone to see them to a room, or call a cab. The guests were not his concern, only the filling of their bellies. A good thing, really. Malcolm wasn’t exactly a people person.

He let his eyelids drift shut and set the toe of his shoe against the counter to rock the chair. He didn’t go home much during the busy season. Summer months, Christmases and New Years’, long weekends, Malcolm would stay in his room on site. It made more sense when one got finished at two in the morning and had to start again at seven to stay where one was. Therefore, his plan was as simple as most nights: two glasses of white, followed by a sleeping pill and a stumble through the back hall to the unmarked, unnumbered doors of the servant’s quarters of the manor. Though politically incorrect, the term still stuck, fitting in both appropriateness and historical accuracy. Malcolm didn’t mind the cramped quarters of the eight-by-ten room, though. It was included as a perk of the job, there were no bugs, and while the mattress was in no way as comfortable as the one on his own queen-sized bed at home, it was comfortable enough for an exhausted body to give five or so hours to.

It had been a busier night than most. Darien’s people had spared no expense when it came to entertaining. And rather than a lavish meal they’d opted for continual service of finger and bite-sized bits of almost every creature known to man, prepared in the most extravagant and indulgent ways possible. The exaggerated thought made Malcolm chuckle and he reached for his glass of wine when a shuffle of sound forced him into stillness.

His first thought was mice, which he followed with an instant and forceful not in my goddamn kitchen.

His next thought made him growl in distaste. Theft.

As intolerant as Malcolm could be, as furious as many things made him, nothing could get him more righteous than a thief. He righted the chair in silence and rose just as quietly.

It was a huge space, each quarter utilized for different requirements—meats and hot sauces, salads and chilled foods, vegetables and sides, desserts and creams—each portion set up as though its own separate room, but all joining and accessible through reach-throughs and walks-throughs along a four-point cross that ran both length and width through the middle of the kitchen. At the front was a large open space for the servers to be handed trays and/or plates. At the back was another open space wherewith to access the huge stainless steel doors of the walk-in refrigerators and freezers. It was from the front where Malcolm had lounged, to the back where the overhead light gave notice of the open refrigerator that Malcolm traveled in stealth-mode.

Past the stainless steel appliances, into the darker middle of the kitchen, like an advancing warrior, Malcolm stopped only once to slide a wooden spoon out of the canister where they sat drip-drying. He may not be able to shoot someone for invading his space, but he could damn well give some smart-ass brat a decent wallop or two.

A pleasant hum met Malcolm’s approach and it took him a second to realize his visitor was singing; a low, deep, under-the-voice mumble that seemed to harmonize with itself in the echo of the walk-in. He had to strain to hear the words and even then they were vague, something about mercy and light, but the melody was sweet and melancholy.

Malcolm stepped up to the open door, ensconced himself in the light radiating from inside the unit, and caught his breath at the sight of the man within. He stood at the rear of the refrigerator, his back to the door and he looked so alluring as he reached and peeked at the shelves that he could have been posing for the cover of an erotic magazine. Long dark hair caught in a barely fettered tail hung straight down the man’s back with a gloss so deep it seemed to glow. The body it lied on was slim and toned. A button-down hung open at his sides, dove gray, with a finish that appeared to have been washed into color-deprived thread-bareness. Elaborately designed embroidery covered the yoke of the shirt, almost cowboy-ish, with black and gray swirls and finials that drew the eye to nicely muscled shoulders. Snug black leather pants hugged the man’s lower body from waist to calf in a way that left nothing to the imagination and yet still, somehow, managed to make the eye crave more.

As the man reached to peel back plastic wrap off a tray on the upper shelf, securing one of the dreaded leftover fruit skewers whose cousins had ended in the trash earlier, every leg muscle tightened, every inch of leather molded, and Malcolm’s body actually flinched with the effort not to reach forward and touch. Until his eyes trailed past the small ass, the long, lean thighs and bunching calves to the man’s feet. Then he growled with a sound so feral that the man whipped around with a look of panic.

“Well, my intention wasn’t to kill you,” Malcolm said, crossing his arms and setting his jaw. “Until I saw your bare feet in my walk-in. Now I have no choice.”

The man’s shirt was not undone as Malcolm had first believed. It was clasped with a single snap, low over his crotch. A fact that Malcolm’s internal w***e bemoaned instantly. For while it was still open enough to enjoy the view of smooth chest and stomach, even enough to notice just how very low the waist on his pants actually was, the snap managed to keep anything below the contour-enhancing hide out of sight.

It only took the briefest of pause for the man to re-center, and just a single breath more for the startled caught-with-a-hand-in-the-cookie-jar expression to bloom into a sensational smile. It was a smile that didn’t stay on lips alone. It drew the man’s cheeks into an impish bow, it lit up gray eyes…and Malcolm’s brain stuttered on the thought…gray? Yes, he decided with an unconscious nod, as smoky and soft as the man’s shirt.

“Wow,” the man said in a voice as slow and calm as a Sunday school teacher. “If someone would have told me the kitchen staff was walking around half-naked I would have opted to spend the night in here.”

Intelligence had Malcolm holding back the “not f*****g likely.” The obvious expense of clothing and the practiced nonchalance advised of importance. Albeit for what, Malcolm couldn’t place. But it was fascination that stole his ability to say anything else. An odd look this man, with his long hair, and his cowboy-s***h-punk clothing. It was as though some god, in a spurt of creative genius, had rooted through rock history and spent some time pulling bits and pieces from it all: a fine base of eighties kick-ass, blended with a solid scoop of nineties glitter, infused with a shot of millennia-indulgence and topped with new-age glamour.

Malcolm had to shake his head to break the spell of the man’s eyes. He opened his mouth to speak and found his tongue refusing the admonishment his brain was telling him to insist on. Rather, like a confused primate, Malcolm just lifted his hand and pointed at the man’s bare feet.

The man winced and shrugged playfully. “Sorry. I’d love to tell you they were clean but to be completely honest I’ve been walking on them all night. So I doubt it.” He looked around the refrigerator before turning another smile back on Malcolm. “But you don’t keep food on the floor, right? I mean, yeah, sure, I get the whole health code and what not. Still, just between you and me I mean—” Another shrug and a chuckled breath, “I’m not gonna tell anyone if you’re not.”

When Malcolm didn’t speak again, the man tried another grin and pointed. “Besides, you’re not wearing your shirt. And Dude, I mean, seriously…the hair.”

Malcolm almost thought the man meant the hair on his head until he followed the man’s eyes to his own chest. He ran a self-conscious palm over his pecs, guilt creeping up his spine at the bareness of himself in the kitchen and frowned at the way the move kindled something in the man’s eyes.

“Pretty,” the man said, drawing his tongue over his bottom lip and Malcolm’s thoughts flailed at the inclination in the gesture. Thought process snapped back in place. Recollections of every pretty little thing Malcolm had come across in his past, every one of them trying to use that to their benefit—to get away with, to get ahead of, to steal, to cheat, to lie—roused his anger back into play.

“Get the f**k out of my walk-in,” Malcolm hissed. “Before I break every damned bone in that puny assed body of yours.”

“Whoop.” The man lifted both hands in surrender. “Mood swing.”

Malcolm stepped forward with another snarl and both fists rising.

“Whoa!” the man said, true surprise removing the cocky and replacing it with something far closer to concerned. “I’m going, or coming, or well…whichever. I mean I’m going from the cooler, but also coming into the room.” He paused, shot a quick glance at Malcolm’s tight hands. “So don’t kill me or anything.”

They locked gazes, Malcolm’s glaring and the man’s apologetic. For all of about two seconds. “Oh! Wait!” The man held up a finger and tiptoed backwards in the cooler. He grabbed the tray of fruit skewers from the top shelf and held them out. “Come on, buddy. I’m starving here.”

“Those are for the guests of the manor.”

The man shrugged. “I’m a guest.”

“Specifically for the guests of the party that was here tonight.”

“No they weren’t,” the man countered.

“Wh—No…yes. They were. Are. They were for the party,” Malcolm insisted, never once stopping to question why he was arguing instead of just removing the tray from the man’s hands.

“They were not,” the man repeated. “There was no fruit at that party.”

Malcolm’s eyes narrowed. So he was a guest. Or a guest of a guest. He let the man walk past him with the tray and then slammed the refrigerator door shut. “Yes, well, it was still meant for the party. It’s not for handing out to random strangers. It was a mistake. But that doesn’t mean—”

“So pretty well it’s already paid for,” the man said, peeling back wrap and snagging the end of one of the skewers.

“By the people that booked the party, yes—”

The man twisted his mouth, stared off to the side in a pantomime of deduction, and pointed with the fruit. “So, kinda…It’s mine anyway?”

He began to wander down the middle of the kitchen, peeking around every walk-through he came to.

Malcolm’s frown deepened and he followed the man quickly. “Just because you’re a guest doesn’t mean—”

“Do you not have chairs in here or what?”

“This is a kitchen. You don’t sit in it, you work in it.”

“Ah!” The man raised a finger in classic Eureka! stance. “Found one—”

Malcolm cut him off immediately. “That’s mine.”

“Can I not—”

“No.”

“But just—”

“No.”

“For one min—”

“I said,” Malcolm growled. “No!”

Sighing, the man dropped the tray on the counter nearest to Malcolm’s chair and leaned against it. He plucked a piece of pineapple off the sharpened stick and popped it in his mouth.

“Hey! I told you that you can’t have that!”

The man shrugged yet again. “And you also told me that I already own it.”

“Right. Of course. Yes.” Malcolm nodded. “Foolish me. I should have known. You’re young but hey, that’s how it works in this business, right? Shouldn’t you introduce yourself then, oh great and mighty owner of Empiric Entertainment? As I would have to assume that’s who you are if you believe you own that f*****g fruit.” Malcolm’s voice rose in octaves through his rant until, with the final word, he yanked the tray away from the unimpressed, still-chewing young man.

“Nope,” the man said calmly. He reached up and pulled another perfect square of yellow off the utensil. “I’m Darien Flint.”

The word was out of Malcolm’s mouth before he realized it was coming. “Liar!”

Darien looked up and grinned around the pineapple. “Nope.”

“B-but…you…you don’t have a goatee!”

An ascending raspberry paused in its path to Darien’s lips. “Am I supposed to?”

Well, you’re not supposed to be so f*****g pretty, Malcolm wanted to say. Instead, “You don’t eat fruit!” was all Malcolm could offer as a comeback.

Darien tilted his head and gave Malcolm a twisted grin. “There’s actually a ridiculously self-defeating story to that fable. Entirely of my own making, mind you. I have since learned that before you lie about something just to get yourself out of a situation, you best be comfortable with living with the consequences of it.”

Malcolm had no idea what to say to that. So rather than try he flopped into the chair and stared blankly.

“You really didn’t know who I was?” Darien asked finally, dropping the used skewer on the all but full tray, rendering the rest of the product useless. “That wasn’t a bluff?”

“I don’t bluff,” Malcolm told him. “I cook.”

Darien chuckled and Malcolm felt a flush of embarrassment rise into his face. “That’s funny to you?”

Darien was still laughing when he answered. “Nah. More charming. You’re cute.”

“And you’re lying again.”

“Not true,” Darien shifted against the counter, setting both palms flat on the surface and testing the strength of the unit. “On either the statement or the implication that I was lying before. I really am Darien Flint. Darien Fletcher actually, but apparently that last name doesn’t have enough…” He paused to finger-quote the next word. “Sting.”

“First off,” Malcolm said distractedly, “do not jump up on that counter. It is for food, not asses. Secondly, sting of flint aside, I suppose Fletcher isn’t so bad. I mean it could have been filcher. Or felcher for that matter.”

When he heard the huffs that signified Darien amusement, Malcolm looked up quickly. “Sorry, I’m tired. My brain is running out of steam and focus.”

“Poor guy,” Darien said, sympathy getting drowned out by lack of inflection. “Listen,” he said, pushing away from the counter and walking towards Malcolm’s chair. “I have an idea. Why don’t you come back to my room with me?”

Malcolm frowned. “Why would I do that?”

“Umm…” Darien pursed his lips and rolled his eyes up to the ceiling. “Good question. Why would you do that?” He moved forward, put both hands on the armrests of Malcolm’s chair and leaned close. Too close. Close enough that Malcolm could smell expensive cologne and the fruit on Darien’s breath. A fact that only made Malcolm aware of how unimpressive he probably smelled in turn. He pressed his spine against the back of the chair, pulling farther away but Darien merely leaned that much closer. “Can you think of any reason at all that two grown men might want to run off to a secluded bedroom together?”

Malcolm huffed words he’d expected to be more forceful than they were. “You don’t even know my name! And you haven’t even asked if I’m gay.”

“My bad,” Darien’s grin bordered on the edge of smirk. And if the damn man hadn’t smelled so damn fine or his gray eyes hadn’t been so damn intense, Malcolm would have made good on his previous promise to beat the man down.

Darien lifted one hand from the chair and dragged fingertips down Malcolm’s forearm. “So why don’t you tell me your name then?”

The touch on bare skin retraced its steps backwards, but it didn’t stop at its starting point below Malcolm’s elbow. Darien continued it, over biceps and shoulder, across collarbone to neck where he circled the hollow at base before sliding around to cup and knead. “As for the gay thing you would have already knocked me out by now if you were straight. Besides, I totally saw you checking out my crotch.”

Okay, Malcolm thought: it was official. He’d spent too many nights alone. When random strangers began to look like potentials, when his body was acting like a stirring bear, when he was starting to consider the offers laid in place by what had to be a mere figment of his imagination, it was time to start getting away from work more.

And work! Good God! If there was legitimacy to the actual touching taking place on the back of his neck and…Wow, it felt nice. Too nice for a mere touch…then had he really got that desperate? Was he really that easily enticed? Because he was at work, and Darien was a client…but Jesus, was Darien actually going to…lean in and—

He stood up like a rocket when his c**k began to wonder if Darien would taste like pineapple everywhere. “Sorry,” he said firmly, almost surprised with the intensity of the shock in Darien’s expression.

That was when the rambling began in Malcolm’s conscience.

Not all that used to hearing no, no doubt.

What’s the matter? No men at the party?

Sure there were. But the whole lot were probably senior execs with saggy jowls and clammy hands.

After all, there weren’t really a lot of reasons someone of Darien’s caliber was going to start suggesting a hook up with someone like him.

Convenience, his inner voice continued. Proximity.

Darien opened his mouth to speak and the embarrassment crept back into Malcolm’s face. What man sat there and pondered over the advances of a rock star? He was single, uninvolved, and he’d already admitted to himself that he needed it.

If he could only shake the image of the gorgeous server who’d stared blankly at his reasoning and posturing earlier in the evening, as if the very act of having to listen to Malcolm’s voice was enough to throw the server into a boredom-inspired coma. If he could just stop thinking about how every time he’d been granted a glance or a favor by any of the “beautiful people” it had been for an ulterior motive: “Would you pass this screenplay on for me? Could you get me an autograph? I’d really love to get into that party. Say, do you know?”

No. Just no. Whatever the purpose of the encounter and whatever the motive behind it, no.

“Enjoy the rest of your night, Mr. Flint,” Malcolm said. He kneed the chair away from his legs and fled the kitchen before Darien had a chance to say another word.