The kitchen was quiet at night. The scullery boys had gone, the fire banked low. Only the ticking of the old clock, the soft tap of flour on marble, and the occasional muttered curse—hers—cut through the silence.

Antonin Carême leaned against the stone archway, arms crossed, eyes sharp as a paring knife.

She hadn’t noticed him. Not yet. Too focused on folding the pastry. Careful. Precise. As if the dough might shatter if she breathed too hard.

He should leave. He wasn’t supposed to be here. But he stayed.

Of course he stayed.

They’d been rivals since Versailles. Her sauces challenged his reductions. His sugarwork mocked her fire-roasted game. She called him vain. He called her dangerous. They’d competed in front of kings, behind closed doors, and once—regrettably—in a hallway at the Palais-Royal where he had nearly kissed her over a spilled tray of oysters.

Now she was here, elbow-deep in butter and defiance.

He stepped closer.

“You’re folding it wrong,” he said.

She didn’t look up. “No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are.” His voice was low, amused. “That’s why you’ve redone it twice.”

Her hand paused. Her eyes finally met his—dark, irritated, alive.

He smiled. Slow. Dangerous.

“You should sleep,” she said.

“You should admit I’m in your head.”

“I only think of you when I’m near boiling water.”

He watched her hands—small, sure, the fingers stained faintly with saffron. “You always this gentle with pastry?”

She narrowed her eyes. “Only when someone’s watching.”

He didn’t touch her. But he leaned in, close enough to feel the heat coming off her skin. Off the oven. Off them.

“Do you know what happens,” he murmured, “when two rival chefs share one kitchen at night?”

She held his gaze.

“The same thing that happens to soufflés in the dark,” she said. “They rise.”