“Well, what do you think?” my mom asks as I look over the stack of papers in front of me.

We’re standing at the bar of the Blue Mojave before opening hours. It’s early morning and the Blue is a lunch and dinner place, so there’s only a handful of employees bustling around in the back, leaving my parents and I to discuss the proposal in front of me.

I raise my eyebrows as I read over everything for what must be the fifth time. It’s a rental agreement for a commercial property in downtown Vegas, which—I have to admit—would be beyond perfect for Ocotillo.

“I think it looks . . . almost too good to be true.” I look up at them. “And you say the Madsens have already approved this?”

“Oh, don’t make it sound so official,” Dad says, waving a hand and taking a sip of his Bloody Mary. “Look, you know we’ve known them for longer than you’ve been around. This is the kind of thing they’d do without even thinking about it.”

“And we’d do the same for them,” Mom adds with a pointed smile.

Mom is one of the most successful attorneys in Vegas, so it’s no surprise to me that the art of keeping up useful friendships has always been second nature to her. But when it comes to the Madsens, I know there’s more sincerity in the friendship for both of them than they usually display. They go back a long way.

“You should have heard Castilla on the phone as soon as we left brunch the other day. She was head over heels at the idea of renting the place to you,” Mom adds.

“They’ve been looking for the right person to take that property for a while now,” Dad adds. As an influential banker, saying that he has an eye for how property moves in Vegas is an understatement. “The Madsens really care about Vegas, you know. They don’t want to see their property turn into some tourist trap. And whether you knew it or not, you really impressed them with your spiel about giving locals like us something to really be proud of.”

“They’d be more than happy to see the place go to someone like you,” Mom goes on.

This is a damn good venue. My chef and I have been going over locations for a while now and we’ve seen this one before, but it was way out of my budget.

The fiasco in LA has turned me skittish. I’m really careful about where my money goes, and that means taking only the risks that I know I can afford. Of course, it’s almost impossible to find a good venue downtown within my rent budget—well, it has been, until now.

The price on the proposal my parents brought me is an insane discount. The Madsens are practically throwing the property at me. It’s cheap enough that I almost feel bad for considering it, but they seem to really want me to have this place. That, and I’m not in a position where I can afford to turn my nose up at an offer like this—not that I’d say that out loud.

“You’re sure this price is right?” I ask, glancing up at them. “Have you talked about it in depth at all?”

“Who do you think helped write it up?” Mom asks, smiling smugly.

“Fair enough,” I say. “Well, it’s good. Very good, I’ll give them that. There are three hotels practically across the street, some of which gets so much air time on travel channels that it’s booked up year-round. I’ve scoped it out a few times, and the floor plans look like everything I could want.”

“So why hesitate?” Dad asks.

Because it is too good to be true.

I thumb through a few pages of the proposal until I come to the line I glazed over, and I tap at it thoughtfully. “Well, this, for starters. It says I’d have to hire the Madsens’ daughter as part of the deal, is that right?”

“Oh, come on, Ben,” Mom says, shaking her head. “What’s with all this ‘their daughter’ talk? You know Claire!”

“I don’t, really,” I say, stroking my chin. “We were just kids, Mom. You’re a completely different person at fifteen than you were at ten, and another different person at twenty. I’m twenty-five. We might as well be complete strangers.”

“Not a complete stranger,” Mom insists, smiling in that way she always does when they’re trying to persuade me of something they know I don’t want. “She’s a new culinary graduate, and she’s interested in your vision for the place.”

“Her and everyone else in Vegas,” I remark, peering at the proposal.

“Come on now, Ben, I don’t think that’s fair,” Mom says.

“I don’t doubt she’s a fine graduate,” I half-lie. How the hell am I supposed to know how good she is? “But you know how much of a risk this whole venture is. Both of you. Every chance I take puts the success of the whole thing in danger, so I need to limit the number of unknowns I’m dealing with. Claire is nice, but she’s an unknown. Worse, she’s young and inexperienced. Call me crazy, but I don’t like the idea of putting a Michelin-star chef shoulder-to-shoulder with a family friend I have to babysit.”

Dad takes a long drink of his Bloody Mary and Mom rolls her eyes.

“Well,” she says finally, letting out a deep sigh, “when the Madsens generously made this offer, I thought it was only natural to offer to have Claire working with you in return. It was a no-brainer. So if you want to be upset at someone, be upset at us.”

“I’m not upset, just cautious,” I say.

“Honestly, son, what are you complaining about?” Dad chuckles. “You should be thanking us. Great location, unbeatable price, and a gorgeous employee working under you.”

Oh, God. This again.

“You can say you’re supporting local chefs in training,” Mom adds swiftly. “I chatted up a few of her old instructors. She comes with glowing recommendations.”

I had my eyebrow arched, glancing between the two of them as if I knew exactly why they were pushing this angle so hard. I have no idea why all four of our parents had it in their heads to set us up, but they’re relentless.

A part of me doesn’t mind. Claire is drop-dead gorgeous, I have to give her that. It’s almost a shame that our careers mean it’d always be too awkward for us to make anything work. I don’t want to tell my parents that, of course.

“It’s still a big risk,” I say frankly, setting the proposal down on the bar and heading behind it to whip myself up a Bloody Mary of my own. “I’m going to need more than just a recommendation to take it.”

“I know you’ve been on edge since LA,” Mom says, and I feel my neck tensing. “Scott didn’t do right by you, and that would leave a bitter taste in anyone’s mouth.”

“He didn’t just ‘not do right.’ He stole the business out from under my nose,” I say, adding an extra shot to my drink. I need something strong for this conversation. “That asshole was playing me from the second he met me in college, and I was too naive to pick up on that. That’s why I’m so cautious about this. I’m not saying Claire’s going to run off to some hip, new neighborhood in LA with my chefs and all my interior design plans and cut me out faster than I can blink, but you can see where I’m coming from.”

“Of course we can,” Mom says. “And that’s why this deal is too good to pass up. A price like this would surely make up for the risk of taking Claire on, wouldn’t it?”

I frown. I can’t argue with that; not immediately, at least.

“My head chef is Jorge Alonso, one of the most talented men to walk out of Mexico City in my lifetime,” I say. “How could I explain to him that he’d be working alongside someone who just graduated and wouldn’t even have the job if it weren’t for her connections?”

“We’re not telling you how to run your business, and you can always turn this strong offer down if you really want to,” Mom says. “All we’re asking is that you give it some thought. It could be better for you than you think, Ben. Both for the business and for you personally.”

“Exactly. You’re too wrapped up in work all the time. You never know what might happen with a couple of young professionals working so close together,” Dad adds with a wink. “You might end up liking her more than you expect.”

I cross my arms, drumming my fingers on a bicep as my eyes flit from my parents to the contract, then back to their expectant faces. They’re waiting on an answer from me.