Hell's Kitchen: Knives Out

Chapter 3: Black Jacket

"Welcome, to the black jacket round," Chef announced as they filed in and took their places. "From here the competition gets harder, the rewards get bigger, and the punishments get even more brutal. One of you will walk away with the grand prize of a quarter of a million-dollar salary and the position of a lifetime. The rest of you will be walking out those doors."

Keith listened to Chef as he finished the rant, but his mind wasn't in it. He kept drifting back to the other night in the hot tub. To Lance's toned abs, to the taste of a pretty decent bottle (or three) of Malbec, to the blush on Lance's cheeks, to the blue of Lance's eyes, to the electricity between them as he'd moved closer - and to the stupid cameras. God , he hated those cameras. And he hated Lance for reminding him of the cameras. And he hated Shiro for forcing him to go on this stupid competition and be on camera. Really this was all Shiro's fault, or at least that's who Keith was going to blame.

Stupid Shiro.

"Everyone got it?" Chef asked and the group shouted a resounding "Yes, Chef". Keith joined the shout but he did not 'got it', he did not 'got it' at all.

~~~***~~~***~~~

Lance lost. Well, everyone lost except Hunk since they weren't competing as teams anymore but rather as individuals. But still, he hadn't been the one to win and that meant he'd lost.

Currently, Lance was scrubbing a fire truck while Hunk (the big fat traitor) went on a helicopter ride with Shay. As the winner, he'd been allowed to choose one person to join him for the prize. Naturally, as Hunk's bestie, Lance assumed that he'd be chosen but noooooo Hunk had completely gone against the bro code. Totally uncool!

So now Lance was soaking wet, covered in sweat and soapy water scrubbing a firetruck. It wouldn't have been too bad, given that he was side by side with Bonnie who was also covered in warm soapy water, except that Keith was actually having a good time and that just didn't sit right with him. This was a punishment after all and if Lance had to scrub all of the truck's tiny nooks and crannies then dammit Keith should too!

Instead, the flirt was getting a personal tour of the fancy red truck from fireman Griffin. He'd been all "Mmm, I love a man in uniform," and had really leaned into wiping the sides and arching his back as he'd reached up high. He'd even made a show of going on his tippy-toes to clean off one of the nozzles ... extra thoroughly.

Every so often he'd run his soapy hands through his hair, slicking it back like a fifties greaser. He'd bite his lip as he smiled at the handsome fireman, and glance over his shoulder to smirk at Lance when the guy would blush or trip over his words. And of course the poor bastard was tripping over his words; Keith was hot. Flirty Keith was even hotter.

Lance would be impressed with his skills if he hadn't used them to get out of their punishment. Though he could live with that, the bastard had intentionally tried to throw Lance off.

He'd been sitting in the driver's seat, fireman Griffin leaning on the door beside him pointing out all the buttons when Lance walked by the front of the truck to clean the grill. That was when Keith pulled the horn.

The abrupt eardrum-rupturing-bone-shaking-eye-popping-ly loud horn had caused Lance to shriek like a little girl - no - big strong man and toss his bucket, the contents of which came splashing down all over him. And so, it was entirely Keith's fault that Lance was now soaking wet and stuck doing their actual punishment.

So screw Keith, seriously, screw him!

~~~***~~~***~~~

The look on Lance's face all evening had tasted so sweet as they sat in the hot tub with Hunk, listening to him recount the events of his prize. Lance had made the poor bastard apologize at least ten times now for having chosen Shay over him and honestly, Keith thought Lance was being a baby about it. Fortunately, his torment of Lance had done its job and the boy's ire was mostly focused on him.