I waved him off. Yeah, he hadn’t quit yet, but he was going to. Saying goodbye now would save me the pain and heartache later.
And the existential crisis when Bianca started to circle the drain.
“Okay. You’re right.” I smiled, but it was watery and thin. “Think about it. Let me know what you decide. I’d love it if you stayed on at least through the menu transition to brunch. But think about that too and let me know what you decide.”
His expression softened and I couldn’t stand the look of pity staring back at me. “Okay, I will.”
Mustering all the false bravado I could gather on such short notice, I widened my smile and brushed loose hair away from my face. “Until then, we have an entire menu to overhaul. We need to get working.”
He nodded. “Yes, Chef. Where do you want me to start?”
“I want to change the menu tonight, Blaze. Like a few hours from now. We’ll use the office printer and make a temporary menu until we settle on a permanent lineup. I may need you to run to the store, depending on what we have and don’t have around here. There should be some change-ups to our regular order in the delivery. I had been planning to test different things. But I’m feeling in the mood to mix things up tonight.”
“You want to change the menu tonight?” The panic in his voice resonated through the kitchen, but it was the look of utter disbelief that made me truly question my decision.
If I had been hoping to charm him with my adorable ignorance, I’d already failed. Blaze didn’t want to start a new menu tonight. He wanted to tweak the old one. Which was the smart business decision to make.
But I was in a mood for chaos. I wanted to make a statement. I wanted to announce to the city that I would no longer tolerate business per usual. Bianca was officially under new management. And if I was going down with the ship, we were going to make as big of a splash as possible in the process.
I must have smiled, because Blaze’s expression only became more concerned. “Are you okay, Chef?”
“I’m great,” I told him. I wasn’t sure if I meant it or not, but I was currently adopting the fake it till you make it philosophy I knew and loved so well. “Let’s get to work.”
To be honest, by the end of the day, I barely survived crawling into my bed. And I didn’t even bother taking off my shoes.
It had been fourteen hours of pure insanity. Scrambling all morning to figure out five dishes we could serve tonight that did not resemble slop. Plus, three appetizers, two salads and four side dishes.
I rolled over and stared at my ceiling, my arms too heavy to lift and my legs sore and overworked thanks to the combination of spin class and hard day. But the pain felt good.
I’d worked hard today. Blaze had worked hard today. It was like he felt guilty for threatening to leave, so he was trying to make it up to me. Which I was absolutely okay with. I would suck every single ounce of go-getter out of him. And then go up in flames as soon as he left.
Regardless of the impending doom, I couldn’t help but feel amazing about service tonight. We had more meal compliments sent back to the kitchen than ever. In the history of cooking. Or at least in the history of Bianca.
Our diners loved tonight’s menu. And while it was far from pretty or perfect back in the kitchen, we were able to serve plates that had been executed to hit our diners straight in the taste buds.
Granted, each plate we served was tweaked a little differently than the last one, but they all tasted great. And in a yelling, sweaty, chaotic kind of way, it was fine.
I needed a shower. At the very least, I needed to kick off my greasy shoes. But I couldn’t summon the energy. I closed my eyes and drifted to sleep where I had dreams of beautiful food and a bustling restaurant and a man that told me I was too beautiful before he gave me the best sex of my entire life.
Seventeen
“You’re early!”Molly complained. “I told Ezra to tell you not before ten.”
I smiled at her efforts to slide a coffee cake ring onto a decorative plate. “I can’t help it.” I stuck a finger under the front of the pastry and helped her unstick it from the butcher paper beneath it. “Just like you can’t help always running late.”
She rolled her eyes and sucked on her thumb. “You can help it,” she mumbled around frosting. “Turn on Netflix or something. It’s simple.”
“I don’t even know where to start on that thing. Some of us don’t have the luxury of binge watching anything but our bank account getting bigger.”
She laughed at my trophy wife dig. “Some of us get to binge watch Netflix and our bank account. You just have to marry money, honey.”
“Ezra!” I called out. “Your gold-digging girlfriend is making fun of me.”
He popped his head over the balcony where their bedroom was located. “I told you not to come early.”
I shrugged again and repeated, “I can’t help it.”
He disappeared upstairs, and I pulled my organic orange juice and bottle of cheap champagne from the tote at my feet. Waving one in each hand, I smiled at Molly and asked, “Forgive me?”
