Rogan grins. Fierce and bright and absolutely reckless.
"Now you're talking."
We spread out across the kitchen counter. Notebooks and laptops and supplier catalogs and half-drunk coffee.
Outside, Pine Hollow sleeps. Inside, we work.
Seven days to prove we're worth the risk.
Seven days to build something neither of us could manage alone.
I think about my mother's tomato seeds. About keeping promises. About things that survive when they shouldn't.
My phone chimes again. Another email. Another deadline.
I silence it and keep working.
CHAPTER 7
ROGAN
Three temps show up Monday morning. One's late. One's wearing sneakers instead of non-slip shoes. The third keeps checking his phone.
"Names," I say.
"Derek."
"Samantha."
"Uh, Josh."
"Great. Derek, you're on prep. Samantha, salads and cold assembly. Josh, put the phone away or leave."
Josh pockets the phone. Looks offended but complies.
Maya hands me the training checklist she stayed up until two making. Color-coded sections. Laminated instruction cards. Emergency contact numbers and allergen protocols highlighted in yellow.
"You're terrifying," I tell her.
"I'm thorough. There's a difference."
The Foundation contract requires we deliver forty plated entrees, sixty appetizers, and thirty desserts to their annual donor dinner. Friday night. Black tie. High stakes. Exactly the kind of event that can make or break a reputation.
Also exactly the kind that makes me want to light something on fire and run away.
But I don't run anymore. Learned that lesson. So instead I'm here, teaching Derek how to brunoise carrots while trying not to imagine all the ways this can go spectacularly wrong.
"Smaller," I tell him. "We're aiming for precision, not rustic charm."
"They're pretty small."
"They're medium. We need tiny. Uniform. Imagine you're impressing someone who measures things with calipers."
Ivy would approve of the caliper reference. She's not here right now but her influence is everywhere. Her supplier spreadsheet. Her seasonal availability chart. Her handwritten notes about which farmers can handle rush orders and which need three weeks' notice.
She's at the seed co-op doing damage control on the Purple Cherokee situation. Meanwhile I'm training people who've never worked a fine-dining service to execute dishes that require timing down to the minute.
"How fast can you plate?" I ask Samantha.
