“The start and stop will take us ages to get through.” Angelica pressed her lips together hard, staring Florence down. “And I won’t take being bullied again.”
“I’m not…” Florence sighed, her tone instantly softening. “Can I talk to you? Just the two of us.”
“No.” Angelica wasn’t going to let that happen again. Enough experience with Josef meant that she wanted someone around when she was being dressed down. “Anything you want to say to me can be said in front of the others.”
Florence nodded, coming closer. Though it didn’t feel as though she was going to do any harm. Her steps were soft and slow, nothing was sudden. Angelica wasn’t going to relax though. Not yet. “I know what you went through the last three seasons, Angelica, and I’m not going to pull the same bullshit that Josef did on you. In fact, I’m working to prevent that as best as I can.”
“You need to let me do my job.” Angelica raised her chin up, staring Florence down. “Because if I can’t do my job, there won’t be a show.”
“Fair.” Florence put her hands out to the sides, looking from Angelica to Rex and quickly back. “But I don’t want this show to run like it used to either. We talked about this before we left Los Angeles, remember?”
Angelica’s eyes lit up. “You wanted tension between me and the owners. Well, here’s your tension. Colm here says there isn’t a stench in this hotel. Agree or disagree?” When Florence didn’t answer, Angelica nodded. “Right, so I’m going to prove to him he’s wrong.”
“Just…don’t make threats you can’t follow through on.”
Like hell she wouldn’t be able to follow through on that if she didn’t want to. Angelica watched as Florence walked out of theshot again, keeping an eye on them all. Finally, she turned back to Colm and started again. They’d get to the bottom of this. They just had a week to do it.
Chapter
Seven
“All right,so what do we have here?” Hope clapped her hands together and leaned over the counter as she stared at the food that had been prepared for her. Apparently Florence had given the kitchen the heads up to do this so that Hope could taste test the food before she dove into what the problems were, as if food could be the only problem.
“We have chicken with lime butter, and salmon and coconut rice,” Chef Rosalie said.
Hope could already tell, just by looking at the plate, that this wasn’t going to be very good. And her stomach recoiled at the thought of having to eat it. She swallowed that lump of fear in her throat as it tried to lodge there permanently. Picking up a fork and knife, she cut through the driest chicken she’d ever seen, shaking the table as she sliced because it took so much effort. Not to mention the knife she was using was clearly dull.
She stared up at Chef Rosalie and grimaced. The woman insisted on being called that, Hope had learned that quickly, and she couldn’t decide if it was a bid for respect or a manifestation of ego. She plastered a smile on her lips as she popped a piece of the chicken into her mouth and started to chew.
And chew.
And chew some more.
Reaching for the water, Hope finally swallowed the piece of chicken with a bit of a cough and pushed the plate out in front of her. She said nothing as she switched plates and tried the salmon—but she had no hopes for this delicate dish after her experience with the last one. Because she knew it would bethatbad.
The skin was so crispy and solid that she couldn’t even cut through it. Hope ended up just scraping what should have been flaky fish off of it, but it wasn’t flaky at all. It was a solid lump. She had to chant in her head to convince herself to take a bite and froze, nearly spitting it out. Chugging water, Hope leaned back in her seat and looked at Chef Rosalie.
“Both those dishes are inedible.” She took another sip of water.
“They’re not! They’re perfect.”
“Look, I know that I cook fancy food on television, that I specialize in high class meals, but this… I wouldn’t even serve this to my kid, and her palate is like any other palate.” Hope shuddered. “Sit down for a minute.” She didn’t want Chef Rosalie to get on the offensive too quickly, which would make it so that Hope would have to fight through personality and defensiveness instead of actually working on the problem at hand.
Chef Rosalie slid into the chair next to Hope, although she did hesitate slightly as if she’d been expecting Hope to start throwing things. Perhaps at one point she would have, but not now.
“I’m not going to even start by asking if the meat you served me was fresh because I know it wasn’t.” Hope glanced toward the camera and raised an eyebrow. “If you want to cook a fancy meal, then you need the freshest ingredients.” Then she turnedback to Chef Rosalie. “But fresh isn’t always cheap, and I suspect that you have such a tight budget here that you’re getting food in and freezing it in hopes of making it last longer. Is that correct?”
“Yes, Chef,” Chef Rosalie answered.
Hope paused at that. In all the previous episodes that they’d filmed, she wasn’t sure she’d garnered this much cooperation right up front. Perhaps Florence Delarosa’s methods would work better.
Starting again, Hope looked Chef Rosalie over. “Me saying this food isn’t good doesn’t mean that you can’t cook. I’m sure you can cook a mean meal, but there are circumstances that often put such constraints on us that they make it impossible to make a good meal. Is your kitchen in order? Everything is up to date?”
Chef Rosalie paused. She held her breath, flicking her gaze all around the room and refusing to look directly at Hope. “No, Chef.”
“How bad is the storage in there?”
“It’s… if you want fresh food, Chef, we’ll need to get rid of everything in the kitchen.” Chef Rosalie’s cheeks tinged pink with embarrassment.
