“So you do two services a day?” Hope asked.
“Yeah.” Kora’s lips quirked upward on one side in a cocky smirk. Like she’d just pulled one over on Hope. Which, in all fairness, she had.
“How long has that been going on?” Hope had to resist the urge to look up and see the camera staring back at her. She knew Cadence was around somewhere, catching every interaction that they were having.
“Years.” Kora immediately started pulling things into the food truck and putting everything together.
“Is the menu different? The lunch menu to the dinner menu?”
“Of course.” Kora winked at her.
Hope tapped her fingers against her bicep as she watched Kora work efficiently. “The food truck is solvent, right?”
“Of course,” Kora repeated, though this time it sounded like she was defensive because of the question.
“And you take care of all the finances for it?” Hope asked, trying to decipher where exactly the boundary lines were and who was in charge of what. She just needed to figure out thesystems in places and work from there when it came to some sort of solution.
“I do.” Kora slammed a door shut. “Why?”
Hope had finally pushed her to pushing back. She canted her head to the side and looked Kora directly in the eye. “I’m trying to figure out why the food truck is solvent, but The Montford isn’t.”
“Oh.” Kora pursed her lips and rolled her shoulders. “Can’t help you there.”
Hope was actually fairly certain that Kora could help her there.
“I just need to get the food and then we can set out. Are you riding with us today?” Kora asked.
“Yes.” Hope straightened up and stepped out of the way. While today would be fascinating, it’d also be tense. Having one more person in the food truck was going to make the already tight confines even tighter, especially with the cameras and Cadence added into the mix.
“Good.”
Within an hour, they were on the road. Hope was strapped into the passenger seat. The truck was far bouncier than she’d anticipated, but when she thought about it, it made sense. She and Kora chatted about random things until Kora pulled into a parking lot next to a coffee shop called Beach Please.
Hope couldn’t stop the smirk of her lips when she read that. “So how do people know where to find you?”
“Social media.” Kora raised an eyebrow at her. “We’ve got a mean social media game.”
“Sounds like.” Hope knew that she’d like Kora at the end of this, but they definitely had a few more stiff walls they needed to break down in the meantime. But she trusted that could happen. “I’d love to talk to you more about that throughout the day and just observe what exactly you’re doing.”
“For sure.” Kora winked at her again.
A rush ran through Hope. And she knew that it’d play well on the camera, but with all of the drama that was going on about her relationship with Angelica, she didn’t want any more questions to be asked. Angelica had filled her in enough about the tone of the inquiry and the solution enough to know that she didn’t want to add any more fuel to the fire.
With the truck parked, Hope watched as Kora and the one assistant that she’d brought that day started in on prep. They chopped. They moved together like they’d been working together for years. Laughter. Chitchatting. A few directions here and there. Laughter again. God, this was what a well-oiled machine looked like. Hope could only wish that every kitchen she walked into would be like this.
Hope itched to join in the prep, but she really wanted to observe and see how everything functioned with just the two of them. And she was getting one hell of a show. Someone knocked on the back door, and Kora popped her head out.
“No, ma’am, we’re not open yet. No, ma’am. Two more hours. I know, it’s so hard to wait. See you at eleven!”
“Does that happen often?” Hope asked.
“Yeah,” Kora went right back to chopping. “We’re pretty popular. We’ve thought about adding a second truck so we can do dinner service as well and maybe some catering, but the money isn’t there for it.”
Hope hummed, dropping her gaze down Kora’s body and back up. “Why is the food truck still associated with The Montford?”
“What?” Kora stilled, the knife in her fingers held tightly.
“You seem to be thriving in a way The Montford isn’t, fully profitable, income coming in to the point that you’re talking about more trucks and catering?—”
