Chapter Nine

FIRST THING THE NEXT MORNING, even before Rachel had finished her coffee, she drove to the bank and deposited the check in the ATM.

Such a small thing, but cashing it was her first acknowledgment that her season at Paisley was over. Her investment had come back to her with interest, which technically made the restaurant a success, however much it felt like she had failed. She needed to move on.

She took her second cup of coffee and her notebooks out to the front porch of her bottom-floor condo, letting the morning stillness wash over her. The sun had begun its ascent into the sky, the light changing from morning blue to bright cheery yellow, the birds striking up an enthusiastic serenade in the trees beyond her chair. This was something that she always loved but never got to enjoy. She got in late, crashed hard, woke up with barely enough time to shower, change, and head back to the restaurant. The most leisurely her mornings had been in years was when she got into her office extra early and enjoyed a cup while she put together the evening’s specials.

She started with her green journal first, tapping her pen on the page while she considered her entry. Money in the bank, she finally decided, then turned to her fresh composition notebook. On the cover, she wrote in large block letters: THE SATURDAY NIGHT SUPPER CLUB.

On the first page, she began a list of things that still needed to be decided:

1) Venue

2) Calendar/frequency

3) Guests

4) Promotion/publicity (if any)

5) Menus/themes

Basically, the only thing that had been decided was the name. And while Ana enthusiastically insisted that she could sell the concept on the name alone, Rachel knew it would take much more than a clever idea to make her new venture a success.

Those five lines glared at her, demanding exploration but defying any ideas she had to further define them. She needed help. A plan. Someone’s coattails to ride while she figured out how to get herself back into the public’s good graces.

She had a phone full of such contacts, some of whom had stayed conspicuously quiet on the #WeBelong situation. She could only hope that some of them would still take her calls.

Instead her phone woke to the last contact added to her list.

Alex.

“Just ‘Alex,’ huh?” Was he so sure he was the only Alex in her life that he could just go by his first name? Not that he was in her life. In fact, if she had her way, he would immediately be out of it. He’d already done enough, thank you very much, and she wasn’t about to give him another opportunity to send what was left of her career down the toilet.

She scrolled through the contact list until she came to the name Caleb Sutter. Might as well shoot high. She pressed Call and waited while the phone dialed.

A man answered on the third ring, his low voice muted by the sound of activity in the background. “Rachel. I was wondering if I’d hear from you.”

Just hearing his familiar voice relaxed her. Caleb was one of her few chef friends she hadn’t actually worked with. He’d opened his own place around the time she’d come to Colorado for the exec job at Brick & Berry and quickly worked himself to the top of the fine-dining food chain. They’d hit it off at Denver’s annual food and wine festival, two young chefs trying to make names for themselves.

“Am I that predictable?” Rachel asked. “I thought you’d expect me to hold out until at least the end of the week.”

“I know you. You get bored. You can’t stand to not work. But you do have good timing. I have an opening for a floater in my kitchen right now.”

Rachel flushed with embarrassment. The floater position was usually a training ground for a sous-chef, staffed by a strong all-around cook who could step in on any station when someone was sick or demands were particularly high.

It was a long, hard step down for someone like her.

The fact that he would even have her in his restaurant was encouraging, though. Maybe not everyone believed the worst about her. “I appreciate that, Caleb. And I’ll keep it in mind. But I think I want to stay out on my own.”

“Equity is doing well, but not that well. I don’t have the money to invest in another venture. I’m completely sunk into this one.”

“It’s not that. I’m looking for an endorsement.”

Silence on the other end of the line. She plowed ahead and told him about the supper club, how she was hoping someone might partner with her on the venture, another chef who had an excellent reputation and the right connections to pull it off.

The silence stretched, and when Caleb finally spoke, his voice held a mix of admiration and regret. “I think this is a great idea, Rachel. But I’m afraid I’m not the one you’re looking for. I wish I could help.”

“I’m not willing to hitch my future to yours” was what he was really saying. And she couldn’t blame him. Not when the public had turned so quickly and violently on her. “I wish you could too. But I understand.”

“Really, though, if you need a place, my door is always open.”

“Thanks, Caleb. I appreciate that. Keep in touch?”

“Absolutely. You too. Come by the restaurant anytime.”

Rachel hung up, knowing that the only way she was going to see or hear from him was if she made a reservation. There were plenty more people to call, however.

The next two didn’t answer their phones. Either they were already in the throes of prep for the day or they were ignoring her.

The fourth person answered and made her wish she hadn’t. Melina De Soto gave a snort in place of a hello. “Well, you’ve got a brass pair, I’ll give you that.”

“Hello to you too, Melina. Did I miss something?”

“The feminist movement, apparently.”

Rachel sighed and fell back against her chair. “You know as well as I do that I was taken out of context.”

“I would have been willing to give you the benefit of the doubt were it not for your little temper tantrum at Johnson & Wales.”

Would that never cease to haunt her? “I left because I didn’t like the way Nina and Toni were talking about our male colleagues. You’re well aware that you wouldn’t be where you are if it weren’t for all the male chefs you worked with. It’s a poor way to repay them by bad-mouthing them for their gender.”

“Maybe that’s true. But we women have to stick together. Which is the reason I haven’t spoken out on social media about you. You might have dug yourself a hole, but I’m not going to fill it full of water while you’re down there.”

Typical Melina with her overblown metaphors. She was a crazy-good chef —a Beard nominee the year Rachel won, in fact —but she was the circle-the-wagons type. Rachel wouldn’t be finding any help from that quarter. “You know what? Never mind. It was a long shot anyway.”

She hung up, not really caring if she burned any more bridges. The one between her and Melina was already smoldering and had been since Rachel proved she had a mind of her own.

And that was it, she realized. Four people she could call on in her time of need. There were others who would support her, no doubt, but they weren’t in a position to help in the way she needed.

She scrolled past Alex’s entry again.

No, that was a ridiculous thought. There was nothing he could do for her. He was a writer, not a chef. And he might be a big deal in New York, but that didn’t necessarily translate halfway across the country to Denver, where people still tended to be less impressed by the goings-on at the coasts.

He was just trying to displace his own guilt. He certainly didn’t have anything to offer, nor did he really expect her to take him up on it.

Which didn’t explain why her fingers brought up an online bookseller and tapped in his name.

A single book came up, titled Mis-Connected. The blurbs were impressive: big names in journalism, humor, and satire, all raving about his take on America through the eyes of a Russian immigrant family; his satirical view of the cultural differences that separated him from his well-educated Russian parents; the clash of a generation that valued privacy and modesty with an American culture that demanded transparency. She bypassed the urge to read the sample —after all, she already knew he could write —and instead scrolled down to the reviews. For every three raves, there seemed to be one infuriated reader. Some felt that Alex was judging them as Americans, even though he had been born in Colorado. Russian expats accused him of co-opting their cultural narrative for commercial means. One said he was a two-bit essayist whose work wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on.

Yikes. No wonder he’d been so worked up over public criticism. If this was what he dealt with all day, she could hardly blame him. It was exactly why she had wanted to hide in her kitchen, expose as little of herself to the public as she could. At least then the worst they could do was criticize her food.

Somehow, her finger took on a life of its own and clicked the sample button, beaming the first chapters directly to her phone.

Just getting to know her adversary. That was all.

Her coffee grew cold and her pen fell to the cement of the porch as she read. He was a gifted writer. She might not be a great judge of literature, but even she could see how he managed to walk the line between criticism and compassion as he related scenes from his Russian-American upbringing: stories of his strict, intellectual parents; the expectations that he would follow their footsteps into teaching; his eventual abandonment of academia to write what his parents termed “little stories.” Page after page painted a picture of the frustrated intellectual, too conservative to be avant-garde, yet too independent for his traditionalist family —the outsider who could see all too clearly the foibles of both camps. In an odd way, Rachel understood exactly how he felt. Still, when she was done with the sample, she could scarcely believe the direction of her thoughts.

Maybe Alex really could help her with the supper club.

She put down her phone and kicked her feet up on the porch railing. That was insane. He was the reason she was having to do the supper club in the first place. He was a public figure of some note, and from what she could tell from a quick Google search, he was capitalizing on her misfortune by doing interview after interview on the topic.

But her gut told her his apology, his insistence that he hadn’t intended this outcome, was sincere.

Where did that leave her?

Before she could second-guess herself, she tapped out a message to him: This is Rachel. I’ll bite. What did you have in mind?

Almost as if he were waiting for her text —she prayed she wasn’t that transparent —his message came back immediately. Let’s discuss over dinner tonight. Six? You pick the place.

She narrowed her eyes at the screen. He wasn’t taking her seriously. Or maybe he was thinking of this as a date, which it most certainly was not. The closest this got was a potential business arrangement. Or an olive branch.

Well, if he was going to let her pick, she was going to meet him on her turf. Or the closest she had right now. Caleb had invited her, so she would take him up on it. Equity Bar and Grill? I’ll get us reservations.

He didn’t respond. Humph. Maybe he wasn’t willing to shell out for the kind of prices Equity commanded. Apparently, apologies were cheap. She dropped her feet to the ground, gathered her pen and notebook, and walked into the house, annoyed that she’d so quickly let herself be suckered.

She was rummaging through the refrigerator for lunch ideas when her back pocket buzzed. She fumbled for her phone.

You’re on.

Her heart leapt with traitorous enthusiasm and just as quickly fell somewhere in the vicinity of her knees. She frantically tapped out a group text to Ana and Melody: Somehow I ended up agreeing to dinner at Equity with Alex tonight. What do I do?

Melody responded first. You go shopping with me! I’ll be right over.

Wait, shopping? No. I’m not dressing up for him.

Ana finally chimed in. Oh, you’re dressing up, Rach. You’re not going out in public to a restaurant owned by the second-most-visible chef in Denver and not dressing to kill.

Rachel nibbled her thumbnail, that somersaulting heart of hers now plummeting to the ground floor. What stupid impulse had made her come up with this idea in the first place? She really hadn’t thought it would go this far. No, she hadn’t thought at all. She’d been overcome with misplaced affection over some good —and clearly manipulative —writing and made a deal with the devil.

A devil with hazel eyes and a dimple she couldn’t stop thinking about.

*   *   *

“You’ve got to be kidding me, right?” Rachel held up the black spandex thing that looked like what would happen if you crossed an old-fashioned swimsuit with a rubber band. Sized for a two-year-old. “You don’t really think I’m going to fit all of this into this?”

Melody pulled the Spanx out of her hand. “Look, it’s stretchy. It’s supposed to be tight to hold all that in the right place. Not that you have that much to rearrange. Seriously, girl, how is it possible that you stay so skinny?”

“Are you kidding me? I’m shaped like a drumstick. Chicken legs on the bottom, meat in the middle.”

Melody threw back her head and laughed. “It’s always food-related with you. Now stop whining and put it on.”

“Fine, fine.” Rachel snatched the elastic shapewear out of her friend’s hand and marched to the bathroom. Once behind the closed door, she stripped down to her bra and underwear and gave a dubious look to the thing. Here went nothing. She shoved her legs into the girdle-panties and tugged upward. They slid up to her knees and stopped.

“Melody? I think I’m stuck.”

“You need to kind of, you know, shimmy it up.”

“Like a sausage?”

“Exactly like a sausage.”

“Great. I’m a human sausage.” After five minutes of tugging and squeezing and rearranging, she was encased in an elastic tube that came up to the lower edge of her bra. “How am I supposed to eat in this?”

Melody suppressed her laughter when Rachel toddled out into the bedroom, stiff-armed and -legged. “You might try walking more naturally.”

“No, you might try walking more naturally. I’ve lived in what essentially amounts to professional pajamas for fifteen years. This is . . .”

Melody held up the body-skimming jersey dress. “Drop-dead sexy. Now stop whining and put it on.”

Rachel slid the garment over her head, letting it flow over her now-smoothed-out curves. From the front room, she heard the door open and close, the telltale click of impossibly high heels making their way across her wood floor.

Ana appeared in the door of her bedroom. “Wow. Rachel, you look . . .”

“Like a sausage draped in cheesecloth?”

“Absolutely gorgeous. Are you trying to give the guy a heart attack?”

Rachel rolled her eyes, though inwardly her heart gave a little lift. It wasn’t wrong to look amazing, was it? Especially since he was so . . . so . . .

Irritating. That was the word she was going for.

“Okay, enough. Let’s get this show on the road. Is my hair okay?” She patted her hair, suddenly doubting the unaccustomed style. “I feel like a little girl playing dress-up. Why did I let you talk me into this? This is so not me. I’m a jeans and —”

“Right, but it won’t kill you.” Ana picked up the little handbag that Melody had brought over and shoved it into her hands while Melody guided Rachel’s feet into wedge-heeled pumps. “Now, you’re going to be late. Get moving. We don’t want him to think you stood him up after you went to all this trouble.”

Melody grabbed Rachel’s elbow and dragged her from her bedroom out the front door. “Let us know how it goes. We’ll lock up behind ourselves. And we’ll text you in about an hour in case you need a quick exit.”

“This isn’t a date, you know,” she said. “I can excuse myself if I need to.”

“Mmm-hmm. Watch for the text in case you need a rescue.”

Rachel strode toward her aging SUV at the curb, then quickly realized she would not be striding anywhere in these pumps. She felt like a geisha, taking mincing steps so she didn’t fall off the heels, her body wrapped so tightly in fabric that she couldn’t breathe. How did women do this all the time? She’d be lucky if she made it through dinner without having a Victorian-style fainting spell.

She climbed behind the wheel, kicked off the wedges so she could work both the gas and clutch without destroying them, started the car, and pulled away from the curb, the waistline of the super-girdle cutting into her stomach the whole time.

Whatever Alex had in mind, it had better be worth it.