Lucie’s Vintage Cupcake Company
Daisy James
The delightfully heartwarming romantic comedy from Daisy James! When life gives you lemons, make lemon-drizzle cupcakes…Lucie thought that proposing to her boyfriend in Tiffany’s would be the best day of her life. Until he said no. In just a few seconds, her whole world is turned upside-down! And when she accidentally switches cocoa powder for chilli powder at work, she finds herself out of a job, too…Baking has always made life better in the past, but can Lucie really bake her way to happiness? Starting her own company, selling cupcakes out of an old ice cream van might just be the second chance that Lucie needs!Of course, she never expected to find love along the way…Previously published as When Only Cupcakes Will Do.
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When life gives you lemons, make lemon-drizzle cupcakes…
Lucie thought that proposing to her boyfriend in Tiffany’s would be the best day of her life. Until he said no. In just a few seconds, her whole world is turned upside-down! And when she accidentally switches cocoa powder for chilli powder at work, she finds herself out of a job too…
Baking has always made life better in the past, but can Lucie really bake her way to happiness? Starting her own company, selling cupcakes out of an old ice-cream van might just be the second chance she needs!
Of course, she never expected to find love along the way…
The delightfully heartwarming romantic comedy from Daisy James!
Lucie's Vintage Cupcake Company
Daisy James
Copyright (#ulink_66ba9ff4-18af-583f-bc80-45ed25b521b7)
HQ
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2016
Copyright © Daisy James 2016
Daisy James asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
Previously published as When Only Cupcakes Will Do
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
E-book Edition © June 2016 ISBN: 978-0-008-20683-3
Version date: 2018-07-12
DAISY JAMES
is a Yorkshire girl transplanted to the north-east of England. She loves writing stories with strong heroines and swift-flowing plotlines. She has written three novels, The Runaway Bridesmaid, If the Dress Fits and Lucie's Vintage Cupcake Company, all contemporary romances with a dash of humour. When not scribbling away in her peppermint-and-green summerhouse (garden shed), she spends her time sifting flour and sprinkling sugar and edible glitter. She loves gossiping with friends over a glass of something pink and fizzy or indulging in a spot of afternoon tea – china plates and teacups are a must!
Daisy would love to hear from readers via her Facebook page or you can follow her on twitter @daisyjamesbooks.
Thank you to my friends Kathleen and Luigi Sanapo for their generous input on the subject of Italian cakes and confectionery and for the fun in the baking… and the sampling!
To my lovely sister, Hazel
Contents
Cover (#u775b5535-9d88-5426-a102-19c9b7579293)
Blurb (#uefa73b75-7d83-53ce-b521-f1bd5991fee0)
Title Page (#ud3e7fd47-933b-57ce-9bf3-4a143c91f960)
Copyright (#ulink_bcb68373-13f6-5a93-90e2-b2fccfb68f00)
Author Bio (#u1178d91f-0eae-523c-ab29-c514a9e899e8)
Acknowledgement (#u2c14fe32-63e2-50e1-8605-559a8b76a0c9)
Dedication (#uf57ab66d-6650-5077-ab6e-46b718e43b8b)
Chapter One (#ulink_7c397d46-df5b-5488-8f63-c47c96fbff59)
Chapter Two (#ulink_e58d9741-bbf5-5106-be81-ffb3089960fa)
Chapter Three (#ulink_711faee0-c0c5-5356-827d-4c32286324e3)
Chapter Four (#ulink_fbc4c331-703f-50dc-b98a-b5734d408a2f)
Chapter Five (#ulink_0e28896e-0d6d-5336-abf0-6cc32bf0f80c)
Chapter Six (#ulink_1b918911-7c9e-5c5c-a041-98c818641b39)
Chapter Seven (#ulink_76f4fc28-289a-5aa6-b8c2-1b54d8b7aa7a)
Chapter Eight (#ulink_571e53f0-fd3b-5c6d-ac2a-c5886cc42e8e)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Excerpt (#litres_trial_promo)
Prologue (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Three (#litres_trial_promo)
Endpages (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ulink_983edb93-7907-5b6e-a6c2-90a08501f5b1)
‘Okay, people, it’s a big night tonight. The restaurant’s overbooked – how did you let that happen, Sofia? – so we all need to be at the top of our game. I want our diners to marvel over our minestrone, drool over our ditali and swoon when they taste a slice of Lucie’s signature strawberry crostata.’ Gino smiled as he delivered his regular pre-shift monologue to his kitchen staff in preparation for the busiest night of the week at Francesca’s Trattoria.
‘Yes, Chef,’ they chorused.
‘I want us to have fun with it because, when we do, our pleasure shows in the food we serve. However, as we all know, it’s an even bigger night for our very own Dessert Diva.’ Gino’s mahogany eyes rested on Lucie.
‘Yay, Lucie!’
‘Go get him!’
‘Alex is a lucky guy!’
A surge of heat rose to her cheeks as she glanced around at her colleagues who had become friends over the last two years. They had listened to her, offering their own increasingly bizarre suggestions, as she’d organised and plotted every detail of what she planned to do that evening with almost military precision. She was determined that everything would be perfect, nothing would be left to chance, for it wasn’t every day a girl proposed to her boyfriend.
‘Okay, let’s go, guys!’
Lucie strode over to her prep area. She tried to prevent her lips from tweaking upwards at the corners but failed. The sooner she finished that evening’s desserts, the sooner she could wriggle into the Hobbs dress hanging in her locker and be on her way. Francesca frowned on her chefs asking for Friday night off but had reluctantly agreed to her request provided she spent the whole afternoon at the trattoria cooking up a storm. She tightened her apron round her waist, grabbed her favourite silver mixing bowl and began to sift the flour for her strawberry tart.
Soon she was in the culinary zone and her happiness ballooned. She adored Alex, but a very close second in the race for her heart was her love affair with baking and her perfect job as a pastry chef for one of the best Italian restaurants in Hammersmith. She sliced, squeezed, liquidised and whisked; all to the accompaniment of Gino’s barked suggestions, Sofia and Antonio’s increasingly racy gossip, and snippets of an aria from one of Gino’s favourite operas. A mouth-watering aroma of garlic and olive oil, intertwined with caramelised sugar and lemon zest, snaked through the kitchen and caused her stomach to growl as punishment for skipping lunch.
At last she sprinkled a generous dusting of sugar on her torta di cioccolato e mandorle and stood back. She checked her watch. It was time to go.
‘Hey, Lucie! You still over there creating your culinary magic? Go on, get out of here! Go get that handsome guy of yours!’ smiled Gino, dragging her into a bear hug and depositing a noisy kiss on each of her cheeks.
Lucie unravelled the strings of her apron and hung it on its designated hook. Gino ran a tidy kitchen, yet, even left to her own devices, she would have had her workspace as pristine as a surgical operating theatre. Tidy kitchen, tidy life – this was the mantra her mother had drummed into her ever since she had held her first wooden spoon. It had seeped into her consciousness, but had slipped from her sister Jess’s shoulders like sand.
‘Bye, everyone. Wish me luck!’
She almost made it to the door, but Sofia caught up with her. She placed her hand on Lucie’s forearm and met her eyes. ‘Lucie, are you absolutely sure you want to do this?’
‘Sofia…’
‘All I’m saying is maybe you should talk to Alex before you rush into anything.’
Lucie rolled her eyes. She’d been listening to various versions of the same sermon for the last eight weeks, ever since she’d announced her intention to propose to Alex.
‘Why not wait until Alex asks you to marry him?’
‘Because, in case you hadn’t noticed, I adore Alex and he adores me. And we’ve been together for ever. I’m fed up of waiting. We’re just plodding along – everything’s become so comfortable, so predictable – and unless I take the initiative I can see us in five, maybe even ten years’ time, still meandering arm-in-arm down life’s highway with no real destination in sight. I want to inject some zing into our relationship – and this is the perfect way to do it!’
The trattoria’s indomitable manager flicked the sides of her short chestnut bob behind her ears. Tall and willowy, especially in her work stilettos, Sofia possessed the stature of a mannequin. If she ever had the need for a second income she would be snapped up by a modelling agency straightaway, but she relished playing the lead female role in her own restaurant drama – well, until the eponymous Francesca Santini, the restaurant’s owner and all-round gastronomic ogre, arrived to stamp on her toes. She opened her mouth again to continue with her soliloquy of caution, but Lucie didn’t have the time or the inclination to listen to a repeat performance, however well meaning.
‘Don’t worry, Sofia. I know exactly what I’m doing. Everything is going to be perfect. The store manager has even agreed to play our song at exactly eight p.m. so it will be on in the background as I make my declaration of true love. I’m so excited I could skip naked along the rooftops.’
It was Sofia’s turn to roll her eyes in frustration.
‘Oh, come on, Sofia,’ said Antonio, appearing from the kitchen to sling his arm around Sofia’s neck. ‘Even you have to admit what Lucie’s got planned is romantic! Just because you’re married to your career doesn’t mean you can deny Lucie a little romance in her life.’
‘A little romance? The scene of this forthcoming proposal wouldn’t be out of place in a lavish Hollywood rom-com production. She’s booked Tiffany’s, for God’s sake! Please, Lucie. I know you think I’m being a killjoy. If you have truly found your soulmate, then I’m happy for you. Alex is a great guy. He’s handsome, funny, a talented corporate lawyer and one of the most passionate Chelsea supporters I’ve ever had the pleasure to be acquainted with. I understand that you’ve been dating for ages but you know he’s focusing on his career at the moment, wants to make partner before he’s thirty. Why not wait until his partnership is confirmed at the board meeting in April and have a dual celebration?’
Lucie smiled. Alex often dropped into the conversation his goal of gaining a partnership at Carter & Mayhew by the time he reached his milestone birthday. She’d nod her reassurance that she had no doubt he would achieve his ambition, before adding her own dream of being at the helm of her own restaurant or running her own catering business. He’d usually pat her arm indulgently whenever she said this, fluff up her curls and tell her they should be working on squeezing out every ounce of enjoyment their lifestyle in the capital afforded them.
‘You’re a good friend, Sofia, and I cherish your support and advice. But I love Alex. I want to marry him whether he’s a partner at Carter & Mayhew or not. It doesn’t matter to me whether he’s a top corporate lawyer or a lowly legal clerk. All I know is that we are destined to be together. So why shouldn’t I propose? This is the twenty-first century you know!’
Lucie checked her watch. She didn’t want to be late. She had even booked a taxi to take her over to Sloane Street where the most fabulous store in London awaited her arrival. Excitement bubbled through her veins and she shivered with exhilaration at the thought that, in less than an hour’s time, she would be an engaged woman.
‘I wish you’d let us come along to witness the proposal of the decade,’ lamented Antonio with a glint of mischief in his espresso eyes. ‘We could take a few photos, record the perfect moment on our phones so you can play it all back for your grandchildren.’
She smiled at him as she straightened the scarlet belted dress she’d splashed out on for the occasion. She had completed her outfit with a pair of Louboutins Sofia had loaned her, which her friend usually housed in a specially purchased glass case like a prized museum artefact in her bedroom. She had so many pairs of gorgeous stilettos, Lucie was surprised she didn’t sell tickets to a gallery viewing. However, the shoes were performing their designated role perfectly and delivered a whoosh of much-needed confidence. She scrabbled around in the dark depths of her handbag and produced a comb to tease a couple of recalcitrant curls back into place and finished off with a spritz of hairspray.
‘Okay, here’s my cab. How do I look?’
‘Stunning, caramia. I’d marry you!’ smirked Antonio. ‘Now, off you go and enjoy every moment. Take no notice of Miss Sceptical over there. She’s just jealous that she has no time to date, unless you include her suspiciously close relationship with her iPhone. Is there a male version of Siri?’
She hooked her handbag over her shoulder, pushed open the heavy glass door and stepped out onto the glistening pavement. She briefly wondered if the sudden downpour was an omen, but discarded the thought. It was late February – she could hardly expect the sun to be cracking the flagstones.
She checked her watch again. Thirty minutes and she’d be a fiancée. As the cab laced its way through the rain-splattered London streets to Sloane Street, the wipers flicking away the onslaught of water droplets, her thoughts meandered to the black onyx signet ring waiting patiently in its little turquoise box at Tiffany’s to make its debut into the world.
She had been planning the big proposal since the first of January – eight weeks ago. If she was entirely honest with herself – and Sofia and Antonio made sure of that – she’d thought Alex might have proposed to her on New Year’s Eve at his boss’s party in Pimlico. It had been an elegant affair – not the usual New Year’s bash she was used to, which involved copious amounts of alcohol, loud and boisterous singing and wild dancing. Greg Parker was a partner at Carter & Mayhew and someone Alex was desperate to emulate. He had everything Alex aspired to achieve – the partnership, the professional respect of his peers as a corporate tax lawyer, a glamourous wife, a beautiful, if somewhat soulless, home, and the pièce de résistance as far as Alex was concerned, the vintage MGB GT. But Alex hadn’t produced the coveted ring.
Then there had been a moment on Valentine’s Day when she’d thought Alex was preparing to go down on one knee, but he’d just been collecting his napkin from under the table. She had crushed her disappointment and only briefly mourned the opportunity missed. She loved living with Alex but being his wife would be the icing on the cake. She had lots of plans afoot for their life together, which began with the imminent proposal. A tickle of nerves mingled with a thrill of anticipation in her empty stomach, but her overwhelming emotion was one of excitement and certainty that, despite Sofia’s counsel, she was doing the right thing. She could envisage her future stretched out before her, clear and arrow-straight.
Of course, Sofia and Antonio – and her best friends Steph and Hollie – knew every tiny detail of her intended proposal. But she had also taken Yolande Parker, Alex’s boss’s wife, into her confidence. Yolande had been happy to organise things so that, after work, instead of Greg and Alex going straight to their preferred watering hole for the pre-weekend moan about the various fortunes of their football teams, Greg would ensure they left the office at a reasonable time and guide Alex as innocently as possible to the jewellery store. Alex did not have the tiniest inkling of what was about to happen. It was going to be a total surprise, she knew it.
As the taxi wound its way through the urban jungle, the rain intensified. It definitely hadn’t been part of her plan to arrive at the door of the most iconic of jewellers looking like she’d been dragged backwards through a car wash. She dug deep into her handbag and extracted an ancient black brolly that was peppered with glitter nail varnish and, strangely, a boiled sweet. Nerves started to smother her excitement. The speech she had prepared ran through her mind like a ticker tape stuck on permanent replay so that now it sounded like complete gibberish.
Panic joined her anxiety and together they gnawed at the edges of her heart. Maybe Sofia was right – her dash to propose would turn out to be a fool’s errand. She hadn’t paused for a moment to consider the possibility that Alex would not be as enthusiastic as she was about settling down. But she quashed her doubts. One thing she was certain of was that he loved her just as much as she loved him. And that, after all, was the only thing that mattered. He was her soulmate, the man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with. She intended to try her damnedest to make him the happiest man in London.
‘Just here okay, darling?’
The handsome façade of Tiffany’s Sloane Street branch reared up in front of her. As the taxi drew to the kerb her raging heartbeat subsided and a ripple of confidence began to wash through her veins. Tiffany’s was not only the most wonderful jewellery store in the world but the place where she and Alex had first met, next to a display of the store’s iconic silver heart necklaces that she had been dithering over for her mother’s sixtieth birthday present from her and Jess. It turned out Alex’s mother would also turn sixty within days and had coveted a Tiffany necklace since her teens. They had bonded over the thrilling selection process and left with not only a little turquoise box tied with white ribbon each, but each other’s telephone numbers. The rest, as they say, was history.
With anticipation and happiness coursing through her veins like ribbons of electricity, she paid the driver and jumped down from the cab. All thought, apart from the approaching moment when she would stare into Alex’s soft pewter eyes and declare her undying love for him, was superfluous. Even the spiral of jitters she’d experienced on the ride over had unravelled and calmed.
She spotted Yolande loitering behind one of the sculpted bay trees at Tiffany’s front door, leaning under the canopy at a precarious angle to prevent her up-do from spoiling. Beyond the glass door she could see the shop’s manager, Brett Coulson – an immaculately besuited George Clooney lookalike who had become one of her best friends over the last few weeks. She knew everything would be arranged to perfection.
Then she caught sight of Alex, sauntering down the street with Greg, so deep in conversation with his boss that he didn’t notice her slip into the entrance portico of the most sumptuous, elegant jewellery store in the world.
Lucie threw Yolande a swift smile. ‘Can you stall them for a few minutes while I make sure everything is ready?’
‘No problem. You look wonderful, by the way. Good luck,’ she whispered before whizzing round the corner to meet Greg and Alex. ‘Hey, there you are! I must show you the charm bracelet that’s on my birthday wish list, Greg.’
Lucie pressed open the door and stepped into the hushed ambience of her personal idea of paradise. It was a true fantasyland of baubles. Everything sparkled and twinkled under the fluorescent lights – each gem a star in its own galaxy waiting for the opportunity to make someone’s dreams come true.
Who didn’t want to own a magic bean from Tiffany’s? Just a glimpse of the little turquoise box sent a frisson of excitement through any lucky recipient’s veins and today it was to be her turn. Well, actually, Alex would be the one receiving the gift of true love – accompanied by a black onyx signet ring – but she’d figured that once he’d accepted her proposal they could spend the rest of their allotted time drooling over the myriad princess-cut solitaires nestling against their velvet trays. She fully intended to enjoy every minute of the half hour’s grace Brett and his staff had offered to her after closing the doors to the public so she could issue her proposal on the exact spot she had first met her fiancé-to-be.
‘Thanks again for agreeing to do this for us, Brett.’
‘Everything is as you directed, Miss Bradshaw. We are excited that you chose Tiffany’s to be part of your history.’ The manager offered her a smile so dazzling it could have graced a toothpaste ad.
The ring was ready, waiting in its presentation case on the counter in the middle of the room. Brett, immaculate, composed and loitering with his hands crossed at his waist and a pleasant smile playing on his lips, was ready. The MP3 player was poised to be switched on as she went down on one knee. She glanced around the store, drew in a deep, steadying breath, relishing the aroma of glass polish and happiness that pervaded the air, and she knew she was ready. She swallowed down on the lump lodged in her throat and scolded the weakness in her knees. Her heart hammered a concerto of joy against her ribcage, her fingers trembling slightly as she fiddled with the ring box.
This was it! The beginning of the rest of her life.
And here was Alex; his hands shoved into his trouser pockets, bewilderment written across his handsome features. Two years they had been together; surely she should be familiar by now with his glow of charisma, the way his presence could expand into every corner of the room. At six-foot-tall, sartorial elegance was a breeze to him. He looked fabulous in anything and everything, but tonight, in his Paul Smith business suit, he looked amazing – especially as he’d chosen to team it with a pale-pink Jermyn Street shirt with the silver Tiffany cufflinks she’d bought him for Christmas just visible at his wrists. His pale grey eyes were at that moment resting on her, accompanied by a comedic quizzical expression, the corners of his lips stretched ever so slightly to produce a matching pair of dimples that bracketed his mouth.
‘Lucie? What are you doing here?’ Alex blurted. He spun his head round to where Greg and Yolande had followed him into the store and lingered, hand-in-hand, mesmerised by the unfolding scene.
Lucie swallowed again, gulped in a lungful of air and closed the distance between them. She took both his hands into hers and looked straight into his eyes, breathing in a waft of his woody cologne, her heart ballooning with love for this gorgeous man who stood in front of her suffused with confusion.
‘Alex, you know that I love you more than anything else in the world, don’t you?’
Alex tossed a glance over to Brett and his assistant who stood shoulder to shoulder to his right, smiles fixed on their faces. ‘Ye… es, I do… but…’
‘And you remember that this is the Tiffany store where we first met picking out a piece of jewellery for our mothers’ sixtieth birthdays?’
‘Yes, I know all that, Lucie, but why are we…?’
‘I truly believe that at that precise moment the director of fate manoeuvred our destinies into alignment and we were meant to be together.’
Lucie pulled Alex over to the counter and picked up the velvet box. She paused to scrutinise his face before flicking open the lid. Alex’s eyes slipped from hers, down to the ring and then back up again, his pale-pink lips parting slightly and then closing. The cute dimples had vanished.
‘Lucie…’
Lucie slowly lowered herself down onto one knee and stared deep into his silver eyes, trying to send him a silent message filled with the extent of her adoration.
‘Alexander James Morgan… I love you with all of my heart and soul. Will you marry me?’
Chapter Two (#ulink_abe22d1b-919c-5dd5-a54e-aca3405ad82b)
Silence spread into every corner of the room and reverberated back into her ears. She wobbled on her knee as Alex let go of her hand and averted his eyes, his mouth twisting in discomfort. He ran his fingertips through his blond quiff and they came to rest on his lips. They were shaking. She’d never seen cool, calm, controlled Alex look so uncomfortable.
What was happening? a small voice in her head queried.
She shot a glance over Alex’s shoulder to Yolande. Only when she saw the smile drain from her lips and her cheeks acquire a faintly reddening hue did the answer came crashing down around her like a shower of ice. Her stomach dropped like a slab of concrete down a well and raced back up to lodge painfully in her throat. She opened her mouth to say something but a strange croaking sound was all she could manage.
‘Alex?’
‘Mmm…?’
‘Alex, say something.’
‘Erm… let me help you up.’ He reached for her arm and drew her to standing, but let go of her immediately, as though touching her skin had scalded his flesh. He slotted his hands into his suit pockets and began to flap his elbows, a sure sign he was mortified and keen to extricate himself from the awkward situation as quickly as possible.
‘Alex, I’ve just asked you to marry me. This is the part where you hug me, kiss me and tell me how excited you are! Aren’t you even going to answer me?’
‘Lucie, I’m… erm… well, I’m flattered…’ He glanced nervously over his shoulder to where Greg had tucked his arm around Yolande’s waist and guided her to a cabinet of jewel-encrusted carriage clocks, mumbling exclamations of interest, clearly embarrassed.
‘Flattered? You’re flattered?’
Her voice came out an octave higher than she’d expected and she could feel her cheeks glowing with the fiery heat of mortification.
The sales assistant peeled away from Brett Coulson and went to assist Greg and Yolande, nervously recounting the features of the pieces they were browsing. Brett caught her eye and stepped forward, smooth and unruffled, as though this sort of thing happened at Tiffany’s every day.
‘Miss Bradshaw, Mr Morgan, perhaps you would like to avail yourselves of one of our private consultation rooms. If you’ll just follow…’
‘No! Thank you.’ Lucie gulped back the pressing tsunami of tears. She turned to Alex. ‘You don’t want to marry me, do you?’
‘Look, Luce, I think we need to talk about such a serious commitment before we make any promises, you know… It’s a bit sudden, that’s all.’ Then, to her amazement, he lowered his voice and leant towards her, gesturing over his shoulder. ‘Why on earth did you have to invite them?’
‘Is that all you can say? Your girlfriend has just arranged for Tiffany’s to stay open late so she could propose to you on the precise spot she met you and all you can think of to say is that you wish I hadn’t invited Greg and Yolande?’
Tears gathered along her lower lashes as the truth became crystal-clear and a metal vice began to crush the air from her lungs. Her peripheral vision seemed to recede and then rush back at her and she reached out to grasp the display counter to steady herself. She hadn’t realised she’d been holding her breath and the lack of oxygen had caused her head to feel fuzzy. As the tears trickled down her cheeks, she surveyed the man she loved with every cell of her body – in a matter of seconds he had morphed into a total stranger.
‘So your answer is no, then?’
‘I didn’t say that, Lucie,’ Alex said, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.
‘But you didn’t say yes.’
And in his silence her whole world crumbled. Seeing the embarrassment on Alex’s face was almost more than she could bear. An involuntary sob escaped from her throat. She clutched her stomach with her arm and doubled over as a slash of pain hit her squarely in the solar plexus.
‘Lucie, I’m sorry. If I’d known you were planning… well, all this…’ He swung his palm around her personal idea of retail paradise, still unable to meet her eyes.
‘Go away. Just leave me alone,’ she spluttered more harshly than she’d intended, her eyes narrowed and her teeth clenched.
Alex stepped away from her as though he’d been slapped and Lucie felt even worse. She saw the discomfort written boldly on his handsome features. He was terrified she was about to cause a scene in front of his boss. That was something Alex abhorred – women who showed their emotions in public were to be pitied. She saw him flash a hand gesture to Yolande and after that her senses became muddled. She felt Yolande link arms with her, mutter an incomprehensible but soothing stream of random words into her ear and watched as Alex disappeared from her life without a backward glance. She vaguely heard Yolande politely thank Brett for his assistance before steering her into the darkness of the street outside to allow the manager to lock the door behind them.
The fresh air hit her brain but her body still endured a cauldron of emotions – mortification and embarrassment at her public rejection, shock and confusion at Alex’s reaction, and pain, a sharp raw pain coursing through her veins, sparkling out to her fingertips before jettisoning back up to her chest where it gathered in a heavy armour of lead weight.
She was grateful for Yolande’s support, physical and emotional, as they waited at the kerb for a taxi. Her mind was so crowded with unanswered questions she was unable to formulate speech, either to ask for her opinion on what had just transpired or to thank her for her kindness. She was vaguely aware of being bundled into the back of a cab, but not before she noticed, incongruously, that it had stopped raining and the sky had taken on a smooth, infinite mantle of black silk which pressed down onto her shoulders and wrapped its fabric around her body, inducing a feeling of claustrophobic panic.
‘Here.’ Yolande handed her a packet of fragrant tissues and enveloped her hands with her own. ‘I’m so sorry, Lucie. So, so sorry that happened to you. I don’t know what Alex was thinking. Perhaps it was the surprise; perhaps when he’s had chance to think things through...’
Lucie stared at Yolande, at her carefully made-up face creased in genuine concern, and found her voice at last. ‘He doesn’t love me. If he did, he would have said yes straightaway, wouldn’t he?’
Sadness now took the place of shame and descended like a tepid shower. Yolande didn’t reply and they sat in silence until the taxi drew up in front of the building that housed the apartment she shared with Alex. The windows on the third floor were in darkness – just like her world. She glanced at her watch and was astonished to see that less than an hour had passed since she’d left the restaurant, her life on an upward spiral, consumed with happiness and excitement for her future. How was she going to explain what had happened to Gino, Antonio and Sofia? She knew Francesca wouldn’t care as long as it didn’t affect her ability to create culinary artistry.
Why did life have to toss such random grenades into the path of the unsuspecting? What was she going to do? She couldn’t continue to live with Alex after what had happened. But she knew there would be a sofa for her at Steph and Hollie’s flat in Wimbledon. And there was always Jess in Richmond if she could endure the commute and being mauled on a daily basis by her two young nephews. She’d better start packing.
‘Want me to come up with you?’
Lucie liked Yolande, but even in her pain-infused state she caught the tremor of dread in the woman’s voice. ‘No, but thanks for… well, for bringing me home.’
‘Are you sure there’s nothing I can do?’
‘I’m fine…’
‘I’ll get Greg to talk to Alex… Perhaps if…’
‘No, please don’t do that. Greg is Alex’s boss. It’s better to keep this between the two of us. I don’t want it to affect Alex’s chance at partnership.’
‘Well, if you’re sure…’
‘Bye, Yolande.’
Lucie slammed the door and the cab sped away, its red tail lights shimmering like cat’s eyes growing smaller and smaller until they disappeared round the corner. She had a feeling of absolute certainty that she would never see Yolande, or Greg, again.
Would her premonition extend to Alex, too?
Chapter Three (#ulink_0c22da07-7bc9-508a-853b-c993e0c6736f)
‘Hey, Lucie, are you planning on serving chargrilled torta di ricotta to our customers this evening?’ chuckled Antonio, grabbing a cloth to remove her ricotta pie from the oven and setting it down to smoulder on a wire rack.
Because it was Friday, the busiest night of the week, Lucie, like Gino and Antonio, had arrived at the restaurant early to prepare her ingredients and bake her most popular desserts for the evening’s service. The torte she’d spent the last hour creating had the additional aura of silver smoke and an intense aroma of burnt caramel.
‘Oh, God! Sorry, sorry!’
Gino paused in his task of separating zucchini flowers from their stems and swept his palm over his dark hair as he turned to look at Lucie, his face wreathed in anxiety. ‘You okay, Lucie?’
Gino and Antonio were treating her like a delicate piece of Venetian glass to be bundled up in cotton wool, dipped in love and affection and dispatched home. While it was a welcome relief to know she was loved, and surrounded by such genuine concern for her well-being, all she really wanted to do was bury herself in a busy shift – the busier, the better – so that her brain had something else to focus on other than the painful memory of her rejection and broken heart.
Once they’d settled into the familiar routine of the daily preparations, Gino strode over to Lucie and enveloped her in an Aramis-infused bear hug. ‘Alex is an imbecille. You want that me and Antonio take our meat cleavers over to Pimlico and surprise the hell out of him on his commute to work?’
Tempting though it might have been to authorise such a foray, she knew it wouldn’t solve anything. And, more worryingly, she knew both Gino and Antonio had large extended families in Italy with accompanying whispers of connections to the Mafia. She was sure it was a wind-up by Antonio, but who knew?
She scrutinised the handsome head chef’s features. Anyone meeting him for the first time couldn’t fail to guess at his Italian ancestry – his Mediterranean-hued complexion, those dark curled lashes. He could be described by some as stocky but there wasn’t a spare inch on him, and when he cooked he exuded such a force of energy he made the onlooker exhausted just from watching him.
However, Gino’s most endearing trait was his infinite capacity to make everyone feel special. He possessed the enviable ability to recall the names of their regular diners like an ageless elephant. He had grown up above his parents’ restaurant on the outskirts of Milan, helping out with the service from the time he could toddle around the tables with the bread basket. Lucie loved him – all the staff at Francesca’s did – and he was the reason she had forced herself to slap on a mask of make-up and return to work. Friday nights were always manic, but the kitchen staff worked in formation like a professionally choreographed ballet troupe. Well, under usual circumstances they did – that day she had been cast in the role of the clumsy, flat-footed clown.
Next it was Antonio’s turn to grab her shoulders and deposit a noisy kiss on each cheek before declaring she was too good for the tight-arsed, stuck-up lawyer and should stick to dating red-blooded, passionate Italian sous chefs instead of dallying with wet, cowardly corporate suits. Lucie smiled her gratitude at the Italian Adonis who had girls reserving the same table every Saturday night to ogle the fruits of his obsession with the gym. Sicily’s loss had been their gain throughout the winter season, but the women would be sobbing into their Prosecco rosé when he returned to Palermo in July to help his uncle out at his pizzeria for the summer.
Yet, as Lucie chopped, sliced and grated the stack of ingredients she would be using in her desserts that evening, she had to admit Gino and Antonio did have a point. Alex still hadn’t returned any of her calls. Even her friend Steph had tried to corner him one morning at the County Court but he’d scuttled away with his client into a conference room. Steph had declared herself disgusted at his spineless attitude.
‘Damn!’
Lucie took a sharp step backwards as an almost empty bottle of extra virgin olive oil, which Francesca’s brother had sent over from his hill farm in Tuscany, slithered from her fingertips. Then she was forced to watch in horror as Francesca herself appeared in the kitchen doorway and bent down to retrieve a piece of the broken glass, her sharp hazel eyes narrowed and her brow creased into parallel lines of concern.
‘I should deduct this breakage from your salary, but I’m prepared to make an exception on this occasion.’ Francesca leaned in a little closer to scrutinise Lucie, running her eyes from her tangle of bird’s-nest-inspired hair to the scuffed toes of her ankle boots. A blast of her heavy perfume lingered in the air between them. ‘If you don’t mind my saying so, Lucie, you look like you’ve been flattened by a runaway steamroller and waited while it reversed to make sure the job was done properly.
‘Of course, I understand that you’ve just endured the most tremendous shock but you must resist bringing your personal difficulties into the kitchen. If you are unable to do so, you should take the rest of the day and this evening off when you’ve completed your desserts. However, I should remind you that indulgence in your relationship problems will most certainly have to be accounted for. I don’t want you to make a habit of it. And if Antonio’s tip-off is correct, and we are to be visited by the celebrity blogger from Anon. Appetit, then tonight of all nights I will need my staff to be at the top of their game.’
‘Really, Fran, I’m fine. I’m sorry, I know how important tonight is and…’
‘Well, if you insist on staying, I want the same attention to detail I demand from all my staff every night of the week no matter what personal triumph or disaster has befallen them that day.’
Francesca paused in the habitual tailspin of energy she used to control every aspect of her trattoria, then walked over to the preparation bench where Lucie had started to murder a mango she was supposed to be slicing. Strangely enough, an imprint of Alex’s features had appeared in the speckles on its skin. She stopped her attack as Francesca rested her palm on her forearm, forcing her to let go of the knife.
‘We can’t allow our standards to slip. Do you understand?’ Francesca allowed her eyes to linger on Lucie’s to ensure her message hit home before flouncing out of the kitchen to check on the alignment of the cutlery.
‘Honestly, I’m fine,’ Lucie repeated to no one in particular.
When she saw how Gino was looking at her, she decided to steer the conversation away from the elephant in the room she had brought to work with her that afternoon.
‘Anyway, does anyone know who the Anon. Appetit food critic – who may or may not be gracing us with his royal presence tonight – actually is? How can one person have so much influence over London’s ravenous diners that one word from him brings them flocking to the tables or sends them fleeing from the trattorias?’
‘There’s no photograph of the guy – understandable, I suppose; he needs to remain anonymous in his pursuit of gastronomic excellence – but his blog apparently became an internet sensation after he recorded and uploaded his forcible eviction from a French restaurant over in Soho at Christmas when he dared to question the provenance of their black truffles,’ explained Antonio as he chopped up a forest of fresh basil for his pesto sauce.
‘One thing there was a photograph of was the bruise the irate chef gave him after he pursued him into the street armed with a wooden rolling pin and a frying pan of fury. Ever since that crazy incident, every chef the length and breadth of London craves and fears an Anon. Appetit review in equal measure. A five-star review is like sprinkling fairy dust on their cuisine and is enough to jettison the restaurant and the chef’s reputation into the upper echelons of gastronomic preference. André Michelin – take a back seat! Of course, the reverse is also true.’
‘Exactly!’ declared Francesca who had reappeared unnoticed as they listened to Antonio’s story. ‘This is why I insist that we must continue to strive for the pinnacle of our talents every single night of the week! For we will never know whether this food critic is eating at one of our tables. If it’s not tonight, it could be tomorrow or next week, or the week after that, and we must be ready. A favourable review could be the catalyst not only to an upswing in bookings but the fulfilment of my dream to expand this little slice of Italian paradise and the security of your employment.’
Everyone was aware of Francesca’s dream to take over the lease of the vacant shop next door. She intended to open an authentic Italian deli that would serve espressos and fresh Parma ham snacks for those patrons too squeezed of the luxury of time to indulge in the full sit-down experience.
‘Whoever this food critic is, he knows his stuff – that much is clear. As it says on his website banner – the pen is mightier than the spatula. But we have nothing to fear if you all concentrate on what you are employed to do and produce your best dishes consistently. But if it is tonight, I do hope you’re up to it.’
Francesca’s eyes lingered for a second longer than necessary on Lucie, who she clearly saw as the weakest link in her culinary empire, before spinning round on her four-inch stilettos and returning to prowl around the dining room before the evening’s diners descended.
Lucie exhaled a long sigh of anxiety. Ever since the celebrated Anon. Appetit blog had burst onto the scene last summer, she had made a conscious effort to avoid reading the reviews, but she’d heard plenty of outraged and indignant analysis of what was published from Gino, Antonio and Sofia. It had gained a huge following in a short amount of time, with diners scrambling to add their own views to the food critic’s posts, thereby perpetuating the effect of his opinion, whether positive or critical.
Needless to say, the negative reviews – some so caustic Antonio insisted on reading them out in disbelief – were the most popular. Lucie could never understand why readers enjoyed seeing hard-working people trashed, for while the food blogger stuck religiously to reviewing the actual food, his readers often made their comments personal.
She remembered a conversation she’d had only a few weeks ago with Gino and Antonio.
‘The scumbag food critic who hides behind the Anon. Appetit blog has rubbished my cousin Leonardo’s pizzeria. He said it wasn’t up to his exacting cordon bleu standards. It’s a pizzeria, for Christ’s sake.’ Gino had waved his kitchen knife in the air in a gesture of what he’d like to do to the celebrity reviewer.
‘Leonardo is devastated – his takings are down by twenty-five per cent and he’s talking about selling up and going back to Florence. I told him these morons make their living from regaling potential diners with witty observations and comedic asides. They have to continually seek out establishments and chefs to belittle and ridicule to ensure their observations remain in the spotlight. Yet these people who don’t know a roux from a roulade tend to forget what diners really enjoy – the comfort of a delicious and satisfying meal served by a friendly waiter at a reasonable price, safe in the knowledge that there will be no part of their meal adorned with snails’ vomit or distilled rats’ urine.’
If she ever came face-to-face with the author who encouraged such vitriol, like Gino she would certainly have something to say to him, too – she just hoped Antonio’s informant had got it wrong and that Mr Anon. Appetit would have the good sense to steer clear of Francesca’s that evening.
Her fingers started to tremble as she sliced a lemon for her crostata al limone. The day was beginning to feel as long as War and Peace.
‘Good grief, who rattled Francesca’s cage?’ asked Sofia as she strode into the kitchen, her eyebrows disappearing into her fringe in consternation as she helped herself to a jug of water to replenish the fresh flowers on each of the tables.
Gino broke away from his task of pulverising a steak to exchange a mischievous smirk with Lucie.
‘If she’s not careful, I think our boss might spontaneously combust! We will do what we always do and cook, cook, cook and every diner in here tonight cannot fail to have an awesome experience – I know it. Are we not the maestros of minestrone, the virtuosos of veal, the connoisseurs of cannoli and cartellate? They’ll all be blown away by our offerings, especially your desserts, Lucie, whichever one they choose to indulge their taste buds in.’
Lucie turned up the corners of her lips, but her smile didn’t register as far as her eyes as she continued absently with the preparation of a Sicilian cassata. As she chopped, whisked and sifted, her mind drifted, inevitably, back to Alex. She fervently wished she could join in with the burbling roulade of kitchen gossip that always preceded a busy evening, but all she felt was numbness creeping from her stomach to her chest and clouding her mind of any pleasure.
Was Francesca right? Should she take the night off after she’d finished preparing her desserts?
But the subject uppermost in her mind was where Alex was at that precise moment. It was just after five o’clock. She knew he would be making his way to the local bar with Greg to perform verbal surgery on the tactical brilliance of his beloved Chelsea. But where would he be spending the rest of the evening when his friends left to take their partners out to dinner? And more to the point, who with? The thought of him dating so soon after their break-up hit her in the chest like a whip of fire. Had he even been seeing someone else when she’d proposed? Was that the reason behind his refusal?
Yes, that had to be the answer – someone else was involved! Why hadn’t she thought of that? Who was it? Probably someone he worked with in that soaring glass shard of a law firm; some corporate lawyer, perhaps, with whom he could discuss the finer details of the government’s current taxation policy over a late-night infusion of caffeine at his desk? Yes, she could picture it now; they hadn’t realised the time, they were exhausted from the mentally challenging work, so they retired to a local wine bar for a nightcap before they…
A blade of renewed pain scythed through Lucie’s brain and her temples throbbed as though they were being squeezed of their last drop of energy in a wine press. A headache threatened – yet another consequence of the agony caused by Alex’s shock refusal of her proposal. The whisk she was using to whip up one of her signature zabagliones clattered from her hand to the floor as she struggled to rein in her emotions.
‘You okay over there, Lucie?’ enquired Gino, his eyes filled with sympathy. ‘Don’t take any notice of Francesca. She has the heart of an ice queen. Ever since Antonio mentioned the dreaded blogger her preoccupation with perfection has spiralled out of control. We don’t even know for sure that he’ll be here tonight.’
‘I’m okay, thanks, Gino.’ And Lucie returned to her internal meanderings.
As always, it was her friends’ overt expressions of sympathy and kindness that tended to set her off. A week ago, Steph and Hollie had welcomed her and her suitcases into their home with love, understanding and the administration of that trio of female solace – wine, chocolate and a good gossip. Yet her brain was still as befuddled with circulating confusion as it had been that dreadful night, and her aching heart was a ghost town without even the tumbleweed to break the monotony of loneliness. Alex’s casual rejection in the space of a moment had been so unexpected she couldn’t quite believe it had happened. She still expected him to call her to arrange a Saturday brunch date, or walk through the restaurant door to declare that it had all been a ruse – that he’d planned to propose to her himself and of course he wanted to marry her.
Before her life had exploded in her face, she hadn’t ever thought things couldn’t get any better. As well as what she’d thought of as her steady love life with the man of her dreams, her ambitions in the career arena were progressing in accordance with the carefully crafted plan she’d made after graduating in the top five of her class at Le Cordon Bleu cookery school in Paris. She allowed her thoughts to swing briefly to those heady days in the City of Light when her brain had been crammed to bursting with all-things-patisserie and she had slaved over a hot stove from the moment she arrived in that celebrated kitchen until she couldn’t hold her eyes open a second longer. She had loved carrying out culinary autopsies on recipes then twisting the results to improve on taste, texture and presentation.
However, she knew she still had a lot to learn in the arena of gastronomic archaeology, and one of her particular interests was Mediterranean desserts. She loved working with Gino on his signature biscotti and experimenting with a wide variety of fillings for their cannoli. She also enjoyed being part of the renaissance of the trattoria in Hammersmith. Gino continually assured her she was an integral cog in their food-creating machine. Her colleagues – Gino, Antonio and Sofia – were like an extended family and Francesca’s was rapidly becoming one of the best Italian eateries in the area as evidenced by the long waiting list for weekend reservations.
With supreme difficulty, she dragged her concentration back to the green figs she was struggling to peel and reluctantly admitted that maybe Francesca had a point. Perhaps she should take a break from work until she could banish the raw edges of her heartache.
What if Antonio’s sources were right and the food critic had chosen to dine incognito at Francesca’s that night? What if she made a mistake? Tears breached her lashes again. Who knew that one person could cry so many tears and still have some left in reserve?
She checked her watch. It was too late to scarper for home now anyway, as the Friday night diners had already started to arrive. But then the tiny part of her reasonable brain still functioning reminded her that Gino was an amazing chef, Antonio was a talented sous chef and Francesca’s Trattoria was the best Italian restaurant in the whole of Hammersmith. A bad review, even from such an alleged gastronomic genius as the guy behind the famous Anon. Appetit, was impossible.
Chapter Four (#ulink_7f08ed0b-0315-5a1f-b8ff-1382a2ec523a)
‘Are you sure you’re okay?’ asked Antonio.
‘I’m fine!’ She forced a false smile to her lips.
‘Well, in that case, perhaps you could try using those delicious toasted pecans instead of ciabatta croutons on your ricotta torte?’ giggled Sofia, as she returned the offending dessert plate that had been rejected by a disgruntled diner, a wide smile displaying her perfect teeth. ‘Ditzy is adorable, just not tonight, eh? What if this delectable dessert had been destined for our famous anonymous blogger Fran is so obsessed with at the moment?’
‘Oh, God, Sofia, I’m so sorry.’
Lucie’s sense of humour temporarily deserted her as she slammed the discarded dessert, along with the plate, into the waste bin and shot off to refrost Francesca’s most popular sweet. She wiped the back of her hand over her forehead and swallowed as panic soared through her veins, sparkling out to her fingertips like ribbons of electricity.
‘Don’t tell Fran, please. I’ve already had to bake a new batch of zeppola after my first attempt turned out more like overblown popcorn.’
‘My lips are sealed, mia pulce,’ Sofia assured her, as she wafted out of the kitchen before reappearing immediately.
‘One tiramisu and a slice of your spectacular mango cheesecake, please,’ called Sofia, her voice bursting through Lucie’s reverie as she jammed the dessert order onto the nail in front of her and disappeared again.
‘Okay,’ she mumbled, barely registering the request.
She reached for the dessert glasses and assembled the ingredients on autopilot as her thoughts continued to spiral down into a helix of despair. Had her late nights at the restaurant and her desire to squeeze every ounce of knowledge she could from Gino before moving on to start her own business driven Alex into the arms of another woman?
Oh, God! It was all her fault!
She grabbed the canister of cocoa powder from a shelf of spices that she’d set out with military precision, and sprinkled a generous dusting over the tiramisu she had prepared earlier. She was so tired, physically and emotionally, that she looked at the soft, smooth surface of cream cheesecake and wondered what sort of pillow it would make. She had been unable to sleep for any more than a couple of hours a night. Her days felt like she’d been cast adrift from her moorings as her emotions swayed from sadness, confusion and misery through to pain and anguish, and finally landed on indignation and anger and a desperate need for answers, before the pendulum swung back again to humiliation, shame and an urge to crawl into a hole and stay there until her heart stopped aching. It was all so exhausting.
‘This the tiramisu?’ enquired a harassed Sofia. Lucie hadn’t even noticed she’d returned and was loitering impatiently at her side.
‘Yes,’ she muttered absently as she set about decanting a vanilla-bean-infused pannacotta and adding swirls of home-made raspberry coulis and mint jam in a lacklustre pattern on a white china plate.
‘Great.’ Sofia sneaked a glance at her. ‘You sure you’re okay, Lucie? You don’t look… well, as though you are totally with us this evening.’
‘I’m fine.’ She flicked her blonde curls from her cheeks behind her ears and once again forced a wide smile onto her lips.
Sofia rolled her eyes, took the proffered plate of tiramisu and a glass schooner of zabaglione and strode off back to the dining room.
Lucie continued on autopilot as she created her usual array of desserts, but minus their usual flourish, until she was jolted from navigating the labyrinth of her misery by Francesca bursting into the kitchen holding a china dessert plate aloft with a half-eaten slice of tiramisu in its centre. Her face was unusually pale, but her lips were stretched into her customary restrained annoyance.
‘Lucie?’
‘Hm hm?’
‘Is this the dessert you prepared for table ten?’
‘Oh, erm…’ She squinted at the plate before meeting Sofia’s frantic eyes. ‘Yes, yes it is – cappuccino tiramisu.’
Lucie glanced again at the half-eaten dessert which was almost identical to the one she had dispatched from the kitchen, minus a corner where it had clearly been tasted. A horrible sinking feeling invaded her stomach as she realised the diner mustn’t have enjoyed it.
‘Why don’t you taste it?’ suggested Francesca, her eyebrows raised, her lips tightened into a line in an attempt to compress her anger.
‘Ok… ay.’
Lucie shot a glance at Gino who’d stopped chopping a pile of porcini mushrooms and strode over to join them. She selected a silver teaspoon, scooped up the creamy dessert and raised it to her mouth. The moment the flavours burst onto her tongue she realised her mistake. It was impossible not to.
‘Oh my God!’ she spluttered, reaching for a glass of water as heat spread across her lips and then raged across the roof of her mouth.
‘What? What’s happened?’ demanded Gino. He wiped his hands on his apron, grabbed his own spoon and sliced away a morsel of the dessert.
‘Aghh, Dio mio! This is not cocoa powder, Lucie! This is smoked chilli powder! Please don’t tell me you dusted a slice of Francesca’s famous signature dessert with a liberal helping of chilli powder?’
Lucie followed Gino’s eyes as they darted to the shelf above her workstation where her spices and herbs were lined up. Sure enough, the cocoa powder and smoked chilli powder canisters had swapped places. Her heart dropped to her toes like a pebble down a well and bounced back to lodge in her throat, preventing her from speaking, from explaining her unforgivable error. Her eyes widened and she squashed her palm to her lips. She couldn’t prevent an arid sob erupting from deep within her core as realisation crashed over her senses.
‘I’m… oh, my God, I’m so sorry. I’ll prepare another one…’
‘I’ve already told the customer that, but he said he had no intention of eating anything else prepared at Francesca’s Trattoria,’ grimaced Sofia who had now joined them. ‘I’ve cancelled the bill but he’s demanding to see the pastry chef in person. He even suggested we did this on purpose.’
‘But why? I don’t even know the guy,’ stammered Lucie. ‘Okay, I admit it. It’s totally my fault. I’ve been a walking disaster since Alex dumped me. I know I should have listened to you when you told me to go home. I’ll go out and explain.’
She ran her fingers through her curls and inhaled a deep breath that did nothing to calm the emotions that had whipped up in her abdomen. She pushed open the door into the dining room and, with Sofia by her side, strode over to the table where a single diner had just finished tapping his iPad with a flourish and was preparing to leave. Lucie held out her palm as she drew level with him.
‘Hello, I’m Lucie Bradshaw. I’m the pastry chef who…. Oh, my God! No way!’
‘Lucie?’
‘Ed Cartolli? What are you doing here?’
‘Oh, don’t pretend you don’t know. The Lucie Bradshaw I knew at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris was whip-smart and razor-sharp. Although if you’re the dessert chef responsible for creating the garbage I was just served, then perhaps you’re not the Lucie Bradshaw with the promising culinary talent I met back then, because that dessert was not even in the realms of what I would have expected from the exceptional student who graduated second in her cordon bleu class.’
Lucie stared at him. Edmundo Cartolli was exactly as he had remained in her mind’s eye. Still infuriatingly handsome, with his Mediterranean-hued skin, his come-to-bed eyes the colour of espresso, framed by thick liquorice lashes, and those matching dimples like brackets at the corners of his full, pink lips. Her heart beat out a concerto of humiliation at her stupid mistake and annoyance at his familiar arrogance as he reminded her that, while she might have graduated in the top two of her class, the top prize had been presented to him.
But she was confused.
‘Why would I know you were here? I haven’t seen you since I left Paris. And why did you say I served you with that tiramisu on purpose?’
Ed ignored her and waved his iPad in her face. ‘I have a couple of photographs of your substandard offering and I’ve already composed the culinary prose I’m famous for.’
She screwed up her nose in bewilderment. What was the guy talking about?
‘Don’t tell me you don’t know who I am?’
‘I’m not sure what…’
‘Let me put you out of your misery. Ever heard of a little blog called Anon. Appetit?’
Chapter Five (#ulink_5b7a1c67-cf85-5e00-865d-58d0fdd28481)
For the first time in her life an incomprehensible veil of red mist descended over her. A scorching fury swarmed through her veins as the realisation dawned that Edmundo Cartolli was the man who had penned the vitriol that had practically closed down Leonardo’s beloved pizzeria and had caused a French chef to chase him from his brasserie with a meat cleaver. Now he was threatening to direct his malicious literary diatribe at Francesca’s and at her desserts in particular. Disconnecting her social niceties app, she clenched her fists and inhaled a deep breath as her prudence flew out of the window.
‘One mistake! One tiny lapse in concentration and you threaten to destroy a restaurant’s reputation with a flick of your pen! For your information, my cappuccino tiramisu has won awards! Exquisite, one reviewer called it.’ Her heart pounded painfully against her ribcage and her breath came out in spurts but she was determined to get her point across. It was important. ‘So there was a problem with your dessert tonight. I’m sorry, okay? It’s none of your business, but I’m in the middle of an emotional meltdown. It happens sometimes – chefs do occasionally have a few minutes to devote to their personal lives. It was a one-off lapse in concentration and you turn it into the debacle of the decade!’
Ed’s darkened jawline slackened and he stared at her as though she had gone mad. He was right. A tiny part of her subconscious mind told her she was definitely looking at her sanity in the rear-view mirror and her propensity for allowing her tongue to go before her brain had leapt to the fore. But he remained silent, motionless, his face a mask of calm.
‘Lucie, come on, why don’t we go and…’ cajoled Sofia.
Her friend grasped her forearm and tried to steer her away from the table, but Lucie snatched her arm away. She was on a roll and wanted to say her piece; although a tiny, sensible part of her brain cautioned her that this wasn’t Alex sitting in front of her. Nevertheless, she shoved the warning chimes into the dark crevices of her shattered brain. She chanced a quick glance at the captivated audience of Friday night diners who had descended into an ominous silence. The waiters had frozen in situ and she could see Francesca weaving her way through the tables towards her, horror creasing her forehead. Many of the diners had their iPhones raised, recording the unfolding drama.
‘What do you know anyway? Do you have the courage to go out and run your own kitchen? You sit there in your Armani suit, sneering at the food put before you, already composing the words you’ll spew forth into your famous blog. It’s a ridiculous name by the way, Anon. Appetit!
‘And why? You think it’s entertaining for your readers, that it’ll draw more traffic to your website? Do you know how hard these people work? What hours they put in – early mornings at the fish market, late nights in the kitchen – to make all this’ – she flung her arm around the room, ignoring the bobbing lights of the phones held aloft for the best angle – ‘an enjoyable dining experience? Your thoughtless words hurt. They slice deep into a chef’s heart. Oh, I’m not talking about me; perhaps I deserve a dollop of criticism for being off my game tonight. I’m talking about Leonardo and all the others whose businesses have suffered such a sharp drop in their bookings that they’re thinking of closing and going back home to Italy. He doesn’t deserve it. Leonardo makes the best pizza in the city!’
She began to feel a little disconcerted that Ed Cartolli had not reacted to her diatribe in any way. He leaned back in his chair, his hands shoved into his trouser pockets, a glint of gold at his cuffs catching the light from the candle on the table, totally in control of his emotions. In fact, was that even a smirk playing around those plump lips? Could it possibly be that he was actually enjoying the scene she was making?
The red veil of rage swirled tighter as an image of them standing next to each other at the workstation in the kitchen of Le Cordon Bleu floated across her mind, both of them fiercely competitive and vying for the top spot. Of course, he had won. The memory fired her ire still further. She gritted her teeth as Francesca arrived next to her and, along with Sofia, linked her arm to persuade her from the restaurant.
But she wasn’t finished.
‘But oh no! The famous Signor Cartolli doesn’t mind who he upsets if it makes an interesting post for his pathetic little website! The vitriol is forming in his sharpened digital pen even before he’s eaten the last mouthful. Is that what it takes to make you feel good about yourself? Putting others down? Do you know how much your words sting? Of course, you don’t have to look the chef in the eye as they read your miserable missives. You never see the pain they cause, like a skewer driven into their hearts! Every chef wants their customers to love their food, the food they pour their love into creating. Your words suppress self-esteem, douse creativity, and even make these lovely people unemployed. Do you even care?’
Her last words were flung over her shoulder as she was forcibly escorted back into the kitchen. The neon lights overhead and the horrified expressions of Gino and Antonio hit her square in the face and she recovered enough of her wits for the slow creep of embarrassment and regret to start flowing through her veins.
‘Oh, my God! Have you any idea what you’ve just done?’ yelled Francesca. ‘I take it that was the blogger from Anon. Appetit? Do you know what’s going to happen now? He’s going to ruin us! He’ll publish his review, if he hasn’t already, on that stupid website of his and people will say “let’s not go there, isn’t that where the crazy pastry chef works? Heaven knows what we’ll find in our food!” How could you, Lucie? How could you do this to me?’
It was the first time Lucie had seen tears collect along Francesca’s lower lashes, but her boss’s overwhelming emotion was anger. In fact, she was so irate that the whites of her eyes seemed to be bulging from their sockets and her dark auburn hair sprang from her head as though she’d been plugged into an electric socket.
‘You’re fired!’
‘Fran…’ Gino stepped forward, his palms held aloft.
‘Unless you want to join her, I suggest you stay out of this, Gino.’
‘Fran, I’m so sorry.’
‘I’m sure you are, but sorry doesn’t cut it. I can’t have a loose cannon in my kitchen, Lucie. If I let you stay Francesca’s will forever be associated with the chef who went mental. I can’t allow the trattoria and its staff to be tarred with such a reputation. With you out of the way, perhaps, just perhaps, I can salvage the situation. I can inform everyone that the person responsible is no longer a member of staff and everything is back to normal. Gino and Antonio, Sofia and Alberto will still have their jobs.’
Lucie looked around the kitchen at the people she had grown to love and knew Francesca was right. In fact, if she hadn’t been fired she would have quit. She had to go.
Chapter Six (#ulink_5124cc26-9f87-5a6b-b091-b8e72a2c2e42)
‘Oh God! Oh God! It’s truly venomous!’ exclaimed Hollie, peering over Steph’s shoulder as she scrolled down the page on her iPad to read the details of the review of Francesca’s Trattoria on the Anon. Appetit website.
Lucie took another glug from the glass of Prosecco rosé Steph had ordered for her at their regular Saturday night haunt. She’d hoped the effervescent alcohol would deliver a surge of Dutch courage so she could smile through the agony, but every single word – even though she had read the review a couple of hours before in the privacy of the bathroom at Hollie and Steph’s flat in Wimbledon – still fired a sharp needle of pain through her battered heart. She could almost quote the caustic missive word for word. Still, she suspected she would succumb to the tears which had lurked so close to the surface after the Alex fiasco.
Are you planning to spend an evening at Francesca’s Trattoria hoping for a real taste of Italian home-cooking? So was I. Take my advice – try somewhere else!
As regular visitors to my blog know, Italy is my homeland and its cuisine holds a special place in my heart. First of all let me say that a truly bad review is an increasingly rare beast and rightly so. There is always something good to be found in every food establishment whether it be the beautifully laundered linen, the warmth of the welcome, a well-flavoured potage or a carefully chosen table adornment.
However, occasionally there comes a time when a word of caution is necessary and we food connoisseurs should not shy away from its verbalisation otherwise we could be accused of being no more than cheerleaders for our pet eating establishments or favourite chefs. Those who rely on my blog and my website for their dining recommendations do so for the vein of honesty that runs through my words. My followers are discerning diners who expect food critics to be consumer champions offering an informed opinion on where to spend their hard-earned cash, especially if it’s for a special occasion.
So, turning to the restaurant – or I should say, trattoria – which is the subject of my review this week – Francesca’s. What better way is there for this Sicilian boy to spend a Friday night than indulging in the authentic taste of his childhood? I was so anticipating the opportunity to be jettisoned back in time to the days when my grandmother’s home-cooking was a weekly treat to be relished. I must say, from the moment I stepped over the threshold of Francesca’s Trattoria the years slipped away and I was back at my grandparents’ village restaurant nestled on the hillside overlooking the Conca D’Oro, every one of my senses enveloped with happy memories and the craving for a decent minestrone.
I was served by a fellow Italian speaker whose knowledge of that evening’s menu was exceptional. Her enthusiasm for every dish on the menu spoke volumes of her passion for her chosen vocation. The minestrone did not disappoint: full of flavour and crammed with fresh vegetables and just the right amount of herbs. For mains I decided to order light – a superbly grilled fillet steak which was exceptional – as I wanted to ensure there was space for the best part of any meal – the dessert. Regular readers will know my penchant for a well-executed Italian pudding.
If I could end my review here I would bestow on Francesca’s Trattoria the full five stars – a triumph to be celebrated with a glass of the best Chianti – but sadly, when the much-anticipated dessert arrived, the evening took a nose-dive into horror territory. Not only was it the worst tiramisu I have ever had the displeasure to endure, I truly believe the pastry chef was secretly trying to sabotage her employer’s business via my innocent taste buds. Why else would I be presented with an unimaginative, second-rate dessert comprising layers of leaden sponge that coat the roof of one’s mouth with a claggy paste so harsh I had to resort to downing a whole glass of the tepid water I had been served with?
Even this, my dear readers, would not have warranted a reduction in stars – for I am nothing if not fair in my assessment of the dining institutions I am fortunate enough to visit. No, the pièce de résistance was that the whole sorry ensemble was not dusted with the expected cocoa powder and shavings of bitter chocolate, but with a liberal sprinkling of smoked chilli powder! Yes, chilli! That aromatic spice fans of Mexican cuisine will be familiar with strewn all over my dessert! Disgusting!
Was this a joke? I asked myself.
Had the dessert been prepared by the proprietor’s five-year-old daughter?
Could it have been a genuine mistake? If so, it is a puzzle to me why an experienced Le Cordon Bleutrained pastry chef would make such a sloppy blunder.
Whatever the truth, it was surely an unforgivable error to make. I will not be returning to Francesca’s Trattoria any time soon and recommend that, if you are still brave enough to try its fayre, you steer well clear of the sweet menu, for if you stray onto its battleground you should know you will be taking your life in your hands. Maybe the pastry chef has yet to find her true vocation – she clearly takes no joy in her current post.
A very generous ***.
‘Oh, Lucie, I’m so, so sorry this has happened,’ said Hollie, her eyes sparkling with tears as she tucked her magenta bob behind her ears and topped up their glasses from the bottle resting in the cooler on the bar. ‘What did Gino say when he read it?’
‘He’s more livid than I’ve ever seen him, and that’s from a guy who’s not afraid of showing his red-blooded Italian emotions. He’s spouting about a cousin of his who can terminate Edmundo Cartolli for a very favourable price. I’m not sure exactly what he means – whether he specialises in taking down websites or individuals. He’s promising that if he ever lays eyes on Ed again he will not be held responsible for the indiscriminate use of his kitchen machete.
‘But what makes it much worse and cringingly embarrassing is that I know him. Would you believe we trained together at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris? He’s the guy I told you about who used to hog all the limelight and flirt outrageously with all the girls on the course. He even tried to get me to go on a date with him once, but it was the night before an important exam and I’m sure it was all just part of his tactics to distract me from studying so he could grab the top spot, like he always did! We were both fiercely competitive. You’ve no idea how hard I worked to take first place, but apart from one solitary occasion, it was always Edmundo Cartolli!’
‘Well, he’s a moron!’ declared Hollie, slamming the stem of her glass onto the marble bar. ‘Why is he a food critic anyway? He can’t be all that special if he can’t get a job as a chef, can he?’
‘Actually, not that I’ve followed every twist and turn of his career or anything, you understand, but I had heard that he was the youngest chef to be awarded a Michelin star at the restaurant he ran in Sicily. I saw the photographs. What? Well, you have to admit, he’s irritatingly gorgeous, especially in his chef’s whites! But for some reason he slipped off the radar last summer, not sure why. I can’t believe he prefers writing about other people’s food to producing it himself, especially when he graduated top of our class at Le Cordon Bleu. Not that I’m jealous or anything. He deserved it.’
‘Well, clearly he’s moved on to apply his exceptional talents to the arena of gastronomic criticism now,’ snapped Steph. ‘Maybe he was fired for poisoning one of his customers and now he’s just a narcissistic peddler of exposition used to draw attention to himself and attract readers of a similar ilk to his pathetic little blog. We all know that negative reviews bring more traffic to his website than a glowing endorsement. Readers of such garbage are like rubberneckers. Wasn’t it his scathing review of that French restaurant that established Anon. Appetit in the first place when the review went viral?’
‘Yes, but you know, I did hear he’d…’
‘Look, Lucie, Ed Cartolli is in the entertainment business. Some people, sad though it is to acknowledge, prefer to invest their precious time in reading vicious diatribes than reviews that are inspiring and uplifting. It’s human nature at its worst. But he of all people should understand how much hard work and sacrifice it takes to set up a restaurant and ensure it not only delivers on its promise of superb food, but exceeds its diners’ expectations so they want to return time and time again. With just one stroke – especially nowadays when reviews are so widely read – a business can be destroyed. It brings a whole new meaning to “poisoned pen”.’
Lucie had never seen Steph so wound up. While her honey-blond hair had been loosened from its elegant chignon in honour of Saturday night, her jaw was set, her lips pursed and her sharp sapphire eyes had narrowed. Two round spots of crimson had appeared on her cheekbones and a splash of prickly heat invaded her chest.
‘It seems I’ve made a habit of swerving into the paths of inconsiderate men lately!’
‘It’s not your fault, Lucie. You can’t control how other people decide to conduct their lives, but I agree it’s been a difficult week all round.’
Steph had been her friend since high school. She was her staunchest ally and knew her almost as well as her sister, Jess, did. When she had asked if she could avail herself of their couch after the Alex fiasco, she and Hollie had agreed without a murmur of hesitation. Not unexpectedly, though, her two best friends had expressed divergent reactions to the news she and Alex were no longer an item.
Steph had declared Alex to be an insipid, weak-hearted excuse for a man who didn’t deserve her continued heartache. Like Alex, she too worked in the legal profession – not in the pursuit of ever-increasing wealth for those who had more than enough for one lifetime, but in the field of matrimonial litigation where she relished the daily opportunity to star in her own courtroom drama. Lucie respected her advice and her judgement. As a side effect of her legal training she was able to slice through waffle and diversionary tactics to get straight to the crux of any problem and exploit its weakness.
Okay, her friend had reasoned over a commiserative cup of over-sweetened tea that fateful night, relationships sometimes didn’t work out. If Alex didn’t want to get married she got that, but to refuse all subsequent contact – to deny Lucie an explanation even – was not only callous but spineless. How could Lucie begin to work through her grief and move on with her life until she knew the reasons Alex had turned down her surprise proposal?
On the other hand, Hollie, top hair stylist and all-round incurable romantic, had been harsh in her condemnation of Alex’s hurtful rejection and had even joined her in a bout of weeping – much to Steph’s irritation. Hollie had urged her to call Alex to demand an explanation for his cruel and humiliating behaviour. Lucie had done as she was told, but her calls had gone straight to voicemail. She’d left two increasingly desperate messages which, in the cold light of day, she’d regretted.
‘Lucie, darling, you just have to move on,’ urged Steph, draining her glass and reaching into the cooler for a top-up. ‘Use this minor hiccup in life’s arduous journey as the catalyst to start following your dreams, not Alex’s! Why not don your Dessert Diva crown and focus on your own career goals? Use this setback as an opportunity to throw yourself headlong into the arms of your lifelong passion – the creation of confectionery magic! What happened to your idea to revolutionise the cake-making business by offering gourmet cupcakes modelled on our love of cocktails? I’m still waiting for those raspberry cupcakes with Prosecco-flavoured butter icing you promised!’
Lucie knew it was good advice. After all, she came from a family whose genes screamed culinary artistry, although her mother had long since relinquished her role of popular TV cookery personality and presenter.
‘You sound like my mother!’
‘How’s Margot enjoying her retirement in Sunny Spain?’ Hollie asked in an effort to divert the conversation to a more cheery subject as she ordered a third bottle of wine.
‘Loving it! She’s enjoying the sunshine and swears her arthritis is finally conquered. Her last email fizzed with details of the current plan she’s working on to present a course of Spanish cookery classes to the ex-pats! I don’t think she’ll ever be able to truly retire.’
‘Well, if you are as passionate about food as your mum has been for the last fifty years then it’s hardly surprising. Did I tell you I watched a few of her classic TV cookery shows from the eighties on the Food Channel? She’s amazing – and so are her recipes. They’re a piece of social history. Steak Diane and Black Forest gateau anyone?’
Lucie smiled. Hollie was spot on. Her mother was amazing and both she and Jess had her to thank for their own addictions to all things gastronomic – she as a pastry chef with ambitions to run her own business some day in the not-too-distant future; her sister as a beta tester for the recipes of a celebrity cook book writer.
Yet it had been a huge challenge to follow in her mother’s celebrity-infused slipstream and forge a career that would not tempt others to suggest nepotism. This professional insecurity had been her catalyst to work even harder and longer at every project she put her mind to, to create a contemporary twist on everything she prepared so that her critics could not accuse her of relying on her mother’s fame. But she adored her and was inordinately proud of what she had achieved. Like Hollie, she still watched her mother’s programmes on the Food Channel. She loved them, but they were like visual instruction manuals for the enthusiastic housewife, totally different to the fun and quirky twists she liked to introduce in her own recipes.
But the pressure of her mother’s brilliance still lingered heavily on her shoulders. It was the overriding reason why she had worked so hard to prove her talents at Le Cordon Bleu and why Ed’s rivalry, and success, had rankled so painfully. While he was out romancing a different date every night, she was holed up in her attic apartment, studying recipe books and experimenting with increasingly exotic ingredients with which to wow her tutor; and still she couldn’t pip him to the top spot. She continued to ask herself whether she would ever be good enough to match her mother’s culinary confidence – in the kitchen and in public.
She still experienced a sharp twang of loss that her mother had chosen to emigrate to Andalucía just before Christmas, especially as her father also lived abroad with a Greek woman he’d met over the internet when her parents divorced ten years ago. But she knew it was a long-held dream of her mother to live out her days in the sunshine, indulging in her own version of Spanish paella washed down with plenty of full-bodied local Rioja. And anyway, it was only a two-hour flight away if she wanted to visit, and her sister and young nephews, Lewis and Jack, still lived in her mother’s house in Richmond where there was a guaranteed welcome whenever she craved a dollop of family love and affection.
‘Oh my God!’ screamed Hollie as she scrolled down her iPhone screen, her eyes growing wider as her finger speeded up. ‘Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God! I’ve just checked my Twitter account. You’re everywhere! Someone’s uploaded a video of your meltdown at Francesca’s last night. Lucie, you’re famous!’
Chapter Seven (#ulink_0aac1454-0531-5ac2-8e7d-da74fa4722ae)
‘Infamous, more like,’ Steph muttered under her breath, as she too grabbed her mobile to check her Twitter feed, a thoughtful expression on her face.
‘You’ve even got your own hashtag and it’s trending! Look!’
Lucie sighed and braced herself to take a peek at her own phone.
While #LividLucie had a certain ring to it, it wasn’t a tuneful one. She was mortified. She dropped her head into her hands, her curls falling across her fingers, as nausea coiled around her abdomen. Could this really be happening to her? Did she really have her own hashtag that was trending on Twitter?
‘I’m so, so sorry, Lucie. But, well, it is sort of funny, don’t you think? Excruciatingly embarrassing, of course, but in a few days I’m sure you’ll see the funny side,’ cajoled Hollie as she squeezed out the last drop of wine into Lucie’s empty glass. ‘Ed Cartolli had it coming to him. Have you read some of his other reviews? There’s a Thai restaurant in Hammersmith that had to close its doors as soon as his review of their place went live.’
‘That’s because he found a snail in his coconut and prawn soup. The environmental health inspectors would have closed them down, not Ed Cartolli,’ said Steph, but held up her hand to quieten Hollie as she opened her mouth to continue her tirade of indignation against the reviews on Anon. Appetit. ‘Okay, Hols, okay, I’m not defending the guy. I’m just saying it wasn’t him who shut the restaurant down.’
‘Can’t you do anything, Steph? You’re a lawyer. Can’t you send him a letter or a subpoena or something? Make all this stop?’
‘I’m a divorce solicitor, Hollie. And even if this was my area of expertise, there still wouldn’t be anything I could do. It’s out there like a metaphorical bull in a china shop. In fact, to be fair to Mr Cartolli, not one of the uploaded videos has appeared on the Anon. Appetit blog or his Facebook page or Twitter feed. These posts are the work of the diners who were at the restaurant, which have been shared and retweeted ad infinitum.
‘And even if I could get one person to take their post down, there are still others who are sharing it. God, Lucie, Hollie’s right. It’s gone viral! We should have done more to stop you going into work after what happened with Alex. You could definitely plead temporary insanity to your crime against karma. My considered advice, as a lawyer and as a friend, is to lie low for a few days; don’t under any circumstances comment or react, and wait it out until someone else stumbles inadvertently into the spotlight and messes up big time. The bandwagon rolls on and people forget.’
‘So there’s nothing I can do? You’re telling me to crawl under a stone and never show my face in public again, is that it?’
‘Well, no, not “never”. Just for a few weeks…’
‘You said days a minute ago. Oh God! What am I going to do?’
‘Hey, maybe Francesca’s reservations will improve?’ said Hollie. ‘That happens sometimes, you know. It’s called rubbernecking, I think. And don’t people say that any publicity is…’ Hollie shrank under Steph’s warning glare and took refuge in her wine. She noticed her glass was empty again and jumped up to order another bottle from the hunky blond bartender she’d been ogling for months. When she returned she was giggling.
‘What’s so funny?’ asked Steph.
‘Maybe Lucie will get a slot on Hell’s Kitchen? Like a female Gordon Ramsay?’
‘Hollie… You’re not helping.’
Hollie jumped back onto her bar stool and, while Steph replenished their glasses, started to fiddle with her phone again. ‘Wow, look at your Twitter account, Lucie! You have twenty thousand followers! Hang on, hang on. I’ll just check Francesca’s Facebook page. Oh my God, nearly five thousand new likes!’
‘Likes? People “like” what has happened!’ exclaimed Lucie, her face glowing with heat as tears threatened to spill once more.
She didn’t care what was happening on social media. She intended to close her accounts immediately. That was easy enough to do, but what was she going to do without a job? No restaurant manager worth their salt would be clambering over themselves to offer her a job. Who would be crazy enough to risk employing her at the moment? She was a pariah! And she couldn’t contemplate working anywhere other than in a kitchen. Food was her passion – no, her obsession – and this was accompanied by a burning desire to continually improve, to hone her talent, to expand her knowledge.
‘I can’t just crawl into a hole for the next few weeks, Steph! I need to work. I need to cook. Every memory I have has food in it somewhere; whether it be an aroma, a flavour on the tongue, a texture under my fingertips. Every aspect sends my memory zooming back to Mum’s kitchen when I used to watch her prepare for her next TV appearance. It’s the thing in my life I love the most – especially now that Alex has ditched me.’
Lucie’s hand shot up to her mouth.
‘Oh God, Alex! He’s bound to have seen this! Now he has every reason to hate me. Do you think it will affect his partnership prospects at Carter & Mayhew? I can almost feel his relief at choosing to walk away from the disaster that is Lucie Emily Bradshaw. No wonder he’s severed all contact. Who could blame him?’
She slumped back in her stool, her elbow resting on the bar. She slotted her chin into her palm, staring at Steph and Hollie in turn, begging for understanding like a lost dog that has been left out in the rain. She took in the expressions on the faces of her two best friends in London. It was clear they were suffering as much as she was and this only added to the turmoil in her heart. How could she have done this dreadful thing to her friends? She was ashamed of what she had done at Francesca’s and wished with all her heart she could spin back time. But her former unhesitating confidence in the power of love and her belief in the restorative effect of oestrogen solace had been punctured by the sharp nib of a poisoned pen.
‘Well, actually, I happen to think being fired is a good thing,’ countered Steph. ‘You have to use this cock-up as an opportunity to shoot for the gastronomic heights you know you’re capable of. Your unbridled enthusiasm for all things food-related is an integral part of who you are. I’ve tasted the results of your experiments and they would put Nigella to shame. You’re a genius! You can’t allow a poor excuse for a chef turned food critic to destroy your life. I, for one, won’t let you. I’ve never understood why you’ve waited so long to exploit your talents.’
‘Steph…’ Hollie gaped at her friend who, while renowned for her straight-talking, had never been so forceful. It was as though she was making her final submissions to a judge in one of her viciously contested divorce hearings.
‘No, Hollie, it’s okay. Baking is more than a professional passion. It’s my raison d’être. Jess and I grew up in a home filled with food and a plethora of exotic recipes. Every time I stumble on an unusual recipe or a new ingredient my spirits soar. I know it sounds ridiculous, but when I marry herbs and spices, I feel like an alchemist creating a little piece of magic. Perhaps now is the time to stop talking and take action!’
Lucie slipped down from her bar stool and looked her friends in the eye as excitement began to bubble into her chest. It was a fabulous feeling.
‘Steph’s right. I should turn this disaster into an opportunity. Running my own business is what I’ve been planning since I first held a wooden spoon. Why did I work so hard in the kitchens at Le Cordon Bleu if I didn’t intend to squeeze out every last drop of knowledge and hone my natural flair for creating desserts? Why did I slave twelve-hour days in that Parisian hotel absorbing everything there was to learn about French patisserie? Why did I spend a whole summer in a cramped, over-heated kitchen in a Cretan tourist resort learning the intricacies of authentic Greek pastries? I love Gino and Antonio, but why have I been wasting my time in a tiny trattoria to gain an insight into the mysteries of Italian confectionery?’
‘I rest my case,’ smiled Steph, stepping forward to hug her.
‘I really, really want to start my own cocktail cupcake business – well, every kind of cupcakes, actually. I’ve got loads of other ideas – Liquorice Allsorts, Sherbet Lemons, even Fab! Ice Lollies, remember them? I think I can make it a success. But, Steph, there’s one thing you’ve forgotten. I don’t have a job. I haven’t got a handy slush fund to splash out on such extravagant dreams at the moment, and after all this social media notoriety, there’s no way any bank would lend me a penny!’
‘Listen, Lucie. I have an idea. It’s not that Hollie and I don’t love having you stay with us, but why don’t you go to Richmond and stay with Jess and the boys for a few weeks until the furore dies down? Reconnect with your family and with reality. This little storm in a teacup won’t seem half as serious from the outside. A lot has happened to you in a short space of time. It’s no wonder you had a meltdown. But every storm passes, every Twitter star fades and everyone can recover from a broken heart with the love and support of their loved ones.’
Lucie stared at her friend, her brain whirring through the possibilities of what she was suggesting.
‘Yes! That’s exactly what I’ll do! Thanks, Steph. Watch this space, girls! Lucie Bradshaw is about to unleash her culinary talents on the world!’
Chapter Eight (#ulink_e6e81e51-16f4-514a-9ef8-d38bf39de646)
It was Easter Saturday and the day had dawned clear and bright for a change. Since she had landed on her sister’s doorstep a week ago the weather seemed to have joined her in the doldrums, offering only bruised skies and continual drizzle. But if the meteorological gods had deserted her, thank goodness her creative dexterity had not. She had just finished whipping up a batch of fat cupcakes and decorating them with a generous swirl of pink buttercream icing topped with edible glitter. The sweet buttery fragrance of warm cakes piled high on a triple-tiered china cake stand tickled her nostrils. It was the best aroma in the world and her spirits edged up a notch. Hope may have been an absent friend in her life in the last few weeks but she still believed in its restorative power.
‘One cappuccino,’ said Jess as she yanked a hoodie over five-year-old Jack’s unruly blond curls, identical to Lucie’s own, and sent him off to play on the trampoline in the back garden.
Lucie sipped the coffee her sister had set down on the marble island in front of her, relishing the taste of the frothy milk adorned with a generous sprinkle of powdered chocolate. She glanced around the engine room of what had previously been her mother’s home in a leafy street in Richmond before she emigrated to Spain, and which was now her sister’s.
The kitchen was the only arena in which Lucie had ever clashed with Jess, her sister’s preference being a culinary version of mayhem. To Lucie’s mind, tidiness meant safety, control. Every polished surface screamed of her crusade for domestic orderliness and her list-making addiction, but her methodical attention to detail was a necessity in her line of work. She couldn’t understand her sister’s penchant for scattering culinary clutter when orderliness would have made her busy life of testing recipes for celebrity chef, Ella Carter, so much easier. In fact, her sister’s job required skills more befitting a forensic scientist than a cook, so she would have thought it was even more important to run a tidy kitchen.
Maybe when she had her own home and family to care for she would appreciate the reasons behind her sister’s tendency to bring chaos to an empty room. However, she would make an exception to her kitchen tidiness rule for the side of the huge SMEG refrigerator which had morphed into a stainless-steel noticeboard and displayed a patchwork of juvenile artwork, postcards and scribbled shopping lists, as well as a planner crammed with appointments and reminders.
Yet her sister was undoubtedly on to something. The room exuded homeliness, which had rubbed off on Jess to produce a calm stoicism in the face of Lewis and Jack’s daily misdemeanours. Just being in her sister’s farmhouse-style kitchen, wrapped in the soothing aroma of caramel and melted chocolate, was a welcome refuge from the harshness of the world beyond its doors and had lessened Lucie’s trauma immeasurably. But, on the down side, she had to endure the constant repetition of her sister’s favourite lecture, a message which had been honed and polished as she strove to bring up her two sons single-handedly after she split from her husband, Dan, when Jack was only a few months old.
‘Look at these cakes. They’re like works of culinary art! I really think you might be on to something with your business idea, Lucie. Maybe you should start by offering them to the café on the High Street. What was your verdict on their cupcakes? “As heavy as old porridge” I think were your exact words?’
Lucie giggled. ‘Well, they did taste a little like the plastic they came wrapped in!’
‘Everything you bake is superb, always was even when we were kids. Everyone who tastes your creations says the same thing. If I might be so bold – they even beat Margot Bradshaw’s!’ Jess chuckled. ‘Just don’t tell Mum I said that.’
Their sisterly camaraderie spread a mellow warmth through Lucie’s veins and she enjoyed being in the cosy kitchen in the company of the person who cared for her the most. She missed her mum but, until she could afford the plane ticket to visit her in Spain, Jess did a fabulous job of surrogacy. It was the first time since Alex had rejected her proposal that she felt like herself again and she experienced a surge of confidence, quickly followed by a sharp dip when reality stuck its nose into her plans.
‘I can’t start up a business without any capital, Jess, even if it has been my dream since I was five years old. Do you remember when we used to drag the wallpaper table out to the front gate and sell our butterfly buns to passers-by?’
‘I do! And yours were always the first to go! Those were happy days, weren’t they?’
‘Remember the race to spend our hard-earned pennies on 99s and lollies from the ice-cream van that used to come along the street on Sunday afternoons? Every time I hear ‘Greensleeves’ I think of that little pink ice-cream van. I wonder where they have all disappeared to? I haven’t seen one for ages. Hey! I’ve just had an idea!’
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