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It wasn’t like prepping for an upcoming high school reunion where you can take months dieting and reinventing your job description to make a better impression.
This was the brutal follow up to bumping into ‘that guy’ that you had a crush on and now you just want them to know what they missed.
“Damn it.” Just a few steps away from the car she turned around and bent over so she could see what she looked like. Caroline sighed bitterly. She wasn’t the kind that liked to compare her looks to others.
She would rather stay away from the limelight if she didn’t need to. Her food, she explained over and over, should speak for itself.
The mirror didn’t tell her anything she didn’t already know. There were wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and laugh lines developing around her mouth.
She probably could have used a little concealer for the shadows under her eyes, but she wasn’t going back home just for that.
“Miss Franzen?”
The excited pitch of a young female voice made Caroline almost cringe.
But she honestly wasn’t going to let that happen.
Putting on her TV Talk Show Guest personality, Caroline turned around. “Hey! Nadia, right?”
Standing beside her on the sidewalk, Nadia looked like she’d been on a jog. Her leggings and top were made from a flattering print wicked fabric.
She pulled out her ear buds and tucked them into a pocket in her top as she spoke. Spoke wasn’t a colorful enough word. The girl practically beamed at her. “Yeah! That’s me!” She looked both ways down the street and then hedged a hopeful question in her direction. “Oh. Wow! Did my dad really ask you?”
“Ask me-”
Nadia’s excitement was palpable. “To come over! I know it’s kind of silly to do that but I know you used to work for my dad and I know you haven’t said one crappy word about him in the media so you guys must have at least an amicable relationship even if you’re not still friends.”
Caroline had to wait a moment for the dust to settle before she drew in a breath to talk.
“I’ve never said a bad word against your father… in the press.”
The sudden edition of words at the end easily caught Nadia’s attention.
With an elegantly raised eyebrow, Nadia tried to add a clarifying question. “So you have said a bad word about my dad?”
Realizing that she’d gone and gotten herself stuck in the proverbial corner, Caroline had to admit to it.
“A few of the culinary students in my class were trying to guess where our group leaders were going to send us to intern at different restaurants. And one of the guys who had always made a point of saying how good he was made this comment that he knew Chef Bouchard had convinced your dad to take one of us as an assistant in the kitchen-”
“Let me guess,” Nadia dropped down into a limber stretch, “he thought he was going to work for my dad.”
Caroline shrugged and continued the story. “And I told him that if Lucas Brierly was going to let someone like Tom into his professional kitchen than Lucas Brierly was as big a dumbass as he was a complete asshole on TV.”
Nadia gasped and Caroline held up her hands in surrender as she closed her eyes.
“I know… I know… the words were bad enough, but what was worse?” She sighed. “What was worse was that-”
“I was standing behind you when you said it.”
Caroline looked up at Nadia and saw the teen blushing to the edges of her ears.
“It’s like I have this magnet.”
Nadia covered her mouth. “Sorry, I didn’t know how to tell you.”
Shaking her head, Caroline waved it off. “It’s just my luck in life, I swear.”
“Or maybe it’s mine, seeing as how I keep hearing you trying to take me down a notch.”
