by Holly Martin
Skye watched Jesse visibly breathe a sigh of relief that the interview was over. He had given very thoughtful and considered answers and it was quite obvious, at least to her, that he had been practising what he was going to say, but it didn’t matter. His passion for food had been very obvious throughout the interview and, despite his initial hesitancy, he clearly wanted this job as much as she wanted it for him.
‘We’ll see you this afternoon around three for the practical, as soon as the last customer leaves after lunch,’ Aria went on to explain. ‘You’ll be cooking at the same time as the other five candidates and, as explained in the details I gave you yesterday, you will have thirty minutes to prepare, cook and finish your recipe. You’ll have access to basic ingredients like cream, fruit, spices and seasoning but anything beyond that you’ll need to provide yourself.’
Jesse nodded. ‘Thank you.’
He stood to leave.
‘Hang on Jesse, I need a word,’ Skye said, then turned to Aria. ‘Are we done here?’
Aria nodded. ‘I’ll see you at three.’
Skye gestured to Jesse to follow her. She walked out of the hotel and Jesse was close behind.
‘Is everything OK?’ he said.
‘I just need a word with you in private,’ Skye said, grabbing one of the golf buggies they used for ferrying guests around the island and climbing in. Jesse joined her and she drove off in the direction of her cottage.
‘Are we not going to the café? I was going to have a play with the rhubarb and lavender before we opened for lunch.’
‘We will be, I just want to talk to you before we do.’
Jesse was silent for a moment as they drove along. ‘Did I do something wrong, in the interview?’
‘I’m pretty sure you did everything right,’ Skye said. ‘Is Bea out?’
‘She’s in the village on the search for the secret door.’
‘Good, we can talk in private,’ Skye said, pulling up outside her cottage and quickly getting out.
Jesse followed her inside and she leaned up and kissed him as soon as the door closed behind him. He immediately kissed her back, his hands sliding up to cup her face. He pulled away slightly, smiling against her lips. ‘Is it that kind of talk?’
‘It’s very much that kind of talk.’
He smiled and kissed her again. Without taking his lips from hers, he bent and scooped her up into his arms and then carried her upstairs into her bedroom, kicking the bedroom door closed behind him. He placed her down, her back against the door, and continued the kiss. He carefully started undressing her while she was frantically dragging at his clothes.
‘Was the interview really OK?’ Jesse said, in between kisses.
‘You were more than OK,’ Skye said. ‘You were brilliant. You had great answers and you had passion and excitement for cooking. You absolutely shined.’
He smiled slightly and went to kiss her again but she stopped him, placing her hand on his warm bare chest. She swallowed. ‘You have no idea what it meant to me to have you there today. I honestly thought we were over, that you didn’t want to fight for us. To see you there today, it showed commitment. And whether you get the job or not, I am so grateful for you at least wanting to try.’
She realised her cheeks were wet with tears and she quickly brushed them away.
He frowned slightly. ‘Why are you upset?’
‘I’m not,’ Skye laughed. ‘These are happy tears, I promise. I’ve just been so tired and emotional lately, I have no idea why.’
He kissed away her tears. ‘Skye, I don’t want to give you false promises. If I get this job, that’s just the first tiny step. Getting visas and permits sorted is going to be a massive hurdle to cross and, while I might be able to sort myself out by applying to the two-year youth mobility scheme, one of the conditions of me coming is that I don’t bring any children. There’s no way I’m leaving Bea behind.’
‘And I would never ask you to do that. But I’m sure we can figure something out and the fact that you’re willing to try means the world to me.’
‘I will try, but I don’t want you to get your hopes up.’
‘I won’t, I promise.’
She reached up and kissed him and his hands started caressing her body, touching her in that exact spot that made her go weak at the knees. She moaned against his lips as that feeling ripped through her. He wrestled a condom from his jeans pocket and then she quickly fought to get him out of the rest of his clothes.
‘I hope you won’t be rewarding the rest of the candidates like this,’ Jesse said, dealing with the condom.
‘Just the ones I fancy.’
He grunted his displeasure at that and she couldn’t help but smile.
‘Although I don’t think any of them could make me scream like you do,’ Skye said.
‘Damned right, what we have is special. I’ve never had what I have with you with anyone else.’
‘Me neither.’
He stared at her and it felt like something passed between them, something undefinable.
Jesse leaned forward and kissed her and then lifted her, pinning her against the door as she wrapped her legs around him.
‘Do I get extra interview points if I make you scream now?’ he said, sliding deep inside her.
‘Oh for sure.’
He started moving against her. ‘I want to make sure I tick every box for you.’
Skye bit gently into his shoulder; the feel of him was exquisite. ‘Well, you’re definitely doing that.’
He leaned into her, one hand against the door, one arm under her, supporting her weight, lifting her higher, taking her deeper.
‘Christ Jesse!’ She clung to his shoulders.
He started moving against her faster, harder, kissing her throat, her shoulders. That feeling started building deep inside her, spreading out across her body.
‘What we have is incredible,’ Jesse said, kissing her hard. ‘And I don’t want to lose this.’
And it was the thought that he wanted this as much as she did that made her crash over the edge, shouting out his name as she felt him fall too.
Jesse stared at the ingredients he had placed on the worktop in front of him. He was taking a big risk with this, he only hoped it would pay off.
He glanced around the kitchen at the other candidates as they all laid out their ingredients at their workstations.
Only one of them had turned up at the café over lunch. Meadow had sat quietly in the corner watching everything going on, studying the menu, trying the different ice creams, and Jesse knew that Skye was impressed that she was taking the time to get to know the place. The other candidates had turned up a few minutes before the practical part of the interview started. There was Simon, who acted like an arrogant ass, and Star, who had every shade of colour possible in her hair – and a glance at her ingredients reflected that too. Then there was Emile, a young French lad who looked barely old enough to tie his own shoelaces. He appeared to be absolutely terrified as he fiddled with the ingredients on his worktop. Lastly there was Faye, who was staring at Simon with puppy-dog eyes. Jesse glanced between the two of them and smirked; they were definitely giving off the air of two people who had snuck off during lunch and had sex. He should know. He glanced over at Skye and she smiled at him.
‘Thank you all for coming,’ Aria said, quickly gaining everyone’s attention. ‘We were very impressed with all of you in the interview this morning, now we want to see you shine in the kitchen. You have thirty minutes to complete your recipes and then we will taste them and talk to you about your creations. Is everybody ready?’
There were murmurs and nods around the room.
Aria checked her watch. ‘Then you may begin.’
There was a flurry of activity around the kitchen and Jesse quickly poured his dried macaroni into a pan and added water, putting it on the hob to boil. He put some bacon under the grill and then turned his attention to the bruschetta he was going to make. He chopped tomatoes into tiny c
ubes and put them in a bowl. He added onions, garlic, basil and olive oil and gave the whole thing a good mix. He grabbed the mozzarella and started cubing that up too, then added that to the bowl, giving it a good stir.
He quickly gave the pasta a stir and turned the bacon over, then grabbed his baguette and chopped it up into slices. He brushed the tops of the slices with olive oil, placed them on a baking tray and popped them inside the oven. Then he started making his cheese sauce for the macaroni.
‘You’ve had ten minutes,’ Aria said.
Christ, that first ten minutes had gone so quickly.
While the cheese sauce was simmering, he drained the pasta and then added the cheese sauce, putting it back over a low heat. He grabbed the bacon from the grill, chopped it up into tiny slivers and added that to the macaroni too.
He turned his attention to the steak now. Placing it into a hot pan with a splash of oil, he added some cloves of garlic to the pan and flipped the steak after one minute, searing each side. He continued doing that, flipping it over after one minute until it was perfectly brown on each side with a slightly caramelised crust. He placed it in an oven dish, covered it in foil and popped it in the oven to keep warm, taking out the baguette slices at the same time.
He laid a few pieces of the bread on a plate and spooned on the tomato and mozzarella mix, drizzling the top with a balsamic vinegar.
Now all he had to do was put together his banoffee sundae and he was done.
He glanced over at Emile who was working next to him, making what looked like some kind of apple crumble sundae. He’d somehow managed to get the crumble part into cubes, which was clever and had probably taken most of the half hour just to do that part. He was artfully arranging that with the cooked apple slices in a tall sundae glass. Custard was cooking on the hob next to him. Jesse frowned as he watched smoke drift out of the pan. He quickly moved over to the custard and gave it a quick stir, but it was quite clear the bottom of the pan was black where the custard had stuck to the saucepan.
Emile glanced over and his face fell as Jesse showed him the black bits that were sticking to the spoon.
‘No, no, no,’ Emile said, rushing over. He actually looked close to tears.
‘You have five minutes left,’ Aria said.
‘I need to add the raisins and nuts,’ Emile said, gesturing to the sundae.
‘Go and do that, I’ll make some new custard. Tinned OK?’
‘No, it has to be fresh.’
‘There’s no time for that, you know that will take twenty minutes or more.’
Emile looked over to Aria and Skye who were watching them astutely. ‘Are we allowed?’
‘They said we can use basics from the kitchen and you don’t really have any choice.’
Emile nodded to concede this and Jesse ran to the pantry and grabbed a tin of custard. He poured it into a new pan and put it over the heat as Emile finished layering his crumble sundae. He stirred it gently, making sure it didn’t burn. When it was hot enough, he brought it over to Emile.
‘Thank you.’
Jesse quickly rushed back to his own station.
‘One minute left,’ Aria said.
There was no time to make the banoffee sundae now, so he quickly took the steak out of the oven, popped it on a plate and dished up the macaroni and cheese with bacon on the side.
‘Time is up,’ Aria said.
He looked at his food. He just hoped it was enough.
Skye watched Simon stand up after presenting his dish. The dessert he’d made had been tasty and presented beautifully. He had finished well within the thirty-minute timeline and his workstation was clean.
The man was still an ass.
Simon went to move away and then turned back.
‘And for what it’s worth, I think Emile should be disqualified. He used tinned custard, not his own, and he had help, which is hardly fair on the rest of us.’
Skye opened her mouth to tell him to piss off but Aria beat her to it. ‘Thanks for that, we’ll take your feedback on board.’
Simon nodded and walked off.
‘You’re much more professional than I am,’ Skye muttered.
‘Oh believe me, I was secretly imagining faceplanting him head first into Emile’s custard.’
‘The fact is, I’ve been in Emile’s shoes many a time. Things go wrong – why do you think I have tinned custard in the cupboard in the first place. Sometimes there’s no time to make your own. I think Jesse showed initiative in using it.’
Aria smiled. ‘I don’t think you need to big him up to me, I’m already impressed. But he has made steak and bruschetta for a job in a dessert café so I’ll be intrigued to know his reasons why.’
‘Well, let’s get him over to explain,’ Skye said.
Aria nodded. ‘Jesse, you’re up,’ she called across to the other side of the room.
Jesse approached with his plate of bruschetta, which smelt and looked amazing, and the steak, which from the outside looked perfectly cooked.
‘What have you made for us today?’ Aria said, continuing with her complete professionalism.
Jesse cleared his throat. ‘To start with I have bruschetta with garlic, onions, tomatoes, mozzarella and drizzled with a balsamic glaze. The main course is steak with a side of macaroni and cheese with bacon. I’m afraid I ran out of time for the dessert, I was—’
‘We saw,’ Aria said, calmly. ‘We’ll get on to that in a bit.’
She picked up a knife and fork to cut into her slice of bruschetta but Skye picked it up with her fingers and took a big bite. She let out an involuntary moan of pleasure. It tasted so good. She took another bite and another and then went back to eat the remaining slice on the plate too, while Aria was still chewing on her first slice.
Aria gave her a look as Skye finished it off, licking her fingers and then picking up the stray slices of tomato that had escaped onto the plate and eating them too.
‘What? I’m starving and that tasted so good.’
She didn’t normally eat lunch – she never had time and dinner was normally a rushed sandwich or something quick – but lately she had been permanently hungry and when she was given food like this she devoured it.
Aria put her half a slice down and Skye was very tempted to snatch it from her and eat that too.
‘It did taste delicious, Jesse,’ Aria said, pulling the plate of steak towards her.
Skye eyed the remains of the bruschetta; was her sister really not going to eat it?
Aria cut the steak into two pieces and nudged one piece in Skye’s direction. ‘Are you going to use a knife and fork for this one or just eat it caveman-style?’ Aria muttered and Jesse stifled a snort of laughter.
Skye picked up a knife and fork, giving her sister a look of contempt. She turned the steak around so she could see the inside of it where Aria had cut it. It was the perfect shade of pink, for her anyway, it wasn’t too bloody, and as she cut into it she could tell it was soft and tender. She took a more civilised bite and it just melted in the mouth.
‘Jesse, this is amazing,’ Skye said, taking another bite.
‘It really is very good,’ Aria agreed, finishing off her second bite and then pushing the plate of steak to one side.
‘Are you not going to finish that?’ Skye muttered, her stomach growling loudly.
‘No, because I need to talk to Jesse and I didn’t think it would be polite to do so with my mouth full.’
‘I don’t mind,’ Jesse said.
‘See, he doesn’t mind.’ Skye continued eating her steak, trying the macaroni and cheese too, which was delicious. Maybe it was working in an ice cream café that sold only desserts and sweet things but any kind of savoury food lately and she simply couldn’t get enough of it.
‘Jesse, these are really good and very well made but I’d like to know why you decided to cook bruschetta and steak for a job in a dessert café,’ Aria said.
Jesse brushed his hand through his hair so it stuck out at all angles.
‘I love making desserts, it’s my favourite thing to do, but it’s not the only thing I like to make. I love working with meat and fish, I love making soup and salads. I like making starters that are exotic and unique and full of flavour. I want to see people having the same reaction Skye just had to eating all my food, not just desserts. Besides, you already know I can make desserts, I wanted to prove I could do more.’
Skye couldn’t help but smile at that. She glanced at Aria to see the hint of a smile on her lips too.
‘I think that was a risky move,’ Aria said. ‘But something I think paid off. This is very impressive,’ she gestured to the steak that Skye was surreptitiously still trying to eat. ‘But I have to ask if working in this place will be enough for you, if your dream is to work with all kinds of food.’
Skye felt the smile fall off her face; that thought hadn’t occurred to her.
‘I honestly never thought I would ever be a chef, so working here would be a dream come true. But maybe one day a week I could work in the hotel restaurant to fulfil my desire to work with other foods.’
Skye liked that; Jesse had aspirations and he wasn’t afraid to share them. He had kind of broken the rules a little by doing this, but when it came to food, she loved that. Working with food should be exciting and passionate. She very often bent the rules when she was cooking and experimenting, so this move ticked all the boxes for her.
‘I’m sure that could be arranged,’ Aria said. ‘If you were to get the job of course.’
Jesse nodded. ‘Of course.’
‘I’d also like to discuss what happened earlier with Emile,’ Aria said. ‘Why did you help him?’
Jesse frowned in confusion. ‘Because he was struggling.’
Skye’s heart swelled with love for him. Helping someone who was in trouble was like breathing in and out for Jesse, it was second nature and he wouldn’t have thought twice about it.
‘But surely if Emile failed then that eliminates the competition. If someone looks bad you can look good by comparison,’ Aria said, clearly, at least to Skye’s mind, playing devil’s advocate.
Jesse’s frown turned to a scowl. ‘That’s not how I work. We’re all in this world trying to get by, trying to survive, and you don’t do that by shitting on other people, pardon my language. I have struggled enough over the years and I know how important it is to get a helping hand now and again. If I can be that for someone else, I always will.’