“Ah—perfect timing!” Kathryn chimed as she laid her eyes on Lizzie.
Jim peered over his shoulder. He looked just as he did in the CC Media headshot Lizzie had seen in articles and on the company Web site: a stocky build with broad shoulders, a wide nose, and a thick crown of gray hair. He had a ruddy complexion, which looked pinker in the light of the sunset shining through their windows, and was dressed in a salmon polo shirt, which Lizzie thought was an unfortunate color choice, given his skin tone.
“Jim, this is Lizzie,” Kathryn said as Lizzie laid the plates in front of them.
“Pleasure,” he said, reaching out to shake Lizzie’s hand. He glanced down at his plate. “Looks great. Let’s eat.”
His tone was abrupt—not rude but unadorned. Efficient. Lizzie sensed he was the kind of man who fielded many questions a day and, short on time, conveyed the answers in as few words as possible. His linguistic economy stood in sharp contrast to his wife, who more than made up for his apparent disinterest in chitchat.
Lizzie shuffled back to the kitchen and began tidying her workstation, catching the odd bit of conversation between Kathryn and Jim. From what she gathered, it wasn’t so much a conversation as it was Kathryn jabbering on for several minutes and eventually catching her breath, at which point Jim would respond with a sentence or two, and then Kathryn’s deluge of speech would resume. Lizzie wondered if this is what it would be like most nights for the next three months, the two of them sitting at an enormous table while Kathryn prattled on for an hour. Then she remembered that, with the exception of a week in July, Jim would only be visiting on weekends. Would Lizzie be the one listening to Kathryn’s monologue all week long? Oh, God. Lizzie’s ears went numb just thinking about it.
When she went to collect the plates, she noticed Kathryn had left a few scraps, but Jim hadn’t left a single bite.
“There’s a little more of everything in the back,” Lizzie offered. “I also picked up a pie.”
“Oh, no pie for me,” Kathryn said, even though Lizzie had been speaking to Jim. “Unless it’s Paleo, which I’m guessing it isn’t. It isn’t easy to find Paleo desserts.”
“Because they taste like dirt,” Jim said.
“They don’t taste like dirt. Some are actually delicious! Remember those ‘noatmeal’ cookies I found? They were grain-free, dairy-free, and refined-sugar-free but tasted just like real oatmeal cookies!”
“No, they didn’t.”
Kathryn clicked her tongue. “Oh, stop being such a negative nelly. They were delicious.”
Lizzie was inclined to side with Jim on this one, even though she’d never tried the so-called noatmeal cookies. The few Paleo desserts she’d eaten had been texturally strange and digestively problematic. She’d never understood why people voluntarily on restrictive diets created recipes to imitate the allegedly evil foods they’d given up. If you truly believed it was healthier to eat like a caveman, then you shouldn’t have a problem giving up muffins and cookies. Lizzie highly doubted her prehistoric ancestors sat around their cave fires making grain-free s’mores.
“Anyway,” Kathryn continued, as she always seemed to do, “as I said, none for me, but Jim loves pie, don’t you, sweetheart? Blueberry is his favorite, tied with cherry. And he loves peach too, although I hear it can be hard to find good peaches these days. They can be so mealy. No flavor at all. He once had a slice of bourbon peach pie—in Sea Island, Georgia, of all places!—and said all he could taste was the bourbon, which I figured for Jim would be a good thing, but he said if he wanted bourbon, he’d drink it in a glass, thanks!”
It went on and on. Lizzie found it odd how Kathryn spoke for Jim, as if he were in the other room and not five feet away. Odder still was the fact that Jim just sat there while Kathryn rambled on. Lizzie conceded that pie wasn’t exactly a riveting topic for the average corporate executive, but didn’t he want to tell his own stories, rather than have Kathryn tell them for him? Perhaps he didn’t have a choice. Or perhaps, after many years of marriage, his only means of coping with her verbal diarrhea was to go temporarily deaf and so he actually had no idea what she was saying.
“It’s strawberry rhubarb,” Lizzie said.
“You like that, don’t you, honey? Isn’t that the kind you had on that trip to Hilton Head? Or was it Pinehurst? I can’t keep track. Jim is a golfer. Always jetting off to a different course. And then there’s little old me, the golf widow. I don’t mind, although I joked with Jim that if he keeps disappearing on golf trips I’ll have to take up the sport myself so that I can join him!”
Lizzie couldn’t tell if she saw pure terror in Jim’s face at this suggestion or if she was just imagining it. From what very little she’d seen, Jim and Kathryn had a good marriage—she doted on him, and he could actually tolerate her endless chatter, which probably set him apart from 99.9 percent of men in the universe—but Lizzie suspected golf was his sanctuary, a few hours of preserved quiet. For Kathryn to intrude would defeat the entire purpose.
Jim jumped in before Kathryn could continue with some story she’d begun about private jets. “A small slice,” he said.
Lizzie nodded and collected their plates, thankful for Jim’s brevity. How would she survive on the nights he wasn’t here? She was beginning to dread the prospect.
She cut Jim a piece of pie, the juicy ruby-colored fruit spilling onto the plate. The perfume of sweet, ripe strawberries filled the air. Lizzie took a deep breath. She would definitely be cutting a piece for herself later.
She grabbed a clean fork from the drawer and carried the dessert into the dining room, where Kathryn and Jim were now speaking in hushed tones.
“Again?” Jim said. He sounded exasperated. “I thought you talked to her.”
“I did,” Kathryn said in a loud whisper. “But you know how she is. It was only a few thousand dollars.”
“Only? We talked about this.”
“I know, but remember what Dr. Stephens said. When Zoe gets like this—” She stopped abruptly as Lizzie approached the table. “Oh, Jim, would you look at that pie!”
He glanced casually at the plate as Lizzie placed it in front of him. “Don’t change the subject,” he said.
Kathryn forced a smile. “What subject? We’re eating dinner. We can talk about all this later.”
Jim sighed as Kathryn began telling him about the Memorial Day barbecue, and Lizzie headed back to the kitchen, glad to escape a room whose air had become tense, sour, and, unless Lizzie was imagining it, tinged with a hint of danger.
CHAPTER 9
The Memorial Day barbecue began Sunday at four o’clock, and by the time the first guests arrived Lizzie was already sweating through her chef’s coat. Every burner on the stove in the butler’s pantry was blazing, elevating the temperature in the room by at least ten degrees, and Lizzie could feel beads of sweat at the base of her neck cutting loose and trickling down her back. She hoped the Silvesters didn’t expect her to spend much time with guests, because she was pretty sure she looked and smelled like a wild animal.
Renata shuttled between the butler’s pantry and living area, directing an army of servers who had appeared that morning, as if by magic. There were at least a dozen of them, all dressed in pressed white pants and white polo shirts, and they all seemed to know where to go and what to do, even though Lizzie had never seen them before.
“Rellenar el guacamole, por favor,” Renata said to one of them, pointing to the refrigerator, where Lizzie had stashed the extra guacamole and salsa. She surveyed Lizzie’s workstation. “How are you doing?”
“Good,” Lizzie said as she chopped a bunch of chives to use as garnish. She wiped the sweat off her brow with the back of her forearm. “Is the grill ready?”
“Preheating. Manuel turned it on about ten minutes ago.”
“Great. Thanks.”
Renata nodded at one of the servers, who’d come in with a tray of empty glasses, directing her toward the sink, where a man with a dishcloth stood at the ready. In a
ddition to the servers, the Silvesters had hired a dishwasher and two prep cooks, who were there to help Lizzie get the food on the buffet in a timely and presentable fashion.
Lizzie wasn’t used to having so much help or, frankly, cooking for such a large group. In New York, her personal chef work involved preparing weekly meals for clients and leaving the food in their refrigerators, all of which was done on her own. And even when she’d done promotional events as a Food Network personality, she’d really only had help on the entertainment side—producers and assistants who were there to make sure Lizzie was effectively marketing her brand. She’d catered the occasional dinner party, often an “Evening with a Food Network Star” that a wealthy lawyer or banker had won at a charity auction. But she’d never run the equivalent of a catering operation. It was a little overwhelming.
Lizzie slipped out the side door to the grilling station, which was located at the side of the house, just before the dunes dropped precipitously toward the driveway. The station was perfectly positioned so that the smoky aroma could waft toward the pool and porch without subjecting the Silvesters or their guests to the heat and mess of the flames. The area featured not one but three gas grills, along with four simmering stations, a large prep counter, and a wood-fired pizza oven. Lizzie couldn’t wait to experiment with the pizza oven—not just to make pizza but for roasting chicken and meat and vegetables—but she figured her first official party wasn’t the time to screw around with fire. Given her luck, she’d burn the whole place to the ground.
One of the prep cooks brought out the tray of marinating chicken, and Lizzie quickly divided it among two of the three grills. She’d use the third for the shrimp. The meat sizzled as it hit the hot grates, the smell of charred skin mixing with the heady marinade of lemon and rosemary. Smoke poured out from the grill, dousing Lizzie in its scent, her already damp chef’s coat now sopping.
She shuffled down the line of grills, the smoke pricking her eyes until they filled with tears. Before her parents divorced, her dad was the one who did all the grilling in their house, usually with a bottle of Rolling Rock in his hand while he flipped the steaks or burgers with the other. Once he’d moved out, Lizzie’s mom took up the mantle, or at least tried. The truth was, neither Lizzie nor her mother liked cooking over open flames all that much. They both called themselves feminists and didn’t want to admit that, deep down, they considered grilling a man’s job. Lizzie would never say it out loud, and every time the thought danced across her consciousness she felt embarrassed and guilty (So old-fashioned! So unprogressive!), but it didn’t change the fact that she’d rather leave the grilling to the menfolk.
Nevertheless, here she was, cooking with fire. Because, of course, she could do it; she just preferred not to. She poked and turned the chicken until the skin was blackened and crispy and the meat was tender and juicy and then piled the breasts onto two serving platters, adding a few sprigs of rosemary and lemon slices as garnishes. She handed them off to Manuel, who passed her a plate of garlic-marinated shrimp. By the time the shrimp were the desired combination of pink and singed, she was so drenched she looked as if she’d jumped in the Silvesters’ pool.
Could she jump in their pool? The thought suddenly sounded like the best idea she’d ever had. Maybe once the guests left. The prospect of a cool, refreshing swim was the only thing that would get her through the next few hours.
Once all of the dishes had made it onto the buffet on the patio, Lizzie poured herself a tall glass of lemonade and scooted back outside to have a drink and catch her breath. She’d never smoked, but she understood now more than ever why many chefs did. Her need for a break was extreme, and she could imagine the peace brought by leaning against a wall and taking a long drag of a cigarette. Given that she had no intention of starting a bad habit she’d have trouble breaking, a cold drink would have to do. Maybe next time she’d add a splash of vodka.
As she took a long sip of the cool, tart juice, she heard a familiar voice on the other side of the stone wall separating the grill station from the pool area.
“Yep, back in Philly,” the voice said. “I always said I’d never move back, but the job was too good.”
Lizzie froze. It couldn’t be . . . What would she be doing here?
“Not since college,” the voice continued. “I can’t believe how much the city has changed. If it had been like this ten years ago, maybe I wouldn’t have left.”
Lizzie inched closer to the wall. It definitely sounded like her, but her presence here . . . it didn’t make any sense. The Silvesters were old. Not nursing home old but older. Old enough to have a thirtysomething son from a first marriage. Old enough to have a daughter who recently finished college. Most of the guests Lizzie had seen at the party were their age. Kathryn appeared to be about ten to fifteen years younger than Jim, but she was still at least fifty. This wasn’t a party for thirty-year-olds.
“Just for the day,” the voice said. “Too much work to take off a whole weekend.”
That velvety timbre . . . Was she here with her parents? That wouldn’t even make sense. Last Lizzie heard, they’d moved to Florida. Not that Lizzie had been in touch enough to know this for a fact. These days, most of what she knew about any of her old friends and acquaintances was through social media: a photo on a Caribbean beach, a short video of a wedding reception, a meme about motherhood. From these snippets, Lizzie would piece together what she knew—or what she thought she knew—about people’s lives. She knew these portraits were carefully curated to present people as they wanted to be seen, not necessarily how they actually were, but as she’d drifted away from more and more of her friends these simulacra were all she had.
Lizzie moved closer to the doorway leading to the patio. She didn’t intend to walk through it. No one needed to see her sweat-slicked face or tangled hair. But she thought maybe she could catch a glimpse of the face attached to that voice, just to confirm it wasn’t her. Lizzie didn’t like to dwell on her own past, and she’d conveniently distanced herself from the unpleasant parts of it she’d rather forget. To have a figure from her past appear here, after all this time . . . no thank you.
She attempted to peer through a space between the wooden door and stone wall, but all she could see was the fringes of the Silvesters’ landscaping. She rested her hand on the doorknob. If she cracked the door an inch or two, she could see who was standing close by without drawing attention to herself.
“Lizzie?”
She whipped her head around to see Renata emerging from the house.
“Kathryn is looking for you. Do you have a minute?”
“Sure.” She pulled her hand from the doorknob. “Be right there.”
She threw back the rest of her lemonade and, just as she turned to go back inside, she heard it.
“April Sherman,” the voice said. “Nice to meet you.”
Lizzie was right. It was her.
* * *
Kathryn met Lizzie in the butler’s pantry. She wore a wicker hat with a broad, floppy brim and black satin sash and was dressed in black capris and a stiff black-and-white sleeveless top.
“Everything is fabulous,” she said. “That chicken—Jim is in heaven! And the green bean salad. I’d ask for the recipe, but who am I kidding? Jim says I can barely make toast. Not that I would anyway these days, unless it was Paleo toast, but you get the idea. People have been raving about the potato salad, too. I am so thrilled Linda passed along your name!”
“Me too.”
Kathryn clapped her hands together. “Anyway, I’ll let you get back to it. I just wanted to let you know how happy we are with the food. Last year’s cook . . . well, no. That’s not fair. Bob was good. He was. We had no complaints about the food. It was really more of a . . . personality issue, I guess. And he and Zoe—well, don’t get me started on all of that.”
Lizzie was tempted to remind Kathryn that she hadn’t gotten her started on anything. This entire pinball game of a conversation had been Kathryn’s doing, and she wa
s the one careening from one topic to the next.
“I will say this,” Kathryn continued, apparently unable to stop herself. “I blame him for the predicament we were in when we hired you. All these chefs know each other, and I know—I know—Bob blabbed around his story to other people in the trade, and when it got back to our hire for this summer, the whole story had gotten blown out of proportion, and he quit out of fear. I tried to tell him half the story was made up and the other half had gotten completely distorted, but he was having none of it. And by then everyone had heard, or at least everyone we called, and it was just . . . ugh. Like I said, don’t get me started.”
Again Lizzie wanted to remind Kathryn that she’d spoken a mere two words since she reentered the house. But of greater concern was this alleged story—a story damaging enough that Kathryn had difficulty filling the position Lizzie had so eagerly taken. Clearly it had something to do with Zoe. Had they slept together? Pretty young college girl . . . edgy older chef . . . it seemed like an entirely possible, if clichéd, scenario. But it also wasn’t the kind of situation that would put off other chefs. If anything, certain potential employees would see that as a perk. Super-rich folks with an easy, hot daughter? Where do I sign up?
No, it had to be something worse. Something that would deter a range of private chefs, male and female, from wanting to live in a palace for the summer. Something that would put off a class of people who are usually desperate enough for work and a steady paycheck that they are willing to overlook a lot of serious bullshit. Something that, even if half of it was made up, the other half was still bad enough to leave the Silvesters in the lurch.
Dear God, Lizzie thought. What the hell happened?
* * *
The party was still going strong some five hours after it began, and Lizzie wondered if and when these people would ever go home. She understood the appeal from the guests’ perspective: lots of good food, open bar, a beautiful mansion right on the beach. Why would you want to go anywhere else? But Lizzie was exhausted, and she just wanted to go to bed.
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