Page 40 of Culinary Chaos

“Do you hear yourself? Seriously? How can you care so little for everyone who works for you? You’re just as bad as him.” Hope pointed in the direction that John had run off to. “Don’t think you’re any different.”

Angelica’s eyes narrowed, crinkling around the corners. No one would ever accuse her of laugh lines. These were anger lines, frustration lines, stress lines. Hope was about to speak again, but Angelica shook her head ever so slightly that Hope was damn sure no one else would even notice.

“We can talk about this later,” Angelica warned. “This conversation isn’t over.”

Without another word, she stormed out of the room, following John. Or at least, Hope assumed she was following him. But who honestly knew? She was left in the wake of anger, which she hadn’t fully anticipated. She knew she’d get riled up, but they’d planned this argument.

At least, Hope had thought they had.

But now she wasn’t so sure about that. She wanted to rant and rage again, to break apart the kitchen and throw things, but the cameras were still pointed in her direction, catching every small reaction she had, and there was no way in hell that she was going to let their audience see her anger matching Angelica’s. One of them had to be the nice one, didn’t they? Wasn’t that what Angelica had implied?

Let it be her.

Hope hated that. Not just for the fact that Angelica thought one of them had to be the hard-ass, but the fact that Angelica believed she could never be sweet and loving and the one who laughed more often. Sighing heavily, Hope turned around to face the kitchen. The entire staff was staring at her, waiting for direction, waiting for her reaction to see exactly how they should be behaving.

“Let’s start with cleaning the freezers out,” Hope said.

“That’s it?” Bowen asked.

Hope shook her head and threw her hands up in the air. “That’s above both our pay grades.”

Bowen sighed, but he looked like he was going to cry. “You don’t think she’ll do it, do you?”

“Do what?” Hope asked as she walked toward the freezer and pulled the door open as fast and as hard as she could. That should help a little bit with her frustration, shouldn’t it?

“Give up on us.”

Hope stilled. She looked directly into Bowen’s dark brown eyes and was met full on with his fear, his anxiety, and his world spinning topsy-turvy. She had to fix that, she had to make him feel better, she had to erase the last ten minutes like they’d never happened. But she couldn’t. “No, I don’t think she will.”

“She seemed so sure of it.”

“Do you think John and Nova will give in to her? Or do you think they’ll hold out?”

Bowen shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Humming, Hope surveyed the freezer. She was going to take a page out of Angelica’s book and avoid with everything she had. Because in all honesty, she wasn’t sure if Angelica had meant her threat or not. She’d like to think it was a bluff, but then again, Angelica didn’t seem like someone to blow smoke.

“Let’s start with everything.”

“Everything?” Bowen squeaked.

“Everything,” Hope confirmed.

Chapter

Fourteen

“Where do you get off thinking that you have the authority to pull the plug on this episode?” Josef leaned over her chair in the conference room, using the bulk of his size and height to try and impose on her.

Angelica frowned. “I don’t.”

“Then why the hell would you tell John that you’re going to do just that when you know very well we won’t agree to it?”

“Because John doesn’t respect women.” Angelica closed her iPad so that Josef couldn’t look at it and see what she’d been working on. The last thing she needed was for him to see her looking up Leanne and where she was interviewing next.

“Respect women?” Josef’s voice rose. “That’s not anything you haven’t dealt with before.”

“You’re right, it’s not.” Angelica crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair, eyeing him. Was this really what he wanted to argue about tonight? Because she was exhausted after the day, after picking a fight with Hope, after really picking a fight with John. “And I’m tired of dealing with it.”