Page 29 of Under the Table

“You rigged the voting.”

Angelica sighed heavily. She shifted a glance to Hope, nearly rolling her eyes, but then focused back onto Johnny. “Why do you think your chefs should have won?”

“Because they’re classically trained, by the best of the best.”

The fact wasn’t lost on Hope that he couldn’t actually name a classically trained chef who had taught hisclassically trainedchefs. She could name them. In fact, she’d met many of them over the years. And his chefs were trained very well. They understood far more than the basics, but that didn’t mean they were the best or that they still couldn’t stand to learn something new. Even Hope wasn’t so egotistical as to think she could never learn something new.

“And you think Chef Lawrence isn’t trained?” Angelica crossed her arms.

Oh, Johnny was in for it now. Hope had seen that move many times over the years, and Johnny was about to get it hard.

“Go get Robin.”

“What?” Johnny’s jaw dropped.

“Go get Robin. We’re going to have a sit-down.” Angelica waved Hope over as the staff finally left.

She led the way to a table in the back corner of the dining room and pulled out a chair for Hope to sit in. “Stay right here.”

Confused, Hope did as she was told and didn’t move her gaze from Angelica. She tried to calm her racing heart. These sneak attacks of confrontation and yelling were over the top and hard to keep up with. If it hadn’t been for Angelica interrupting both times, she wasn’t entirely sure what she would have done about them.

Sy came over with a camera, setting it while Rex glowered at the two of them. But he said nothing, just crossed his arms and watched from a distance. What the hell was his problem lately? It was like he’d drawn in on himself since they’d started filming—or really prepping for the season—and was just exploding at her randomly.

Surely this couldn’t all be jealousy, could it?

Angelica sat down and folded her hands in front of her. She leaned over to Hope and whispered, “We’re going to have this out now. I’m tired of skirting around the real issue.”

“The real issue?” Hope leaned in closer, keeping her voice quiet. They had microphones on, sure, but only the crew could hear them.

“The owners.” Angelica pursed her lips, raised her eyebrows, and then leaned back in her chair. She stared directly at Robin and Johnny as they walked over and sat across the table from them. “Good, glad you both could join us.”

“What’s this about?” Robin asked.

Angelica nodded.

Hope held her breath, determined not to say anything unless she had to. Angelica seemed to have this task in hand.

“After spending all this time in the hotel, working through the issues we’ve found, the ones we haven’t found, there’s really only one thing holding Gardenia back from being a place where people can come and find respite, and from the business side of it being profitable.”

“Oh?” Robin seemed surprised by that.

“And you’re not going to like what that problem is.” Angelica kept herself very still.

Hope would be scared to be sitting on the opposite side of the table from her right now. She could smell the attack coming at them from a mile away, and it wasn’t something that she wouldwant to defend against. Because Angelica would win this one. Hands down, and without much flair.

“So you can either listen to what we have to say, or we can do what we can and know you’re doomed to fail and continue on as you have been.”

The silence was loud.

Hope’s heart thundered so loud that she swore everyone sitting at the table could hear it. The crew probably could with the microphone taped to her chest. Thethud thud thudwas so ear-splitting. Hope’s skin turned clammy when there wasn’t an immediate response from either Robin or Johnny.

Would they actually bury their heads deeper in the sand than they already were?

She was just about to say something out of that nervous habit of hers to fill the silence always when Angelica spoke up.

“So which is it? Do you want the answers to your problems or would you like to continue on the way you’ve been doing it?” She held her chin up, staring them down.

God, that in and of itself was sexy as hell.