“No one ever complained about Louis’s mac and cheese balls,” she says. “They were fine. More importantly, he made them and didn’t try to mess with a menu two days before a wedding!”
“Just because no one complained doesn’t mean they were good,” I point out. “No one ever complains about vanilla ice cream but that doesn’t mean it’s good.”
“I like vanilla ice cream.”
“I’m sure you do.”
“What’s that —" Violet stops suddenly, narrowing her eyes. “No. We’re not doing this.”
I fight back the urge to smile.
“Doing what?”
“We’re not getting into a fight over this. We are at work and we are not fighting and you’re going to make the balls because that’s what they’ve ordered and that’s what’s on the menu and that is all, Eli.”
She doesn’t wait for a response, just jerks the door open and walks back into the kitchen. I’m right behind her, but I stop just inside as she makes her way between people, dodging a rack of pans and neatly stepping around a sous chef as he pulls a sheet of pasta from the pasta maker.
“I’m not making the balls!” I shout after her, over the din.
Violet turns around at the far door and smiles at me. It’s a dangerous smile.
“Yes, you are!” she shouts, and then she’s gone, the door swinging shut behind her.
In unison, everyone in the kitchen looks at the door.
Then they turn to look at me.
“What? It’s fine,” I tell them. “Keep cooking.”
They all go back to their jobs. I stand there for a few more moments, telling myself not to let Violet get the best of me.
Then I go back to work.Chapter EightVioletI stare down at the seating chart instructions, wondering why the bride and groom don’t just do this part themselves. Most do, but for some reason, Emma and Ashton decided that leaving me three full pages of instructions about who should be seated next to whom and who absolutely should not be seated next to whom would be easier for everyone involved.
Maybe they really enjoyed typing out all their family drama, past and present, for a complete stranger. I don’t know. I just know that Emma’s college roommate, Julie, should not be seated with the bride’s sorority friends, that the groom’s brother can’t be in the same half of the room as the bride’s coworker Della, that Emma’s cousins on her mom’s side all need to be seated at separate tables because of something that had happened in the nineties, and apparently the groom’s boss and the bride’s uncle, Jim, will get along famously and should be seated together, but absolutely not near the bar.
I’m starting to get a headache when there’s a quick knock on my half-open door.
It swings open before I can say anything, and there stands Eli.
He’s tall, dark, annoyingly handsome, totally interrupting my train of thought, unlikely to make my afternoon less of an exercise in frustration, and holding a plate of something.
“Come on in, I’m not busy,” I say, eyeing the plate. It looks he’s brought me mac and cheese balls, but I know Eli better than that.
After our earlier disagreement, he’d probably rather drink rattlesnake poison than make mac and cheese balls. Unless, of course, he’s bringing me mac and cheese balls laced with rattlesnake poison.
“Good,” he says, crossing my office in a few steps and putting the plate on my desk, right on top of the seating charts that I’m trying to work on. “Here.”
There are four breaded, fried balls, each about an inch and a half in diameter. They’re obviously fresh and, to be honest, they smell really good.
Briefly, I wonder if Eli knows how to get rattlesnake poison on an hour’s notice.
His older brother, maybe?
Would anyone in town be surprised if Levi knew how to get snake poison in sixty minutes?
Unlikely, though. I’m pretty sure Eli wouldn’t try to murder me. Even for twenty grand.
I pick one up between my finger and thumb. Poison or not, they smell amazing, and I’m pretty much incapable of resisting a tasty fried treat.
“Careful, they’re hot,” he says, folding his arms in front of himself. He’s still wearing his chef’s jacket, still has a kitchen towel slung over one shoulder. “Fresh outta the deep fryer.”
Another, non-snake-poison possibility presents itself to me.
“Did you make terrible mac and cheese balls just to prove your point?” I ask.
“Do those look terrible?”
“I can’t tell, they’re fried balls.”
“Just eat one before they get cold,” he says.
I keep considering the fried ball without putting it my mouth. I know they’re not actually poison, but I hate giving Eli the satisfaction of telling me what to do.
“What are they?” I ask, just to delay another moment.
“Delicious. Which you would know if you ate it,” he says, the faintest hint of amusement around his mouth.
He’s watching me. Not glaring, not rolling his eyes, just watching my face with his intense, deep green gaze.