‘This the tiramisu?’ enquired a harassed Sofia. Lucie hadn’t even noticed she’d returned and was loitering impatiently at her side.
‘Yes,’ she muttered absently as she set about decanting a vanilla-bean-infused pannacotta and adding swirls of home-made raspberry coulis and mint jam in a lacklustre pattern on a white china plate.
‘Great.’ Sofia sneaked a glance at her. ‘You sure you’re okay, Lucie? You don’t look… well, as though you are totally with us this evening.’
‘I’m fine.’ She flicked her blonde curls from her cheeks behind her ears and once again forced a wide smile onto her lips.
Sofia rolled her eyes, took the proffered plate of tiramisu and a glass schooner of zabaglione and strode off back to the dining room.
Lucie continued on autopilot as she created her usual array of desserts, but minus their usual flourish, until she was jolted from navigating the labyrinth of her misery by Francesca bursting into the kitchen holding a china dessert plate aloft with a half-eaten slice of tiramisu in its centre. Her face was unusually pale, but her lips were stretched into her customary restrained annoyance.
‘Lucie?’
‘Hm hm?’
‘Is this the dessert you prepared for table ten?’
‘Oh, erm…’ She squinted at the plate before meeting Sofia’s frantic eyes. ‘Yes, yes it is – cappuccino tiramisu.’
Lucie glanced again at the half-eaten dessert which was almost identical to the one she had dispatched from the kitchen, minus a corner where it had clearly been tasted. A horrible sinking feeling invaded her stomach as she realised the diner mustn’t have enjoyed it.
‘Why don’t you taste it?’ suggested Francesca, her eyebrows raised, her lips tightened into a line in an attempt to compress her anger.
‘Ok… ay.’
Lucie shot a glance at Gino who’d stopped chopping a pile of porcini mushrooms and strode over to join them. She selected a silver teaspoon, scooped up the creamy dessert and raised it to her mouth. The moment the flavours burst onto her tongue she realised her mistake. It was impossible not to.
‘Oh my God!’ she spluttered, reaching for a glass of water as heat spread across her lips and then raged across the roof of her mouth.
‘What? What’s happened?’ demanded Gino. He wiped his hands on his apron, grabbed his own spoon and sliced away a morsel of the dessert.
‘Aghh, Dio mio! This is not cocoa powder, Lucie! This is smoked chilli powder! Please don’t tell me you dusted a slice of Francesca’s famous signature dessert with a liberal helping of chilli powder?’
Lucie followed Gino’s eyes as they darted to the shelf above her workstation where her spices and herbs were lined up. Sure enough, the cocoa powder and smoked chilli powder canisters had swapped places. Her heart dropped to her toes like a pebble down a well and bounced back to lodge in her throat, preventing her from speaking, from explaining her unforgivable error. Her eyes widened and she squashed her palm to her lips. She couldn’t prevent an arid sob erupting from deep within her core as realisation crashed over her senses.
‘I’m… oh, my God, I’m so sorry. I’ll prepare another one…’
‘I’ve already told the customer that, but he said he had no intention of eating anything else prepared at Francesca’s Trattoria,’ grimaced Sofia who had now joined them. ‘I’ve cancelled the bill but he’s demanding to see the pastry chef in person. He even suggested we did this on purpose.’
‘But why? I don’t even know the guy,’ stammered Lucie. ‘Okay, I admit it. It’s totally my fault. I’ve been a walking disaster since Alex dumped me. I know I should have listened to you when you told me to go home. I’ll go out and explain.’
She ran her fingers through her curls and inhaled a deep breath that did nothing to calm the emotions that had whipped up in her abdomen. She pushed open the door into the dining room and, with Sofia by her side, strode over to the table where a single diner had just finished tapping his iPad with a flourish and was preparing to leave. Lucie held out her palm as she drew level with him.
‘Hello, I’m Lucie Bradshaw. I’m the pastry chef who…. Oh, my God! No way!’
‘Lucie?’
‘Ed Cartolli? What are you doing here?’
‘Oh, don’t pretend you don’t know. The Lucie Bradshaw I knew at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris was whip-smart and razor-sharp. Although if you’re the dessert chef responsible for creating the garbage I was just served, then perhaps you’re not the Lucie Bradshaw with the promising culinary talent I met back then, because that dessert was not even in the realms of what I would have expected from the exceptional student who graduated second in her cordon bleu class.’
Lucie stared at him. Edmundo Cartolli was exactly as he had remained in her mind’s eye. Still infuriatingly handsome, with his Mediterranean-hued skin, his come-to-bed eyes the colour of espresso, framed by thick liquorice lashes, and those matching dimples like brackets at the corners of his full, pink lips. Her heart beat out a concerto of humiliation at her stupid mistake and annoyance at his familiar arrogance as he reminded her that, while she might have graduated in the top two of her class, the top prize had been presented to him.
But she was confused.
‘Why would I know you were here? I haven’t seen you since I left Paris. And why did you say I served you with that tiramisu on purpose?’
Ed ignored her and waved his iPad in her face. ‘I have a couple of photographs of your substandard offering and I’ve already composed the culinary prose I’m famous for.’
She screwed up her nose in bewilderment. What was the guy talking about?
‘Don’t tell me you don’t know who I am?’
‘I’m not sure what…’
‘Let me put you out of your misery. Ever heard of a little blog called Anon. Appetit?’
For the first time in her life an incomprehensible veil of red mist descended over her. A scorching fury swarmed through her veins as the realisation dawned that Edmundo Cartolli was the man who had penned the vitriol that had practically closed down Leonardo’s beloved pizzeria and had caused a French chef to chase him from his brasserie with a meat cleaver. Now he was threatening to direct his malicious literary diatribe at Francesca’s and at her desserts in particular. Disconnecting her social niceties app, she clenched her fists and inhaled a deep breath as her prudence flew out of the window.
‘One mistake! One tiny lapse in concentration and you threaten to destroy a restaurant’s reputation with a flick of your pen! For your information, my cappuccino tiramisu has won awards! Exquisite, one reviewer called it.’ Her heart pounded painfully against her ribcage and her breath came out in spurts but she was determined to get her point across. It was important. ‘So there was a problem with your dessert tonight. I’m sorry, okay? It’s none of your business, but I’m in the middle of an emotional meltdown. It happens sometimes – chefs do occasionally have a few minutes to devote to their personal lives. It was a one-off lapse in concentration and you turn it into the debacle of the decade!’
Ed’s darkened jawline slackened and he stared at her as though she had gone mad. He was right. A tiny part of her subconscious mind told her she was definitely looking at her sanity in the rear-view mirror and her propensity for allowing her tongue to go before her brain had leapt to the fore. But he remained silent, motionless, his