Dining with Joy (2 page)

Popping open the Big Mac box, Joy took a large first bite, eyes closed, savoring the scent and taste of the special sauce and warm beef. When she swallowed, exhaling, she glanced at Duncan.

“My friends and I used to ride our bikes over the bridge to this McDonald's on Saturday afternoons.”

“How old is this salad?” Duncan frowned at the cherry tomato speared on the end of his fork.

“We'd go to the beach in the morning, bake in the sun, then ride our bikes across the bridge, our money tucked into our bathing suits.”

“Hmm, nice.” Duncan leaned over his salad and sniffed, making a face. “So, you want to tell me about Omaha?”

Joy reached for her napkin to wipe sauce from her fingers.
Right, Omaha
. “Wenda Divine blindsided me. We were watching two young chefs demonstrate Culinare's latest cookware, and all of a sudden, I have an apron over my head and I'm being challenged with a secret ingredient.” Joy eyed her Big Mac, her appetite waning. “I panicked.”

“Panicked?” Duncan nibbled at his chicken, the lines of his face accented in the light falling through the window. “Panic is burning the food. Panic is undercooking. Panic is forgetting an ingredient. You, my dear Joy, fell off the stage.” Duncan twisted the cap from his water. “Garth showed me clips.”

“I didn't
fall
off the stage, I swooned.” Joy shoved her food forward and folded her arms on the table. “After the initial shock of crashing onto concrete, it was pretty funny.” She smiled. “You should've seen Wenda's face as she bent over me, her bow lips tight with fake concern while her fat eyes fired daggers.”

“You could've broken your neck, Joy.” Duncan slapped the plastic lid onto his uneaten salad.

“What would you have me do? Try to cook with the secret ingredient?”

“Yes, if you must know. I'm sure you could burn food with the best of them.” Duncan tipped up his water bottle for a long, hard swig.

“Burn the food? I'd have to
graduate
to burning food. Got to know how to cook before I can burn.” Joy closed the lid on her Big Mac box. “Did you know, Duncan? That I'd end up on stage with Wenda Divine? I have a rider on my contract. No cook-offs.”

“No, I didn't know.” Duncan sipped his water again, his gaze drifting out the window. “Who were the men who picked you up from your swoon?”

“The men of Delta Tau Delta, University of Nebraska.” Joy sipped her soda. Part of her success was her male following, especially on college campuses. Whole fraternities TiVoed her show and watched at night.

When Joy came up with the idea of Stupid Cooking Tricks, college men across America were the first to submit videos.

Duncan picked at the wrapper on the water bottle. “Your mom . . . how's she doing? Your nieces still living with you?”

“Mama's fine. Lyric and Annie-Rae are fine. In fact, they're playing softball right now.” Joy leaned toward Duncan. “As we speak.”

Duncan nodded. “Your brother and his wife—”

“Sawyer and Mindy.”

“Still in Vegas?”

“Still in Vegas. Trying to find themselves.” Joy regarded Duncan, trying to determine how his demeanor started a swirl of dread in her chest. “So, what's new with you, Boss? Ready for season four of
Dining with Joy
?”

The man leaned forward, cupping his hands around his water. “Remember how you felt when you stood on the pitcher's mound, bottom of the seventh, your team was up by one and the opponent's next batter was their best hitter? And if she hit off you, the NCAA championship would be lost?”

Joy narrowed her eyes at her producer. “Is there a reason you're talking softball to me?” She didn't like the way the conversation settled over her soul.

“You're going to need the same courage this season.”

“Courage? What are you talking about?” Why did he hesitate? A no-nonsense producer and businessman, Duncan hardly wasted time with small talk or cushioning hard news.

“We've had fun, haven't we?” Duncan smiled, slow and steady, more cushioning of the conversation.

“We've had fun, yes. Despite the fact your show's host can't cook, we've had some success. But you didn't drive down from Atlanta to remind me of the good times, did you? What's going on? Did we lose a big advertiser?”

Duncan lifted his eyes to Joy's. “I sold the show.”

The declaration pressed against her. “Excuse me?” She slid her soda cup to the edge of the table. “You sold the show?”

“Closed the deal two weeks ago.” Duncan started stacking their uneaten food onto the tray.

“Why? To who?”

“Allison Wild at Wild Woman Productions. She needed a show to pitch to a network and contacted me about
Dining with Joy
. She thinks you're fabulous, by the way. She's on her way to Beaufort. We're meeting her at the studio tomorrow morning, nine o'clock.”

“This is incredible . . . Duncan, you can't just sell the show. What happened to all the
fun
?” A thin tremble started beneath Joy's skin, creeping through her middle. She gripped her hands in her lap. “This makes no sense.”

“Out of the blue like this, yeah, it doesn't. I should've said something, but toward the end of last season, I realized I'd taken the show as far as I could. I was bored—”

“Bored? How can you be bored? The show is coming into its own. Stupid Cooking Tricks alone is putting us on the map. We're defining our brand, creating a cooking show that's about the viewer, the fans. There's no cooking show out there like ours.”

“I agree, all true, all true, but I'm tired of cooking shows.” Duncan's flat monotone conveyed his boredom. “This would've been my eleventh season. Seven with your dad, three with you. I'm out of ideas. Out of zeal. To be honest, Joy, if I didn't get out of the way, I'd wind up killing the brand. So when Allison called, nearly salivating over the phone about you and the show, I knew it was my chance to do what I want to do. I'm forty-nine years old, and if I'm ever going to try movie production, I'd best start now. I have a friend in L.A. who's been asking me to merge DT Productions with his company.”

“You should've talked to me.” Joy shook her head, squinting beyond the window at the pale blue horizon.

“Look, I know this doesn't seem fair.”

“No, it doesn't.” Joy swept up the napkins from the table and wadded them onto the tray, slightly aware that the volume of her voice drew stares from around McDonald's dining room. “Not even close to fair.” She jerked to her feet, tray in hand, and started for the trash bins.

“Joy, listen.” Duncan's grasp on her arm stopped her in the middle of the room, between tables. “You're still in business. Still host of the show. Your contract remained intact. Allison is very talented and creative. I don't know which network she pitched the show to, but you can bet your audience will double or triple this season. We'd gone as far as we could on the Premier Channel.”

“I hosted the show because you were desperate.” Joy freed her arm from his hold and leaned toward him. “Because Daddy asked me to help you as he lay in a hospital bed, dying.”

“And we've done well. But I can't believe in three years this show hasn't woven into your DNA, become a part of you. You don't get a little bit of a thrill by hosting your own television show? Being a celebrity?” His grin mocked her.

“You think I enjoy lying to the viewers? That I get a kick out of pretending to be something I'm not? Do you think I like falling off stages and joking my way out of cooking questions?” The trembling in her middle intensified. “But I did it for you and because my dying father asked.”

“Seems that new Dodge Ram out there was a nice pill for your pain.”

“Duncan, I'm a cooking show host who can't cook. It's a miracle we've pulled off the charade this long. Now you want me to continue with a new producer, a woman I don't even know? Did you even tell her?”

“She knows what she needs to know. That you took over the show after your father died suddenly of a heart attack. She knows you did it to help me save my financial investment. She knows we changed the name from
Dining with Charles
to
Dining with Joy
. She knows you're funny, clever, and very popular with male viewers and the under-thirty crowd. She knows you're gorgeous and absolutely dynamite in front of the camera.”

“You look like a caught teenager, Duncan. Why didn't you tell her?”

The man inhaled, his lips forming an answer, then he hesitated. “Because I wanted the sale, and frankly, I don't think she needs to know.”

“Then I'll tell her.” Joy spun toward the trash bins by the door. The dining room was beginning to fill up, and she wanted to leave before the teen behind the counter pointed her out. She was too tired, too on edge to play cooking show host tonight.

“Don't bite off your nose to spite your face, Joy. There's no reason for Allison to know. My guess is she'll oversee this first season with you, then back off to develop other projects. Ryan will move from director to producer. You'll take on more of a producer role, and this time next year Allison will never be the wiser. Until then, the crew will back you up. Sharon will continue to do all the recipe development, prep work, and cooking. I've filmed dozens of cooking shows with all kinds of folks and trust me, the prep chef can make a monkey look like Emeril Lagasse.”

“Are you equating me with a monkey, Duncan?” Joy slapped the emptied tray on top of the bin, tugged her Bama cap down over her forehead, and pushed out the door. “I'm telling her.”

“Then what, Joy?” Duncan's footsteps scraped along the pavement behind her. “Hmm? Try for a coaching job? Maybe take your liberal arts degree and what . . . write freelance articles? Wasn't this the year you planned on buying your own place?”

As a matter of fact, a pre–Civil War home on the corner of Federal and Pinckney. “It doesn't feel right, Duncan.” Joy jerked open the driver's side door, climbed behind the wheel, thinking. “As much as I love the show, and yes, the money, and the fans and the travel, it's hard to pretend I'm a cook when I'm not. It's like finding out Mr. Rogers hated kids.”

“Tell you what.” Duncan moved close to peer into her eyes. “Give Allison a chance. If you don't like her, tell her the truth, break your contract, and walk. But I've been producing for a long time and you're a rare talent, Joy. No, you can't cook.” His low laugh was laden with the familiarity of an inside joke. “But you're an entertainer. The camera loves you. Your fans love you. My guess is Allison will take you to the moon.”

“And once I'm there? Then what?”

Duncan lightly kissed her cheek, a fatherly gesture. “Then on to the stars.”

Three

Luke lowered the heat under the saucepan and tasted his saffron sauce. Beautiful. Just the way he liked it—rich and smooth. He'd been off his game a bit since losing Ami's and leaving Manhattan for the lowcountry.

“Luke, shug, are you going to serve that gravy or propose to it?” Mercy Bea peered between the heat lamps, the ends of her piled-high hair barely missing the bulbs. “I got hungry customers.”

“Sauce, Bea, it's saffron sauce. Not gravy.” Luke ladled a bit into a dipping bowl. “And it's good enough to take home to Mama.”

“And my mama would also call it gravy. In the South, anything you slather over meat or fish is gravy.”

“I'll have you thinking my way by the time Andy returns from his back surgery.” Luke tipped his head toward her as he backed away from the service window.

“And I'll have you thinking mine.” With an exaggerated tip of her head, Mercy Bea glared at Luke, picked up her
gravy,
and turned for the dining room.

Luke laughed. After six months he was starting to feel like a part of the Frogmore Café family. A strapping Emmitt Smith-like chef, Andy Castleton owned the place with Mercy Bea, a single mom of two.

Luke liked the routine of working nights, getting lost in the comfort of cooking, forgetting about the past year of bankruptcy, failure, and defeat.

When his cousin, Heath McCord, suggested time in the southern sun and surf as a way to recoup and get his bearings, Luke packed a bag and drove down the next day.

He found a job at the café working part-time until Andy announced he was going out for back surgery. He clapped his broad hand on Luke's shoulder and asked him to oversee the back of the house.

Luke glanced around the kitchen, at home among the old walls and creaking rafters. But he couldn't hide out here—or board in Miss Jeanne's third-floor apartment—forever. He was thirty-six years old.

Sooner or later, he'd have to face his peers, return to New York, and redeem his tarnished restaurateur reputation.

Across the room, Russell, the prep chef and dishwasher, stacked trays of clean Mason jars under the counter.

Luke collected the saucepan and emptied the contents into a warmer. Yeah, when Andy returned to the café, Luke would give his notice.

Until then, he'd enjoy the café, the lowcountry, and life by the ocean. Beaufort was a great little town.

Grabbing a towel, Luke wiped down the prep table, then checked the lowboy for supplies. A church book club came in every Monday night around eight looking for comfort food—pies, cake, or chocolate.

Wandering into the dining room, he took a jar from the tray under the lunch counter, scooped it with ice, then filled it with sweet tea.

The dining room was quiet, peaceful, ethereal with end-of-day light slipping through the windows. The golden glow of a hurricane lamp gleamed off each of Andy's polished tables.

Sipping his tea, Luke leaned against the back of the counter and watched Mercy Bea cackle over a story being told by a couple of older gentlemen at table three. Paris drew a broom over the slick, smooth hardwood by the front door.