We waved good-bye, and then Cheryl and I went inside to clean up. Simon followed, asking if there were any leftovers.

  Chapter 5

  The event at teatime left me feeling unsettled and cranky. Josh could insist that I had to continue with filming the show the following day, but he couldn’t make me look happy about it.

  I’d made a mistake agreeing to this, when I’d known better in the first place. And now I was, I realized, stuck with it. I’d lost most of a week’s income, and that over the busiest time of the year, in the hopes of some future promotional opportunities for Tea by the Sea, as well as Victoria-on-Sea. If I boycotted the show now, those promotional opportunities would never come about, and the income would still be gone.

  Simon went back to his gardens, clutching a thickly buttered scone and a fistful of pastries while Cheryl and I tidied up the most recent mess. That done, I started more baking while Cheryl prepared sandwich ingredients to put in the fridge. As I kneaded and folded and mixed and tasted, I felt some of my anger fading, but I could tell by the set of her shoulders and the look on her face that Cheryl’s wasn’t.

  I popped a batch of vanilla cupcakes into the oven and washed my hands. “That should do it. Thanks for staying and helping out.”

  “Not a problem. Might as well take advantage of Jim being away for the night and earn myself some overtime. Has anyone ever told you you’re a good boss?”

  “Not that I recall.”

  “I’m telling you now.” She took off her apron and threw it into the hamper in the back room to join the rest of the day’s laundry. “If I wasn’t concerned about ruining your business, I’d be tempted to slip a little poison into that Tommy Greene’s tea tomorrow.”

  “Don’t even joke about that.”

  “I’m not joking. Good night, Lily. Are we’re closed to the public all day tomorrow?”

  “Yes. The judging’s supposed to be in the morning, which is what some of this food’s for, but if it goes longer than expected, I can’t have customers with reservations hammering on the door. And then, I sincerely hope, we’ll be done and America Bakes! can go on to torment North Augusta Bakery.”

  “Allegra Griffin and Tommy Greene. A match made in heaven.” Cheryl left, and the back door swung shut behind her.

  I waited until the cupcakes were out of the oven and cool enough to put into containers before I also left for the day. I went through the dining room, checking everything was ready for the morning. I switched out lights as I went, and then I locked the front door behind me.

  I often put in long nights baking for the following day, but tonight I wanted to get home early. I was dead beat. All that smiling and making polite conversation was difficult enough, never mind knowing professionals were judging my efforts. And then the incident between Tommy and Marybeth. I’ve worked in the restaurant industry for a long time, and I’ve seen plenty of temperamental cooks. My ex-boyfriend, a Michelin-starred chef, came to mind. Verbal abuse might be common, but there’s never any excuse for it. Cooking is a high-stress career, but so are a lot of careers. So is life.

  I walked slowly up the long driveway toward the lights of Victoria-on-Sea. The sun was lowering itself into the calm waters of the bay, and the sky was a blaze of red, deep gray, and pink. The petals of the daisies and white roses glowed in the dusk settling over the flower beds. A flock of birds flew overhead, seeking refuge for the night.

  Only two people were sitting on the veranda. Rose and Tommy Greene. Rose had her nightly gin and tonic and was regaling him with stories of her days at Thornecroft Castle as she gently stroked Robbie, snoozing on her lap.

  I hesitated, decided not to approach, and turned away, but I was too late.

  “Lily! Come and join us,” Rose called.

  I reluctantly climbed the steps. Tommy stood politely, and I gave him a stiff nod. He smiled a greeting, but I did not return it.

  “All finished, love?” Rose asked. Robbie opened one eye, saw it was only me, and closed it again.

  “For tonight.”

  “Why don’t you get yourself a drink and join us? Tommy and I are having great fun trying to find out what families we both know.”

  “I’m tired,” I said. “It’s been a long day. If you don’t need me for anything, I’ll be off.”

  “Are you all right, love?” she asked.

  “I’m fine.” I looked at Tommy. “It’s also been an emotionally difficult day. Where’s the rest of your merry crew?”

  “They went out for dinner,” he said. “I didn’t feel like making merry, as you put it, so I stayed behind. Besides, your tea was more than enough.”

  “Good night, Rose.”

  “Your grandmother tells me you live on the property,” Tommy said. “Let me walk you home.”

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “No, but I’d like to see more of the garden.”

  “Garden’s open anytime.” I walked away.

  * * *

  I heated a frozen dinner in the microwave, ate it without tasting it, and then took my book and a glass of wine out to the porch. I didn’t read for long: by eleven o’clock my eyes began closing and my head nodding. I put the book down and got up. I took my things into the cottage and got Éclair’s leash. She’s a labradoodle, energetic, and highly intelligent, with floppy ears, intense dark eyes, and masses of curly beige fur. She’s named for the French pastry because of the streak of cream fur running under her belly. She didn’t need to be told we were going for a walk and danced at my feet.

  I let us through the gate, and she began running in circles, following her nose, chasing scents only she could detect. I breathed in the warm, soft night air, full of the scent of the sea and of the gardens. Éclair headed for the big house, and I trailed along behind. It was a clear night, the moon was bright, and the lamp over the veranda was on, as were some of the lights in the guest rooms. Rose’s windows were dark.

  A man was in the rose garden, examining the bushes, and Éclair hurried to greet him. I called to her sharply, but I was too late. Tommy Greene straightened and turned around. He saw me, and then he bent down and gave the dog a hearty pat. Pat over, Éclair ran back to me, and Tommy followed.

  “Good evening,” he said. “I’ve been admiring your garden. It’s quite special.”

  “Thank you. Good night.” I turned around and started to walk away. He fell into step beside me while Éclair ran on ahead.

  “Nice place you have here,” Tommy said. “You and your grandmother. This garden must take a lot of work.” His accent slipped, some of the rough edges fell away, and his tone was softer and lighter.

  “It does,” I said. “We have a good gardener. He’s English.”

  “As the best are. I was admiring the roses. Some nice varieties, and several that are not at all common.”

  “That’s down to the previous owners and their gardener. They were collectors, I understand.”

  “It shows.”

  I looked at him. “You . . . know about roses?”

  He smiled at me. I was so startled I almost froze in my tracks. The smile was genuine, and even kind. “Love of my life. Apart from my wife and the kids, and sometimes my wife complains she’s in third place.”

  “Where does cooking rate?”

  “Pretty high up there, I will admit, but I wouldn’t say I love it. I’ve been cooking since I was a wee lad helping out in my parents’ pub in Halifax. It’s a job, you know. Not a passion, although I do enjoy it. I did enjoy it, anyway, when I was cooking. It’s a job I’ve been lucky enough to do very well out of indeed.”

  We rounded the house, and the waters of Cape Cod Bay came into sight.

  “I miss England sometimes,” he said. “Yeah, a beach house in Malibu’s nice, but it’s not a two-bedroom flat over a Yorkshire pub, now is it?”

  “I . . . uh . . . guess not.”

  “I miss cooking. Cooking’s my roots. You might say it’s in my blood, and I’ve not being doing enough of it lately.”

  “You own what? Five restaurants?”

  “Six. Three in Manhattan, one in New Orleans, one in Vegas, and two in LA. I think that makes six.”

  “Seven.”

  “Oh. Right. The Vegas one’s new. I forget about it sometimes. Yeah, I own those places, and I’ve designed the menus, worked out the major details, anyway. But I don’t cook there. I don’t cook much at all anymore.”

  My cottage is situated not far from the main house, but I didn’t head immediately toward it. I followed Tommy as he walked to the edge of the bluffs. He was showing me another side of him, and although I was wary, I was also curious. He leaned on the railing and stared across the water.

  “What would you think about a Cape Cod version of Greene’s Pub?” he asked.

  “You’d get plenty of customers. The nice places in North Augusta have lineups all summer long. Some of the not-so-nice places, too. It can be quiet in the off-season, though.”

  “I might scout around while I’m here. Would you like a job?”

  I turned and faced him. The soft breeze ruffled strands of hair that had escaped from my ponytail, and a piece drifted into my mouth. I plucked it out. The salt-and-seaweed scent of the sea was strong, and far below us the tide crashed against the rocky shore. The beach was empty; the tide coming in.

  “I have a job. If you mean, would I like a job working for you, I don’t think so.”

  “You’re angry about what happened today.”

  I stared at him. “Of course I’m angry. I’m furious. You bullied one of my staff. You’re a big-shot TV personality, a wealthy man, a business owner with six, no, seven restaurants, and you bullied a young woman working as a waitress. You wanted to have her fired from a job she needs to help provide an income for her family. Yes, I’m angry, but I think you’re the one who needs anger management lessons.” I threw up my hands. “For all that would help.” I started to walk away.

  “For what it’s worth,” he said, “I’m sorry. I told Marybeth that. If it matters to you, and I hope it does, she accepted my apology.”

  I stopped and turned around. “You did? She did?”

  “That’s my TV shtick, don’t you know? I’m the brilliant but bad-boy chef, rough around the edges, hardscrabble childhood, fought my way to the top with my fists and plucky determination and hard work.”

  “Is that right?”

  He leaned against the railing and looked out over the dark water. “Nah. Maybe some of it’s a grain of truth, but not about my childhood. My parents owned a pub, but it was a nice pub in a nice area. They were good people, still are good people. I got in a few scrapes when I was a lad—what boy doesn’t?—and I had some what you’d call anger management issues when I was starting out. No more than any other family-taught cook from the North of England trying to make it in the London culinary world. But somehow I got that reputation, and it stuck. The foulmouthed genius, they called me. Still do. On the show I’m expected to throw a temper tantrum every now and again. He wanted me to get in an argument with you about putting extra stuff, like orange peel, into scones, but I figured you wouldn’t be drawn, and I told him that.”

  “So you turned on innocent little Marybeth. I can’t forgive you for that.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t,” he said. “I was surprised, truth be told, when she started to cry. I figured she’d know it was all part of the show. Reality TV—”

  “Has nothing to do with reality. But people aren’t always aware of that, are they?”

  “No.”

  “If you don’t like being known as a bully, why don’t you stop?”

  He turned to face me. His eyes were dark and serious, and he pondered my question for a long time. “I’ve been thinking of doing that, but maybe I’m addicted. To the fame, the money most of all. Plenty of good chefs are out there who’d do a better job than me of being a TV personality. So I stick to being the bad boy, and I give the director and his producers what they want.”

  “That’s sad.”

  “The price of success. I meant what I said.”

  “About what?”

  “You can have a job with me anytime. Your baking’s good. Top notch. Made with skill and love.”

  “And Cape Cod ingredients, grown locally by local farmers.”

  He chuckled, the sound surprisingly warm and gentle. “Can’t forget the importance of good ingredients, and I never do. I haven’t had such a good scone as I had today since my gran died, and I mean that, too. I hate the stuff these yanks make. Hard as rocks and as dry as that patch of sand down there. Never mind chocolate chips. The devil’s invention, those are.”

  “I make chocolate chip cookies for the children’s tea.”

  “My point exactly. Great for the kiddies. You think about it. The offer’s there. As for the show, I’m going to give you ten out of ten.”

  “You are? Uh . . . thank you.”

  “You’ve achieved exactly what you set out to achieve, and everything about your place is perfect. I can’t say what the other judges are going to give you, and I won’t say I won’t find the next place just as good, but I wanted you to know.”

  He turned to his left and pointed toward the stairs leading down to the beach. “Is it safe to go down there, do you know?”

  “Not at night. Even with the moonlight, it’s too dark, and the beach isn’t lit. The tide’s coming in, and although it doesn’t cover the beach completely, it does create some tricky spots, which you need to be nimble of foot to get around. Save it until tomorrow. When the tide’s out, you can walk a long way.”

  “I’ll do that.” He gave me a wave and left me.

  I stared after him. The man was full of surprises.

  Chapter 6

  The next time I saw Tommy Greene, he was dead.

  Yesterday I’d been determined not to participate in the show any longer, but as my anger receded, particularly after my conversation with Tommy, I realized I couldn’t just not show up. A lawsuit would ruin me. I’d signed a contract, and I could be pretty sure that CookingTV and their backers had a heck of a lot more legal firepower than I could assemble.

  I’d make nice and continue with the show today and hope never to see them again. If by any chance I did win this round, I’d try to find a way to get out of continuing.

  We’d have a slightly later start today, so I’d been told to be on set at nine for makeup and the rest. I’d serve afternoon tea and sit at a table on the patio, weather permitting, with the judges and listen to them criticize me and my place.

  What fun. Not.

  Rose had once again explained to her guests that the individually cooked breakfast offerings would not be available. Despite that, I got up at my regular time of quarter to six, let Éclair into the enclosed yard while I showered, fed her breakfast to enjoy while I dressed, and we left my cottage at six o’clock, as usual.

  I walked slowly along the cliffside, enjoying the early morning warmth and clear air, while Éclair sniffed at every bush and blade of grass, checking the overnight news from the neighborhood. The bay was busy with charter fishing boats and early whale-watching trips heading to the animals’ feeding grounds in the open ocean.

  Éclair spotted a familiar figure leaning on the railing also watching the activity, and she hurried to say good morning. Simon turned with a smile for me and a hearty pat for the dog, and I let us into the small, dark, outdated B & B kitchen. Every room in this house is decorated as though it were in a grand nineteenth-century English country house, except for the kitchen, which hadn’t been updated since the 1950s at the latest. It was dark, poky, crowded, and badly laid out.

  I put the coffeepot on and began assembling ingredients for a breakfast bread and butter pudding.

  “Not doing the full English again today?” Without being asked, Simon rummaged in the fridge for fresh fruit for the morning’s salad and put berries and melons on the chopping board, along with bananas.

  “No time. I have muffins and a coffee cake in the freezer, and I’ll put this in the oven for Edna to slice and serve. I’m not due on set”—I put quotation marks around the words—“until nine for makeup and all that nonsense, but I want to go up as soon as I’m done here to make sure everything’s perfect in the dining room as well as on the patio, if they decide to shoot outside.”

  “The rain that had been predicted seems to be holding off. When I’m finished here, I’ll pick today’s flowers and bring them up.”

  “Thanks.” I poured a mixture of eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon over the cubes of day-old bread I’d arranged at the bottom of a large baking pan. “All I want is for this to be over. I hate having my space invaded. I hate being judged. I suppose I’m judged all day, every day, every time someone puts a crumb in their mouth, but I hate having it said out loud to my face. Most of all, I hate having my staff upset.”

  “What happened yesterday? It was obvious something had, but you didn’t want to tell me.”

  “I still don’t. I don’t know what I think about it.” I remembered my talk with Tommy yesterday evening. How . . . nice . . . he’d seemed.

  “They did some filming in the gardens yesterday afternoon, after finishing in the restaurant,” Simon said.

  “That’s good. I think. Do you think it is?”

  “I do. It’s all part of the atmosphere of Tea by the Sea, and any mention of Victoria-on-Sea’s good, too. Josh wasn’t there, but his assistant, Reilly, showed the camera crew what he wanted. He even got some shots of me admiring the roses. The English guy, Tommy, was there, too. He had some surprisingly knowledgeable questions about the plants.”

  “Turns out he’s a keen gardener. Hardly goes with his tough-guy image, does it?”

  “I don’t know ’bout that.” Simon put on a rough-and-tumble Cockney accent and held up the knife he was holding. He narrowed his eyes and bared his teeth. “We gardeners can be a bunch of mighty tough blokes, you know, mate. We regularly get into fights to the death over who has the best petunias or camellias.”