And the current chef? A legend in the industry. At thirty-two, he’d already earned a Michelin Star and the respect of every major restaurant critic, food blogger and worthy food and wine magazine across the country. He’d made executive chef of his first kitchen by twenty-five. By twenty-eight he’d been given the James Beard award for Outstanding Chef. By thirty-one he’d grabbed Lilou an Outstanding Restaurant award. Rumored to be a total ass and dictator in the kitchen, Killian Quinn’s dishes were inspired and fresh, perfect to the point of obsession, but most of all, his refined recipes and plate presentation were copycatted all over the country.
Or so I’d read in the latest issue of Food and Wine, and the hundreds of articles I’d perused online during my research once my brother offered his parking lot for Foodie—directly across the street from Lilou.
I’d watched Quinn’s rise to stardom closely during my culinary school days, fascinated by his luck and success. But over the last couple of years my interest in his career had faded along with the other important things in my life. Only when Vann mentioned my potential “competition” across the plaza did I remember Lilou and where it was located, forcing me to also remember the powerhouse chef that I would possibly share customers with.
I found myself gazing across the parking lot, admiring the simple design of Lilou; the subtle, simple banner that declared its famous name and the uncomplicated design aesthetic so different from my flashy, trendy truck across the street.
“He’s not my competition,” I mumbled to myself, swearing it like an oath.
And he wasn’t. Our clientele wouldn’t be the same. Or if they were, we’d be serving them at different times. He would get them for dinner service and I would lure them in later, after they’d been drinking and dancing all night.
I didn’t want his customer’s extravagant tips; I wanted their business when they left the nightclubs and made bad, late night decisions. Decisions that more than likely included searching for a late night, greasy fourth meal.
Killian Quinn offered them a once in a lifetime dining experience. I offered comfort food that would cure hangovers.
Lilou might be the precise image of everything I’d given up, of the dreams I’d pissed away and the life I could have had… but a restaurant like that wasn’t my competition.
So why did I feel so intimidated standing in its shadow?
Chapter Two
I wasn’t supposed to open until this weekend. Molly and I had been furiously working to get the Foodie signage and kitchen ready since I’d returned home with only a tiny bit of savings left to my name, the promise of an early inheritance and this crazy, absolutely insane idea.
Thank God, Molly had missed me during my European escape. She put up with my obsessive planning and preparations just to spend time with me. I couldn’t have gotten this far without her, but she couldn’t hold my hand forever. Especially when go time was here.
Molly could paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel blind, one hand tied behind her back on banana leaves but she couldn’t make toast without setting the fire alarms off.
And maybe I was exaggerating her talent a teensy bit, but only because seventeen years of friendship and undying loyalty swayed me.
Vann’s head popped through the open door, his face scrunched up with concern. “Were you serious about no food?”
I tore my eyes off Lilou and gave him an apologetic shrug. “Thursday,” I promised him. “I’ll be firing all engines for an entire day’s worth of food testing. You can be my guinea pig.”
“Fine,” he huffed. “But I expect breakfast, lunch and dinner.”
“You’re a workaholic,” I accused him. “That store is going to ruin your life.”
He gasped and shook his head back and forth in wide-eyed disbelief. “That store is my life.” He looked around pointedly at the shiny inside of my desperate business venture. “Besides, you’re one to talk.”
“Hey, I’m not a workaholic yet! Give me at least three more days before you start flinging accusations.”
His mouth twitched with a smile he wouldn’t let loose. “Fine, you can be my apprentice for the afternoon. I’ll show you how all the best workaholics take lunch breaks.”
“Really?”
He jerked his chin toward the parking lot, “You’re a chef. You can’t exactly starve yourself.”
“I run a food truck.” I grabbed the edge of the stainless steel counter and squeezed. “I’m going to run a food truck,” I amended. “I’m basically a fry cook. Hardly worthy of the chef title. And I can starve. I can very easily starve.”
His usually intense gray eyes softened, followed by a patient sigh that was so out of character for him, my insides went squishy with sisterly affection. “They’re going to love you, Vere. And your truck. And your awesome food. This is a brilliant idea.”
“And if they don’t? If I fail?”
“You won’t,” he promised. “Besides, I’ll send all my customers to you. Guaranteed business.”
I snorted, a smile finally breaking free on my face after acknowledging Lilou across the way. “Your crunchy granola loving crowd is hardly my ideal clientele, Vann. Besides, opposite business hours, remember? That’s why this whole thing works.”
His mouth tilted into a rare smile. “Hey, even crunchy, granola-loving, tree huggers drink too much on occasion. We even stay out late once in a while. Sometimes past midnight.”
My eyes bulged in mock surprise. “No, Vann! Past midnight? I can’t even imagine. That’s just… so crazy. You’re really living life on the edge.”
His smile disappeared, and his voice flattened, back to the super serious big brother I knew and loved. “I’m rethinking my offer to buy you lunch.”
“You’re buying?” I grabbed my purse from the wire shelf overhead and followed him out the door. Pausing to lock the door behind me, I added, “You should have led with that.”
“Wait!” Molly stopped me with my key still in the deadbolt. “I need to store my paints.”
She’d already packed away the bright reds and taken care of her paint pallet, but her brushes still glistened with crimson. I eyed them skeptically.
She let out a longsuffering sigh. “I promise not to stain your pristine sanctuary. Seriously, Vera!” She gestured at the sign she just painted for me—for free—then waved around her expensive brushes in exasperation.
“No dripping,” I sternly warned her.
She rolled her eyes but nodded compliantly. “I promise to leave it as shiny and new as I found it.”
I unlocked the door again, and pulled it open for her. She pushed past me without waiting for me to drop the outer step so her climb into the truck was awkward and wide. She didn’t seem to notice.
“Yeesh,” Vann mumbled. “And I thought I was anal.”
I turned to give him the evil eye. “I guess she could have washed her brushes off in your store.”
He cringed, seeing my point.
My brother was as meticulous and OCD as they came. We were products of our environment. And by that I meant, raised by a single father that hardly remembered to run the dishwasher let alone clean things like bathrooms or clothes or really anything. Vann and I had emerged from our childhood home desperate for order and good hygiene. We were the opposite of everything Dad had been.
But not out of spite.
We loved our dad fiercely. He’d sacrificed everything for us and then managed to raise us to be decent, successful grownups. Or at least that was how he’d raised Vann. I was still finding my sea legs on the functioning adult ship. But I hoped to make him proud soon.
Really soon, since I didn’t have much time.
The sound of an engine interrupted our quiet afternoon, growling through the plaza. Most of downtown was a busy mix of one-way streets and constant traffic, but the center strip, with its border of brick industrial buildings turned into trendy lofts and high-end businesses, was the busiest part.
Three separate plazas, one right next to the other, boa
sted restaurants, bars, clubs, lofts and businesses successful enough to pay the exorbitant rent. This section of town was all millennials clubbing until ungodly hours and high rollers throwing their money around for extravagant dinners and designer clothes.
I was neither cool enough to have real estate here nor rich enough for the rent. But Vann’s custom bicycle shop fit in perfectly and after begging, pleading and selling my soul to the city council, I’d been given temporary and reluctant approval to operate on the same property.
At this time of day, the plaza was busy but not as boisterous as it would be later this evening. The sound of a motorcycle zipping through the plaza rumbled above all the other noise. Vann and I watched with equal interest as the sleek black crotch rocket zipped through the alley beside Lilou and slid to a stop, like the driver was from some kind of British spy movie.
It was obnoxious how cool he looked.
Goosebumps skittered over my arms, despite the warm summer sun. Keen awareness rocketed through me, and my stomach flipped with nervous anticipation.
“That’s him,” Vann confirmed my suspicions. He turned, his eyes glinting with mischief. “Your competition.”
Swallowing past the fist-sized lump in my throat, I grated out, “He’s not my competition.”
I felt Vann’s smirk even though I refused to look at him. I couldn’t take my eyes off the black helmet and lean body that had dismounted from the motorcycle with a level of grace I’d never, ever achieved.
I gulped and tried not to hyperventilate.
He stared in our direction. If my neighbors in our plaza were curious about the silver RV taking up residence in front of the bike shop, splashing Foodie across the front in bright red paint was a pretty good indication of what was going on.
He pulled his helmet off and let it dangle in one hand. I flinched, taking an instinctive step back. I couldn’t make out the finer details of his features, but I hate you was pretty much written all over his squared shoulders and angry aura.
Killian Quinn knew what moved in across the street from him and it was safe to say he was not a fan.
I’d been advertising on social media and in local papers since I’d gotten approval and all the necessary permits required to open. I had a fair amount of positive interest, but Vann had stayed tight-lipped with his neighbors. He told me it was because he preferred the element of surprise. I was confident that meant he was terrified to tell them that he’d opened his lot to a late-night food truck, afraid of what they’d think of him.
“Then why do you look like you’re about to throw up?” Vann teased.
My voice was a choked whisper. “That’s really him?”
“Killian Quinn in the flesh.” Vann had never cared about food. Growing up we’d been mostly responsible for our own meals. If we wanted to eat, we had to scrounge for ourselves. Our dad worked two jobs, first shift and third shift, and never had the energy for family dinners or grocery shopping. Vann survived on the bare minimum.
It was why he was so happy with granola bars and protein shakes. They were several steps above his childhood diet of ramen noodles and Kraft mac and cheese.
I’d taken the opposite approach. Denied basic meals and balanced food groups, food became fascinating to me. I dreamed of the day I could eat something that tasted good. I became obsessed with food that didn’t taste cheap or convenient.
Good food became a goal that sprouted wings and grew talons during my junior high Home Ec class. My goal grew to be a living, breathing monster when I got to high school and found a teacher that had once been a chef at a European bistro before she’d met the love of her life and moved here to start their family.
She’d settled in her husband’s hometown and turned to inspiring the next generation of chefs when she should have opened her own kitchen and made a name for herself. She’d always laughed when I told her that, insisting that love, marriage and raising a family was the greatest thing she could ever do.
Moral of the story? Kids ruined everything.
Just ask my dad.
All that to say, Vann wasn’t intimidated by Killian Quinn in the least. He didn’t read Food and Wine obsessively or troll online food blogs every single day. He didn’t have to compare himself to the greatness across the plaza or wish that his life had gone in a similar direction as Quinn’s, instead of the fiery train wreck mine had become.
From across the busy street, I watched Killian Quinn staring back. I didn’t have to be close to know it was him. I’d cyberstalked him enough times that I could recognize his dark, wild shock of hair and the signature beard that stood out in an industry filled with cleanly shaven men.
He continued staring at us while we stared back. Vann didn’t move to say hi to him, and I felt frozen in place, waiting to shatter from the presence of someone so prolific and talented.
I couldn’t be certain, but I could have sworn his eyes narrowed at the freshly painted Foodie declaring my business to the world. I could have sworn his gaze moved over my paint-splattered white t-shirt and black and white apron tied around my waist. I could have sworn I felt his gaze on me, assessing, calculating, taking in my black bandana, assessing my face, arms, body before looking at the food truck behind me again.
I could have sworn Killian Quinn absorbed every one of my weaknesses and insecurities, including the fragile faith I put in the truck behind me. He had weighed my worth and my talent, or lack thereof, then disregarded me as anything but a fleeting annoyance.
His body jerked as if awoken from a trance and he turned his attention to his bike, pushing it to park on the side of Lilou and storing his helmet in a side compartment. His motorcycle jacket stretched over broad shoulders as he stretched his arms wide and then across his chest as if working out kinks.
I stayed transfixed, watching this hero of mine as he fiddled around for another minute, then pulled keys from his pocket and let himself in the side door of Lilou. The door slammed shut behind him, and there was no more Killian Quinn.
Letting out a slow breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding back, I shivered despite the heat of the day.
“You’re really that intimidated by him?” Vann asked, surprise and some amusement lacing his tone.
“He’s a big deal,” I told him.
Vann shook his head and turned to offer Molly a hand as she jumped down from the RV. “If you say so.”
“If I say what?” Molly asked.
“Not you. Me. We just got our first glimpse of him,” I explained, turning to Molly with ABORT MISSION written all over my face.
Molly was momentarily perplexed. “Him? Oh, him! And I missed it! Why didn’t you call me out here?”
Vann made a choked sound, clearly disapproving our interest. “I really don’t get what the big deal is. So he’s a good cook. So are you, Vere. You’ve got nothing to be afraid of.”
Molly nodded enthusiastically, patting me on the shoulder. “Vann’s right. You’re the best. Killian Quinn’s got nothing on you, babe.”
“If that’s what you think then why are you so interested in him?” Vann asked Molly curiously.
“Uh, are you serious?” She laughed. “Because he’s smokin’ hot! Didn’t you just see him? He could make burnt oatmeal, and I would pretend to be amazed.”
“More likely you’ll be the one to make him burned oatmeal,” I laughed.
“If he’s as good as you say he is, my cooking might be a deal breaker, huh?”
“You’re cooking is a deal breaker for every guy,” Vann muttered.
Molly punched him in the kidneys, causing him to jerk forward and grunt. Vann reached up and grabbed a fistful of Molly’s hair, yanking it backward. The two of them were like a Three Stooges routine.
“Stand up for me, Vera!” Molly demanded.
“I can’t,” I told her honestly. “Vann’s right. Your cooking is so bad it’s almost a deal breaker for me.”
“I hate you both,” she pouted. “And just for that, I get to pick the restaurant.”
/> I tried to protest. Molly’s taste ranged from Junior Whoppers with cheese to filet mignon- cooked well done. Ick. “But—”
“Am I buying your lunch too?” Vann squinted at her.
She squinted back. “Are you offering?”
He shrugged and decided, “I’ll put it on the business card and call it a client lunch.”
Molly and I grinned at each other. “Make it someplace nice, Molls.” She started to point across the plaza but I cut her off before she got ahead of herself. “Except Lilou. They’re not open for lunch. And we don’t have a genie, so there’s no way we’re getting in before the next solar eclipse anyway.”
Her face fell, disappointed, but it was a universal truth. Until something better popped up or a zombie apocalypse occurred, there was no way we were eating at Lilou without doing our time on the reservation list.
“Vincenzo’s it is!” Molly decided.
“I’m going to have to fight a carb coma for the rest of the day,” my ultra-healthy brother complained.
Molly pinched his waist, looking for pudge that wasn’t there. “And it’s going to feel so good.”
I laughed, despite my fresh onslaught of nerves and pending failure. We walked across the plaza past Lilou, on our way to the next block of buildings and cobblestone square. I couldn’t help but stare at the darkened windows as we passed, taking in the rustic white washed brick and vibrant green ivy snaking around the windows. I couldn’t see him, but I knew he was in there and my pulse quickened with insecurities.
Until this moment, opening Foodie had felt like the craziest thing I’d ever done.
But I realized that wasn’t true. Now I was forced to acknowledge that Killian Quinn resided less than a football field away from me and I realized that this was the craziest thing I’d ever done. And the stupidest.
It wasn’t the truck that was foolish. It was opening a pseudo fast food restaurant across the plaza from one of America’s rising chefs.