Greta and Trinee looked at Quinn.
“How can we?” she asked. “We’d need fresh produce and meat and herbs . . .”
“Fresh nothing,” Greta said, bustling around. “We’ve got an entire freezer full of stuff to use up. And we’ll have eggs just as soon as someone goes and collects them. We could start with half days. Breakfast and lunch only. Dinners would have to wait until we’re back on our feet.”
Quinn literally didn’t know what to say. She felt a responsibility to these people who needed their salaries but when she turned in a slow circle, taking the place in and looking for sanity, she failed to find it.
Tilly popped her head back in. “What’s going on, did you reopen?” She looked . . . hopeful.
It shocked Quinn. As did the words that came out of her mouth. “Yes, but just as a trial,” she said.
Greta grinned and unlocked the front door. The three old men came in. “Lou, Hank, and Big Hank,” the oldest one said by way of introduction. “I’m Lou. That one’s Big Hank.” He jabbed a thumb at the shortest but widest one.
Big Hank stopped in front of Quinn and looked anxious. “You any good at cooking?”
“I’m a sous-chef at Amuse-Bouche,” she said.
Everyone collectively blinked as one.
“It’s a trendy, popular restaurant in L.A.,” she said.
“Never heard of it,” Big Hank said.
“Me either,” Lou said. He was bald, his head shiny like a cue ball, although he did have a bunch of hair coming out of his ears.
“What the hell’s a sous-chef?” Not-Big-Hank asked.
“Not sure, but it sounds fancy,” Greta said. She tossed Quinn an apron. “Have at it, City Girl. It’s all yours today. Make it easy for yourself and stick with the breakfast menu only. Pancakes, waffles, French toast, bacon, sausage, biscuits, eggs . . .”
Quinn shook her head. “I don’t do that kind of cooking.”
“What other kind is there?” Tilly asked.
Quinn shook out the apron. It read: WARNING! HOT STUFF COMING THROUGH. “I mostly handle the planning and directing of food preparation, supervise kitchen staff, take care of any problems that arise, that sort of thing.”
Tilly didn’t look impressed.
Neither did anyone else.
Big Hank turned to Greta, looking desperate now. “I’m real hungry,” he said.
Greta took back the apron. “I’ll make my famous pronto potato pancakes. I do it as a special once a week,” she told Quinn.
Everyone groaned but when Greta whipped around to look, they all found something else to look at.
“We hate her pancakes,” Trinee whispered to Quinn. “But no one’ll say so and hurt her feelings.”
Everyone looked pleadingly at Quinn.
Oh good God. And that’s when she saw Trinee getting the baskets ready for the tables. “Wait! You can’t just put out cold butter packets. And the crackers might be stale.”
“Yes, because that’s our problem right now,” Trinee said. “No one at the stove cooking, but the crackers might be stale.”
And so Quinn ended up in the kitchen learning a very important lesson—there was a huge difference between being able to cut up a carrot in two hundred different fancy ways and flipping pancakes fast enough to fulfill quick orders.
“Another short stack,” Greta yelled at her thirty minutes later.
When Quinn hadn’t been looking, the café had filled up. “It’s going to take a few,” she said. “I need to make more batter.”
“The sign out front says we serve FAST,” Greta said and clapped her hands. “Chop-chop. What the hell are you doing now?”
“Garnishing the plates,” Quinn said. She hadn’t found any fresh herbs but there’d been a bag of carrots, which she’d sliced up for a splash of color.
“She’s cute,” Trinee said. “Real cute. But she’s not especially quick.”
Quinn didn’t even have time to roll her eyes because Trinee was bringing in the orders with alarming speed, stringing them up by her face. Which is how Quinn ended up burning a big pan of eggs. The last of their eggs, in fact.
“I thought you said you knew how to cook,” Tilly said, sounding disappointed from her perch on the counter.
“I think that’s a health hazard,” Quinn said. “Get down.”
“I think that burnt pan is the health hazard,” Tilly said, waving a hand in front of her face.
“Tell us the truth, City Girl,” Trinee said, hands on hips. “You just watch cooking shows and think you’re a chef, right? Which one, Cutthroat Kitchen? Iron Chef?”
Lou poked his head into the kitchen. “You want me to take over? I cooked in the army for hundreds back in the day.”
Quinn gritted her teeth. “I’ve got this.” And she would get this. If it killed her.
“Great. But we’re out of eggs.” Greta shoved an empty basket in her hands. “Go get more.”
“From the store, right?”
“Honey, we ain’t got time for that,” Trinee called in from the other room.
“The henhouse,” Greta said. “Out back.”
The words struck terror in Quinn’s gut. “But . . .”
“The hens are just sitting in their laying boxes on their eggs,” Greta said. “All you’ve got to do is shoo them.”
Quinn looked at Tilly.
Tilly shrugged. “Don’t ask me. The chickens were Mom’s, not mine.”
Fine. Two minutes later, Quinn stood staring at the hens, who were flapping their wings and making threatening noises. “Hey,” she said. “This wasn’t my idea.”
A few of them ran right in her path and she nearly fell to her ass trying to get out of their way. “Stay cool,” she told herself and headed to the boxes where the majority of the hens sat. “I just need the eggs, ladies, that’s all.”
Not a single hen left her perch, all of them mutinously holding guard.
Quinn did as Greta had suggested. She waved her hands and said, “Shoo!”
No one shooed. All of them stared at her with beady black eyes.
“Great.” She drew in a breath and made eye contact with the hen closest to her. “Hi there. You’re pretty, very pretty.” She could see the smooth curve of an egg peeking out from beneath the bird. “And hey, I’m sure you’re used to this, right? So you won’t mind if I just . . .” She tried to pilfer the egg and the hen went batshit crazy, squawking and trying to peck Quinn’s hand off.
Staying cool went out the window. Quinn screamed and ran. She got to the back door of the café and put her hand to her chest to keep her pounding heart inside. By some miracle she still had the basket in her hand.
Greta let her in and looked down at the empty basket.
Quinn gasped for air. “I barely got out with my life.”
Greta rolled her eyes and pointed to Tilly. “Honey, you’re up.”
Tilly hopped off the counter.
“Wait a minute,” Quinn said. “You know how to get eggs?”
“Duh.”
“Why didn’t you just do it in the first place?”
Tilly flashed a smile. “’Cause this was more fun.”
A few minutes later she came back in, basket full of eggs. She handed them over. “Okay, so yeah. I gotta go now.”
“Where?” Quinn asked.