Gabe kicked him under the table, appalled but envious.

"So?" Melissa-something-or-other, the chef responsible for the foul-tasting vegan spa cuisine, asked. "Was I right, or what?"

"Or what," Patrick muttered, balling his napkin up beside his plate.

"You were right," Gabe said and pushed his own mouthful of bitter mush into his cheek away from his taste buds. "This is really something."

"Well?" She smiled broadly like a cat with her eye on the canary. "When do I start?"

Patrick laughed, but quickly coughed to cover it, so Gabe didn't bother kicking him again.

He managed to swallow the mess in his mouth, took a huge sip of the unsweetened berry smoothie to wash it down and was appalled to discover she'd somehow made berries taste bad, too.

He'd interviewed and auditioned five chefs and this one really was the bottom of a very dark, very deep barrel.

"Well—" he smiled and lied through his teeth"—I have a few more interviews this week, so I will have to get back to you."

The girl looked disappointed and a little mean-spirited, which wasn't going to help her get the job. "You know," she said, "it's not going to be easy to find someone willing to live out here in the middle of nowhere."

"I understand that," he said graciously, even though it was getting hard not to throw her out on her scrawny butt.

"And it's a brand-new inn." She shrugged. "It's not like you have the credentials to get a—"

"Well, then." He stood up and interrupted the little shit's defeating diatribe before she got to the part about how he was ugly and his father dressed