Prologue
HADLEY
“Okay, everyone! We’re back in twenty. Places, please.”
“You okay, Had?” Stuart, my longtime friend, collaborator, and, on this set, the assistant director, asked me with concern as he crossed from Max’s kitchen space to mine.
I smiled. At least, I attempted a smile. My competitor was rapidly taking away my reasons to smile, one by one. But that wasn’t Stuart’s fault. “I’m fine, thanks. I’m less sure about our friend Chef Cavanagh over there.”
Stuart rolled his eyes and nodded. “I’m so glad this is our last segment.” He backed away from me with a grimace and then shouted, “Ten seconds!”
I cleared my throat and straightened my apron, looking down at my coconut-curry chicken and naan waffles one last time to make sure I wasn’t missing something important, like the chicken. Or the waffles. I figured I could make just about anything else work for the judges—and with how stressful the day had been, thanks to my fellow chef’s antics, I figured if the main ingredients made the plate, I could call the day a success.
Stuart’s verbal countdown ended after four, and I kept my eyes on his fingers—three, two, one. I was ready to hear the outcome of a long day in the kitchen, and I was more than ready to put an end to a miserable two days of filming alongside Max Cavanagh.
First there were eight. Now there are two. Which of these landmark, on-the-brink-of-legend chefs will be crowned America’s Fiercest Chef? We’re about to find out.
I tried to listen to the host, Xavier Stone, as he gave a quick recap of all we had been through over the course of our two days of filming, which would play out as six separate episodes, spread out across six weeks of Culinary Channel can’t-miss viewing. But, as I had been for the entirety of two days, I was too distracted by my competitor to focus on a single thing happening in the moment.
“I’m sorry,” Max muttered, actually turning and facing my direction, not seeming to care one little bit that the cameras were on us. “Did he just say ‘on the brink’? Did he say we’re on-the-brink-of-legend?”
“Oh my gosh, please stop!” I seethed through my teeth.
“Cut!” The director called out the command, and everyone in the studio groaned. It was a familiar call-and-answer of which we’d all had enough. We’d all be professionals and prepare to do our jobs, Max Cavanagh would decide not to be a professional and not do his job, then we’d all have to stop and repeat the cycle from the top—over and over for two days, like a chicken on a rotisserie grill.
“Chef, what’s the problem this time?” Glenn, the director, asked from his chair.
Max shoved his knives aside and hopped up on the counter. As he did, the knives tumbled to the ground, taking a beautiful cut of unused Wagyu ribeye with them.
“The problem is, Glenn, that it’s insulting for you to refer to us as on-the-brink. I mean, considering the ratings we get for this network, and considering my nine Michelin stars, I’d say we deserve better. You’re with me on that, right, Hayley?”
Oh, where to begin.
I shook my head and opened my mouth to speak. I was prepared to tell him that I most assuredly was not with him. I couldn’t have been less with him.
Until two days ago, I had looked up to him as a brilliant chef and a masterful businessman, not to mention an engaging television personality. At thirty-six he was only three years older than me, but he’d reached pinnacles in his career that I didn’t anticipate reaching until I was no longer young enough to enjoy them, if I ever reached them at all. It was amazing how quickly the awareness that he was a complete and total jerk had gotten in the way of my esteem. He wasn’t legendary. Jacques Pépin was legendary. Wolfgang Puck was legendary. Julia Child was a legend among legends.
Maxwell Cavanagh was a spoiled little boy with a haircut he stole from Hugh Grant, circa 1994, and a propensity toward underseasoning his stocks and bases.
“It’s Hadley,” I mumbled as I crossed to his kitchen space to pick the gorgeous, expensive meat off the ground. And I have two Michelin stars of my own, thank you very much. I didn’t say that, of course. How pretentious that would have sounded.
“Hadley, Stuart’s got that,” Glenn called out.
Stuart was, indeed, fully capable. In addition to working on America’s Fiercest Chef, he was the director on my weekly show. He also happened to be my oldest friend and probably the only reason I was on television, so I knew him to be extremely capable.
I handed the meat to Stuart after he had carefully scooped up Max’s MAC knife set and gingerly passed it to a production assistant to take and clean. “Here you go,” I whispered with an apologetic smile.
“Thanks,” Stuart replied, once again rolling his eyes.
As I stood back to my feet and realized Chef Cavanagh was towering over me from his perch just a couple feet away, I questioned what I was doing there. I don’t just mean picking up the steak. Why had I stuck around for two days of demeaning treatment from a chef I had once admired but whose cooking skills were actually very much on the same level as mine, apart from the underseasoning? Yes, To the Max was the number-one show on the network, but At Home with Hadley was number two—and gaining ground all the time.
Why hadn’t I corrected him more vehemently when he called me Hayley for the eighth time? Why hadn’t I told him that his béchamel needed more nutmeg? And why had I picked up the blasted meat that had landed on the floor as a result of his temper tantrum?
“Thanks, doll.” He hopped down from the counter and leered at me as he returned to his mark, as if nothing had happened.
Doll?
“Did you seriously just call me doll?” I asked.
Glenn, who was typically heard and not seen, was suddenly standing beside us. He leaned in closer to Max and softly asked, “What would you prefer, Chef? Would you rather we just go with ‘legendary’?”
I scoffed, and they both turned to face me.
“Is there a problem, Hadley?” Glenn asked.
I lifted my hands in the air and, as my jaw dropped, looked around the room. Seriously? Is anyone else hearing this? My level of confusion and frustration grew as I realized both Glenn and Max were looking at me with accusation in their eyes—as if I was slowing down production—and yet no one else seemed to be clued in.
Why am I just now hearing it?
“Chef,” I corrected him hesitantly.
“Yes?” Max answered.
I shook my head and cleared my throat, focusing entirely on Glenn and doing all I could to pretend Max wasn’t there. “No, I mean . . . you should call me Chef. You refer to Chef Cavanagh that way, and I’d appreciate it if—”
They turned away from me. Turned away!
I took a deep breath and attempted to tune out their discussion regarding the proper usage of the term legendary.
Anise. Broiler. Colander. Dough. Egg timer.
My tried-and-true trick of calming down by alphabetically listing items found in the kitchen had failed me spectacularly before I got to fondue set, and I felt heat rising in my cheeks. Just about the time the rushing blood reached my temples, resulting in a whoosh pulsing through my ears—similar to the sound of the ocean but ever-so-slightly tinged with the ambiance of chainsaws and screeching owls—Stuart entered my periphery with a kind smile.