No games.
“Look, Hadley, I’m crazy about you.”
His eyes were closed at first. He thought that would make it easier. But then he realized that part of the whole “no games” thing should be knowing and understanding how she felt. He couldn’t do that without looking at her. He opened his eyes and immediately returned his chair to its original position across from her and took in everything about her reaction, which so far was nothing more than wide eyes and a bottom lip captured by her teeth.
Max inhaled and continued. “And I know we talked about all the reasons now isn’t the time to try being anything more than friends, but—”
“Those reasons are still there, Max.”
“I know. I know. But so much has happened since then—”
“Yeah . . . like neither of us have a manager anymore!” She laughed and swiped at her eyes. “I don’t know what’s going to happen with At Home with Hadley. I mean, Leo had already arranged a few things, like the house and the crew, but we were still in the middle of contract negotiations. And you—they’re bringing back To the Max, right? What do you think that would look like, with you traveling all over the world, and us trying to carry on any sort of relationship?” She sighed. “I’m crazy about you too. I am. But I can’t date. Not right now. Remember how I talked about being confused before? What do you think today has done for my confusion level?” With a sad but determined smile, she continued. “And the fact is, even just a couple weeks ago I was being handed everything I had ever worked toward, but now I may have to get a little scrappy.”
He was more impetuous than she was. He knew that. But even he had to admit she brought up some very valid concerns. Concerns that he knew he could dismantle one by one, if given the chance, but they were valid nonetheless. And at the core of it all was that unrelenting fear that he could lose her from his life altogether. He just couldn’t let that happen.
He noticed Vikram exiting the kitchen with their starters so he sat up straight and prepared the table for the food’s landing.
“Okay,” Max said as he smoothed out the tablecloth and raised his eyes to meet hers. “For now. We’ll take some time. Sort some things out.” Regardless of anything else either one of them had going on in their careers, he had six more weeks with her. Six weeks in which he got to spend at least three days a week with her. That would have to be good enough for now.
He’d even try to refrain from kissing her, but he made no guarantees.
28. Let rest. Serve warm.
HADLEY
Where are you? You Know Who is about to blow a gasket because we’re already ten minutes behind and WE HAVE SO MUCH TO DO! (His shouting. Not mine.)
It was time to begin our last night of filming for Renowned, and Max was not yet at my house.
Why do you always call him You Know Who? Are you afraid Marshall Simons is intercepting our texts?
Would you put it past him? Now, Maxwell Cavanagh, WHERE IN TARNATION ARE YOU? (My shouting.)
I’m just crossing over the bridge into Brooklyn. Be there in ten minutes.
I grinned. Sometimes he had the sense of humor of a dad from an eighties sitcom. I walked out of my bedroom, where I had been hiding from the panic of You Know Who, and headed downstairs to the front door. I ignored the shouts as I passed and opened the door with a grin.
“You’re so predictable,” I greeted him.
He smiled as he stepped inside. “How are you?”
“Nervous. You?”
He took off his leather racer jacket and hung it up as I closed the door. “Why are you nervous?”
“You know how these last interviews go,” I replied through clenched teeth. “Do you remember Wolfgang Puck’s season?”
“You mean when Simons had him so flustered, Wolfgang kept mispronouncing Spago?” He threw his arm over my shoulders and we walked toward the kitchen together. “Nothing to worry about. There’s nothing left for him to throw at us.”
“At you, anyway. You’ve talked about everything—anger, your dad, rehab . . .” My voice trailed off, though I silently added, “Miss Fancy Pants Kitty Cat.” “But he hasn’t asked me to dig very deep yet.”
“That’s just because you’re boring and the world’s interest in you is only skin deep.”
“Oh! Is that what it is? Well, that makes me feel much better. Thanks for that.”
He planted a quick kiss on my temple and said, “Anytime.”
When the news broke to the world, about five weeks earlier, that To the Max was returning to the Culinary Channel, it hadn’t taken much time at all for Max Cavanagh to become Max Cavanagh again. At least in the world’s eyes. He was once again in demand for social events and interviews and various television appearances. And, as Leo had forewarned me would be the case, Max definitely became the star of Renowned. But I don’t think anyone knew quite what to do with a Max Cavanagh who didn’t shout or throw things, and who turned down almost all of those events and interviews and TV appearances.
We had meteoric ratings success with episode one, and climbed even higher with episode two, of course. And then most of those viewers stuck around for episode three. But since then, we’d fallen sharply. Ratings were still very solid by Renowned standards, but Chef Simons had abandoned Renowned standards. I’m pretty sure he’d been hoping for some amalgamation of Survivor and The Bachelor, in which Max either gave me a rose each week or I extinguished his tiki torch. The Renowned Max and I loved so much—in which food was the focus, as well as the catalyst to discovering the heart and soul of the chef—had seemingly disappeared before our eyes under the pressure to produce ratings and viral clickbait.
“Chef Max!” Chef Simons exclaimed as soon as we walked in. “Where have you been? We have so much to do!”
“Yes, so I heard. Apologies, Chef. I got tied up on a business call.”
“All right, let’s get you both in the living room,” Lowell commanded.
I had very mixed emotions about the season wrapping. It would be nice to have my house back—or at least have it down to sharing it with only one film crew. And I wouldn’t be sad to see Chef Simons go. I’d reached the conclusion he was sort of like the Wizard of Oz—seeing the man behind the curtain had been extremely disenchanting. And it would be nice to have more time available again to focus on restaurants and the magazine.
Beyond that, I wasn’t allowing myself to think about what life would look like once filming wrapped.
“This is either going to be fun or a train wreck,” Max said to me as we sat on the loveseat together.
With all that we’d had thrust upon us over the course of eight weeks, we hadn’t had a single joint interview, outside of the kitchen. Apart from that, though, we’d been run through the entire Renowned gamut. From increasingly absurd cooking competitions to visits with chefs we’d competed against on America’s Fiercest Chef; hidden cameras that never caught anything of consequence to on-location filming scenarios that reinforced the feeling that we were on the first-ever season of The Bachelor: In the Kitchen. Max and I had joked that they’d probably have us cooking in a hot tub before all was said and done.
“I’m leaning toward train wreck,” I whispered. “Don’t you think it’s weird that we’re just now sitting down with Chef Simons together? Doesn’t it feel like we’re about to have the rug pulled out from under us?”