The Billionaire’s Full Figured Desire

“It was just a joke, sir,” Frida said in a bored voice. The way she was handling this definitely went against the procedure, and pretty much every known rule of professionalism, but at this point, she couldn’t say that she cared very much. Her mind was pretty preoccupied at the present. “We take customer satisfaction very seriously, which is why we’re going to replace your meal for you at no charge.”

Frida could tell from the man’s stance and demeanor that he wanted the fight, but in the end, he decided against it. Which was wise. He nodded gruffly. “Thank you,” he murmured.

“My pleasure, sir.” Frida nodded. “Andrew! Re-fire that Eggs Benny, and fry those eggs this time. No runny yolks, yes?”

“Heard, Chef.” Andrew nodded, his back to Frida as he’d already begun to relay the orders to the line cooks.

Frida sighed a sigh of relief as she headed back to her office. That wasn’t too difficult or stressful. And stress was one thing she was trying to avoid today; soon she was going to have more stress than she could shake a stick at, and there really was no need to lump more stress on top of that. Like she always said, avoiding stress was the secret to long life, and maybe one day, if she was very lucky and enough customers stayed out of her

way, she’d even managed to live for a while herself!

As soon as she got back to her office, she rolled her eyes. The clock was still there, sitting on her desk. This was the reason why she couldn’t get anything done, people kept interrupting her! It was as if nobody even wanted her to fix her clock! Frida decided to have a look at the piles and piles of paperwork on her desk and get to fixing the clock in a moment. Hours passed, and by noon, she still hadn’t gotten to it.

Even with the fateful tick-tocking of the clock forever in the back of her mind, like a splinter in her skull driving her mad, Frida kicked the can down the road of fixing the clock until finally, at about one-thirty, the fateful hour fell down upon them. Standing at the Head Chef’s favored position in the doorway, she spotted him as soon as he came in. Terrence Harrison.

Frida was surprised that she even recognized him, he looked so different. He wore a collared polo shirt, khaki pants, and “sensible” Converse trainers. And was that gel in his hair? He looked like a dad, who was also really into golf. Like, more interested in golf than he was his own kids. Which, sadly, was a lot of dads. Frida supposed that this attire supported her theory about him not turning up wearing his usual suit, that would’ve been far too recognizable, especially so early in the day. He would’ve looked like a lawyer, or a banker, and there weren’t too many of those this part of town.

All-in-all, Frida had to admit that she was impressed with Terrence’s ability to stand out when he felt like it, and blend in so well whenever he chose. She definitely would not have him pegged to be a food critic if she didn’t know exactly who he was. But her surprise overseeing Terrence did nothing to quiet the doubtful voices in her head that kept her anxiety over not knowing what Terrence planned to do at an all-time high. Against what they had agreed, she attempted to catch his eye but he was looking firmly away from her. Frida had a sneaking suspicion that Terrence knew exactly what she was trying to do and was making every effort to stop it, which she considered for the best, in the grand scheme of things. She may have not known what he was thinking, but she knew that she herself had made an executive decision; she was not going to sabotage the restaurant’s reputation. Under any circumstance. She’d tried to make that clear to Terrence before, but whether he’d got the message was none of her concern.

“Andrew,” Frida said softly. “We’ve got a walk-in. Let’s look alive, shall we?”

Andrew shrugged. “Talk to the Front of House staff, boss, you know the drill.”

Frida knew that she wasn’t supposed to be interfering, or indeed eavesdropping in any way, shape, or form, but she couldn’t help herself. And in fact, she was moved to wonder if she’d always known, deep down, that she wouldn’t be able to help herself. She honestly couldn’t say for sure. All she knew was that she couldn’t resist sidling up the very corner of the counter, where she was closest to Terrence’s table, and eavesdropping under the pretense of wiping the counter down.

She couldn’t hear much, mostly just Terrence talking to the waiter, whose name was Felix, about this and that. Frida was listening for something, anything, that she could use to gauge whether or not Terrence was going to be setting out to give them a good or a bad review. Or, more accurately, an honest or an unfair review. Frida couldn’t hear much at all, and if she stayed wiping that small section of the counter down, then people were bound to get suspicious, which was exactly what nobody wanted. So, using her cleaning cloth, she worked her way down the counter just to keep up the appearance and then disappeared back into the kitchen. Andrew was tearing a ticket out of the mini-printer on the little table by the door.

“Order on,” he said importantly. “Chicken tagliatelle, extra parm, no garlic. Seems pretty straightforward. I’ll handle this one, boss.”

Frida nodded. “You do that, Andrew. Call me if you need anything. Actually, I’ll just be here…you know…in case.”

Andrew gave Frida an accusatory look like he was accusing her of micromanaging him, but he soon lost interest in this and went back to his job. Frida watched every step of the making process of the dish to go out, a plate of tagliatelle pasta cooked in a creamy reduction and stirred together with sliced and seasoned chicken breast.

It was a simple dish, made with double cream that had been flavored with chicken stock, but it had beauty and elegance in its simplicity, and Frida was glad that Terrence had chosen it because it was easy to make and yet packed an impressive punch. She knew that she was indeed micromanaging Andrew, despite him being much more experienced in the professional kitchen than she was, but she couldn’t help hanging around him like a tick on a bull as he personally prepared the meal.

Just as she expected from him, Andrew cooked the meal to perfection; he started with a generous helping of double cream, heating it gently in a saucepan before he added a half ladle of bubbling chicken stock, to flavor it. He continued simmering the sauce while the stock cooked off, releasing its aromatic scents into the air, and then added the tagliatelle, a type of pasta that was very similar to fettuccine in that it was long and flat, like a ribbon.

The pasta had been pre-cooked al dente, so it took less than five minutes before it was soft, and more importantly, had soaked up all the flavors of the cream. Lastly, Andrew sliced the pre-cooked chicken breast and stirred it into the mix before seasoning with some salt and pepper. After he plated it up, he sprinkled parmesan cheese on top.