Jessica gave her such a helpless look that Lily couldn't help but smile. "I'm guessing you don't share my passion for makeup." She splayed her fingers across her chest. "'Be still my heart. I find that completely shocking."
"According to my sister, it's nothing short of heresy'"
Lily laughed. "At the very least."
"Yes, well, not all of us are slaves to fashion."
"Oh, honey, of course we are. You obviously just haven't met the right consultant yet." Until now . There was nothing more frustrating to Lily than untapped potential, and seeing Jessica's made her itch to do a complete makeover.
Not only was the other woman's face devoid of makeup, her medium-brown hair was much too long and bushy for her narrow face, overwhelming its delicate bone structure. Lily didn't need labels to recognize quality clothing when she saw it, and she could tell at a glance that Jessica's sweater was an expensive one. But the color was all wrong for the brunette, muddying her fair complexion, and it was too bulky for her slender frame. Her jeans were fine, but those shoes were a nightmare. They looked like a potato farmer's brogues.
It wasn't up to her to barge in and start rearranging anyone's life, however, so she simply smiled and turned back to the marvelous kitchen she'd been given permission to play in. But wiggling her painted toes appreciatively in her own Cuban-heeled, open-toed, retro pumps, she thought dryly. So I won't barge. I can hold off for a day .
She was immersed in deep admiration for all the wonderful gadgets and the well-stocked pantry when Jessica said uncertainly, '"Well, you'd probably like me to get out of your way."
Lily swung around. "Oh, no; don't go. I could use your help familiarizing myself with where everything is. That is—oh, dear, I'm being presumptuous, supposing you don't have anything better to do, or that you ordinarily spend a minute longer in a kitchen than you have to, aren't I? I'm sorry. Am I keeping you?"
Jessica laughed, and it was a surprisingly bawdy sound, as if someone had just told her a deliciously dirty joke. "No, you're not keeping me from anything more pressing than a quilt I'm working on, and as my family would be the first to tell you, that's merely a hobby. As for spending time in the kitchen, considering I'm the one responsible for that abysmal offering in the dining room this morning, I leave it to you to determine if I should be allowed in one."
Lily grinned, then headed for the refrigerator to see what she had to work with. "I'm going to take a wild leap here and assume you're not as crazy about cooking as I am."
"As a matter of fact, I have a feeling I might actually enjoy it, but I haven't had much opportunity to find out."
"Wait, don't tell me. Would that be because you've always had a cook to do for you?"
"Something like that."
"Well, poor little rich girl. You're not expecting a lot of sympathy from me, I trust." It wasn't until the words left her mouth that Lily realized what she'd said. With a jolt, it occurred to her that she felt nearly as comfortable with the other woman as she did with her friend Mimi in Laguna, which explained why she hadn't even hesitated to give her a bad time.
To her relief, Jessica seemed to feel the same way.
"Actually," she said, "I think you should feel very sorry for me. You have no idea what a sad tale I have to tell."
"Yeah?" Lily started pulling ingredients out of the fridge, giving Jessica a wry look as she passed the items to the other woman to set on the counter. She twirled one hand like royalty granting an audience. "So spill."
"Richard, Cassidy, and I are—are you prepared for this?—the 'poor' relations in the Beaumont clan."
Lily gave a mock gasp.
Jessica flashed a smile that transformed her face from plain to almost pretty. "I know. Shocking, isn't it? Mama was one of those women for whom appearance is everything, so of course we had a cook, as did everyone in our set. The difference was, while we merely appeared to be wealthy, they actually were. If there had been any real money in our part of the family, I might have been allowed in the kitchen. But only genuinely rich girls can afford to behave as if they don't have a bean to their names. What we had," she said with a shrug, "was connections." Then, with the slightest hint of bitterness, she added to herself, "Yes indeed. We certainly do have those all important connections."
Lily didn't know her well enough to ask what that was all about, so she merely said lightly, "Well, I don't have a connection to my name outside the restaurant industry. But stick with me, kid, and I can at least teach you to cook."
"Really?"
"Oh, yeah. Absolutely."
Jessica came to stand by her side. "What are you going to make?"
"Just something very basic this morning, since we're a little pressed for time. We'll do scrambled egg-stuffed breakfast pitas and a cantaloupe-blueberry salad. Will your husband and sister be joining us?"
"I… imagine."
"I wasn't sure if they'd already left for work."
"Oh, no, the office for B Networks is upstairs in the east wing."
"Okay, then, we'll plan on seven." She indicated the eggs, mushrooms, red pepper, onion, and cheese assembled on the counter. "You see anything here that anyone can't eat?"
"No."
"Excellent. I'll make a poppyseed dressing for the salad first so it can chill while I get everything else ready."
"What can I do?"
"Cut the cantaloupe and assemble the salads," Lily replied, reaching for a bowl. "Do crosswise slices."
Jessica raised her eyebrows, and Lily demonstrated what she meant, cutting the melon the long way, then handing the other woman the knife. She turned back to her own station and scraped a carton of vanilla yogurt into the bowl and added some lemon juice and poppy-seeds. A few minutes later she glanced up from grating orange zest in the bowl. "I think I saw some Boston lettuce leaves in the fridge, so when you're done there, get those out and put a few on each plate to make a bed. Then add four or five slices of cantaloupe and sprinkle them with a handful of blueberries." She whipped the dressing, covered it with plastic wrap, and placed it in the freezer for a quick chill. Then she went to work chopping the vegetables.
"How do you do that?" Jessica demanded a moment later.
"What?"
"Chop that fast without slicing off a finger."
Lily laughed. "Practice. Training."
"Can you teach me how to do it?"
"Sure. C'mere." When Jessica joined her, she held up her left hand. "The trick is keeping your fingers tucked under. See?" She demonstrated how to pin down the green onions in such a way that there were no horizontal protrusions to accidentally cut off. Finishing the onions, she julienned the red pepper, then offered the knife to Jessica. "You want to try it on the these?"
Jessica did better than she'd anticipated, but in no way did she attain anything close to Lily's speed. She laughed and went back to removing the last of the rinds from the cantaloupe slices. "I can see it'll take a little practice."
Lily wagged her eyebrows. "Meet me here an hour before each meal and I can give you plenty of that."
"I just might." Jessica smiled and scraped the rinds into the compost bucket Ernestine kept next to the sink. She hadn't expected this, she realized as she washed and dried her hands, then collected salad plates from the cupboard and set them out on the counter to adorn with lettuce leaves. She hadn't expected to like Lily this much, to feel this almost instant sense of kinship with her, as if they were best friends from grade school who'd just met up again and taken right up where they'd left off.
And wasn't that amazing? With Lily's blonde bombshell looks, sparkly jewelry, and wiggly walk, she was exactly the sort of woman who usually made Jessica feel about as exciting as yesterday's leftovers. She was one of the girly-girls, those ultrafeminine types who seemed to know instinctively all the things that escaped Jess. What colors to wear, which makeup to buy, how to put together an ensemble that made the most of one's assets. A woman like Cassidy.