SUGAR & SCANDAL

The health inspector’s letter was propped against the espresso machine like a death threat.

_30 DAYS TO COMPLY OR CLOSE._

I ripped it down and shoved it under the register, next to the stack of unpaid vendor bills and my dad’s old recipe cards. Rossi’s Diner had survived the 2008 recession, a grease fire in 2016, and my Nonna’s funeral when we ran out of her secret marinara. It wasn’t going to die because of a busted walk-in freezer and a city inspector named Keith who’d had a vendetta against my family since high school.

The dining room was empty. Again. It was 3:17pm on a Thursday and the only thing I’d sold today was a black coffee to Mrs. Alvarez, who tipped me in expired coupons.

I untied my apron and threw it on the counter. Flour puffed into the air like surrender. The flour canister was half empty. The walk-in was still broken. And the bank had called twice this morning.

Rossi’s was bleeding out, and I was out of bandages.

The bell above the door chimed.

“We’re closed,” I said without looking up. My voice came out cracked. I hadn’t talked to anyone but Priya in two days.

“I’m not here for the food.”

That voice. Low, sharp, like a knife sliding through cold buttercream.

My head snapped up so fast my neck cracked.

Ethan Cole stood in my diner.

Black chef’s coat buttoned to the throat, sleeves pushed up to reveal forearms covered in tattoos. Knife scars on his knuckles. Hair a little too long, like he’d been running his hands through it. He looked like he’d walked straight off the set of _Restaurant Wars_ and into my personal hell.

He was also the last person on earth I wanted to see.

He was the man who’d spit out my tiramisu on live TV last season and told 4 million viewers it “tasted like desperation and bad decisions.”

The same man I’d called a “talentless, over-plated fraud with a God complex” before launching a cannoli at his perfect, arrogant jawline.

The clip went viral in 3 hours. #CannoliGate had 80M views. My diner got 2 stars on Yelp overnight. His restaurant got a Michelin star the next week.

“Get out,” I said. My hands were shaking. I curled them into fists to hide it.

He didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Instead, he slid a thick manila envelope across the sticky counter. It stopped right next to a ring from a coffee cup.

“Channel 8 wants you back on _Restaurant Wars_.”

I let out a laugh. It sounded unhinged, even to me. “So you can humiliate me again on national television? Hard pass. I’d rather set the kitchen on fire myself.”

“Not as a contestant.” His blue eyes were ice. They flicked to the health inspector’s notice sticking out from under the register. He’d seen it. Of course he had. “As my partner.”

The word didn’t make sense. “Your what.”

He leaned in over the counter. I smelled cedar and smoke and something clean, like expensive soap. It was infuriating that he smelled good.

“They want us to fake date for the show. Six weeks of filming. We convince America we’re in love. We win, you get the $500k prize and save this place.” His gaze cut around the empty diner. “I get to rehab my image after you made me TikTok’s most hated chef.”

My brain short-circuited. “You want to fake date. Me. The woman who assaulted you with Italian pastry.”

“Producers’ idea.” His jaw ticked. “They think it’s good TV. Enemies to lovers. The cannoli couple. America loves a redemption arc.”

“I’d rather sell the diner for parts than be in the same room as you for six minutes, let alone six weeks.”

“You can’t sell it,” he said quietly. Too quietly. “Your dad’s name is still on the deed. And the bank forecloses in 30 days.”

My blood turned to ice water. “How do you know that?”

“I did my research, Mia.” He pushed the envelope closer. My name was typed on the front in bold: MIA ROSSI. “Sign by midnight, or watch your family legacy become a parking lot for the new condos going up on Main Street.”

He knew about the condos. He knew about the bank. He knew about my dad.

Panic clawed up my throat. “You don’t get to talk about my dad.”

“I’m not.” He stood up straight. He was taller than I remembered. Broader. The TV cameras didn’t show how he took up space. “I’m giving you a choice. The same choice you didn’t give me when you ruined my reputation.”

“That’s not—”

“Isn’t it?” He cut me off. “One review from me and your Yelp tanks. One cannoli from you and I get death threats for a month. We’re even, Rossi. This is me offering a truce.”

It wasn’t a truce. It was a hostage situation.

He turned to leave. His boots were silent on the tile floor. At the door, with his hand on the brass handle my dad installed in 1998, he paused.

“Oh, and Mia?” He didn’t turn around. “We’ll be sharing a kitchen for the challenges. And a hotel room. Network’s rules for ‘authenticity.’”

The door shut behind him. The bell gave a sad little jingle.

I stood there for a full minute, staring at the door. Then I looked at the envelope. At the health inspector’s letter. At the photo of my dad and me on the wall, from opening day 1995. I was 6 years old, missing a tooth, holding a spatula bigger than my head.

Then I picked up the phone and called my best friend.

“Priya,” I said when she answered. “If I have to fake date a man I hate to save the diner, does that make me a sellout or a genius?”

There was a pause. Then: “It makes you a Rossi. What did the bastard offer you?”

I told her.

She was quiet for a long time. “Mia. $500k saves the diner. It pays off the debt. It buys a new walk-in. It gives you Dad’s legacy back.”

“I have to live with him, Pri.”

“You lived with me in college. How bad can he be?”

“He told 4 million people my tiramisu tasted like desperation.”

“And you gave him a concussion with a cannoli. I think you can handle him.”

I looked at the contract again. 47 pages. I could see clause 19 from here: _Participants will share living quarters._

“Six weeks,” I whispered. “I can survive anything for six weeks.”

“Exactly. It’s just business. You hate him, he hates you, you win the money, you never see him again.”

It sounded simple when she said it. It sounded impossible when I thought about being trapped in a hotel room with Ethan Cole. With his eyes and his voice and the way he’d looked at me like he knew every bad decision I’d ever made.

I hung up and pulled the contract out of the envelope.

Clause 12: _No physical intimacy unless pre-approved by producers._

Clause 19: _Participants will share living quarters to “enhance authenticity.”_

Clause 33: _If either party reveals the relationship is fake, they forfeit all prize money and pay $1M in damages._

It was indentured servitude with better lighting.

At 11:58pm, I signed my name. _Mia Rossi_. The pen shook so hard the ‘i’ looked like a stab wound.

Twelve hours later, I was in a black SUV with tinted windows heading to Napa. Ethan Cole sat across from me, typing on his phone, pretending I didn’t exist. He was wearing a different black chef’s coat. No tattoos visible today. He looked bored.

The producer in the front seat turned around. A red light on her camera was already blinking. “First question for the happy couple! What do you love most about each other?”

Ethan didn’t look up from his phone. “Her right hook. She throws a mean cannoli.”

I smiled so hard my cheeks hurt. The camera loved it. “I love his humility. And his ability to make grown men cry over risotto.”

The producer literally clapped. “This is gold! Keep that energy!”

I wanted to throw up.

The hotel was a villa at a vineyard. Romantic. Isolated. Probably booked for honeymooners. The producer handed us a single key card.

“One king bed,” she said with a wink. “Network thought it would help you ‘bond.’”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said out loud.

Ethan dropped his duffel bag on the terracotta floor. It landed with a thud. “Relax, Rossi. I don’t sleep with liars. Or women who weaponize pastry.”

“Good. Because I don’t sleep with egomaniacs who can’t take a critique.”

He finally looked at me. Really looked. And stepped closer. Too close. I could see the flecks of grey in his blue eyes. I could count his eyelashes. I could see the tiny scar through his left eyebrow.

“Who what, Mia?” His voice was lower now. Just for me.

Who make my knees weak when you’re angry. Who I dreamed about hating for 12 months. Who I watched on YouTube at 3am after my dad died.

I stepped back and hit the wall. “Who can’t take a joke.”

His mouth twitched. Not quite a smile. Not quite cruel. “We’ll see who’s laughing in 6 weeks, cannoli girl.”

THANK YOU FOR READING 💫💕