Lizbet fights to keep her composure. Mario Subiaco? Almost involuntarily, Lizbet looks over at JJ. His mouth has fallen open a bit.
“I’m Mario Subiaco,” Mario Subiaco says, offering Lizbet his hand. “The chef of the Blue Bar.”
The Blue Bar. Of course—Mario Subiaco used to be the pastry chef at the Blue Bistro, which was Nantucket’s best restaurant before it closed in 2005. Mario Subiaco is the OG Nantucket celebrity chef. JJ keeps Mario’s picture—clipped from a profile of him in Vanity Fair that was written just after the Blue Bistro shut its doors—taped to his office wall! Lizbet thought Mario Subiaco was in Los Angeles working as a private chef for Dwayne Johnson. But apparently he’s here now.
Holy buckets, Xavier, she thinks. Good job.
“Lizbet Keaton,” Lizbet says, shaking his hand. “I’m the general manager of the hotel.”
“Yes,” he says. “I know.”
“You’re Mario Subiaco!” JJ sounds like a nine-year-old Pop Warner quarterback who’s meeting Tom Brady. “You’re a legend, man!”
Mario nods. “Thanks, that makes me feel really old. Who are you?”
“JJ O’Malley,” he says. “I’m the chef/owner of the Deck.”
Mario shrugs. “Never heard of it. But as a fellow chef, I’m going to ask you to let Lizbet here get to work.” Mario checks with Lizbet. “If that’s what you want?”
Suddenly, Lizbet is mortified that her messy personal life is on display in the parking lot like this, JJ with his serial-killer beard in his clogs, holding his phone （playing Dido）， a dozen roses on the ground by his feet.
Lizbet smiles at JJ. “So good to see you again.” Making a clean exit, she turns on her heel and follows Mario into the building. She hears the Dido song cut off. When she looks back, she catches a glimpse of JJ staring forlornly after her. Revenge—check, she thinks, and she feels a little sorry for him.
When Lizbet and Mario reach the service kitchen—which will be used for the complimentary continental breakfast and lunch by the pool—Lizbet says, “Thank you, but you didn’t have to step in.”
“I saw him grab you,” Mario says. “I thought maybe you needed saving.”
Immediately, Lizbet’s starstruck awe diminishes. “I can take care of myself,” Lizbet says. “And a lot of other people besides.”
Mario has the gall to wink at her. “I’m guessing that was your ex-boyfriend, showing up to propose?”
It’s none of Mario Subiaco’s business who it was, but Lizbet doesn’t need a feud between the hotel and the bar on the first day; there’s plenty of time for that later.
“I should probably get upstairs,” Lizbet says.
“I lied to him, you know,” Mario says.
“Excuse me?”
“I told him I’d never heard of the Deck. I’ve been away from the island, sure, but I haven’t been living on Mars. You two did some real stuff at that place, huh? A rosé fountain? Wish I’d thought of that seventeen years ago. And I heard the food was banging.”
“‘Those were the days, my friend, we thought they’d never end,’” Lizbet says. “Oh, but end they did. I left the Deck and I left him. We’ll see what happens this summer.”
Mario smirks. “This summer, I steal all his customers.”
God, you’re cocky, Lizbet thinks—or maybe in her caffeine mania she actually whispers it, because Mario bursts out laughing. “I know you need to be upstairs to start your very important general managing, but can I ask your quick opinion on something?” He waves her into the gleaming white-and-stainless-steel kitchen of the Blue Bar. Lizbet watches him for a second, thinking she’d like to put her stiletto right up his ass. It’s only seven thirty in the morning and she’s already had enough of chefs for one day.
But she follows him anyway.
“I was just back here doing a little mixology,” Mario says. “Come see.” He leads Lizbet over to a wide butcher block made of zebrawood—they spared no expense down here—that’s crowded with fruit. There are tiny wild strawberries, kaffir limes, watermelons, blood oranges, kiwis, dragon fruits, rambutans, mangoes, two kinds of cherries （bing and golden Rainier）， guavas, blackberries, coconuts, grapefruits, and something that looks like—yes, it is—a pink pineapple. It’s a fruit festival, a fruit jamboree, a fruit rave. Down the counter is the alcohol, all top-shelf: Plymouth gin, Finlandia vodka, Casa Dragones tequila. Lizbet is impressed from a cost standpoint alone.