CHAPTER 2

The night in Los Angeles buzzed, restless, like a wire that wouldn’t stop sparking. The market had its own rhythm—grease popping, voices calling, the air thick with garlic frying and sweet dough turning brown. The heat stuck to skin, damp and heavy.

Maeve Wells worked her stall, Maeve’s Bites, under a line of fairy lights that made the place look warmer than it really was. Her counter was just a slab of old wood, marked up with burns and knife scratches, nothing fancy. On the counter sat piles of tamales, steam curling off them, and empanadas that breathed out little bursts of heat every time she opened the lid. 

What people really came for was the jar sitting at the edge of the counter—her mango salsa. Which was very sweet. She cleaned her hand on the front of her apron, adding another dirt to the mess already there. Tugged the knot tighter, breathed out, and kept moving.

She was twenty two. Still young, yeah, but there was nothing soft about her. She carried a grit most people didn’t expect when they looked at her the first time. Small, wiry, tougher than she looked. Skin browned from too many hours in the sun. Curls that slipped loose no matter how many times she tied them back. And those hazel eyes—always alert, restless, cutting through the noise like they saw more than anyone wanted them to.

Her hands never stopped. Quick, practiced, moving on their own, like they’d learned the work years ago and didn’t need her to think anymore.

 The queue didn’t care that her sneakers were scuffed, that her nails had grease under them, that her fingers smelled like cumin. To them she was the miracle worker who could turn plain masa into something you wanted to call your own.

But she wasn’t thinking about the food tonight. Her eyes kept snagging on the flicker of a TV above the taco truck across the lane. Carter Langston’s press conference played on loop—his face filling the screen, that damn set of grey eyes making a fuss like he was daring the world to look away. The Langston Challenge. A billionaire putting up a contest for a wife. Maeve snorted, tossed a rag over her shoulder, and handed a foil tray to a waiting customer. “What kind of man picks a wife like he’s casting a reality show?” she muttered more to herself than anyone else.

Leo, her boyfriend leaned against the stall, lanky, relaxed in the way of someone trying to show he wasn’t worried but who was, actually. He jabbed a thumb at the screen. “You keep staring like you’re about to sock the TV, Maeve.” He attempted a grin that didn’t reach his eyes. “Seriously, what’s up?”

She jerked a thumb at the broadcast. “That. Him. Acting like women are trophies. It’s gross.” 

Still, even as the words left her mouth, his tone got to her. Cold, steady, too sure of himself. It slid under her skin before she could stop it.

 A dangerous curiosity she shoved back down. Hard.

Leo’s face dropped. “Forget him. We’ve got real stuff.” He folded his arms tighter. “Your mom’s hospital bill came. And Tommy’s tuition—due next week, right?”

A hollow opened up in Maeve’s chest. Her mom’s chemo ate money the way a sinkhole eats earth. Tommy freshman, wide-eyed, always sketching engines on napkins was supposed to get an education, not sit out classes while bills piled up. Aunt Rita who’d raised Maeve after her dad left—was barely keeping her own diner afloat. The stall was the family lifeline. It scraped by. It wasn’t close to enough.

Aunt Rita bustled over, cheeks flushed from the heat of her own truck. She waved a glossy flyer—hard to miss; The Langston Challenge slammed across it in big, stupid letters. “Maeve, honey, have you seen this? They’re taking applications tonight. Cooking, business smarts, poise—you’ve got all that. You should apply.”

Maeve froze with a ladle over a pot, the smell of chili clinging to her. “Me? Aunt Rita, no. I’m not an heiress. I’m a street vendor with a busted blender.” She glanced down at the grease on her hands like it might prove her point. “He wants a trophy. Not someone who scrubs pans at midnight.”

Rita’s voice dropped, gentler now, though the bite was still there. “Maeve, you’re more than just this stall. You know how to run a kitchen, how to bargain, how to keep people coming back.”

And listen—the finalists get cash. Enough to pay for the meds, maybe Tommy’s semester. Even if you don’t win the ring, the money could save us.”

Leo shifted on his feet. “Rita, don’t. It’s a circus, Maeve. They’ll chew you up. You don’t fit that world.”

Maeve looked back at the screen anyway. Carter’s line; Show me what you’ve got—looped in her head. A stupid spark lit in her chest. She wasn’t polished. She wore thrift-store blouses and had a mouth that didn’t kiss up. But she could cook—no one could touch her tamales. And business? She’d kept this stall afloat on grit and spreadsheets sketched in a notebook. Poise, she had in her own way; she’d stood up to drunk customers and government inspectors and not blinked.

“I’m not saying yes,” she said finally, wiping her hands with the hem of her apron. “But i will think about it.”

That night, when the market had finally closed, and the fairy lights were off, Maeve sat on her crooked bed. Her legs folded and her laptop on her laps

 The Langston Challenge site glared back at her. A video pitch, a cooking demo, and ugh a statement about “why you’re the perfect partner for Carter Langston.” She almost threw up reading that line. But the fine print mentioned fifty grand for the top five finalists. Fifty grand could cover Mom’s meds. Was enough to keep Tommy in school. Might even help Rita fix that busted grill.

Leo hovered in the doorway like a storm cloud. “You’re actually thinking about this?”

“I’m thinking about Mom,” she said flat. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, then typed. She filmed herself in the cramped kitchen—cursing when she burned an empanada, laughing at her own clumsy hands, talking into the camera like it was her aunt and not a billionaire’s application portal. She showed the tamale folding, the salsa—her secret mango-whatever that made people come back—and she told the camera about Tommy and Rita and bills that made her stomach knot. It was raw, messy, not polished at all. She uploaded it before she could talk herself out of it and slept like she’d run a marathon.

A few days later, the market buzzed hotter. Word rolls fast in a place like this. Maeve kept her head down, flipping empanadas, until her phone pinged. Subject line: Langston Challenge: You’re In. Her chest went weird—like someone had stepped on it—and then she laughed, the sound half-cry, half-who-the-hell-am-I? She made the cut. Live cooking competition. Downtown. Televised. Tomorrow.

The ballroom where they filmed looked like another planet. Chandeliers. Cameras. People who smelled like money. Contestants flanked in dresses that must’ve cost more than Maeve’s rent. The other women gave her those pitying looks—like she was a charity case at the wrong gala. Maeve stood there in a thrift blouse and jeans, hair half-tamed, feeling every pair of eyes like a hand.

Her station felt small but honest: a cutting board, a bundle of masa, and the spice that was hers. She made a choice—her mother’s tamales, but turned inside out, elevated: a truffle-whisper in the salsa, a modern crackle in the filling. Bold. Maybe reckless.

The judges circled like vultures—chefs with knives in their eyes, Langston execs with notepads. Then the room shifted. Carter walked in like the room belonged to him (and maybe it did). 

For just a moment, his eyes slid past all the glitter and caught on Maeve. Just for a second. Whatever was in the way he looked at her was gone before she could figure it out and was already looking at somewhere else.

 Maeve felt something like a jolt—not fear. Not awe. Defiance, more likely. She was not going to look small.

Her dish went hot. The judges leaned in; one of them actually smiled. A ripple of applause—real applause—hit her chest like sunlight. She let herself breathe, stupid and small and proud. And then Carter took the stage.

He spoke clean, crisp—like everything that came out of his mouth had been pressed and ironed. “Impressive,” he said, the word cold. “But this isn’t a charity cook-off. Only one can stand beside me.” His head turned, the motion slow, deliberate. The crowd sucked in breath. Then his gaze found her again. “Maeve Wells, step forward.”

The spotlight landed on her immediately; the light was too bright and the crowd were shouting and whispering.

 Maeve’s legs moved before she could even think. She walked forward with her chin up, every stare of a weight she shoved down. He watched her approach, that smile of his like a knife wrapped in silk.

“You surprised us,” he said when she stood before him. His voice had a flavor she couldn’t place—amusement? scorn? something sharper. “But surprises can be dangerous—”

The words just hung there. For a minute it felt like everyone in the room leaned toward them, waiting. Everywhere was so quiet that Maeve could even heart

e sound of her hear beating. And then…