Out to Lunch Read online

  Praise for

  Off the Menu

  “Readers hungry for cleverly written contemporary romances will definitely want to order Off the Menu.”

  —Chicago Tribune

  “Another fabulous and soul-satisfying meal . . . With the perfect blend of humor and heart, Ballis’s writing is powerfully honest and genuinely hilarious.”

  —Jen Lancaster, New York Times bestselling author of The Tao of Martha and Jeneration X

  “Enticing. Ballis writes a bit like Emily Giffin and Isabel Wolff, and the recipes will please gal foodies as well.”

  —Booklist

  “Smart, sexy, and delightfully buoyant . . . In a word, scrumptious.”

  —Quinn Cummings, author of The Year of Learning Dangerously

  “Interesting characters and a satisfying plot . . . Fans of Stacey Ballis will devour her latest book.”

  —Examiner.com

  “A great contemporary romance about a chef striving to find balance in her life and enjoying both her man and her career.”

  —Parkersburg News and Sentinel

  Good Enough to Eat

  “Good Enough to Eat is like a perfect dish of macaroni and cheese—rich, warm, nuanced, and delicious. And like any great comfort food, Stacey Ballis’s new book is absolutely satisfying.”

  —Jen Lancaster

  “Witty and tender, brash and seriously clever, Stacey Ballis’s characters are our friends, our neighbors, or, in some cases, that sardonic colleague the next cubicle over . . . Her storytelling will have you alternately turning pages and calling your friends, urging them to come along for the ride. And in Stacey Ballis’s talented hands, oh what a wonderful ride it is.”

  —Elizabeth Flock, New York Times bestselling author of What Happened to My Sister

  “A toothsome meal of moments, gorgeously written, in warmth and with keen observation, Good Enough to Eat is about so much more than the magic of food; it’s about the magic of life. Pardon the cliché, but you’ll devour it and wish there was more to savor.”

  —Stephanie Klein, author of Straight Up and Dirty and Moose

  The Spinster Sisters

  “Readers will be rooting for Ballis’s smart, snappy heroines.”

  —Booklist

  “A laugh-out-loud hoot of a book. Jodi and Jill are amazing characters. They are challenged by balancing their business lives with style, charm, and grace. A must-read.”

  —A Romance Review

  “Filled with characters so witty and diverse yet so strong in their passion for friends and family that they could easily be our best friend or favorite aunt . . . Women of every age will relate to Ballis’s clever yet unassuming story about sisterhood, dating dramas, and the bonds of friendship and family.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  Room for Improvement

  “For those who say ‘chick lit’ is played out, all I can say is think again. Stacey Ballis proves the genre can be funny, honest, clever, real, and, most importantly, totally fresh.”

  —Jen Lancaster

  “More fun than a Trading Spaces marathon. One of the season’s best.”

  —The Washington Post Book World

  “Rife with humor—always earthy, often bawdy, unwaveringly forthright humor.”

  —Chicago Sun-Times

  “A laugh-out-loud novel that will appeal to HGTV devotees as well as those who like their chick lit on the sexy side. One of the summer’s hot reads for the beach.”

  —Library Journal

  “In her third outing, Ballis offers up a frothy, fun send-up of reality TV. Readers will have a blast.”

  —Booklist

  Sleeping Over

  “Ballis presents a refreshingly realistic approach to relationships and the things that test (and often break) them.”

  —Booklist

  “Fans of relationship dramas will appreciate this fine, character-driven tale.”

  —The Best Reviews

  “Sleeping Over will have you laughing, crying, and planning your next girls’ night out.”

  —Romance Reader at Heart

  “This engaging story delivers everything you ask from a great read: it makes you laugh, it makes you cry, it makes you feel.”

  —Romance Divas

  Berkley Books by Stacey Ballis

  ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT

  THE SPINSTER SISTERS

  GOOD ENOUGH TO EAT

  OFF THE MENU

  OUT TO LUNCH

  Out to Lunch

  STACEY BALLIS

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) LLC

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

  USA • Canada • UK • Ireland • Australia • New Zealand • India • South Africa • China

  penguin.com

  A Penguin Random House Company

  This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.

  Copyright © 2013 by Stacey Ballis.

  Excerpt from Off the Menu by Stacey Ballis copyright © 2012 by Stacey Ballis. Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  BERKLEY ® is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) LLC.

  The “B” design is a trademark of Penguin Group (USA) LLC.

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-101-61254-5

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Ballis, Stacey.

  Out to lunch / Stacey Ballis.—Berkley Trade paperback edition.

  pages cm.

  ISBN 978-0-425-26549-9 (Berkley trade paperback)

  1. Administrative assistants—Fiction.

  2. Celebrity chefs—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3602.A624O98 2013

  813'.6—dc23

  2013031071

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Berkley trade paperback edition / December 2013

  Cover photos: “Spaghetti” by Silvia Rico/Getty Images; “Dogue de Bordeaux” by Erik Lam/Shutterstock.

  Cover design by Rita Frangie.

  Interior text design by Laura K. Corless.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE: The recipes contained in this book are to be followed exactly as written. The publisher is not responsible for your specific health or allergy needs that may require medical supervision. The publisher is not responsible for any adverse reactions to the recipes contained in this book.

  Version_1

  Contents

  Praise

  Berkley Books by Stacey Ballis

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17r />
  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Eight Months Later

  From Jenna’s Notebook

  Special Excerpt from Off The Menu

  For Bill, always

  Acknowledgments

  I want to thank, as always, my amazing family of Ballises, Thurmonds, Hirts, and Surrats. I am a lucky girl.

  My agent Scott Mendel, for being exceptional in every possible way.

  The extraordinary team at Berkley/Penguin, most especially my editor Wendy McCurdy for always seeing the book I mean to write and helping me uncover it, Leslie Gelbman for sticking with me, Katherine Pelz for all the details, and everyone in marketing and sales for keeping me employed.

  My core group of writer pals who keep me sane and remind me that we have the best job in the world and write the books I love reading most: Elinor Lipman, Amy Hatvany, Sarah Pekkanen, Laurie Notaro, Laura Caldwell, Elizabeth Flock, Eleanor Brown, Quinn Cummings, Alison Pace.

  The incomparable Jen Lancaster, for many more reasons than I can put here, most of them hilarious.

  Tracey S. and Gina B., who are so much more than lunch buddies, and Lisa L. and Amy G. for being the best girls to vacation with. And Wayne G. for knowing that I wrote this book before I met him, and didn’t mean to borrow his name.

  Penelope, whose strength and determination and courage were a huge inspiration in the writing of this book.

  And of course, my insanely dreamy Charming Suitor, who still thinks most of my crazy is adorable and makes my life thoroughly delightful every single day.

  1

  I take a deep breath and look out at the sea of faces. Friends, family, colleagues, clients. I’m weirdly calm, in spite of the fact that when it comes to the public speaking part of our business, Aimee has always been the voice of our company. Today is my turn, since Aimee can’t exactly come up here and talk about herself. Even if it were possible, it would be “very bad form,” and Aimee is nothing if not a stickler for good manners.

  Over the years as we built first our own separate businesses, and then the company we founded together, Aimee was always better at the investor meetings, the panels we were asked to sit on for Women in Business conferences, the guest lectures at local colleges and high schools. I’m a behind-the-scenes girl from way back. Aimee was always the hostess, I was always the cook. Didn’t matter if it was one of our early dinner parties in our first little crappy apartment off campus in Hyde Park, or one of the seven-figure weddings or galas we produce for the rich and famous. Aimee is the front-and-center mover and shaker, and I’m the kitchen workhorse.

  But this space is full of love and kindness, and I can feel Aimee’s faith in me, and I face the room to say what needs saying. There is stillness in my chest, the tightness that has been lurking there all day unfurls, and I take a deep breath and begin.

  “Thank you all for being here today to honor the extraordinary Aimee Brand, my best friend, my soul sister, my business partner, and in many ways the one true love of my life.” Everyone laughs a little at this, and that warm sound bolsters my resolve.

  “My name is Jenna Stewart. Aimee and I met when the wise team at Student Affairs at the University of Chicago placed us together as freshman roommates. From the moment we first talked on the phone the summer before classes started, it was clear that we were a perfect pair. We couldn’t have been more different, me an only child, Jewish, who grew up in downtown Chicago, and Aimee heading to the big city from her boisterous Lutheran family on their Indiana farm, with too many brothers to count!” There is a chortle from the front row, where five of Aimee’s six brothers are shaking their heads and smiling. Jordan, the youngest, is staring off into space. He was an oops baby, born after Aimee was already off at college, and now, at twenty-three, he’s clearly uncomfortable about his lack of connection to the older sister who was always more like a distant aunt, around in a whirlwind for occasional holidays.

  “Aimee had been a Young Republican, I had organized my high school’s field trip to the Democratic Convention. She had the Amazonian height, the blond curls, the legs for days, and I . . .” I trail off and gesture impotently at my short, round self, my dark wall of straight hair. Supportive chuckles and smiles. “But none of this mattered. We shared deep passions. John Hughes movies, the New Romantics, the Chicago Bears. We both loved chicken-flavor Ramen and hated the shrimp flavor. We liked thin-crust pizza over deep dish, and wine over beer, and gin over vodka. From the moment we met, Aimee and I dreamed all our dreams together. Our company is the result of years of conversations over bowls of Sunday cereal, and bottles of cheap sauvignon blanc, and late-night whispers in the dark. We started our first businesses separately, but as soon as we were established independently, we merged them into one entity. Yes, it was a smart thing to do from a business perspective, a catering company and an event-planning company becoming one-stop party shopping. But the truth is, if Aimee and I were going to work so many long hours, we wanted to do it together.

  “Aimee has always been the source of my best and deepest laughter. She has been my secret-keeper for more than half my life. The sister I never had, my conscience, my sounding board. We have traveled the world together, literally and figuratively. She is my hero.”

  I look up and catch Wayne’s eye. He’s nodding constantly, his big square head strangely fluid on his thick neck, like some odd bobblehead doll on a dashboard. My heart sinks. Because the one thing I’ve never been able to understand about Aimee is why she married this loaf. But today is not the day to question her sanity or motivations, and lord knows I’m the last person to be able to pass judgment on anyone’s romantic choices. At least Aimee has a husband who’s crazy about her, sitting here in support today. He might not be the guy I would have chosen for her, but as odd as he is, as annoying as I find him, I don’t ever question his love for her or hers for him. But I can’t think about that now.

  “No one I have ever known personally or professionally can come close to Aimee’s passion or perseverance. It doesn’t matter if it was doing the Chicago Scavenger Hunt and Urban Race, in record-breaking time I might add, to raise money for cancer research in memory of her Mom, Jean; and her Dad, Thom; or negotiating the buyout of our company, or teaching her nieces one of the cheers from her days on the high school squad. Aimee is a one hundred percent effort, one hundred percent of the time woman.

  “Aimee taught me how to tip a maître d’ for the best table, and how to tip cows. She gave me the best birthday presents, and the best life-coaching. Her unflagging honesty and fearlessness in every area of life meant things as simple as I never went out in public in unflattering pants on her watch, and as complex as our taking some calculated risks with our business that ended up ensuring our futures.

  “Aimee always believed in hard work and harder play, and in generosity of spirit and pocketbook. She is the one who made sure that our company had established significantly reduced not-for-profit rates for our services, and a commitment to both pro bono work for smaller charities and a profit percentage devoted to charitable donations. Aimee told me once that you couldn’t be completely proud of your work unless it was benefiting others and not just yourself.

  “Aimee taught me patience; she taught me that every person, even the most hateful, has something to teach us, and there is always something about them to like. She taught me that you should face the day with more hopefulness than despair, and more mascara than lipstick.”

  And good underwear. I can hear what Aimee would add, as loudly as if she had actually said it.

  Everyone laughs, and the sound almost drowns out Aimee’s voice in my head, but I know she’s behind me, approving.

  The laughter around me swells.

  “Nothing in my life has ever made me prouder, happier, or more full of joy than to have the honor and privilege of being Aimee’s
best friend, sister by choice, and business partner.”

  Everyone in the room is nodding, and I know it’s time for me to wrap this up. Aimee always said that you could feel in a room when your audience was at a good place to stop listening, plus my knees are suddenly a bit weak. So I know it’s time to say the words.

  “And nothing in my life will ever be harder than facing every day without her.”

  I turn behind me and face the simple mahogany coffin, place a hand on its shiny smoothness, and let the tears come.

  2

  I have no idea what to wear. What on earth do you wear to your first ever therapy session followed immediately by your best friend’s will reading? Conservative, obviously. Nonitchy, nonpinchy, since you’re going to be uncomfortable anyway. Aimee would know what to wear. She’d know in a heartbeat. I stand in my closet in my underwear, sensible black cotton briefs on my ever-expanding tush and simple bra locking and loading the girls, for whom gravity is an endless enemy; hair in a towel turban on my head. Volnay, my twelve-year-old long-haired dachshund, sighs deeply, her elegant head resting on her stumpy crossed front paws.

  “I know, girl, I’m figuring it out.”

  Aimee loved this closet. To be clear, Aimee designed this closet. She specifically had me buy a four-bedroom house, despite my lack of either romantic partner or offspring, because, and I quote, “You need an office and a walk-in ubercloset and a room for me when I sleep over.” I always did what Aimee said, and called my Realtor back and said to stop looking at the two-bedroom condos, and start looking at four-bedroom houses.

  “You have the money, indulge,” Aimee had said when my Realtor, Deborah, showed us the gorgeous house on Maplewood three years ago. A two-story Arts and Crafts gray brick place on a lot and a half, wraparound yard, two-car garage with deck on top, huge master bedroom suite, and three decent-sized bedrooms on the second floor. It was more than I had thought of paying, but Aimee had a point. We had recently sold our company, StewartBrand Events, to a New York–based company, Peerless. Peerless is THE full-service event planning company on both coasts and had wanted a Chicago office, but decided that they wouldn’t be able to compete with the company Aimee and I had built together, so they made us an offer we couldn’t refuse. It wasn’t Gates money, but it was eight figures cash plus stock and salary for a five-year commitment as consulting partners. Enough eight figures that it was still eight figures for each of us even after taxes.