“Where would be the fun in that?” Rita Mae grinned. “You’re quite entertaining as it is.” When Madison frowned at her, Rita Mae sighed. “Okay. For starters, I wouldn’t use the cheese knife.”

Madison went to the drawer and got out another knife, holding it up like a trophy.

“That’s a filet knife.”

Grumbling, she got out another one.

“Are you kidding me?”

“Wrong again?”

“That’s a bread knife.” She stepped beside Madison and got something much smaller out. “Try a potato peeler.”

Madison took it and went back to the kitchen counter where five tiny potatoes waited. “Since when do I have so many different kitchen utensils?”

“I bought a whole collection from the shopping channel.”

“Oh.”

“You really hadn’t cooked anything before we moved in, had you?”

“I have money.” Why stand in the kitchen when you could pay people to do it for you?

“You do indeed. But still you’re peeling and cutting potatoes at the moment. Why?”

“Danielle sent me home after the lunch crowd.” Maybe she sounded like a petulant child, but she didn’t care. She slammed the potato peeler onto the cutting board. “She needs Sherry but not me.”

Rita Mae leaned beside her against the counter. “Have you asked Danielle why she’s sending you home early more often than not?”

“I don’t have to. Sherry is a great waitress, and I’m…”

“You’re what?”

Madison rolled her eyes. “Maybe Danielle doesn’t like how I talk to customers.”

Rita Mae smirked. “And how do you talk to them?”

Madison shrugged.

“Sherry mentioned that you sometimes…” Rita Mae twirled her hand as if searching for the right words, “aren’t that friendly with the customers.”

Sherry and Rita Mae talked about her behind her back? She smashed the potato peeler against the countertop and crossed her arms in front of her chest. “I’m friendly to everybody.”

“Are you, now?”

Madison huffed and unfolded her arms to continue peeling the potato, which was gradually becoming smaller and smaller. “Okay. Maybe sometimes I could be a little bit friendlier. But some people think that just because they’re paying a few bucks to eat and drink they deserve to be treated like kings and queens but can treat us like we’re nothing.”

“I see. After all, when you go out somewhere, you always treat the people serving you with the utmost respect, right?”

“Righ…” Madison glared at Rita Mae when she realized what she was trying to do. “That’s different.”

“How so?”

“I’m the owner.”

“Oh, now I get it. So it’s okay when the customers want to be served promptly and from a friendly waitress as long it’s, let’s say Sherry and not you, right?”

That’s not how she’d meant it. “You know what I mean.”

“No, not really.”