She turned back to PJ, her brain forcing her to deal with the more pressing issue first. “I promise. I will pick up all her takeout orders from now on. All of them.”

“I’m really sorry. We just can’t. In this case the customer was dead wrong. I have to do it. She’s banned from dining with us. What am I telling my staff if I let this slide? It goes against everything—”

“I know.”

“I’m sorry. If you want to come in and dine with us, you know you’re always welcome. But Dru is going to have to purchase her meals elsewhere. I can’t ask anyone who works for me to deal with that treatment. And frankly, you shouldn’t do it either.”

Amanda felt her stomach drop to the floor, as he put his hand on her shoulder and gave it a light squeeze that said, “Look at your life, girl. Look at your choices.” PJ was right. She was paid to put up with Dru’s abuse, but subjecting the food service staff of the greater Los Angeles area to her behavior was not some right she’d been awarded. Sometimes there were consequences for shitty behavior, and Dru had just lost pretty much the only place in town she actually liked to eat.

“Okay,” Amanda said, frustration nearly closing her throat.

PJ nodded, then turned back to the kitchen. The conversation was over. Amanda tucked the food close to her chest, then ducked her head and made for the door. If she moved fast enough there was a pretty good chance Sam wouldn’t see her while he was hearing the day’s specials. She moved smoothly, quickly, but not quickly enough. Just as she slid by him and his crew, his assistant turned and bumped into her. She stumbled back a step, her ass bumping the corner of a nearby empty table.

“Oh shit. My bad,” Sam’s assistant said.

“It’s okay.”

“Hey, it’s Cha-Cha.”

Sam of course spun around, his eyes wide with disbelief. “Amanda.”

“Hey. Nice to see you. I—uh, I have to get going.” She took off for the door, but not without feeling the brush of Sam’s fingertips on her arm as she rushed by him. He was following her. Maybe if she walked fast enough she could get back to her car and accidentally run him over before she was forced to talk to him. She hurried down the street, and just as she turned the corner where she’d parked her car down a muraled alley, she heard him call after her again.

“Amanda! You dropped your phone!”