The Way to a Woman's Heart (48 page)

‘So,’ Tom stepped in, ‘if you want Ash, Ella, Billy and Poll to win, you add zero one, and if you want Iris, Jean, Dawn and Cathy to carry away this year’s crown, you add zero two.’

‘And we’ll be back on air, live, in one short hour’s time to crown this year’s champion.’ Gabby smiled invitingly. ‘So get dialling and texting to make sure your favourite team wins. And in the meantime, Tom and I will taste all this delish food. Aren’t we lucky, Tom?’

‘Er, oh, yes, we are.’

Ella relaxed. It didn’t really matter now if Tom and Gabby liked their food or not. They would only win if the viewers voted for them. For the first time she wished it had been down to Tom and Gabby. Given the way Gabby was fawning all over Ash again, they’d have walked it…

‘Oooh!’ Gabby enthused, as she and Tom tasted the girls’ gorgeous-looking frothy candyfloss pink food. ‘Prawns and
crayfish all in a pink Marie Rose sauce and with lollo rosso, too, to emphasise the colour motif. Oh, I absolutely love it! Clever, pretty, and very, very tasty.’

‘Prawn cocktail,’ Ash hissed. ‘Easy-peasy.’

Ella giggled.

‘Oh, yes – and followed by an all pink shepherd’s pie, with pink veg.’ Gabby didn’t sound quite so enthusiastic. ‘Now, I know this actually tasted wonderful in your first round, ladies, and it does again, but I think you may have used a touch too much cochineal this time. It’s more candyfloss Day-Glo than Barbie, don’t you think?’

‘But the blancmange for pud is a triumph!’ Tom muttered round a massive mouthful. ‘There’s nothing like a big, pink blancmange to take a chap back to his nursery days.’

‘Sometimes I think you’ve never left them,’ Gabby snapped. ‘Well done though, ladies. A sumptuous meal well worthy of our final. Right, now let’s see what we make of Hideaway’s Farmhouse Wedding Breakfast. Especially as Ash has moved on from starters to the main course – and wonderful it looks, too.’

Tom and Gabby were ecstatic. They loved the way the food looked, loved the concept, loved the intricacy and the skill.

They ate lots of it, enthused hugely, and congratulated warmly.

‘Fabulous flavours, very elaborate – and very, very clever.’

‘Oh, Ash, you are soo talented. This tastes absolutely wonderful. I totally l-o-v-e it. Dear Raymond would surely be honoured to have this on offer at the Manoir.’

‘And it perfectly complements the starter and the gorgeous frothy pudding.’

‘A wedding breakfast fit for royalty. Well done, all of you.’

Ella, Poll, Ash and Billy beamed at one another. It was OK. It was all over now. There was nothing more they could do.

‘Right folks, that’s it from us for this segment of the show.’ Tom wiped his mouth. ‘You’ll have an hour of soaps or something to numb your mind before we’re back on the air. But don’t forget – you only have this hour in which to vote. We’ll be taking your phone calls and texts right here in the studio, then we’ll be back with the results. So start voting – now! And do not go away!’

‘Pickin’ a Chicken’ indicated that the ordeal – so far – was once again over.

While the studio audience were being treated to an hour of ‘light entertainment’, Gabby and Tom shook hands with everyone and the studio manager indicated that the contestants should all wait in the green room.

‘I’m going outside for a smoke,’ Billy said. ‘I need some fresh air.’

‘Contradiction in terms there, I think.’ Gabby sniffed. ‘No doubt you’ll be joining him, Tom? Just another of your disgusting habits.’

Ash shook his head, then linked his arms through Ella’s and Poll’s and led them to the green room.

‘God, I’m nervous now.’ Poll sighed, collapsing on a sofa. ‘No, no, I couldn’t eat anything. I’ll stick with this iced water. I think it went well, didn’t it?’

They all nodded, suddenly both physically and emotionally exhausted.

Iris Freckles and her team, all of whom seemed completely untouched by any of it, piled their plates high with everything the green room had to offer and chatted happily about their vague plans for a seafront Multi-Coloured Snack Shack if they won.

‘We don’t care much one way or the other,’ Iris mumbled happily round a cheese and pickle sandwich. ‘We only went in for this to show our hubbies. They’re all plain food, meat and two veg, sort of blokes. They hate our fancy cooking. Laughed at it. So, we thought we’d show them. Didn’t expect to get this far, though, did we, girls?’

The girls all shook their heads.

‘They’re dead proud of us now, and we’ve proved our point, haven’t we, girls?’

The girls all nodded.

‘But surely the money would make such a difference to you?’ Ella frowned. ‘Even if you don’t really want to open a proper restaurant?’

‘Money’s always nice, yes, but just between us, we four had a nice little lottery win last year on our syndicate at work – we’re not short of a bob or two.’

Blimey, Ella thought. Lucky or what? They’re
bound
to win.

Ash stood up. ‘Excuse me a sec. Just got to make a quick phone call.’

As he left the room, Poll and Ella exchanged ‘Onyx’ glances and sighed.

Iris Freckles reached casually for a vol-au-vent. ‘What about you? What’s your plans?’

Poll smiled dreamily. ‘
If
we win we’re going to open a Farmhouse Feast Restaurant in Hideaway Lane.’

Ella frowned. ‘Are we?’

‘We are.’ Poll nodded. ‘I’ve decided. I haven’t even breathed a word of it – you know, tempting fate and all that. But that barn that Billy’s been working on – well, I thought it would be perfect for Ash’s’ restaurant.’

‘It would,’ Ella agreed. ‘It would be wonderful. But what about all the rules and regulations?’

‘I’ve already spoken to my solicitor, who’s done the necessary checks and he says there’s no problems. Also, access will be easy as there’s a private road behind the farm, and there’s also plenty of room for parking.’

‘Blimey.’ Ella blinked. ‘You really have thought this through, haven’t you?’

Poll nodded proudly. ‘And Ash will run it, of course, and be the main chef, but we can all work there too on and off, and contribute ideas and recipes, and I thought we’d call it Hideaway Home and serve fresh, old-fashioned vegetarian food.’

‘Wow. I’m impressed. It all sounds, well, perfect.’

‘Oh, it will be.’ Poll leaned over and squeezed her hand.

‘If we win…’

Ella sighed. If they won – the phrase that had haunted them for so long. And for so long it had all seemed a mad faraway dream. Now it was merely inches away – or not…

‘Goodness me – it sounds really fantastic.’ Iris started on
the first of several cream cakes piled on her plate. ‘I hope you win, then. You really want it. We don’t, but we haven’t told that Gabby-cow that. She’s a bitch.’

Billy wandered back in then, closely followed by Ash, refused anything to eat and sat beside Poll and held her hand. ‘That Tom’s a nice chap, duck. But he’s a bit, um, odd tonight. Distant. I reckon him and Gabby has had one heck of a row.’

‘I expect they always do,’ Poll said. ‘He’s probably used to it. Oh goodness, I wish they’d hurry up. I feel so sick.’

Ella looked over at Ash. He smiled at her.

Oh, I don’t care about Onyx any more – just please let him win, Ella prayed to whichever gods were listening.

Please, please, please…

The green room door opened and the studio manager nodded at them. ‘OK. We’re ready for you again now.’

Ella had never felt so terrified. Never wanted to win anything so much. Never been so scared of losing in her entire life.

‘Come on.’ Ash took her hand. ‘Don’t flake now. You’ve done brilliantly so far. And we’ve had such good fun, and Trixie and her so-called fairies didn’t cause any complications tonight, did they? And there’ve been no news flashes about London hotels being razed to the ground, so we can safely assume Trixie’s behaving herself as she promised – and all this will soon be all over.’

‘But what if we don’t win.’

‘Then nothing much will have changed, will it? It’ll be disappointing, but everyone gets over disappointments eventually. And we’ll have enjoyed ourselves, learned a lot and had new experiences. It won’t go to waste.’

She looked down at his hand holding hers and wanted it to stay there for ever. She stroked his fingers. ‘Ash…’

‘It’s OK,’ he said, gently removing his hand. ‘We’ll talk about it later.’

Then the floor manager ushered them all back onstage, and behind their now spotless work stations again, to rapturous applause.

Oh, sod it, Ella thought miserably, I’ve really, really made a complete idiot of myself now… Oh, come on, Ella, get over yourself and smile!

‘Hello again!’ Gabby, changed into shimmering silver, sashayed on to the stage waving to the audience. ‘We’ve come to the most important and exciting part of all our shows! The culmination of weeks and weeks of travelling the country, being welcomed into your homes, cooking and experimenting! And I’m delighted to be able to tell you that the votes have all been counted, the lines have closed, and we have a definite
Dewberrys’ Dinner
winner!’

The audience clapped and whooped and cheered.

‘But –’ Tom held his hands wide ‘– before we announce that, Gabby and I have something to tell you. Haven’t we, Gabby?’

‘We have.’ Gabby stopped smiling. ‘Sadly, this is the last year of
Dewberrys’ Dinners.
Tonight we’ll be crowning our last ever
Dewberrys’ Dinners
Winner.’

The audience gasped and groaned.

‘Yes, but it’s not all bad news,’ Gabby continued. ‘Next year, the live cook-in-your-own-home programme is going to be called
Gabby’s Gourmets
. The format will be very similar to the current show with the same lovely cheque and restaurant deal for the lucky winner, but I shall be going
solo.’ She shot a killer look at her husband. ‘Tom is keen to follow his own career off-screen.’

The audience was completely shell-shocked. No more Gabby and Tom? It was like Ant and Dec splitting up.

‘We felt it was only right to tell you this tonight before it breaks in the media,’ Tom said. ‘And definitely before announcing tonight’s winner. Because tonight belongs to them – and we didn’t want to detract from their glory.’

‘Sooo.’ Gabby was twinkling professionally again. ‘That’s our news out of the way – now, let’s get down to the really important business of this evening! Announcing this year’s – the final year’s –
Dewberrys’ Dinners
Winner!’

The audience whooped some more.

‘As you know,’ Tom said, ‘the winner will take away a nice cheque and our people – or rather, Gabby’s people now – will be in touch with their people, to discuss the setting up, initial financing and running of their very own restaurant!’

The audience screamed with enthusiasm.

Ella looked at the others. They were very pale. Clearly the news of the demise of
Dewberrys’ Dinners
came a very poor second to the result of tonight’s show.

‘Let’s not keep you in suspense any longer,’ Gabby said, dragging it out. ‘I have the envelope with the number of votes cast right here.’

The studio grew dark. Roving spotlights criss-crossed over Gabby and the envelope, and Tom and the contestants.

‘Tonight’s winner,’ Tom said in a gruff serious voice, ‘is…’

There was a drum roll. Then silence.

Oooh, Ella groaned silently, not the damn stupid drawing-it-out-for-the-tension thing again.

The silence went on and on.

Gabby stepped forwards and tore the envelope open. More silence.

Ella’s stomach was in knots and she really, really wanted to scream.

Gabby glanced down at the envelope and smiled. ‘Hideaway Farm! Congratulations, Poll, Billy, Ella and the sexiest ice-cream man in the universe, Ash!’

Gabby grabbed Ash and hugged him. Tom hugged everyone.

Suddenly the studio was filled with dancing golden lights and falling stars and rousing music. The audience were on their feet clapping and cheering.

Ella was then hugged by Ash, then Poll, then Billy.

Gabby and Tom were now shaking hands with everyone and talking but she couldn’t hear a word they said.