Hank continued:
“You’ll spend more hauling them home than they’re worth.”
“Maybe.”
“You’ll lose half to spoilage by tomorrow.”
“Maybe.”
“And when you figure out this was stupid, don’t bring them back.”
Clara stepped closer.
She held the five-dollar bill against his shirt.
“Then take the five and give me every ugly pepper you were too blind to taste.”
The men near the truck went quiet for half a second.
Then somebody laughed again.
Hank’s smile turned sharper.
He took the bill.
“All right.”
He folded it twice.
Put it in his pocket.
“By Friday, you’ll be begging me to haul this rotten mess away.”
Clara opened her mouth.
Someone behind them spoke first.
“Don’t dump a thing.”
Everyone turned.
A man stood beside the pickup.
Clara had noticed him earlier but assumed he was another buyer.
He was perhaps forty-four, tall, clean-shaven, dark hair beginning to gray at the temples, white shirt sleeves rolled to his forearms, navy trousers, boots too polished for a farmyard.
He held one of the rejected peppers.
He had broken off a clean section.
He was chewing.
Hank frowned.
“Julian?”
The man swallowed.
Then looked directly at Clara.
“If you bottle what I think you can make from this, I want the first fifty cases.”
The laughter stopped.
Clara stared at him.
“What do you think I’m making?”
Julian Cross smiled.
“That depends.”
“On what?”
“Whether you know why those peppers taste better than they look.”
Hank snorted.
“They taste like peppers.”
Julian took another bite.
“No.”
He held up the misshapen orange pepper.
“These are fully ripe.”
Hank folded his arms.
“So?”
“So stores rejected half of them because they ripened unevenly.”
Julian looked toward Clara.
“High sugar.”
“More developed flavor.”
“Some dehydration.”
“Exactly what I’d want if I were roasting them.”
Clara’s heart moved slightly faster.
That was exactly what she had been thinking.
She had not said it to anyone.
Julian noticed her expression.
“You were going to roast them.”
Clara kept her face neutral.
“Maybe.”
“And vinegar.”
“Maybe.”
“Smoke?”
She narrowed her eyes.
“Who are you?”
He extended his hand.
“Julian Cross.”
“Cross & Ash.”
Clara knew the restaurant.
Everyone within sixty miles did.
Cross & Ash had started as one restaurant in Austin twelve years earlier and grown into a small group of upscale Texas restaurants known for wood-fired meat, seasonal vegetables, and the sort of menu descriptions Clara’s father liked making fun of.
Her family had eaten there once after her college graduation.
A fourteen-dollar plate of roasted carrots had caused her father emotional distress.
“You own Cross & Ash?”
“Among a few others.”
Clara shook his hand.
Hank laughed.
“Now you’ve got a chef encouraging this.”
Julian corrected him.
“I’m not a chef.”
“You own restaurants.”
“Yes.”
“That makes you worse.”
Julian smiled.
Then looked toward Clara.
“What’s your name?”
“Clara Dawson.”
“Dawson Farm?”
Her expression changed.
“You know it?”
“I bought tomatoes from your father years ago.”
That hurt unexpectedly.