Chapter 85: Chapter 85

Anna felt it was necessary to explain clearly, so she lifted a corner of her skirt, revealing a similar burn mark on her knee: "I got burned myself! It seems like a minor celebrity like me can’t handle the coffee offered by Young Master Hawthorne. I didn’t even get to drink it, and this happened."

As she spoke, Anna looked apologetically at Ethan Hawthorne: "Originally, the coffee was spilled on me. I didn’t expect your hand to be so close to my leg at the time, truly sorry."

Hearing her apology in such a sincere tone, Ethan Hawthorne sneered.

This Anna... is smarter than he imagined!

What she implied just now was that the coffee was too much for her to handle, wasn’t it? She’s trying to dispel Ethan Hawthorne’s thoughts about her!

And she knew that a direct refusal might not work, so she opted for a subtle one.

On the surface, she looks seductive and alluring; Ethan Hawthorne even thought she would be easy to win over. Who knew she was a rose with thorns.

Previously, when Ethan Hawthorne invited her to have coffee together because she wasn’t willing to attend the program’s recording on time, Anna outwardly complied and agreed. But when Ethan was about to take advantage of her, she seized the moment and spilled the scorching coffee over herself.

Ethan Hawthorne, with a long-standing reputation as a playboy, could certainly tell when a woman was genuinely into him or just pretending.

But Anna was smart because she also burned herself, making it look more like an accident.

If Ethan didn’t see through it, there was no way to blame her.

If he did see through it, he’d distance himself even more from Anna and wouldn’t provoke her again.

Because such a woman is ruthless, harsh to others, and harsh to herself. New ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄhapters are published on NoveIＦire.net

Ethan Hawthorne is currently embroiled in lawsuits; he doesn’t want to get entangled with another difficult woman.

However, seeing such a beautiful woman and not being able to have her still leaves Ethan somewhat dissatisfied.

Since this woman stubbornly refused him so insensitively, Ethan Hawthorne naturally wouldn’t show her any respect.

So, in the subsequent recording of the show, Ethan Hawthorne wore a constant scowl.

The format of the "Food and Love" show is : After confirming the presence of the male and female guests, pre-arranged audiences are invited to enter the venue.

These audiences are mainly responsible for clapping and seeking camera time; they are students from nearby universities with tickets randomly given out by the program crew, and some tickets are given to the guests’ fan clubs.

Even the smallest star will have a fan group; if you’re going on a program, the fans try to make it look impressive.

However, there was a certain disparity in fame between the two guests participating this time, so you could see that Ethan Hawthorne’s fans were in the majority, while Anna had only two or three sparse fans, holding her name up in the corner.

The program recording started, first introducing the male guest with a brief introduction and interview.

Then, bringing out the female guest to start selecting ingredients and cooking.

While the female guest is cooking, the spotlight remains on the male guest. The amount of screen time she gets depends on how much the host and male guest talk about her during their conversation.

Ethan Hawthorne and Jay Cross both obviously had issues with Anna. During the opening introduction, the two talked for over ten minutes about Ethan’s new drama, as if they forgot there was another guest on the show, leaving Anna standing behind the curtain with her legs growing sore.

It wasn’t until the director prompted someone to hold up a sign that Jay Cross suddenly seemed to remember and mentioned Anna: "For today’s episode, we’re fortunate to have Young Master Hawthorne as our guest, and we’ve specially chosen a beautiful chef for him. I wonder what Young Master Hawthorne expects from our female guest?"

"Female guest? Most female stars in the entertainment industry we’ve met on other occasions. But as for today’s? To be honest, if it weren’t for the show, I’d never even heard of her."

According to the script, there was supposed to be a wave of mutual compliments here, and at the same time, to promote the film Anna is currently starring in.

But Ethan Hawthorne didn’t follow the script, which is actually good, as it triggered the first explosive topic of this episode—"Young Master Hawthorne straightforwardly claimed he’d never heard of Anna? The most awkward atmosphere between male and female guests in the show’s history."

No matter how awkward the atmosphere, Anna had to come out.

No matter how little face Ethan and the host gave her, when Anna stepped out in a light purple dress under the spotlight, she was still dazzling.

Even Ethan couldn’t help but glance at her following the spotlight. Truly an earthly beauty, the more he thought about it, the more dissatisfied he was!

Since Anna refused to cooperate by using topics about her figure or related to Conrad Sterling to garner attention, Jay Cross just skipped her interview and directly had her enter the kitchen for the cooking segment.

"This episode will coincide with the Dragon Boat Festival, so today our main dish theme is rice dumplings. Next, Anna will demonstrate in our studio how she wraps rice dumplings, and Young Master Hawthorne will eventually taste and evaluate the final product."

Jay Cross interviewed Ethan Hawthorne: "By the way, does your family have a tradition of eating rice dumplings every Dragon Boat Festival?"

"Yes, my family elders always value these traditional festivals."

"The rice dumplings you’ll eat in our studio this time might be different from those at home in previous years. What are Young Master Hawthorne’s expectations?"

Upon hearing this, Ethan glanced in Anna’s direction and laughed: "To be honest, not much. Based on my experience, generally, people who look good aren’t very good cooks."

"Oh really?" Jay Cross laughed along, "Where did this experience come from?"

Ethan certainly wouldn’t admit on the show how many female friends he’s had and how many pretty women’s cooked meals he’s tasted to gain this experience.

As a male celebrity, avoiding this topic and using family as a shield is the best strategy: "I got the impression from my mom. She’s very pretty but can’t cook at all."

Although these two seemed to be implying Anna’s cooking isn’t good, fortunately, Ethan’s comment managed to bring the camera focus back to Anna, directing it to the kitchen where she was cooking.

There, you could see Anna placing two layers of bamboo leaves one atop the other, cutting off one side with scissors, and wrapping it into a cone in her palm, adding glutinous rice, mung beans, red dates, one by one...

She made two rice dumplings, the second one containing egg yolk and marinated meat.

After wrapping one sweet and one savory dumpling into bunny shapes, she tied their ears together as a pair, making them very cute.

Anna worked neatly, clearly having put in a lot of effort. Her hands were very fair and beautiful, and her careful and serious demeanor while wrapping the leaves made it seem like she was crafting art, pleasing to the eye, so much so that the director was reluctant to switch the camera back.

Soon, she wrapped three pairs of dumplings. Seeing that no one came to ask her about her journey in wrapping them, she directly put them in water to boil.

The director signaled to Jay Cross, indicating to bring Young Master Hawthorne over to the kitchen, so they could capture all three in one shot.

Receiving the director’s cue, Jay Cross finally turned to speak to Anna: "Now we see the dumplings have started boiling. How long will it take before Young Master Hawthorne can taste them?"

"A normal pot requires about forty minutes. But since I’m saving time for the show, I’m using a pressure cooker, which should take about twenty minutes," Anna shared her knowledge from online and her own recent experiences of boiling dumplings.

Jay Cross picked up one of the uncooked dumplings Anna had made and held it up to the camera. It looked quite legit.

"They look beautiful, but I wonder how they taste," Jay Cross complimented absentmindedly.

"Don’t worry, you’ll get to taste them soon," Anna smiled at him.

For some reason, Jay Cross felt that Anna’s smile at that moment was a bit eerie.

Although it was indeed sweet and beautiful... it’s rare for her to be so considerate of the host while preparing for the male guest, but Jay Cross couldn’t shake the feeling that there was a hint of malice in it.

Was he being overly sensitive? Could a rice dumpling somehow lead to revenge?

Surely Anna didn’t hide a penny or something sharp inside a dumpling to chip his tooth, right?