by J. S. Cooper
“The meatloaf?”
“Girl.”
I looked over to Wade who was now laughing silently. I glared at him. He just smiled back at me and I sighed loudly.
“What do you recommend, then?”
“Well, we have a variety of world-class dishes.” She beamed at me happily. “You can’t really go wrong with any of them.”
“Really? So then, I’ll have the las—”
“We’ll have two burgers,” Wade cut me off. “I’ll have bacon and cheese on mine.” He looked over at me. “You want bacon and cheese?”
“Just cheese.” I pursed my lips. “And I’ll have the burger medium.”
“We’ll take the burgers medium-well.” Wade cut me off again. “And we’ll take an order of fries and onion rings.”
“Sounds good.” Beryl nodded. “I’ll have that out to you in a few minutes.”
“I’ll have a cup of coffee as well, please,” I added quickly.
“We’ll take two of your finest Cokes,” Wade said with a smile.
I shook my head as Beryl walked away. “Okay, what the hell is going on here?” I asked, my tone a little sharp. “I didn’t want a burger.”
“Honey, Beryl and I were doing you a favor. Her husband Peter is the chef, well, I guess I’d say cook, and there’s only one dish he can make that tastes good.” He grinned. “The man knows how to drop some frozen fries and onion rings, and he knows how to cook up a burger on the stovetop. His other dishes, not so good.”
“What the ... Are you joking?”
“Do I look like I’m joking?”
“So basically, the only items you can get at this café are burgers and fries?”
“They make a damn good burger and fries.” He grinned. “And anyway, you’re the chef at home, so we don’t need to worry about eating here too much.”
“Yeah.” I bit down on my lower lip. I should just keep my mouth shut because my skills in the kitchen weren’t all that either. “Oh yeah, you never told me some of your favorite dishes so I could try and make them for dinner some evenings.” I paused and looked at him. “What meals did you say you were preparing for yourself again?”
“What are you talking about?” He stared at me blankly.
“When we first talked about the job, you said you were going to make your own breakfasts or dinners or something?” I smiled at him weakly, wishing I could remember exactly what he’d said.
“Hmm,” He shook his head. “I don’t remember that. You’re responsible for all meals. That’s why I’m paying you so much, remember?”
“That’s not how I remember it.” I could hear my voice growing colder. “When am I supposed to have any time to myself?”
“To do what? Call your boyfriend on the phone?”
“I do need to talk to and see other people.”
“You can invite him to come up if you want to.” He shrugged. “I’d like to meet the man that can put up with your smart mouth.”
“Put up with my smart mouth? I’ll have you know that he likes my mouth just fine, thank you very much.”
“I’m sure he does.” He leaned forward. “It looks like you can open it quite wide, though I don’t know if that’s an issue with him.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I don’t want to be crude, but I think you know what I mean.” His eyes bore into mine. “Maybe your boyfriend isn’t working with much, so it never mattered how much you could fit in.”
“Fit in?” I repeated his words. “Fit what in?” I stared back at him and then his meaning dawned on me. “Oh hell no.” I blushed a deep red. “You’re so damn inappropriate!” I sat back and pointed at him. “If I sue you, you’re going to have to pay me a lot more than a hundred grand.”
“Are you planning on suing me?” He raised an eyebrow. “Is that what you’re saying?”
“No, of course not.” I sighed. “You just need to remember that you just met me, and I’m your assistant, not some girl you met in a bar that you can just talk to however you want.”
“You think that’s how I talk to girls in bars?”
“It would explain why you’re single.” I smirked. “No matter how good looking you are, no girl is interested in a guy approaching her and talking about BJ’s.”
“BJ’s?”
“Blow jobs,” I said, almost too loudly, and blushed. “Don’t even try and deny it. We both know that’s what you were referring to when you were talking about my mouth.”
“We do, do we?” He sipped on his water. “I would ask if you liked giving them, but I don’t want to be any more inappropriate with you.”
“Yeah, right.” It was my turn to grab some water now. “I don’t think you care about propriety whatsoever.”
“You think you know me so well, don’t you?”
“Actually, not at all.” I shook my head as I stared at him. “What do you do for fun? Do you live here full time?”
“So many questions.” He chuckled, but I could tell he didn’t like to talk about himself.
“Well, not really. I asked you two questions. That’s not exactly a litany.”
“Using your Ivy League words on me, huh?” Wade teased.
I realized that this was his way of changing the subject. Why did he dislike talking about himself so much? Most men I knew—in fact, most people generally— were always more than happy to talk about themselves.
“So, what do you do for fun?” I asked him again. “I told you about my poetry.”
“Oh yes, my little Emily Dickinson.”
“I’m nowhere near as good as Dickinson.”
“I bet you are.”
“I’m not.”
“Let me hear one of your poems.”
“Wade, I asked what you liked to do for fun. Stop trying to deflect and change the subject.”
He stared at me as if he were thinking and then finally he answered me.
“I like hunting.”
“Figures.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’m not trying to judge you, but I don’t like hunting because I don’t believe in killing innocent animals. I’ve seen those videos of hunters going to Africa and killing nearly extinct rhinos and elephants. It’s disgusting.”
“I’m not a trophy hunter.” He pursed his lips. “I would never go and shoot animals that are nearly extinct.”
“But you do shoot for fun? Hunting is a sport for you?”
“I grew up hunting with my dad.”
“And that makes it okay?”
“I feel like you don’t even want to hear what I have to say.” He sighed. “All I said is I like hunting. Maybe I hunt rodents or cockroaches.”
“Who hunts cockroaches?” I rolled my eyes.
“Maybe I do.” He grinned, and I just shook my head.
“Well, you hunt them and then eat them.” I smiled at him sweetly. “That’s something I’d love to see.”
“I can do that if you cook them for me.”
“Eww, no! I don’t even want to see a cockroach, let alone cook them.” I pretended to throw up. “That’s so gross.”
“Are you discriminating against cockroaches?”
“Are you an idiot?”
“Is that any way to talk to your boss?” He tapped his finger on the table.
“No, sir, sorry, sir, won’t happen again, sir.”
“Good, good.” His eyes crinkled and we both ended up with a smile on our faces. “You have a good sense of humor. I like that.”
“Thank you.” Despite myself, I was flattered by the compliment.
“It’s a pity you have a boyfriend.” His stare grew more intense and my scalp prickled a little.
“Why is that?” I swallowed as I waited for his response.
“Well, because I wouldn’t be able to do this ...” He said as he stood up and walked over to me.
“Do what?”
Time seemed to slow as he leaned down and pressed his lips against mine. He kissed me for a few seconds, his lips warm and
firm. My eyes widened and my skin flushed, but before I had a chance to react, he straightened back up.
“That.” He grinned at me. “I’ll be right back.”
And with that, he walked to the back of the café. I sat there rubbing my lips and wondering what the hell had just happened.
“Hey, I actually have to stay in town longer than I thought today.” Wade walked back to the table a moment later. “I can get you a car back home or you can roam around the town. I’ll give you the rest of the day off.”
“Sounds good to me.” I was hoping he would explain to me what he’d been thinking by kissing me. Not that it had been a full-on make out session or anything, but a kiss was still a kiss. I wanted to know if it had meant anything to him.
“Feel free to explore the town and I’ll give you the number to a car service to get home. Here’s a set of keys if you get home late.”
“Oh, thanks. I guess I don’t want to wake you up.”
“Oh, you won’t wake me up. I might not be home when you get back.”
“Oh?” I waited for him to tell me more, but Beryl chose that moment to return with our burgers.
“Here we are, folks, two of our finest grilled cheeses. Hope you enjoy them!” She gave us a cheerful smile.
“Grilled cheese? But—” I started but Wade shook his head as he sat down.
“Thanks, Beryl, looks great.” He grabbed a fry from his plate and munched down on it as an admittedly delicious-looking grilled cheese was placed in front of me.
“Thanks.” Once again I felt like I was in the Twilight Zone. “Okay, what’s going on here?” I looked at Wade and raised an eyebrow. “Did we or did we not order burgers? And actually, I ordered lasagna, but you told me just take the burger because that is what they are known for.”
“Savannah, you have to understand that you’re in Herne Hill Village now, not the big city. Things work differently here.”
“What the hell does being in a small village have to do with it? Shouldn’t I be able to order what’s on the menu and actually get it?” I grabbed the grilled cheese and took a bite. The warm American cheese oozed into my mouth along with the perfectly crisp sourdough bread. “This is delicious,” I said as I took another bite and grabbed a French fry.
“See, it is as it was meant to be.” He grinned and took another bite. “Sometimes life doesn’t go according to plan, but it always goes the way that it should.”
“I guess so ...” I grabbed another fry. “So, you won’t be home tonight?”
“Tonight, tomorrow morning … Who’s to say?” He winked at me and then sat back. “I’m a busy man.”
“Have a date?” I asked him lightly, trying to pretend I wasn’t interested in the answer, but I could tell from his cocky grin in response that he knew my question wasn’t that innocent.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” he sniffed.
With that, I decided to ignore him for the rest of the meal. If he could play hot and cold, so could I. Let Wade Hart try and kiss me again, I’d slap him across the face and tell him to have a good day.
“What I’d really like to know about are your parents,” I said. “The love letter your dad wrote to your mom, it was so sweet. So loving. It must have been amazing growing up with parents so in love.”
“So in love?” He mimicked my words, his face twisting cruelly. “Do you want to know the truth of my parents’ relationship, Savannah?”
“Yes.” I nodded, surprised at the vehemence in his voice.
“My dad loved my mother, he loved her so much that when she left him to flee to Paris to make it as a model and hook up with designers and nobility, she broke his heart. She broke his heart into a million pieces. My mother was a socialite. At the end of the day, all she cared about was her looks and being adored by as many men as possible. She never loved my father. She only loved herself. And when he realized that, he died. He died because he didn’t want to keep living. He died of a broken heart. He wasted away into nothing, and I will never forgive her for that.”
Wade’s voice sounded hollow, and I felt like I was glimpsing a softer side to him, a deeper side that made me look at him as someone other than my cocky, sexy, and completely arrogant boss. I saw him as a man with issues. A man with a past. A man with more depth and more pain than I ever would have imagined. After reading the letter this morning and seeing the photograph, it had struck me that his father must have truly been very heartbroken. He’d loved Wade’s mom so very much. And it hadn’t been enough.
If a man ever loved me that much, I’d find it very hard to walk away.
Chapter 9
“There are a lot more people here than I thought there would be,” I whispered into the phone. I took a nervous sip of red wine.
“Makes sense, it’s a small town. I bet all the locals go there.” Lucy sounded cheerful. I could hear the sound of the television in the background. “Did you decide what poem you were going to recite tonight?”
“No.” I sighed. “I’m shocked I signed up, to be honest. You know how I feel about performing in new places.”
“It will be great. Hey, hold on a second. Jolene, no! Jolene put it down, Jolene!” she yelled. I made a face wondering what my dog was up to now. “Hey, sorry about that.”
“What happened?”
“Jolene grabbed a slice of my pizza and ran.” She made a tut-tutting sound. “That dog is really too much.”
“I’m sorry, Lucy.”
“It’s not your fault,” she replied, but I knew she did think it was my fault. She didn’t think I had trained Jolene well as a puppy, but I had tried my best. “So, how’s it going with bossman?”
“Bossman still sucks.” I lowered my voice. “But something interesting happened today.”
“What?”
“He kissed me.”
“He what?” Lucy screeched. “How did you not start the conversation with this information?”
“Well, I didn’t want to make it seem like a big deal.” I took another sip of wine. “I mean it wasn’t like a full-on pash.”
“What?” Lucy sounded confused.
“Full-on pash.”
“What the hell is a pash, Savannah?”
“Remember that Australian show we watched where they called making out pashing?”
“No, I don’t, and stop changing the subject. Your boss kissed you, and what did you do back?”
“I kissed him back.” I paused and then giggled slightly. “Okay, I mean, maybe I’m exaggerating a bit. His lips pressed against mine for five seconds and I didn’t push him off.”
“That’s it?” Lucy sounded exasperated. “Girl, that’s not a kiss.”
“Well, it was something,” I shot back, embarrassed that I was probably making something out of nothing.
“Talk to me when he’s going down on you under the kitchen table or you’re giving him a BJ in a restaurant.” Lucy giggled. “That’s the sort of session I want to be hearing about.”
“He’s not going to go down on me in the kitchen.”
“Girl, then is he even worth it?”
“I never said he was.”
“You know what our problem is, Savannah?” Lucy sounded all matter-of-fact, and I sat up.
“No, what?”
“We’re too inexperienced and immature. How do we expect to find real men and have real, passionate relationships if we’re still acting like kids?”
“Who’s acting like a kid?”
“Girl, your boss barely pecked you and you were acting like you guys filmed some sort of X-rated video.”
“I never acted like we made an X-rated video!” I huffed.
“You either want in his pants or not, and if you do, then you need to go for it.” She giggled and my eyes narrowed. Was she drunk?
“Are you drinking, Lucy?”
“No.” She hiccupped.
“Really?”
“Well, maybe I made myself a martini.” She laughed. “It doesn’t taste like a martini, but it sure is s
trong.”
“Oh, Lucy!” I laughed out loud. “I wish I was there getting drunk with you.”
“I wish I was there with you about to go on stage and perform.”
“You should go to an open mic night in the village. Maybe you’ll meet someone.”
“I don’t want to meet anyone. At least not while I’m alone.” She sighed. “I wish you were here.”
“Awww, I’ll be home soon, and then we can go on all sorts of adventures around the city because I’ll have money then.”
“Promise?”
“Promise!” I smiled into the phone. “I better go now, though. More and more people are starting to pour in and sit around the stage. I don’t want to be that rude asshole still on their phone.”
“Okay, call me later. Have fun and kill it, girl.”
“Bye.” I hung up and was surprised to find a younger-looking man standing in front of me with a grin on his face and a glass of Guinness in his hand.
“No one would think you’re a rude asshole.” He smiled. I blushed as he nodded at the seat next to me. “Is that seat open?”
“Yes.” I gestured at it. “Please have a seat.”
“New to town, right?” he asked as he sat down and drank from his stout.
“How did you know?” I asked in surprise.
“This is a small village. Everyone knows everything. You work up at Hart Manor?”
“Hart Manor?” I raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t know it was called that.”
“That’s what we locals call it.” He chuckled. “You work for Wade?”
“Yes, do you know him?” I asked, wondering if the two men were friends. The guy next to me looked to be about my age. He wasn’t terribly well-dressed, but he had a nice friendly smile and a warm personality.
“I know of him. Never met him.” He shook his head and put his glass down. “I’m Gordon, nice to meet you.” He held out his hand to me and I shook it. “I want to say your name is Vanna or Vania?”
“Close, it’s Savannah.” I laughed. “The gossip train works fast.”
“You’re from Georgia?”
“Nope.” I shook my head and wondered if Beryl had passed on that piece of incorrect information. “I’m from Florida, but I live in Manhattan right now—well, not right now. Right now, I live with Wade Hart. I’m his assistant.”
