Thinking of you.
The incoming text alert was almost immediate, and Morris’s heart jumped. Keep hoping to see you at the bar. Hurry home, breakfast is waiting.
Chapter Thirteen
DUDE, GONNA be late. Sorry.
Theo hit Send and set down his phone with a sigh of regret. He’d been looking forward to his semidate with Morris tonight. If hooking up after midnight and vegging on the couch with the hope of scoring if they caught a private moment was actually considered a date.
It seemed like Theo only ever got to see the man in quick snatches. It wasn’t nearly enough to satisfy his desire for more, and Theo wasn’t just thinking about sexy times either. He clicked with Morris in a way he hadn’t clicked with anyone else before. The thought of this being only a fling was rapidly changing to a desire for something more—not that Morris seemed interested in a deeper relationship, and Theo couldn’t blame him because he was never around.
Theo checked over the dining room to make sure all the chores had been finished even though the last bartender and waitresses had already left. He knew Jill would’ve gone over it, but he needed something to occupy his antsy thoughts. The dining room was as pristine as Theo’s kitchen, living up to their exacting standards.
He didn’t know what he was going to do without Jill to mind this half. It didn’t matter his sister was only cutting back until the baby was toddling. It made the twin holes in his heart echo emptily. He kept looking up expecting to see his dad behind the bar, his mom tucked away at the back table she preferred as she went over receipts.
Theo craved a cigarette. It had been over a year since he’d quit, and sometimes he still wanted the taste and ritual. Not that Jill would let him have one in the restaurant anyway. His nerves jangled with the need, and he drummed his fingertips on the tabletop as he waited for Lincoln and Scottie to finish gathering their things in the kitchen and for Jill to come back with her husband. He’d go back to the kitchen to check on them, but Scottie would only chase him out if he saw Theo poke his nose back there again.
Theo’s phone dinged, and he grabbed the welcome distraction. No worries. I’m still up. Working on some concept sketches for a new idea.
Theo smiled and scrubbed a hand through his hair. Can’t wait to see it. No drama at work today? He glanced up as Scottie passed by, heading toward the front door. “Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” Theo asked his sous chef.
“Skinny is done in the kitchen,” Scottie replied with a perplexed frown. “I’ve got to prep in the morning. Where the fuck do you think I’m going?”
“We called a family meeting. You’re family.” Theo stabbed a finger toward him. “Sit your ass down.”
“I don’t want to weigh in on restaurant decisions. That should be up to you and your siblings.” Scottie’s frown deepened, but he slid into the booth next to Theo as Lincoln came out of the back. His brother looked tired from loading and unloading dishes, and damp from the dishwasher steam. Theo hated keeping him out so late, but he wanted Lincoln’s input, and Lincoln wanted to use his own money for that new bike, so he wasn’t quibbling about the extra hours.
“Half my siblings aren’t here,” Theo retorted. It stung. Dustin and Robin should be there. These were major changes they were implementing, and his wayward brother and sister still had a financial interest in the restaurant, but both of them said they couldn’t make the drive and the decision was up to the rest. Theo refused to let it eat at him, but it was like acid in his throat. Every time he thought he’d beat that demon, it came back. “You are. Besides, we want your opinion. Isn’t that right, Lincoln?”
Lincoln nodded and slumped into the booth across from them. “Better you than me, Scottie. You do the important stuff. I clean tables and wash dishes. I’d rather be playing a video game right now.”
“I started out bussing tables too,” Theo said. Their parents had been big believers in establishing a work ethic early on. And like Lincoln, Theo enjoyed saving up for things with his own money. In his case it had been a secondhand car. He’d loved that baby. It had been the perfect car to neck in down by the river.
“Yeah, but you like cooking and stuff. Freak. I don’t.” Lincoln gave him a moody smile before his gaze flicked to the front door as the bells chimed. Craig and Jill walked in, and Theo could tell from the expression on his brother-in-law’s face he wouldn’t accept any more hesitations from any of them. They were going to make these final decisions tonight. Theo’s chest felt heavy. This sucked.
Craig hovered over Jill, his craggy face concerned. Theo supposed if he were a first-time father, he might be acting the same way. That at least was one worry he’d never have to face. Craig’s gaze swept over the group at the booth, his eyes conveying his sympathy and the hard set of his mouth, his determination.
Jill waved off Craig’s offer of support and lowered herself into the booth. “In another couple months, I’ll need help getting up and down. Right now me and baby girl are fine.” Her tone was as testy as her gaze, which meant she was in agreement with Theo on this total suckage. His phone dinged with a message back from Morris, and he pocketed it with a sigh. No more time to indulge.
Craig opted not to comment, grabbing a chair instead and straddling it backward. “Okay, I know you two don’t want to make this decision, but it has to be made.” He held up his hand, counting off his fingers as he went along. “First, Lincoln’s going to be back to school by the time the baby gets here. High school is hard enough without putting in so many hours at the bistro. None of us want him to feel obligated to volunteer.”
Jill and Theo’s eyes met. “That’s something we can agree on,” Theo said. Lincoln’s well-being came first. They couldn’t count on him to take extra shifts all the time, keep up with his homework, and still have the normal teenage life he deserved.
“You won’t hear me complain.” Lincoln slouched back, tugging his cap low over his eyes.
“Second,” Craig continued. “We had several really good candidates come through here for interviews. If we wait too long, they are going to be snatched up by other offers, and it’s not fair to string them along. We should give them an answer, yes or no.”
Theo had more of a quibble there. Didn’t matter if they were qualified or not; they were outsiders. But he kept his mouth shut. If he got started, Jill would get started, and Craig might kill him. None of them were leaving until they made a decision, and Theo didn’t feel like being here all night.
“Personally, I liked Rose Williams,” Scottie cut in. Theo cast him a look of betrayal. “What? You wanted my opinion.”
“You liked her because she was gorgeous and had that islands accent thing going for her,” Theo accused.
“That didn’t hurt,” Scottie agreed with an easy shrug.
Craig frowned and went through the stack of applications in front of him. “She’s the one your friend recommended, right?” he asked Theo.
Lincoln snorted. “Friend, right.”
“Yeah, his sister works for a hotel in Annapolis. They worked together.” Theo nudged Lincoln with his toe and Lincoln nudged him back, a smirk playing about his mouth. “She gave her a letter of recommendation. Look, I have to say this. I hate this. I hate giving up control to anyone who’s not family, but I know we have to.”
Theo looked around the table at each one of them. “And I know you all want me to either cut back on my hours some or consider closing the restaurant for one day a week. That has never happened, and I’m not willing for it to happen now. The weekends bring in our best revenue, and we make a killing at the lunch hour during the workweek.”
Theo paused and felt his pulse jump. This part at least was something he could be joyful about. “So one of the changes I propose is for Scottie to split duties with me. We come up with a schedule, when I work dinner, he does lunch, with full authority over the kitchen staff. We already make the menus together. We split the time shopping at the markets. As much as I’ll miss working beside him, there’s no one
I trust more to run my kitchen.” Theo smiled at Scottie’s stunned expression. “And I think he should get the pay to reflect it as well.”
Jill beamed, the tension around her eyes easing. “That’s an amazing idea. You two have both been doing double duty so long it’s a miracle you’re not ghosts of yourselves. What about days off, though? You two should still have at least one day off a week, preferably two.”
Scottie was still staring at Theo with wide eyes, his sarcastic exterior stripped away for once. “You trust me with your kitchen?” he asked in a low voice.
“You’re my brother from another mother,” Theo replied. He tapped his knuckles to Scottie’s. “I couldn’t do this without you, man.”
“Wow, okay.” Scottie sat back with a shake of his head as Craig and Lincoln threw in their agreements. “Thanks, guys, seriously. I won’t let you down. Theo and I can come up with a schedule tomorrow.” He glanced at Theo for confirmation, and he nodded. “We’ll each pick a day to do double duty so the other has a day off. I’m okay with starting out with one. It’ll already be a big break after this last year.”
“Yeah, I’m not comfortable with taking off two days yet. Once we get settled and school starts for Lincoln, then we can revisit it.” The phone in Theo’s pocket buzzed with another incoming message, and the temptation to take a peek was a siren’s song.
Craig cleared his throat and tapped the stack of résumés meaningfully. “I’m glad to have a solution for the kitchen. Now we need to settle on a solution for the front.” He held up his hand as Jill began to protest. “Honey, I know you want to keep working up until the baby is born. That’s okay with me. That doesn’t negate this decision. Let’s face it, babies are unpredictable. They come when they want, so we need a plan in place. Hiring someone now gives you time to work with them. Then when you do take time off, you’ll be at ease knowing there’s someone you trust taking care of things instead of stressing about it. Not to mention you need a couple days off a week too.”
Jill made a face. “I don’t like you.” She reached over and took his hand, giving it an affectionate squeeze.
“That’s because you know I’m right and you can’t come up with an argument against it.” Craig patted her hand as she shrugged with a rueful smile of admittance.
Theo wanted to protest, too, but he didn’t want to make Jill feel guilty about taking time off and easing back. It was hard. They’d never had anyone at the front of the house who wasn’t family. It felt like he was letting his mom and dad down again. Bad enough he couldn’t keep the family together after they’d buried their parents.
“As long as they aren’t jerks, I don’t care,” Lincoln cut in. “That lady with the blonde hair and razor smile, Orit, I didn’t like her.”
Craig frowned as he pulled out her résumé. “She was the manager of that steakhouse for years. They have a good rep.”
“That’s a swanky, snobby place,” Scottie said. “No lie, good food, but not the sort of atmosphere we have here. This is a family place, very homey. Even I could see her nose in the air as she looked around.”
“She’d have us all in little uniforms,” Lincoln said morosely. “Little soldiers jumping to her attention. I can imagine her expression if anyone steps out of line.”
“Aren’t you overdramatizing it?” Craig asked with a pointed look at Lincoln.
Theo remembered the flirt in her eyes when they’d talked. He didn’t get the vibe the others did, but he trusted their opinion. He thought back over their encounter and recalled Orit being full of plans to “enhance” the bistro. He grimaced. No, he didn’t care for that thought at all.
“Yeah, I didn’t like her either,” Jill added. “My impression was she’d rather change what we have instead of embracing it. I’m not willing to alter what works. We’re successful because we’re a place you can come to on a budget and bring your kids without worrying about feeling unwelcome.”
“Okay.” Craig sat her application to the side and pinned each one of them with a long look. “Before we discuss the next applicant, I want you to keep one thing in mind. Even your parents didn’t do this alone. They had five kids to take care of. They split duties with others as well. It’s not as important to keep it all in the family if you don’t have enough family here to cover it, as much as it’s important to have people you trust in these positions. So try to be open-minded.”
Theo exchanged glances with his sister of mutual commiseration and then sighed inwardly. Time to do this. “We will, Craig. Who’s the next one?”
THEO PULLED the car into their dark driveway and noted by some miracle there was still a light on downstairs at Morris’s place even though it was so late. “I’m tired. You guys argue too much,” Lincoln announced as Theo parked. “I’m going to bed.”
“I’m going to go talk to Morris for a few minutes, if that’s okay,” Theo said, eyeballing the light as he held out the keys to Lincoln.
“Whatever.” Lincoln snatched the keys out of his hand. “If you want to make a booty call on our neighbor, I’m not going to say anything.”
Theo blinked. He didn’t expect Lincoln to come out and say it like that. “Good to know.”
“It’s not like there could be a serial killer upstairs and I’m getting stalked while you’re getting your freak on,” Lincoln added in a huffy voice.
Theo wasn’t sure if he was more unsettled by the fact he was that obvious or the thought he might be setting a bad example for his brother. Questions like that cropped up often now. He remembered when he didn’t have a damn care in the world about whether his brother knew about his sex life. He and Morris were grown adults, responsible and all that. Neither of them was committed to someone else, and they were free to do whatever the hell they wanted. He needed to stop second-guessing himself so much.
“If we were going by horror movie rules, wouldn’t I be the one getting killed? Not you.” Theo threw an amused glanced at his brother, who rolled his eyes.
“Whatever,” Lincoln muttered again. “That’s fiction. This is real life. I don’t want to move to a new apartment if this doesn’t work out, that’s all I’m saying.”
Theo watched him climb up the hill to their place and disappear inside. He forgot how dramatic high school could be, when the thought of facing your ex every day was torture. He was lucky if he caught a glimpse of Morris over the week. He didn’t think living upstairs was going to be a problem if it didn’t work out.
Morris’s door was unlocked, and he could hear the low murmur of the television. Theo stuck his head through the door. “Hey, Morris. You still awake, man?”
Silence greeted him, and Theo glanced at his phone to check the time of his last message. It wasn’t more than thirty minutes ago. Hangin’ w/Sam and Dean. Come on in.
Sam and Dean…. Theo tried to recall if they had been among Morris’s friends he’d met after the con, but he couldn’t put a face to the names.
He followed the sound of the TV and found Morris facedown on his couch with his cat curled up on the small of his back. Morris’s long arm was draped over onto the floor resting on a discarded sketchbook with a pencil not far away. His dreads had half fallen across his face, and a faint snore came from behind them. Theo shook his head. “And they say I’m work driven.”
He debated whether to slink back out and leave Morris a message but decided to wake him first. If Morris stayed like that the entire night, he was going to wake up with a painful crick in his neck.
On the TV two guys got into a black Impala before driving off down a creepy-looking street. It seemed like the kind of show that would give a man nightmares before bedtime. Theo shut it off and stepped over an empty box of tacos from the fast-food joint on the corner. Theo didn’t know how Morris could stomach that shit; he really didn’t. He must have a gut of steel.
Theo gently shook Morris’s shoulder as the cat opened one eye with an evil glare. “Hey, man, wake up before your cat kills me or you knot your body into a pretzel.”
Morr
is groaned and opened one eye in a scary impression of his cat. “You had really better be Theo and not some figment of my imagination, or I’m kicking your ass.”
“It’s really me.” Theo crouched down next to him as the cat yawned, deliberately showing all of her teeth as if to warn Theo away. “Sorry to bother you, but you really didn’t look comfortable.”
“Comfortable is relative.” Morris shifted and Cassie’s tail thumped him as she let out an odd-sounding squawk of complaint. “I was having a really amazing dream where you and Idris Elba were arguing over who was giving me the best blow job and using my very willing body as a guinea pig.”
Wow, Theo ranked with Idris Elba in a dream. That was kinda awesome. Theo grinned and brushed Morris’s dreads back so he could get a better look at his face. “Don’t keep me in suspense. Who was winning?”
“I was too deliriously turned on to judge.” Morris shifted again, looking over his shoulder at his cat. “Don’t you have your own bed?”
Cassie sat up, her baleful gaze on Theo. Deliberately she kneaded her claws into Morris for a few moments before stretching and jumping down. “I think your cat hates me.”
“She hates everyone when she’s woken up.” Morris rolled onto his side and caught Theo’s hand. “You look beat up.”
Theo felt beat up. But the sight of Morris sprawled out on the couch erased the heartache of the night. He’d deal with that later. Right now, he’d rather get lost in the present. Morris tugged on his hand and Theo sat down next to him. “This makes me feel better.”
“Glad to be of service.” Morris brushed his fingers along Theo’s jaw.
Theo skated his hand down Morris’s side. He loved the long lankiness of his body and the breadth of his shoulders. He loved the weight of Morris’s hair against his skin and the scent of him drowsy and warm. “I’d intended on waking you up so you could go to bed, but then you mentioned blow jobs.” Theo shot him a hopeful look. “You wouldn’t be teasing me, would you?”
A Little Side of Geek Page 14
