At Your Service

by Amy Jo Cousins

  "Now let's get out of here. Tyler will be chewing nails by the time we get back to the bar."

  And that had been all that was said about Grace's history and hotel choice.

  On the way back to the bar, Sarah made it clear that she'd meant her kind words when she offered up a spare bedroom in her apartment. Her roommate had recently moved out and she was in no hurry to find another one. If Grace wanted to stay there for a while, she said, they could work something out between them.

  When Sarah emphasized that the arrangement would be strictly casual and wouldn't involve anything like signing a lease, Grace agreed on the spot.

  Finished with her glass washing behind the bar, she gave yet another heartfelt mental thank-you to this family that was taking her in as if she were one of their own. She knew it was callous to use them like this, but she couldn't remember the last time someone had offered to take care of her. She was too used to doing it all on her own.

  It took her a moment to realize that Tyler still stood behind her and that the words coming out of his mouth were about her.

  "I pretty much picked her up off the street," he was saying, "cleaned her up, and tonight I plan on taking her home with me."

  "What?" she shrieked and stood up so fast that the top on her head cracked against his chin.

  "Ouch." He rubbed his chin, and was pleased to see how quickly she rose to take his bait. "I was just saying, darlin', that—"

  "Not another word," she threatened, turning and advancing on him with soapy hands ready to strangle.

  "—you'd be coming home with me tonight. You know you need a place to stay."

  "I'm not going home with you, you moron." She was shouting by now and it felt good. "I'm going home with your sister."

  When the wave of laughter from the happily eavesdropping customers broke over her, she realized that they'd gathered quite an audience. Good-natured catcalls and comments flew her way from the men seated at the bar, their girlfriends laughing along with them.

  "Man, Sarah's boyfriend isn't going to be too happy to hear that!"

  "Or maybe he'll be twice as happy!"

  "Get your minds out of the gutter," she scolded the collection of faces at the bar.

  "Don't be mad, Grade." Catching her off guard, Tyler wrapped his arms around her and reeled her in close to him. "You're too hard to resist." With a wolfish smile, lots of teeth and a look of hunger in his eyes, he bent his head over her and she knew he was going to kiss her in front of the entire bar.

  And because she wanted him to so badly, could feel herself rising up onto her toes to lean into his kiss, could feel her legs shifting to cradle one of his thighs between hers, she panicked.

  Next time, hit him with this.

  Susannah's words from opening night raced through her head—along with the fleeting thought that later on she'd regret this—before she reached out blindly with one hand.

  She only had a moment to realize that she'd grabbed the dirty spoon Tyler had been using to stuff olives with blue cheese and then she was rapping it sharply against his skull.

  "Grace!" Addy looked shocked at the far end of the bar.

  Tyler rubbed his head gingerly and grimaced as he smushed the blue cheese in his hair even more.

  The crowd of onlookers had doubled in number. She could see Richard and his wife clapping hands in approval across the room.

  She threw her hands in the air.

  "His mother told me to do it," she announced, and decided to march out from behind the bar with whatever dignity remained intact. And she did, except for the part where she had to duck down to squeeze beneath the bar counter. She headed straight to the kitchen.

  Sarah and her mother were singing along to "Under the Boardwalk" when she burst through the doors. Sarah was sending the last of the big soup pots through the dishwasher and Susannah was wiping down a counter. They both looked up when they heard the saloon-style doors slam against the wall.

  "I had to do it."

  "Do what?" Sarah called.

  Susannah was already smiling.

  "I had to hit him upside the head. With a spoon."

  Tyler's mother just grinned peacefully as Sarah pelted the both of them with questions. "I knew you would."

  Her feet might never recover.

  Grace decided that it had definitely been years since she'd worked a full schedule as a server. She propped her feet up on a chair across the aisle and dug into the plate of pasta balanced on her lap. Susannah had insisted on making her a plate when she realized that Grace hadn't had time to eat before her shift, or had a spare five minutes during it, either. They'd finally closed the kitchen at ten o'clock, although the bar would stay open until 2:00 a.m. But without food that needed to be served, Tyler could handle the customers at the bar and she could sit for the first time in eight hours.

  At a table in the back of the room, she spread out with her dinner and her paperwork. She totaled up her checks and credit card receipts and counted out her cash, in between bites of rigatoni in a creamy tomato sauce.

  By the time she double-checked her math, she had cleaned her plate.

  All in all, it hadn't been a bad night. Not as much as she used to spend on a pair of shoes, in her old life, but enough to make a start on paying rent to Sarah. Besides, Grace thought, she was embarrassed to admit, even to herself, that she'd ever spent three hundred dollars on a pair of shoes.

  "Are you making out okay here? Cash-wise, I mean."

  She looked up to find Tyler standing over her. The bar was still noisy enough that she hadn't heard him walk up.

  "Pretty well, actually. Your friends are good tippers."

  "Yeah, well, they like you, too. Half the people who've been here tell me they'll only come back as long as I manage to hang on to you."

  She didn't want to meet his eyes, so she focused on gathering up her paperwork. Stuffing her checks and receipts on one side of her order book and the balance of her cash total on the other, she clapped the book closed and passed it to him over her shoulder.

  When he bopped her on the head with it, she craned her neck to glare at him in irritation. Then she remembered what he'd told her earlier when he sent his sister home and immediately felt guilty.

  "Do you need me to stock something for you?" she asked. She was, after all, getting paid to work this late. "That's what I'm here for."

  She couldn't tell if he was irritated or just tired when he spoke.

  "Take a break, Grace. We can stock later. I was just.check-ing to see if you wanted a drink. You get one on the house after each shift, and seeing how rough tonight was, I'll even break out the champagne if you want."

  I am such a jerk. "Thanks, but I think I'll stick with coffee."

  "Let me know if you change your mind." He strolled back to the bar, a bar towel tucked in his back pocket and red wine staining his left sleeve. It had been a long night for both of them.

  And it was just the two of them left working. Tyler had sent his sisters and his mother home shortly after the kitchen closed, When Grace had started to protest at being left by herself with him, he'd pulled her aside so that his family couldn't hear him.

  "I want them to go home, Grace. They've been spending too much time here. Addy's got a two-year-old at home. Sarah's working at the clinic before coming back here and—"

  "Stop." She surprised herself by putting a finger up to his lips. "Send them home. We'll be fine."

  The look of relief on his face showed her how badly he felt about relying on his family to help him out. When he hugged her, it was as a friend, and she squeezed him back without reservation.

  "Thank you." He held her at arm's length and seemed to struggle to look solemn. "I promise I won't flirt with you. Not even a little bit."

  "Yeah, right." She'd scoffed automatically.

  "Okay, maybe just a little bit. I'm only human, darlin'."

  But she trusted him not to make things difficult for her. Something about a man growing up with so many women in his family
, particularly such strong-minded, outspoken women, made her comfortable with working with him until the small hours of the morning.

  Then there was that part of her that wanted him to make things difficult for her.

  Her mind kept on straying back to that one kiss in his office and the way her stomach had clenched behind the bar when he'd pulled her close again. She'd caught herself mindlessly staring into space more than once since then, unable to recall what she was doing and far too conscious of the heat pooling deliriously in her belly, remembering his kiss.

  If only he didn't have such a mouth on him. Every time she looked at him she imagined it pressed fiercely against her own. She could feel the way the corner of the door frame would have edged sharply into her back if he'd continued to kiss her in the office, backing her up against the wall, and pressing her hands above her head, where they couldn't push him away, a And she wouldn't really want to.

  Grace realized with a start that she was doing it again. Fantasizing about her boss. The boss she was lying to daily, even if only by what she didn't say to him. She knew she couldn't afford that kind of complication in her life right now and vowed to stop it from that moment on.

  Closing time, and the ability to go hide at Sarah's apartment, never seemed so far away.

  The hours passed quickly enough though, between her side work and stocking for the next day's business. Before she knew it, they were saying goodbye to the last customers of the night and Tyler was locking the door behind them.

  Most of the lights at the rear of the restaurant were shut off, the ones up front dim enough to cloak the whole room in an aura of peaceful calm. She wiped down the last of the tables and straightened, arching her back in an effort to work out some of the kinks. Tyler was rummaging around behind the bar, so she felt inconspicuous enough to bend over and do a few toe-touches, stretching out her muscles. When she heard him walking toward her, she stood again quickly and reached for a chair to upend o'n the nearest table.

  "Leave it, Grace. I've got a busboy who can come in tomorrow. He'll finish up here." She saw that he held the previously offered bottle of champagne in one hand and a pair of plastic cups in the other. At her look, he explained, "I didn't want either of us to have to wash another damn glass."

  She smiled in appreciation. "Thanks. But I think I'm too tired for champagne."

  He walked over to a table, set down the bottle and cups, and pulled out two chairs side by side. When he looked at her, she read nothing but tired appreciation in his gaze.

  "Come sit with me, Grace. It's been one hell of a day, but after a week of being open, I'm starting to think we're going to pull it off. Surely that deserves one celebratory drink."

  She wavered and was sure he could read the indecision in her eyes.

  "Have I seriously hit on you once in the last few days?"

  "No." She had to admit that, and repressed the thought that she'd been disappointed.

  "See? And tonight I'm too wiped out to flirt even. I'm totally harmless."

  "I doubt that," she muttered loud enough for him to hear and chuckle at. Then she gave in and sat next to him. When he poured her a cup of champagne, she accepted it with gratitude.

  "Here's to surviving the grand opening and our first crazy week." Tyler lifted his cup and she clinked her plastic cup dully against his. "You busted your butt working tonight, dar-lin'. I appreciate that."

  She felt the champagne she sipped burst in sharply fruited bubbles on her tongue, before tilting her head back and letting the cool liquid trickle slowly down her throat. She brought her gaze back to his and found his eyes on her, not quite as dulled now.

  Safer to keep talking.

  "It was hardly just me." She waved a hand in a tired circle, encompassing the whole room. "Your family work at least as hard as I do, and you put in more time than all of us."

  "Yeah, well, this is my baby." He closed his eyes for a moment and she felt free to stare at him for once. He looked tired. Tired, but still strong, as if he could jump up and work another twelve-hour shift if that's what it took to run his business. Something about that determination made her want to know more about this man.

  "Have you always wanted to own a restaurant?" The quietness made it easy to ask personal questions. Like trading secrets in the dark at a grade-school sleepover.

  His hands where they rested on the chair arms were limp with relaxation. His voice when he spoke was surprisingly clear.

  "Sometimes it feels like it." He laughed and sat up straight before stretching hugely in his chair. "But no, I didn't know what I wanted. I fell into the business by accident long before I figured out that it's what I love." He sipped champagne out of the plastic cup and seemed to think for a while before looking at her. "Are you and your dad close?"

  "No." Quiet memories, so fuzzy with time as to contain almost nothing more than a feeling of warmth and a crisp smell she thought might have been her father's cologne. "He died when I was very young."

  "I didn't know that." She was glad that he didn't apologize or say any of the stupid things most people came up with in an effort to comfort her for a twenty-some-year-old loss. His next words made it clear why. "Mine, too." He was gazing at his hands now as he spoke. "He was a jazz musician. Saxophone, mostly. My mom has a couple of recordings he worked on, background stuff. Not much. When I was about seventeen, I looked old for my age and I started sneaking into clubs. Blues and jazz clubs." He laughed a little and shook his head, eyes distant. "I told myself it was because I could drink beer, feel tough, get in a little trouble. But I think I was mostly just trying to remember what it felt like to hear my dad play."

  He shook his head again. "After a few years I ended up working at a couple of my regular hangouts. Started out bussing tables and worked my way up. Eventually, even my boss pointed out to me that I should be running my own place. I think I was just working up the nerve."

  "And now you're here," she said, pleased with the neatness of his story, but also feeling a vague jealousy that his business had such a personal meaning to him. She'd felt that way herself, before, although everyone left in her family seemed to think she was crazy for doing so.

  "Well, almost here." He sank back into his chair and closed his eyes again. "If everything goes according to plan, in a year or two I'll punch out the side and add on a second room so I can have live music on the weekends."

  And you can feel your dad here all the time. But she didn't say the words out loud. Just cleared her throat and asked him, "And you never wanted a partner? You know, someone to share the workload?"

  "I had one, once."

  She knew she was prying, but couldn't resist asking him, "What happened?"

  His eyes were still shut, but she saw him grimace briefly. "It turned out that while I thought we were planning a business to run together for the rest of our lives, she was looking to open a trendy hotspot that we could sell off to some restaurant conglomerate six months later. Needless to say, she wasn't thrilled with my plan, or with me, so she dissolved the partnership, you might say."

  "Ouch. Sorry."

  "Hey, she returned the ring. That was nice." He tilted his head toward her and opened his eyes long enough to wink at her. "Besides, it reminded me to focus on what's important Making a success out of this place."

  "There's not a doubt in my mind that'll happen. How could it not, the way you kill yourself working around here?"

  His next words made her jump.

  "I haven't been working sg hard that I didn't notice you taking charge a number of times, little Miss I'm Just A Waitress."

  Where his voice was clear, hers squeaked. "What do you mean?"

  He glanced at her, eyes dull with tiredness. "Wasn't it you I saw sending Sarah off to the kitchen on day one and bringing Maxie out to bus tables and fill water glasses?"

  "Sarah was so scared she kept on dropping drinks on her customers," she answered defensively. "And Maxie was going stir-crazy in the kitchen."

  "And was it you I heard that
night, comp'ing the entrees for the couple at table ten?"

  "That was directly related to Sarah's problem with the drinks." She bit her lip. "Although I probably should have run it by you first."

  "And the two new dishes added to the daily specials board?" By now, Tyler had sat up and his eyes glinted at her.

  "I just suggested to your mother that we might want to expand the options for our vegetarian diners." The magnitude of the changes she'd made during the chaos of the past week, without consulting her boss on any of them, had her cringing now. "Your mom was the one to decide we should go ahead and add the dishes tonight." His raised eyebrow drew the rest out of her. "I suggested that we wait and change the menu tomorrow."

  Good Lord, she berated herself, if this is the best you can do pretending to be a waitress, you might as well quit now. Why don't you just come out and tell him you're a world-class restaurateur in charge of the Haley Group?

  Her guilty thoughts must have communicated themselves to him. The next words out of his mouth were the ones she cringed to hear.

  "No way were you just a waitress at your last job, Grade."

  "But, really, I was," she started to protest.

  "I bet you were running the place, without getting paid an extra dime to do it, and someone else was taking all the credit."

  As explanations went, she reflected, that was actually fairly close to the truth, albeit on a much smaller scale. She sighed. "I think you're right." It had been Charles's job she'd done for him, the man her family had selected and groomed to marry her. The man they'd made president of the Haley Group, despite his having no real ties to her family other than the assumption that he would eventually marry Grace. "I still should have checked with you first."

  "Hey." He trapped her hands on the table with one hand and grabbed her chin with the other, forcing her to face him. "When I want an employee who can't think for herself and comes running to me with problems she ought to handle on her own, I'll tell you. Got it?" His hand on her chin moved her head up and down in a nod of agreement. "You've been terrific. Got that?" He made her nod again and then moved to release her.