by Lilly Black
“Yes,” she says, always helpful in that regard. Her little sister was born deaf, and Nicole’s proficient at signing and lip reading as a result. “He said ‘You are mine.’”
Excuse me?
I know one sign - the one I flip at Nicole because she’s just now getting around to telling me. If I had known at the time, I might have followed that cocky son-of-a-bitch into the parking lot to set him straight…assuming she read it right. I hope she got it wrong. Well, at least I choose to try to convince myself that I hope she got it wrong.
August 20
Things at work are back to normal on Tuesday until I look up and see Playboy standing there with his smug grin. My mind flashes back to his mouthed words at the door last night. Even though Nicole probably misread it, part of me is a little excited at the prospect of it being true. This man is impossibly sexy, and though I try to pretend not to notice him, when I smell his cologne delicately in the air as I breeze by him, I think vaguely that it must be what the air smells like in heaven.
“When you have a chance…” he says, and I acknowledge him with a dismissive wave of my hand, trying to pretend he’s no different than any other customer.
“What’ll it be, Playboy?” I ask when I’m finished making him wait. He’s wearing a suit again, light grey with no tie and a navy shirt that brings out more blue in his eyes. Dozens of men come through here in tailored suits every night, but I have never undressed a single one of them with my eyes before. I know it would be an exercise in futility, but I can’t stop thinking about it.
“Same round as last night,” he says as if I would remember what he and his friends drank out of hundreds of other customers. I do. I just don’t want him to know it.
“Remind me again what beer Steph drinks,” I say.
“So you call Steph by name, but I’m still just Playboy?”
“Steph tips me sixty dollars a round. Playboy’s the best you get for thirteen bucks,” I snip, immediately regretting it. His tips are already more than generous, and I certainly don’t mean for him to tip me like his asshole friend, whose excessive tips are a degrading, thinly-veiled attempt to get me into bed.
“I see,” Playboy says with mock indignation as I walk away to fill his drink order. When I return, he has his hand over a stack of bills on the bar. He pushes them toward me.
“Keep the change,” he whispers and walks away. There are over ten bills here, and the top one is a $5. Nice. He has probably cleaned the small bills out of his wallet.
At the cash register, I count it and find that the second bill is a twenty, then a ten, then two ones for the whole $37 total, and…
If he and Steph have a bet, he just really upped the ante, I think as I count the crisp, new one hundred dollar bills. There are ten, and on the top one in the marker I use to redline the drinks on the waitresses’ order pads is the word Mine. A dreamy smile spreads across my face as I examine the other bills for more writing, wondering what it would be like to be his…to hold him…to kiss him…to…
What the fuck are you doing? I snap myself out of it. This was no valentine! “Be mine” is not the message a $1,000 tip is meant to convey, and I get the message loud and clear: “Name your price, Evan.”
Furious, I stalk out from behind the bar to return his offensive tip along with a piece of my mind, but I can’t find him or his friends anywhere. Then I notice the drinks he bought sitting on a table near the elevator untouched.
How dare he do that and just leave! I think as I return to the bar in a rage, but a few seconds later, Nicole brings a tray of empties to the waitress station, handing me a disposable coaster that changes my mood entirely.
“From the gorgeous guy in the Tom Ford suit,” she announces, knowing that name means nothing to me. “You know, the hot, blonde guy you’re so in love with.” I scowl at her as I read the note on the coaster. It says “My name is Cain,” and I laugh because pissing me off was all part of his plan.
“I think he likes you, too,” Nicole says.
“I think he’s a rich asshole.” A really hot, rich asshole.
August 21
Wednesday is my first day off this week, and when Syndi from work picks Nicole up around 5:00 pm, I have the house to myself. I settle in for a long, hot bath with a book, but I can’t stay focused enough to read. My mind keeps wandering back to work…to last night…to Cain. He’s so infuriating with his smug grin, his cocky attitude, his hair too long for nine-to-five with that damn strand of lighter blonde just a bit too short to stay tucked behind his ear, his eyes that look blue and green at the same time, his intoxicating cologne, his grin that curves a little more on one side, his confident attitude, his gorgeous dark blonde hair with that sexy strand that won’t stay…
Oh my God, Evan! Stop it! I scold myself. The only thing that man has in mind for me is a starring role in the backseat of his Porsche, or fucking Lamborghini, or whatever pretentious-assed car he drives, and even if I wasn’t certain he only wants me for his momentary sex toy, what’s the point? There is no reason to believe that he would be any different than all the other guys I’ve ever been with, and none of them could ever make it worth my effort. Hell, maybe it’s all me. Maybe I really am frigid like I tell guys in bars to get them leave me alone, but if I am, then there is just no point in dragging myself through the motions with someone like Cain. I’d be better off to stay celibate until I can figure out how to fix myself. I do get aroused….well, sometimes I get a little bit aroused, and though I am loath to admit it, the thought of being with Cain excites me more than anything has in a very long time, maybe ever. But my problem is not so much the journey as the destination.
Feeling sorry for myself, I pull the plug, and as I’m wrapping the towel around my long, dark hair, I hear my cell phone alert me to a new message.
Your friend is here asking about you, Nicole texts, and I feel a jolt of excitement.
Tell him I am offended by his garish tip, I will absolutely not keep it, and I’m sure whomever is tending bar tonight is perfectly capable of mixing a suitable AsgÃ¥rd and tonic. There. I send it.
As I towel-dry my hair, I catch myself looking expectantly at the phone, waiting for his reply, and finally, when I have already relented and turned on the hair dryer, it comes through.
He said to tell you to buy yourself something pretty.
God, he’s exasperating! I think as I grab my phone and begin furiously tapping out a response.
Tell him that I hope to see him there tomorrow night so I can return his money as I do not intend to render whatever service would call for a tip of that obscene amount. I hit send, and go back to blow drying my hair as I await his response, watching the phone as time ticks away. It usually takes me about half an hour to get it completely dry, but when I finish, there is still no response. I text again.
Everything ok? I ask, and about a minute later, Nicole responds.
Yeah. Got busy. Cain left before I got a chance to deliver your last message. Sorry. :-(
Oh, he would do that, wouldn’t he?
August 22
Thursday at 6:00 pm, I clock in at Prometheus. It’s our busiest week night, and I’m thankful because I need the distraction. Nicole is already convinced that I am interested in Cain, and I don’t want the hassle of having to argue the point with her when I know I barely have a leg to stand on.
About an hour into my shift, I look up from the cash register to see him stepping out of the elevator. I have been keeping my anger well-stoked as I waited for him, and how dare he come in here looking so hot! He’s wearing a black dress shirt and suit jacket, and when he rests his arms on the bar, platinum cuff links with the initial B catch the light. He’s too perfect, like he stepped out of an ad or off the cover of a magazine…or out of the sexual fantasies of the collective female consciousness.
“There you are,” I snap, fishing an envelope out of my apron pocket as I stalk toward him. It contains the same ten $100 dollar bills he gave me. I thrust it into his hand, feeling r
aw electricity as his fingers graze mine in passing.
“What’s this?” he asks.
“You marked it ‘mine,’” I say. “If it’s yours, you should keep it.”
“It isn’t mine. It’s yours,” Cain says.
“That is not open for discussion.”
“As you wish,” he says with no hint at how he’s taking this beyond his clear amusement with his ability to piss me off.
“Good,” I say, thinking that we have come to an understanding. “Can I get you a drink?”
“No, thank you. I won’t be staying. It was…interesting to meet you.” Cain turns away from me and disappears into the growing Thursday crowd.
Well, Evan, I guess you got what you wanted - certainly what you deserved, I think as he walks out of my life.
Though I know it’s for the best, I’m still hopeful every time the elevator doors open for the rest of the night, but Cain does not return. At closing time when everything has been cleaned, counted and put away, Nicole and I head down to the parking lot, and as I dig for the keys to my ten-year-old black Honda, I find something unexpected at the bottom of my purse.
You’ve got to be fucking kidding me! I think as I pull out the same white #10 envelope I gave Cain earlier. I don’t know how he managed this, but here it is. Warily, I peel back the tape, and inside I find ten $100 bills with “Yours” written on the top one. It makes me laugh at first, but then I remember the way he left things between us. He made it sound like I will never see him again to have another chance to give it back. “It was interesting to meet you?” That sure sounds like a goodbye to me, and in spite of everything, the thought of never seeing him again is profoundly bleak.
August 23
Well, I guess I’m keeping your money another night, Playboy.
It’s Friday night. I’ve worked until after 1:00 am with no sign of him, and as I wonder how I’m ever going to find him to return his money, I’m distracted by some drunk girl with a fake ID I had refused to serve earlier. Another bar must have accepted it, but now she’s back here looking for her friends, car keys in hand.
“Why don’t I get you some water while you text them, and you can wait for them here?” I suggest, irritated because she shouldn’t have been able to get by Dave the first time, let alone twice.
“I already did, but I can’t wait anymore. I have to work in the morning.” I offer to call her a cab, but she won’t leave her car here overnight, and though I tell her to wait while I grab a beer for the customer beside her, when I turn back around, Drunk Girl is already getting into the elevator. I rush to the end of the bar that runs to the roof’s edge to try to signal Dave to stop her, but when I see him, I’m stunned. He’s standing beside a black limousine, shaking hands with…Cain?
What the fuck?
“Dave!” I scream in vain. I catch a waitress to cover the bar for me, calling Dave on his cell on the way to the elevator to tell him to stop Drunk Girl, but when I get downstairs, I am not at all happy with the arrangements he has made to get her home safely.
“Uh-uh,” I say firmly, becoming unpleasantly aware that I forgot to slip on my pumps before leaving the bar as Cain’s exquisiteness in the halo of streetlights ravages my mind. “I’m not going to…um…”
“Um…” Cain says smugly.
Damn, he pisses me off!
“I’m not going to put her in a car with some strange man,” I say, snapping out of it.
“Well, there’s progress. You called me a man instead of a boy,” he says with that adorable grin that curls just a bit more on the left side.
“It’s fine, Evan. We can trust Mr. Ballantyne,” Dave says. I narrow my eyes at him.
“This is somebody’s little girl and I don’t want to be a part of teaching her that it’s okay to hop in a car with a stranger just because she’s too drunk to drive,” I explain. San Diego is the 8th largest city in the country, and there are lots of men out there who would take full advantage of her in this impaired condition. I don’t believe for one second that Cain is one of those men because the only drug he needs to seduce his way into a woman’s bed is his smile, but it’s not about him. It’s about the precedent.
“We won’t even be in the same vehicle. I’ll drive her car,” Cain offers.
“Okay,” I relent. “I’ll call the cab.” Dave opens his mouth to say something, but Cain shakes his head, silencing him.
“The limousine is yours, isn’t it?” I ask.
“Why? Would you be more inclined to trust some strange man if he had a limousine?” Cain asks facetiously.
“I’d probably be less inclined,” I snipe. “And give me your ID, Playboy, as collateral.”
“Yes, Ma’am,” Cain says with a laugh as he takes his driver’s license out his wallet and hands it to me. “I hope I don’t get pulled over.”
“I think you can follow the rules for a few miles,” I say, glancing at it before slipping it in my apron pocket, catching only his full name - Cain Tolbert Ballantyne. Strange. Tolbert, pronounced Tol-bear, is my mother’s maiden name. It’s French like my last name and almost everyone I knew back home even though my mother isn’t originally from New Orleans. It makes me wonder how Cain got it, if it’s a family name, if it comes from France, Canada, Louisiana?
As Drunk Girl directs Cain to her car, I head back up to the bar and examine his ID. He’s twenty-seven, and he lives in an apartment downtown, which is about a twenty minute drive from here in good traffic. Based on the address, I would guess it for a top floor of one of the high-end skyscrapers, and the penthouse and the limo squash my last glimmer of hope that Cain Ballantyne and I could have any common ground…unless, of course, we’re more alike than I could glean from my limited knowledge of him. I don’t come off like someone with my background, having put great effort into the image I project to the point that not a trace of Louisiana comes through in my accent. Could I be misjudging him?
It’s after 2:00 am - closing time - when Cain returns. With the bright lights up and the red lights off, the waitresses encourage people to get out by snapping up their drinks as I see Cain in good light for the first time, and he’s even more magnificent.
“Our drunk friend is safely in her dorm,” he announces.
“Well, it’s after last call, but I suppose that deserves a drink,” I say as I give him back his ID.
“Are you offering to have that drink with me?”
“I have too much work to do,” I say. It’s an excuse. Nicole would gladly cover for me given the circumstances. “But I really appreciate your help tonight.”
“Yet I get nothing for my noble deed but the offer of a drink alone?”
“You have my undying gratitude.”
“It’s not your gratitude I want,” Cain says.
“It’s all you’re going to get,” I snap at him, angry with myself for even considering that I might have misjudged him, and he pauses, glaring back at me, just a hint of a smile curling in the corners of his mouth.
“What’s it going to take to break you?” he asks, breathing the words as if he’s thinking aloud, and though he probably just meant to break my resistance, in my usual, glass-half-empty view, I take it to mean that he wants to break me like a horse.
“Go home, Playboy,” I spit as I walk to the end of the bar and begin feverishly polishing the brass fixtures at the waitress station.
“Good night…Ice Queen,” Cain says, leaving me frozen with my back to him, tears welling in my eyes.
Ice Queen, Cain? You have no idea, I think as I listen to the last footfalls of this achingly beautiful man as he walks out of my life again. It’s what he meant to do last night, but fate, though usually out to fuck me, sent me a drunk girl. If not for her, I wouldn’t even have known Cain was with Dave tonight, but I guess it doesn’t matter now. It’s done, I blew it, and I didn’t even remember to give him back the money.
August 24
“I know what you’re doing,” Nicole says as she hands me a list of drink requests. It’
s Saturday night, and the bar is in full swing.
“What are you talking about?”
“You keep looking at the elevator. You’re hoping Cain comes in.” She calls me out. No one in the world knows me better. We’ve been best friends since we met waiting tables together at a restaurant in Los Angeles shortly after I left home. We became roommates, and in the first year we lived together, she lost both of her parents in a car wreck. Her older brother moved to West Virginia with their little sister, enrolling her in a boarding school for the deaf, leaving Nicole and I completely on our own. We’ve only had ourselves to depend on for so long, we’ve become like the mothers neither of us have. It’s why it makes me crazy that she dates men who are no good for her and why it makes her crazy that I don’t date at all, and it’s also why she’s excited that I appear to be interested in Cain.
“You like him,” she taunts.
“Do not,” I argue.
“Do, too,” she sings as I walk away to fill her order. Okay. Maybe I looked at the elevator once or twice but only because I feel bad about how we left things last night. Just because I don’t want to be the latest notch on his bedpost doesn’t mean that I have to be so hateful to him. That, and I owe him $1,000.
When last call comes and goes with no sign of Cain, I can’t deny my disappointment because it’s written all over my face, but at least I don’t have to deal with Nicole teasing me about it, her mind clearly elsewhere as she comes excitedly bounding up to the waitress station.
“Guess what!” she calls out in hushed animation as the last stragglers shuffle to the elevator.
“What?” I ask.
“See that guy?” She indicates a well-dressed man with light brown hair walking toward the exit. He looks back over his shoulder at her, giving her a smile and a wave before stepping into the elevator. “That’s Jackson. I’m going out with him tomorrow night.”
“Oh,” I say, not meaning to sound let down, but I was hoping her “guess what” had something to do with Cain.
“So here’s the thing, and please don’t say no,” Nicole says, and I grit my teeth, knowing and dreading what’s coming. “Jackson is in town staying with a friend - a guy friend - and he was hoping I could find someone to…”
