by L A Cotton
And then Tara delivered four little words that left me with a sour taste in my mouth and a sinking feeling in my stomach.
“The piranhas are here.”
I heard them before I saw them. The high octave of their laughter got louder as I worked my section of the room, offering guests flutes of champagne. I smiled and only spoke when spoken to. My back must have been to them because while I could hear their cackles and conversation, I couldn’t spot them in the crowded room.
“… he won’t be able to resist tonight.” I wasn’t purposely eavesdropping; they were that damn loud. Another voice said, “Do you think he’s getting cold feet? It all happened pretty quickly?”
“Not really, Jenna. We both knew this was coming. Our fathers had this all planned out, and, besides, we’re perfect for each other.”
I swept around the group I’d just finished serving, and my eyes spotted them against the wall. Brittany Arnold and her minions. I had run into them at more than one event—the piranhas. According to Tara, her family was from old money, born and bred in Upper Arlington. Trent Arnold, Brittany’s father, was CEO of Arnold Holdings.
“Oh look, it’s Penelope.” Brittany’s voice dripped with contempt, but I let it roll off me.
Mostly.
My eyes caught the huge rock on her ring finger, and I shuddered inwardly. Who could possibly love someone like her? I had yet to witness one redeeming quality in her. Sure, she was beautiful and never looked less than runway worthy, but beneath all that makeup and money was a cold-hearted bitch.
Feeling riled, I bit out, “It’s Penny, actually.” I immediately regretted it, and in an attempt to recover my slip, I plastered on a fake smile and said, “Champagne?”
If there was one thing I’d learned quickly during my time working for Touch of Class, it was that you didn’t correct these people.
The girls each helped themselves to a glass while Brittany’s eyes burned into me as I tried to look anywhere but at her.
“My mistake, Penny. I just love what you’ve done with your hair. It’s very, what do you call it? Trailer-chic.”
My heart thudded in my chest. How dare you, I wanted to say. But I’d lose more than just my cool if I did. So I simply smiled and turned to leave. Brittany had other plans. She stepped to the side effectively blocking my passage. I tried to veer around her, but she stuck out her foot just as I moved. I felt myself fall. The silver tray clattered to the floor, glass shattering everywhere. All heads turned to me as I landed in a heap, my cheeks a deep crimson. I heard the gasps and low whispers, but only one voice perforated my embarrassment. “You really should watch where you watch step, Penelope.”
Tara rushed over to me, handing her tray to one of the other servers. “Are you okay?” Her eyes flitted over my head to where Brittany and her friends stood.
I gave her a terse nod, embarrassment still weighing heavy in my chest. “Yeah, I’m fine. Help me get this mess cleaned up?”
“Ladies and gentleman, dinner will now be served. Please move into the Arlington Suite,” a voice said, and I breathed a sigh of relief. The guests started to move away from us, queueing to enter the suite where they would spend the evening dining and donating. Brittany muttered something about how pathetic we were before joining the queue.
“What a freaking bitch,” Tara said in a low voice when everyone was out of earshot.
I pushed myself up to my feet and blew out a long breath. “She tripped me.”
“Oh, I know exactly what she did. She tried the same thing with me on my first shift. Come on, let’s get this cleaned up. I’ll sneak up a glass of West Lake’s finest when we’re done. Before the real fun starts.”
True to her word, Tara swiped us two leftover champagne flutes and made me drink it before giving me a breath mint. “Sometimes, all you need is alcohol,” she joked. “Feel ready to face them again?”
I shrugged. What choice did I have?
“Don’t let them beat you, remember? Hold your head high and plaster the biggest, fakest smile on that pretty face of yours. If it weren’t for us, half of the people out there would starve. They need us.”
Her speech made me smile weakly, and although it was the biggest pile of utter crap I’d ever heard, it did make me feel a little better. Besides, I’d met worse than Brittany Arnold.
Survived worse.
“I’ll swap sections with you. I’ll take the piranhas tonight.”
“No, I got it. It’s fine. You’re right.”
Tara hopped down off the counter in the back of the kitchen and smoothed down her uniform. “Okay, let’s do this.”
We lined up with the rest of the servers at the service counter. The chefs were busy putting the final touches on the first course while bellowing orders at us. How to present the dish to the guests, to make sure the shrimp tail faces away. I rolled my eyes when Tara glanced back at me and grinned. When it was my turn, I loaded two small plates on my left arm, picked up another with my right, and followed Annabel, one of the regulars, out the door and into the dining room. Golds and royal blue, the colors of West Lake and Associates, embellished the whole room. I’d never met Mr. West, but some of the girls had worked his functions before. By all accounts, he was a formidable man and demanded nothing but the best.
I veered off to the left and entered my section, tables six through ten. Brittany sat at table six, my first stop. I inhaled deeply and approached her table. She looked up and smirked, but I ignored her and placed the plate down in front of the person seated opposite her. An older woman with gray-blond hair swept up in a sleek chignon sat to her right, and there were two empty seats to her right. Odd, I thought to myself, but I served the appetizers starting with the person seated next to one of the empty seats. It was petty, but it meant I would serve Brittany last. My small sense of payback.
I returned to the kitchen and collected three more plates. When I arrived back at table six, I had to clear my throat to be heard over the gaggle. “Will the other guests be joining us?”
“My fiancé and father will be here shortly. Please leave their appetizers.” Brittany’s bark was worse than her bite, and I tipped my head.
As I walked back to the kitchen, I glanced back at table six.
And stopped dead.
Two men were approaching the table. One, an older man with graying hair, was obviously her father. He had Brittany’s eyes. Her evil smirk. He sat in the empty seat furthest from his daughter. The other man leaned over Brittany’s shoulder, smiled at everyone, and pressed a brief kiss to her cheek. Her whole face lit up. He sat down. I wanted to sink to the floor. Wanted the ground to open up and swallow me whole. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders. I wanted to throw things at her face. To hurt her for far more than just choosing to make my life as a server hell.
She had the one thing I wanted but could never have.
She had Blake.
“Penny, Penny.” Someone shook me forcefully, but my eyes were transfixed on table six.
On Blake and her.
Brittany Arnold was Blake’s fiancée.
His person was the piranha.
“Penny, what the hell has gotten into you?” Tara barked with such bite that I jumped. “Huh, what?” I blinked at her and then turned my attention back to Blake.
And her.
Her.
“Sorry, I’m fine. Fine.” My voice sounded anything but fine.
“Whatever you say,” Tara said. “Can you still do your job?”
“Yes, yes, I can do my job. I’m fine,” I reiterated as I tried to convince us both.
Tara mumbled something under her breath and rolled her eyes. I didn’t take it personally; it was just her way. Besides, I was too concerned with how close Blake and Brittany looked.
Mary breezed into the kitchen beaming. “Fabulous job, darlings. Tara, you handle cleanup, and Sophie, you take point on the second course.” Her eyes landed on me, and her smile faltered. “Penny, is everything okay? You look a little pale, darling. You’
re not getting sick are you? Mr. Weston would be most concerned if you’re spreading germs to half of the city.”
Weston?
As in Blake Weston?
My lips drew into a tight line, and I forced them into a half-smile. “I’m fine, just a little tired. Noisy neighbors.” I shrugged as if it was no big deal. It was almost the truth.
Mary’s perfect smile was back in place in an instance. “Well then, shall we?” She gave Tara a curt nod and disappeared out of the kitchen.
I grabbed Tara by the arm sharply. “She said Mr. Weston? I thought it was Mr. West?”
“He’s the West in West Lake and Associates, but his actual name is Weston, as in, Anthony Weston.”
Blake’s uncle was Anthony Weston, of West Lake and Associates? My stomach knotted tightly and then unraveled as it plummeted to the floor.
Tara’s dark eyes narrowed at me. “Why all the questions?”
“Nothing, I, hmm, I, nothing. It doesn’t matter.”
She huffed. “Well, if you’re finished getting your period, can we go do our jobs now?”
Our jobs, of course.
“Of course.”
I followed Tara out of the swinging door and into the room. My eyes remained lowered, but it didn’t stop me from peeking out from under my lashes to watch him. Them. Blake and Brittany were sitting slightly angled toward one another, his arm draped over the back of her chair. As I drew closer, I noticed they were talking to other people seated at their table, laughing and joking as if they were all old friends. Blake looked at ease with a playful expression on his face, the same one I’d witnessed so many times during the summer. The tailored, crisp white shirt molded to his broad shoulders. He looked good in a tux. Too good. His hair was shorter, styled to perfection, and even the scruff covering his jaw that I’d come to love over the summer was gone.
Who is this person?
No one even looked up as I approached the table. Not even a cursory glance. It was as if I was nothing. Insignificant… Invisible. I sure felt it.
I worked quickly; collecting the empty plates from each guest’s left side, I risked only the occasional glance over at Blake and Brittany. They were in full conversation with the woman seated at Brittany’s other side who I assumed was her mother. She had the same cold eyes as her daughter. Blake smiled at something she said, his lips hooking up on the side. It was such a simple gesture, but it caused the air to suck right from my lungs. It was the moment I realized that this wasn’t all some dreadful mistake. A production crew wasn't about to leap out from hiding and announce that this was all part of some elaborate prank. No, the truth was staring me right in the face—Blake wasn’t just with these people… he was one of them.
A wave of nausea slammed into me and I stumbled backward. The stack of plates balanced in my hand wobbled and a knife rolled off the edge and clattered to the floor. Ten faces glared at my incompetence, but I didn’t see them; I only saw two blue eyes filled with shock and horror. We remained staring at one another for longer than we should have. Long enough to earn a confused look from Brittany as she tried to piece together how Blake could possibly know someone like me—the hired help. She laid a hand on his arm commanding his attention. I used the moment to collect the remaining plates and get the hell out of there.
My back pressed to the wall where I stood with the other servers watching Anthony Weston deliver his opening speech. His presence didn’t live up to the rumors. He wasn’t just formidable; he was terrifying. A tall, well-built man with a thick head of salt and pepper hair, he spoke with such poise and certainty that not a single sound could be heard. Guests raised a toast, clinking their glasses when required, but when Mr. Weston was talking, every single person in the room listened.
“Now that the formalities are out of the way, I have one last announcement to make before I hand you over to our emcee for the evening, Mike Carter. As some of you know, seven years ago, I discovered I had a nephew…” My heart slammed in my chest, and I inhaled trying to breathe. “The day Blake came to live with my wife, Miranda, and me, I gained the son I never had. Well, tonight I can announce that I am to also gain a daughter.”
Mr. Weston raised his glass in the direction of table six, but I forced myself not to look. If I looked, the thread I was hanging by would surely snap.
“I can think of no better match for Blake than Brittany. The Arnold and Weston families have a history that goes back decades, and now, they also have a future.” He said her name as if she was royalty, like everyone in the room would automatically know who she was. “Please raise a glass in toasting their engagement and wishing them a future filled with happiness and success. To Blake and Brittany.”
The thread snapped.
I excused myself quietly and rushed into the kitchen unable to catch my breath. Heads whipped in my direction, but I ignored their confused glances as I made a beeline for the staff restrooms at the back of the building. My body crashed through the door, and I fell into the first stall slamming the door behind me. I crumpled down onto the seat and pinched my eyes shut trying to stop the tears from falling.
Fiancée.
He had a freaking fiancée.
Short, ragged breaths heaved in and out of my chest as my world crashed down around me. All summer, I’d slowly allowed Blake in. Smile by smile. Heated look by heated look. And although I felt the change in him, I thought it was time’s doing. I was too blinded by his presence to realize the boy I’d once known was gone. The imposter sitting at table six looked like my Blake, smiled like him… but it wasn’t him. He wasn’t my lost, messy-haired kid with the crooked smile who showed me the stars and dreamed of a future where we made our own rules. The man out there in the designer tux drinking the expensive champagne from a crystal flute didn’t have to worry about making his next rent check or working shitty jobs to make ends meet. He didn’t know what it was like to be so haunted by the past that you didn’t live, you only existed.
With each thought, each painful memory, my fragile heart shattered all over again.
I’d known Blake had someone—he had told me as much—but I was too lost in our memories. One look at him across the fire and my soul remembered even when I wanted to forget. I couldn’t ignore the way our hearts called to one another. I’d spent the whole summer letting Blake back in, letting him mend the broken pieces of me.
Was it all a lie?
And if it was, where did we go from here?
The door to the restrooms opened, and Tara’s voice called, “Penny, are you in here?”
I reached around, flushed the toilet, and then dried my eyes on some paper. “Yeah, I’m fine.” Drawing a deep breath, I exited the stall catching my reflection in the mirrored wall opposite.
I looked like shit.
“Are you okay? You don’t look so well.” Concern flashed in Tara’s eyes, but she quickly replaced it with annoyance.
“I think I have the stomach flu,” I lied clutching my stomach and gagging for added effect.
“Shit,” she cursed. “Mary will freak. Get out of here, and I’ll cover for you. You had a family emergency, right?”
“Thank you.”
“Go. Sneak out the back exit.”
I nodded and hurried out of the restrooms. After retrieving my purse from the lockers, I left the clubhouse.
I didn’t allow myself to cry again until I got back to the apartment.
“Oh, shit. How did I not know this?” Marissa’s voice went all high pitched, and I moved the cell phone away from my ear. “Penny? Pen, are you there?”
“Yeah, I’m here.” I sighed, exhausted from a night spent sobbing into my pillow. I cried until my eyes stung and there were no tears left to cry.
“Get your laptop,” she ordered.
“Laptop? I don’t have one,” I replied meekly.
Marissa gasped down the line. “What the hell? Do you live in the dark ages? How do you watch Netflix or Google shit? How do you do that thing we all do called social media?”
I shrugged picking at one of the threads hanging from the couch. “I go to the library.”
“We need to get you hooked up, pronto.”
I rolled my eyes, a little annoyed at her presumptions. Didn’t she realize I couldn’t afford it? My reasons would only fall on deaf ears, though, so I remained silent.
“Okay. Well, then I’ll Google, and you listen. Hang on. I’ll put you on speaker.”
The line went quiet except for the sound of the frantic tapping of keys. Tap, tap, tap.
“Ah-ha, I have something.” Her voice startled me, and I leaned back on the couch feeling as if I might need the extra support. “Anthony Weston, founder of West Lake and Associates, blah, blah, blah, adopts nephew, Blake Weston, after discovering his estranged sister had died following a drugs overdose. Blake had been put in foster care following his father’s arrest and subsequent incarceration for drug offenses. Anthony and his wife, Miranda, ask that reporters respect their privacy at this sensitive time.
“Oh, wait, there’s something else. It’s a photo of Blake with his aunt, uncle, and the Arnold family. That's her family, right? Piranha bitch… does she have long blond hair and eyes that could kill a girl dead with just one look?”
That’s her.
“Yes.” I sighed sadly trying hard not to conjure up the image of Blake pressing his lips to her cheek. Lips that had kissed me.
“Daughter of Trent Arnold, CEO of Arnold Holdings, is to attend Ohio State with a family friend and nephew of Anthony Weston, yada, yada, yada…”
My mental dam broke and images of Blake and Brittany flooded my mind. I imagined them attending class together, romantic picnics in Lincoln Tower Park, watching the Buckeyes on game day, and lazy mornings in his dorm room.
That should have been us.
The thought punched me in the chest, and I clenched my eyes tight forcing out my thoughts.
“Oh, I have more. They-”
“Stop.”
“What?” Marissa said, and I could imagine the frown etched across her forehead. “Come on, Penny, we need to know the facts. He left you the note, so he’s obviously not happy with her. Who would be…” She launched into a dissection of their relationship, but I tuned out. Blake had said it was complicated; only now, I realized he didn’t mean with Brittany. He meant with me.