Georgie gawked. “What?”
“You know, hang out. Get some ice cream. Play games. Watch a movie.”
Georgie pulled on her jacket. “You are not dating my friends.”
“Who said dating? I said ‘hang out.’ And I meant friend. Singular.”
“And I said no. Singular.” She waggled the car keys at him, and he followed her outside.
Deacon had been coming with her to work and hanging out in the kitchen for a few minutes before her shift started, then he’d leave and come back later to help close. This usually included some chatting with Tyler or Mai, and it interested Georgie to watch her brother field Mai’s questions about his beliefs, his lifestyle, or his life plans.
“You know, you really can’t tell me I can’t invite Mai over,” he said. “I’m older than you.”
Georgie turned, and he stopped short. “I know.”
“Then what’s the deal? I’m only here a few more days. It’s not like I’m pursuing a relationship. I just like her. I think she’s interesting, and she asks good questions.”
“And she’s a Trekkie.”
“Well, sh-yeah.” He nodded.
She smiled. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m just selfish. Like you said, just a few more days.”
He grinned. “Who can blame you there?”
She rolled her eyes and got in the car.
He got in on the opposite side. “Just be warned, Mai might be coming over.”
“Fine.”
She started up the car. “Put your seat belt on.”
“You are such a boss.”
The day before, Reuben had left for the Northwest Food Service Expo in Oregon, leaving Haru and Caleb in charge of keeping the kitchens running and Mai and John in charge of waitstaff. With Jace gone too, the kitchen had a decidedly different feel to it. Not exactly a sense of freedom, because everyone in the kitchen remained intent on keeping up with the waitstaff and the orders, but more like a sense that the grown-ups were gone, so let’s play grown-up. As soon as they got to work, Mai played by bringing Deacon a piece of day-old cake in a paper bag. Which, of course, led to more talking.
Talking, flirting, whatever they wanted to call it.
After a second warning from Georgie, Deacon finally excused himself with a promise to return.
After he left, Mai scrunched up her nose. “Your brother’s pretty cute.”
Georgie sighed. “He gets it from me.”
Mai smiled and shook her head. “You’ve come a long way, baby.”
“What do you mean by that?” Georgie asked.
Mai shrugged, then looked reluctant to say more.
“Oh, no. You flirt with my brother, you answer my questions.”
Mai laughed out loud. “Fine. I was just noticing how much you’ve changed since you started working here. You’re not afraid anymore.”
Georgie dropped her gaze, knowing that wasn’t true but liking how it sounded anyway. “Just go wait your tables.”
Mai ignored her and lowered her voice. “And you definitely weren’t so afraid of Jace anymore. I’m sorry he had to go. Maybe he’ll be back. Reuben said it wasn’t definite.”
Georgie swallowed. “It’s not definite.”
Mai smiled, then left to organize the front.
But it feels so definite.
The evening flew by. Work was steady, and they kept up with it pretty well. When Deacon showed up, Georgie had to check the clock on the wall before she believed it was closing time. He immediately started helping Tyler by unloading the big industrial dishwasher. Those who were closing made themselves useful. The music was on, and the kitchen took on a celebratory-like atmosphere.
“Georgie, can you take over cleaning this grill?” Haru asked. “I’ve got to go help out front with the money.”
“Oh, sure.”
“Thanks.”
Georgie poured the ice water on the griddle’s surface and pushed it back and forth with the spatula, remembering the first time she’d done this with Jace standing next to her, carefully showing her what to do. And she realized how right Mai was. She had come a long way.
John and Rhea came in from the front with loads of dishes, talking lightheartedly. They reached the sink, and Deacon tried to send them away. Rhea laughed, but she and John prevailed in adding to the pile.
Tyler shook his head. “Nice try, Deak.” He patted Deacon on the back with his wet hand and went back to spraying dishes.
Georgie smiled as she resumed cleaning the grill. Deak? He is Deak now? Is that a name?
The back door opened suddenly, and Anders stepped in, pulling the hood of his sweatshirt back. He held the hand of a little girl in jeans and a messy T-shirt. All sounds in the kitchen stopped. Somebody even reached for the music and turned it off.
Anders’s brow was furrowed, but he didn’t look angry. He looked tired. Maybe nervous. “Where’s Reuben?” he asked quietly.
Georgie looked at John.
“He’s not here,” John said.
Anders turned his head away, grimacing in disappointment. Georgie hoped he would decide to leave, remembering the last time he was here. He didn’t look high, but she wasn’t an expert. She looked at the little girl, who had been watching her. The girl quickly withdrew behind Anders’s leg.
“Do you know when he’ll be back?” he asked.
John and Rhea exchanged glances. “He’s gone through Sunday.”
“What about Jace?”
“He’s back in Nevada.”
Anders swore and touched his forehead. He closed his eyes, his eyelids quivering slightly. “Well, can you give Reuben a message for me before then?”
“I can try,” John said. “You can always leave a message at the office number too.”
“Yeah, I’ve tried that. Look, I’ve got to get a job before Monday, or they take my little girl away, and he’s kind of the only one who’s given me a chance. He said he’d talk.”
The little girl whimpered, and he looked at her. “C’mon, none of that.”
Mai entered the kitchen from the dining area. She stopped short. “Hey, Anders.” Her voice was tentative. “What are you doing here?” She looked at Georgie, confused.
Anders didn’t seem to know how to answer her. The little girl continued to whimper.
Georgie’s heart went out to her. “Would she like something to eat?”
Anders turned quickly to Georgie. He hesitated, but then he gave her a short nod.
Georgie held out her hand, and Anders nudged the little thing forward.
“Go ahead, Linny.”
She looked back at her daddy but took Georgie’s hand.
Georgie led her to the walk-in fridge. “Would you like a sandwich?” She motioned for Mai to follow. As she did, Georgie spoke softly to Linny. “We have bread and cheese. Or we have chicken fingers. Do you like pie?”
The little girl nodded, finally taking her eyes off her daddy. Georgie pulled the walk-in door open. She turned her attention to finding something the little girl might like to eat.
“What’s going on?” Mai asked quietly.
Georgie whispered as she looked over the shelves. “Anders wants his job back.”
“What? Is he crazy? Reuben wou—” Mai stopped herself and looked down at the girl. “Well, he’d have to think about it, wouldn’t he?”
Georgie nodded and sighed.
After Linny had chosen a ripe pear and a piece of pie, Georgie opened the door to raised voices. Her gut instinct was to close the door again, but she heard Deacon’s calm voice under the shouting.
She looked down at the little girl, whose eyes had doubled in size as she clutched her pear. Georgie turned to Mai and gestured to ask if she had her phone. Mai shook her head. Georgie’s was in her jacket with her keys and wallet. They weren’t allowed to work with their cell phones on them. “Will you stay right here?” she asked Linny.
The little girl shook her head no, her gaze stuck in the direction of her father’s voice.
Voices rose again—A
nders’s and John’s and Tyler’s now—shouting, “Wait! Wait a minute!”
Georgie heard an odd thunk, and Deacon and Rhea cried out at the same time.
Mai pushed past. “Anders? What in the—” She gasped.
Georgie stepped out to see the commotion and drew in a breath. John had a phone up to his ear and a hand out toward Anders. Deacon held his hand over his face as though hurt and was slowly sinking to the floor. Anders held the heavy sprayer nozzle, stretched on its long, snakelike cord. He had a knife out in his other hand, pointed at Tyler. Georgie looked back at her brother. He pulled his hand away, revealing a bloody gash over his eye. He knelt down on the floor as if his legs had given out, and swayed.
“Deacon?” As she stepped forward, Anders glanced her way, grabbed Tyler, and pulled him so Tyler faced everyone else. The sprayer nozzle bounced and hung swaying. Anders’s knife was now pointed at Tyler’s throat.
The fear in Anders’s face was nothing like Georgie had seen before. The little girl hiding behind her whimpered.
“Anders,” Mai said. “Let him go. Just let him go. You don’t want to do this.”
“All I asked,” Anders spat at her, “was for my job back. I’d be good. Just wash the dishes better than this pretty boy.” He gave Tyler a jerk, and Tyler grimaced.
Anders focused on John. “Just tell Reuben . . . to give me back my job, and I can keep my girl. I’ve been tryin’, but nobody will listen. He said he’d talk. I can have my job back, and this turd”—he gave Tyler a shake—“can go back to workin’ at Old Navy.” Tyler was pale but remained calm, his eyes on Deacon.
John murmured into the phone. The phone. If Reuben was on the other side, he could have already called the police from where he was. They would be coming. He would have done that.
Carefully John held the phone out to Anders. “Reuben will talk to you, Anders. But you’ve got to give up Tyler.”
Anders looked at the phone. He squeezed Tyler closer, the veins in his arm pulsing along his tattoos. Tyler winced.
Anders looked at John. “Give me my job back. I’ll give you the kid if you’ll give me my job back. I swear I’ll be good. I swear it.”
John slowly put the phone up to his ear. “Did you get that, Reuben?” He listened. He spoke again to Anders.
“Reuben will talk to you. Give up Tyler.”
Georgie saw the conflict in Anders, and he began to breathe heavily. His voice rose. “Give me my job back.” His eyes watered. Tyler sucked in his breath as the blade touched his skin. “I’ll give you the kid . . . if you give me my job back!”
Dread pulsed through Georgie’s veins like ice water, and she broke into a sweat, suddenly overcome with terror.
She saw him. Ian held the ring out as the car picked up speed. Too much speed, and he hugged the corner. She fought against the force of gravity pushing her against the door, the tires squealing.
“I’ll slow down if you take the ring back! C’mon, Georgie, you decide.” He laughed, and she heard the car accelerate on the black road, the scattered street lights flipping past.
“Slow down. Please, slow down,” she pled.
“Take the ring back. We belong together, Georgie.”
She shook her head, frantic. “No, Ian. Not anymore.”
Briefly his foot eased off the accelerator, and she didn’t dare move. Please, she prayed, Please let me out.
But he pressed down again, and the engine roared. His laughter was gone. “Take the ring back.”
She braced herself as the headlights reflected off the guardrail on the curve ahead.
“It’s a simple game we’re playing, Georgie. You take the ring, I slow down.” He still held the ring in front of her, his other hand on the wheel. He watched the road, a thrilled look on his face.
They screeched around the next curve, and she gripped her seat belt with one hand and the door with the other. She was going to be sick.
A game.
This was insane. “No, Ian,” she yelled, angry now. The thrill vanished from his face. “Stop the car, and let me out.”
The authority in her voice surprised her. Bolstered her.
He turned his head to look at her, his expression muddled.
“I’m done,” she said.
Headlights from an oncoming car flashed in their faces, and the car’s horn blared. Ian jerked his attention back to the road and swerved. Georgie screamed as they missed the car, but Ian overcorrected, still racing, and the car scraped against the guardrail, sparks flying.
“Slow down, Ian!”
He swore hard, and the car swerved in the other direction. They crossed the center line and careened toward the steep hill on the other side, and as Ian fought the wheel for control, the car shot back across the winding road, crashing through the guardrail head-on, and Georgie no longer knew if the bloodcurdling scream was hers or Ian’s . . .
Georgie wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but flashing lights through the restaurant back door and the sound of a police radio pulled her back to reality. She tried to steady her breathing. Everything blurred and swayed before it came into focus.
She was on the floor with a blanket around her, a cup of water in her hand. Mai sat with her arm around her shoulders. The little girl, Linny, sat near them, sniffling and wiping her nose as a paramedic spoke softly to her.
Across from Georgie, another paramedic tended to Deacon, wrapping his head as he sat on the floor. He attempted to motion away a stretcher, and as he did so, he caught Georgie watching. “You okay, Boss?” he asked.
Mai lifted her head.
Georgie nodded.
“You scared me for a few minutes there,” he said weakly.
“I scared you?” Her voice sounded tinny. Like she spoke into a microphone.
He tried to nod, but the paramedic told him to hold still. “You’re okay though?”
Her heart still hammered in her chest. “I think so.” He was the one with the bandage on his head.
“Hey.” He gestured toward the gash above his brow. “We’ll be twins.”
“It’s a dream come true,” she said as her voice stopped echoing in her ears. But she felt floaty, like she wasn’t really a part of what was happening in this room.
He smiled but kept his eyes on her for several seconds before he seemed to believe she was okay.
He blinked then and looked at Mai. “I was going to ask if you wanted to hang out tonight.”
“You were?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s sweet,” Mai said.
“This isn’t what I had in mind,” he said.
Mai smiled. The paramedic seemed amused. Georgie wondered if she was supposed to say something but couldn’t think of the words.
Deacon let the paramedic finish wrapping him on the stretcher.
Georgie looked around her, blinking slowly. Tyler, John, and Rhea were talking to police officers, and she tried to focus on what they were saying for a few minutes, but it was difficult.
Mai squeezed her shoulders. “Hey,” she said. “You blanked out on us. They thought you were in shock.” She tapped the cup, and Georgie lifted it and drank.
She wiped her lips and remembered the horrible scene in the kitchen. “Where’s Anders?”
Mai peeked over at Linny and lowered her voice. “Back of the cop car. They busted in just after you screamed. You distracted the heck out of Anders, so Tyler knocked the knife away and threw his elbow into him, and then the cops came crashing in. It was over pretty fast.”
The paramedic talking to Linny took the little girl’s hand and gently led her out of the restaurant. She still held her pear.
“I wonder what will happen to her,” Georgie said.
“I don’t know. So sad.” Mai pulled her arm from around Georgie and shivered. “Anders really lost it.”
“He must have wanted her though.”
“Yeah, or he brought her here for sympathy points.”
Georgie picked at the edge of her blanket, considering
that. Hadn’t he been sincere? She put her head in her hand. She still hoped the best of people. Even if that left her wide open for disappointment. And hurt. “So . . . I screamed?”
Mai nodded. “Like Jack Nicholson had just put an ax through your door. Pretty smart move.”
“Yeah.” Georgie hadn’t meant to scream. She hadn’t meant to lapse into remembering the accident. Anders must have triggered the memory. Ripped it out of its hiding place.
Brains were weird.
The accident. She remembered every crisp, awful detail.
“Hey.” Mai waved her hand in front of Georgie’s face. “You still look pretty shaken. You okay? Everything happened pretty fast.”
Everything had happened pretty fast. She felt a lump in her throat, remembering once more the thrilled look, then the fear, on Ian’s face. He was just a kid. A spoiled, messed-up kid who had no clue how to love somebody. The jerk. What his parents had done to him, what his ego had done to him, they weren’t her fault.
The accident wasn’t her fault.
They’d both been victims in the end. Anger. Sadness. Relief. Each took their turn pulsing through her. She took a soft, deep breath and blew it out, feeling months of guilt rise off of her and dissipate into the air.
And without her bidding, something slipped in its place. Something she welcomed.
Assurance. Hope. Love.
She pushed away a tear. “I wish Jace were here.” The words came out of nowhere, but as she said them, she was overcome with a longing for Jace’s arms around her and his steady gaze and his presence in the kitchen. “I miss him.”
Mai nodded. “We all do.”
“I think he’s the dragon,” Georgie whispered.
Mai studied her a moment. “You know what a cage looks like from the inside, don’t you?”
Georgie didn’t answer. But she didn’t have to.
“Have you escaped?” Mai asked.
“Maybe.”
“With your own wings?”
Georgie met her gaze. “I’ve had some help.”
Mai smiled. “So did the emperor’s daughter.” She drew her arm around her again, their heads touching.
“Does Jace know you miss him?” Mai asked.
Georgie shook her head.
“So let him know.”
The thought of letting Jace know anything—everything—filled her with a sense of agitation . . . and hope.
Kisses in the Rain Page 30