by Tijan
There was that then.
I nodded, hearing myself thank him for half a cup of coffee, before I walked out of that diner.
Kian was going to find me and there was nothing I could do about it. I felt it in my gut.
“Being optimistic is the worst attitude in the world to have.”
Escape was an exclusive restaurant that I’d been working at every summer since becoming Joslyn Keen. This morning was the first time I was being trained at the same job I always had as a hostess. The trainer, who looked two years younger, decided to bestow his infinite wisdom onto me.
I scratched behind my ear and leaned in, making a show of reading his nametag. “Really, Henry?”
He clipped his head in a nod. “Yes. Be realistic. Don’t be optimistic. That way, you’ll always exceed everyone’s expectations.”
That made no sense to me, but I wasn’t going to argue. Henry looked ready to bite my head off if I dared to smile. With a fierce expression, he towered over me at six feet two. His hair was brushed to the side, and he was a gangly guy.
He was also new to Escape.
Even though I’d picked up hours during college breaks, today was the first day I started back full-time again, and I didn’t recognize any of the staff. I called Paul last week to double check that I could still work for the summer, and my manager assured me that it was fine.
When I came in and found that I would be training for my usual job, I couldn’t find anyone who remembered me to make sure it was correct. Paul was out for a few days, and the assistant manager was new. When I dared to broach the topic, thinking maybe I should be training the new guy instead, the assistant manager braced herself for a battle. Recognizing the signs, I held up my hands and backed away from that fight. I would train. That was fine. So, here I was, being told where the menus went, the layout for the tables, and how to roll silverware during downtime.
Not that we would get a lot of downtime.
Escape was a popular high-end restaurant. If people dropped in to get a seat, they usually couldn’t. It was one of those restaurants where a customer needed to make a reservation a day ahead, and that was one of the reasons I was surprised by all the new employees. Escape was good to their employees. There wasn’t a big turnover rate. As Henry snapped his fingers to get my attention, I didn’t think I could ask him about that question.
Oh well. Time to go with the flow and learn my old job again.
“Okay.” My host trainer touched the Bluetooth in his ear, nodding, and then said, “On it. It’s ready in the back?” A pause. “Got it. Thank you, Tamara.” He said to me, “I know we’re slammed right now.”
There was one couple waiting for a table.
He continued, “But Tamara is coming up to help host for us. A special order came in, so we need to deliver some food to the newspaper.”
My eyebrows went up at that. “We do delivery now?”
He bent down to stuff some menus into the back of our hosting stand but paused. “When have we not?”
Touché.
I almost saluted him. “Got it.”
After loading the food into his car, he explained, “Every delivery is handled with special care. We don’t deliver to many places, but the newspaper is one of those that we need to wine and dine, so to speak, for obvious reasons.”
Yes, for obvious reasons—that I couldn’t think of at that moment.
“Amazing publicity.” He gave me the reason.
Another item that I didn’t know Escape cared about because they never had. I frowned. “There seems to have been a lot of changes with the restaurant since I worked last.”
“Really?” My trainer didn’t sound too interested as he turned the car into traffic.
I knew we were only a few blocks away, so I didn’t answer.
As he parked, he paused and frowned at me. “Did you say something before?”
“Nope.”
“Oh.” He unclipped his seat belt.
I flashed him a grin. “Where do we go, boss?”
“Uh…” He got out, shut his door, and opened the trunk.
The food was loaded up in our arms, and he led the way to a side door. After his foot tapped the bottom, the door was pushed open from the inside…and I looked up to the smiling face of my roommate’s archenemy.
“Susan…” My voice died.
Her smile vanished, and she straightened back from the doorway. “Jo.”
My trainer looked between the two of us, readjusting the food trays in his arms so that he would have a better grip. “You two know each other?”
Susan’s smile returned, but it was forced. She moved back, holding the door so that we could get through. “I didn’t know you were working at Escape.”
I said as I passed her, “Only every summer.”
But Susan didn’t care. She didn’t respond as she let the door close, and then she went before us, leading the way down a hallway. “We have a meeting tonight, so we wanted to order some food. You guys can bring it this way.”
We were led into a conference room where people were sitting around a bunch of tables. Susan had us unload the food on a back table. I assumed Erica would be somewhere else since Susan was promoted above her so when I heard my name, I was surprised.
Erica came over from one of the tables.
I said, “Hey.”
Erica frowned as she skimmed me up and down. “I forgot you were working at Escape again this summer. You started today?”
I nodded and patted some of the food containers, grinning. “I’ve been promoted to delivery now.”
Susan had been standing by, waiting for us. She let out a sigh when Erica came over, too, but leaned forward and studied all the food. Seemingly appeased, she cleared her throat now. “Excuse me for a minute. I need to grab the money.”
As she disappeared, Erica stepped closer and said to my trainer, “Go away. I want to talk to my friend.”
His pale cheeks reddened, but he smoothed a hand over his hair. He was trying to make it look casual, but he was failing.
I added, “I’d listen to her. She might be short, but she can be a big bully when she wants to be. I’d run, run far, my friend.”
He threw me another frown but moved backward a few steps. When he was far enough so that he couldn’t overhear, he made a point of stopping, leaning against the wall, and folding his arms over his chest.
Erica laughed to me. “I think he’d keel over if he realized I ate boys like him for breakfast.”
I gave him a look. “Yeah. Come to think of it, he does look like a younger version of Wanker, but he’s more cutthroat. I can already tell, but forget him. You’re still working with Susan? I thought you two went your separate ways at work.”
“God,” she muttered under her breath.
Susan came back, digging out money from a black bag. She went to Henry.
Erica lowered her voice. “I wish. No. I can’t escape her just yet. I’m still just part-time, but her full-time promotion has gone to her head. She offered to pay for all this food, and she’s acting like she’s the boss of everyone.” She perused the group waiting by some tables. “But I can’t really fault her. It’s because of her that I was even included on this project. For the next few weeks, we’re all working on an interview.”
“An interview?” I grinned at her, batting my eyelashes.
She laughed, nudging me in the side with her elbow. “Don’t make fun of me.”
I dramatically sucked in my breath and held a hand to my chest. “I would never.”
“Ha-ha.” She didn’t sound amused. “I can’t tell you anything yet, but it’s big, and it’s worth putting up with Susan for now.”
“That’s good then.”
“Uh…” Henry raised his hand, waiting for me at the doorway, while his other hand held our emptied delivery bags to his chest.
I smirked. “Mr. Happy Pants forgot my name.”
Erica barked out a laugh.
He made another impatient gesture to
the door.
I waved at him. “Yeah, I’m coming.” Moving toward him, I threw over my shoulder to Erica, “I have to go. I’ll see you tonight.”
She grinned, heading back for her table. “See you later.”
It was past closing time, and Henry called after me as I was about to walk out the door, “What are you going to be?”
Turning around, I pushed open the door with my back and thrust my fist in the air. “Not optimistic!”
“I’ll see you tomorrow or whenever you work next.” He gave me an approving grin and wave.
I was tempted to give him a double thumbs-up sign with a cheesy smile, but refrained. I wouldn’t have meant it, and God forbid, I would be fake. Though Henry would’ve lapped it up. He was all about fake and circumstance. It could’ve been his graduation song.
“Jordan.”
I had opened the second set of doors, and it was swinging shut behind me when I heard my name. I stopped mid-step. My foot was literally in the air, and it came down roughly as I twisted around. I thought I would be ready, but nothing could’ve prepared me. This was fitting in some way. He’d been out a week, and I had been waiting every day. I lifted my head, but the sight of him in front of me didn’t seem real.
But he was there.
He was staring at me, looking at me like he knew the only me that mattered, the real me.
“Kian.”
He was wearing a black leather jacket.
That was the first thought that stuck out to me, but I couldn’t get past it. I didn’t know why, and I started laughing in my head. Yes, I was nervous. Yes, I was a little scared, and yes, a part of me had been waiting for this meeting to happen for too long. Now, here he was. In a black leather jacket. Really?
I grinned. “Could you get more typical bad boy than that?”
He moved his head to the side, narrowing his eyes.
I didn’t want to drink in the rest of him—how his dark eyes seemed even more alluring in person than on the television, how there was an air to him that pulled at me, which was weird and wrong, especially in how it also pushed me away. I wanted to run, but at the same time, I couldn’t do a thing while he was looking at me like he had during the trial.
Kian hadn’t been allowed to speak to me, not after he’d killed Edmund. Before the trial, during the trial, and afterward, there’d been no exchange between us. In some ways, Kian was as much of a stranger to me as he was to everyone else. And in other ways, I felt like I couldn’t be more exposed to him if I turned my insides out. He knew me. That was how I’d felt all this time even if it wasn’t validated, and I was feeling that again.
“Jo!”
Footsteps sounded from behind me, and I twisted around. Jake was across the street. He lifted an arm up and stepped out, turning to check the road. He was coming over to me.
No…
He couldn’t.
I didn’t want him here.
What was he even doing here?
I looked back with an apology ready for Kian, but it died on my lips. He was gone.
Jake hurried past the cars beside me and stepped onto the sidewalk. “Hey. Glad I caught you.”
“No.”
“What?”
No.
He couldn’t be gone, but he was.
“Jo,” Jake softly prompted. He moved close, so he was standing right behind my shoulder.
If I swung around to look at him, I would’ve touched his chest. I sucked in my breath. Kian had been here. He’d actually found me.
I had to call Snark. He’d tell me what to do now.
But Jake was still here. Jake was familiar. Jake didn’t have a team that wanted to blame me for my foster father’s death.
I let out some air, deflating my lungs, and hoped to calm my nerves before I moved back a step and turned around until I was facing him.
He was frowning at me, and he cocked his head to the side. A small strand of his hair fell over his forehead, and he raised a hand to push it back, his eyes warming as he did that absentminded gesture. The corners of his mouth lifted in another grin, transforming his face from concern to caring.
“Sorry. I’m just…I thought I saw someone I used to know.”
The truth felt lame as it stumbled from my lips, but I followed one of Snark’s guidelines. “Stick to the truth, but be vague. It’s the best form of lying there is.”
Jake nodded, his grin curving higher. He glanced up and down the street. “I hate when that happens. Used to happen to me all the time after our thing ended.”
I shoved Kian to the back of my mind and made myself shake all the lingering tension away. “Yeah?”
His eyes darkened. “All the time. It was…annoying.”
“I’m sure Tara loved that.”
He smirked, but a smidgen of pain appeared in his depths. “She wasn’t too happy about it. I think she knew. I kept thinking I saw you, and then sometimes, I actually would—you know, if you were walking to class or something. Messed with my head. I kept wanting to talk to you, but…”
His gaze fell to my lips, and he moved closer. I could feel the heat from his body, and he was looking down at me, looming over me.
This was how we’d been before. I would close my eyes and rest my forehead to his chest. I’d rest my hands there or tug on his shirt, pulling him the rest of the way to me, and then we would be touching. Jake would hold back, his hands in his pockets. He’d let me dictate if we would touch, and there was something heady about that feeling. He made me feel powerful.
But the old want to touch him…wasn’t there anymore.
I was cold, dejected somehow, but I moved away to hide it. “What are you doing here, Jake?”
His eyes were fixed on my lips. “What do you mean?”
“You, me, standing outside my job at night. Just the two of us.”
He chuckled, and his hand lifted to graze against my cheek before he moved another step backward, his hand falling away. “Okay. I’m sorry. You got me. I came to find you on purpose. I knew this was when you used to get done with work, and I took a chance, figuring it would be the same tonight.” He held his hands in the air, surrendering, with a half smirk on his face. His hands dropped, and so did the smirk. He grew somber. “We didn’t talk about it at the bar the other night, but I wanted to explain what happened. Tara and I broke up. She and I—we don’t work. We’re toxic, and something had to change. I don’t know if it was because of you, but I can’t stand here and say that I don’t still have feelings for you.”
Nope. I shook my head and held a hand to his chest, pushing him back a step. “Jake.”
He had a twinkle in his eye. “But I promise you, as an oath from Jake Alexander Monroe to you, Jo…slyn…”
“Really?”
“Joslyn Jo.” He winked at me. “Why don’t you ever use your full name?” He put one hand over his chest. “I solemnly swear, that I am here, in the attendance of your company, not as a future fling, one-night stand, or one-year stand”—a second wink—“but as a person with the sole agenda of becoming friends.” His hand lowered, as did his voice, and he moved back to me. “I just want to be your friend again, Jo. For real, I miss that most of all.”
“Just friendship?”
“Really.” He touched his finger to his mouth, and then he made the shape of a cross in the air. “My promise, before God and all.”
I groaned, but I couldn’t hold back the grin that was fighting to be let out. “I have a feeling that your promises aren’t going to hold up.”