The lady sitting next to me is bobbing her head along to the music that must be blasting through her earbuds. I don’t have to wonder what she’s listening to for long, because she starts to belt out Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive.” She’s singing with such fervor I can only assume that she was recently jilted. I send a silent prayer of good fortune her way. We’ve all been there, sister.
A few other people give her a cursory glance, but no one seems too shocked, what with this being the NYC subway and all. I get off the train at Columbus Circle and cross the street to Central Park South feeling light and optimistic. Any day that God texts you is a good day.
Walking into The Asher is like setting foot on another planet. It is so far out of my daily experience it isn’t funny. Twenty fancy stories tall, all overlooking Central Park. This place could pass for God’s house—not in a church sense, but, you know, his city pad. The lobby is chic and intimidating. So much that I almost turn around and leave. Marble floors, crystal chandeliers, and sumptuous overstuffed furniture in dark burgundies and browns practically shout that paupers aren’t welcome.
I walk past a famous rock star, a famous model, and a socialite who I regularly see on Page Six, the New York Post’s gossip column. I have a bit of a thing for local gossip. I have this vision of learning about some famous person desperately searching for a shockingly colorful watercolor and I’ll be all, “I know JUST where you can find one!” Then I’ll stalk them and get them to launch my career. It’s like that Stevie Wonder and Ariana Grande song about faith. Except in my case, I’ve got faith my success will evolve out of my dedication to Page Six.
I wait my turn at the front desk behind two Japanese businessmen. An intensely stuck-up clerk smiles at me in a way that suggests he doesn’t get enough fiber in his diet. When I walk up to him, he asks, “May I help you?”
Smiling like fiber is my friend, I say, “I’m here to see Tony Collins.”
“Do you have an appointment?” he asks coolly.
“I don’t, but Gabe sent me.” I feel like I’m speaking in code and that I’m participating in some kind of cosmic drug deal.
“Gabe who?” he wants to know.
“Gabe …” How do I answer this without sounding insane? Nothing’s coming to me so I say, “God.”
“Gabe God sent you?” Todd—I look at his name tag—picks up the phone. I’m assuming he’s calling security and I’m about to be forcibly removed from the premises. I turn to leave before having to endure the humiliation when I hear him say, “Shane, it’s Todd at the front desk. I have a young lady here to see Mr. Collins. She says someone named Gabe God sent her?”
Wow. I’m not sure what I thought would happen. Obviously I believed God this morning while texting him, but somehow hearing myself say that Gabe God referred me made me question the veracity of my earlier communication.
Todd smiles nicely now, and says, “Won’t you please sit in the lobby? Mr. Collins will be over shortly.”
I walk over to a very sumptuous brown leather sofa. I put my purse on the coffee table in front of me as a woman in an apron approaches. “May I bring you something to drink?”
“Oh, I’m not a guest here,” I tell her. “I’m waiting to meet with Mr. Collins.”
“Mr. Collins asked me to bring you a beverage of your choice while you wait. He’ll be with you in just a moment.”
She hands me a menu and waits while I give it a cursory glance. “Oh, hibiscus tea, my favorite!”
“I’ll be right back,” she says. Oh nononononono, I wasn’t ordering a pot of eighteen-dollar tea, I was just making small talk. Oh dear, what do I do now? I don’t have eighteen dollars on me. I try to flag her down, but short of yelling, “YO, waitress lady, over here!” I don’t have a chance of reaching her in time. She’s practically sprinting away in her sensible black flats.
In a panic-induced sweat, I do the only thing I can think of. I call my credit card company to make sure I have enough of a balance to cover a pot of eighteen-dollar tea. I learn that I actually have twenty-six dollars of available credit so I’m breathing easier by the time my beverage arrives. That is, until I see the plate of pastries my waitress has brought with her. She can’t expect me to pay for those, can she? I certainly didn’t order them.
Before I can ask her to take them away, a handsome man in his thirties walks up to me. “Hi there. Are you Gabe’s friend?”
I stand up in such a hurry I nearly launch myself at him. “I’m Jen Flanders.”
“What can I do for you?” he asks as he sits in a chair across from me, but not before grabbing what’s probably a forty-dollar scone off the plate.
“Um, well, I was talking to Gabe this morning and was telling him that I needed a good job. He suggested I come down and talk to you.”
“Oh, right, okay. What position are you looking for?”
“I don’t really know, but honestly, I’m not picky. I’ll do anything.” My cheeks flush and I quickly say, “Any regular hotel position that you need to fill. You know, anything that doesn’t require a lot of job experience. I’ve been walking dogs while I concentrate on my artwork …” I wonder if there’s an opening for someone suffering from verbal incontinence. I’m not trained for anything to do with the hospitality industry.
“We just lost someone at the front desk, so if that interests you, I’d be happy to hire you on a trial basis,” he says. “We’d pay you during training, of course.”
My mouth hangs open like the hinge on my jaw just gave way. “That would be wonderful!” I tell him before asking, “Would you like me to fill out an application?”
“Not necessary. Any friend of Gabe’s is a friend of ours. We’ll need your social security card and address of course, but other than that, you’re good to go. Can you start tomorrow?”
“Absolutely I can, and thank you, Mr. Collins.”
He shakes my hand before telling me to report to the front desk tomorrow at ten. He starts to walk away when I ask, “One more thing …”—I point to the spread in front of me—”is there any chance I could get an employee discount for this?”
“Those are on me,” he says with a little wink before leaving me to my very posh afternoon tea. I snap a picture of all the delicious pastries and send it to GOD with the caption: I got a job at the front desk, I start tomorrow, AND they comped me these! Can you believe it? Do you think I can sneak them into my purse? Also, thank you times a million!
I sit back and sip my tea, wondering if there’s any way I can slip all these pastries into my bag without anyone noticing …
Who knew when I woke up this morning my fortunes would turn so spectacularly?
Chapter Two
Gabriel Oliver Daly
“Well, look who the cat dragged in,” my mom yells in her thick Irish accent as she rushes over to a table of tourists carrying a tray of Guinness.
“He looks familiar, doesn’t he?” my dad says, narrowing his eyes at me from behind the bar of their pub, The Salty Nuts Tavern, one of the most popular watering holes in Hell’s Kitchen. “Almost like that boy we raised years ago, the one who looked like me but acted exactly like his mother—a right terror. Gandalf, Genghis, wait—” He snaps his fingers as though my name has just come to him. “Gabriel!”
I wave at him while I wait for my mom to empty her tray. “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been almost three weeks since I stopped by,” I say, going for a contrite tone.
The tourists grin at our exchange like they’re part of some dinner theatre production. Playing along, I offer a smile while my mom tells them, “He’s a fancy lawyer now, so he’s too busy for the people who gave him life and kept him fed while he grew into the gorgeous lad you see before you.”
She walks over and I give her a kiss on the cheek. “Hello, Mom. I like your hair. Did you do something different with it?”
Different is a tame word for what she’s got going on. She refuses to let herself go grey, yet she doesn
’t “see the sense in paying someone for somethin’ she can do herself.” She not only dyes her own hair, but she cuts it too. Today’s look is a bright reddish-orange attempt at a pixie cut that resembles a cartoon character being electrocuted. She smiles and bats her eyelashes. “Your da says I look exactly like a red-haired Jamie Lee Curtis now.”
“He’s right,” I agree, because, why not let them live in their blissful state of illusion?
One of the men at the table nearest us interrupts with, “Hey, how come you don’t sound like your parents?”
“I grew up here,” I tell him.
My dad, who is clearly listening, calls, “But he was born in Ireland! I made sure of that. He’s as Irish as the Blarney Stone on St. Paddy’s Day.”
“You made sure of it, did you?” my mom says, scowling in his direction before telling the tourists, “The way he talks you’d think he carved the boy from wood like Pinocchio.”
“Don’t get your knickers in a twist, Mary. It’s not like anyone thinks I managed to have him on my own,” he says.
My mom rolls her eyes, then gives the customers her standard line, “If you need anything at all, don’t hesitate to ask … the five-haired grouch over there.”
With that, she links arms with me and we make our way to the bar. I walk around behind it and put my briefcase down, then pour myself a water.
“So, Byrne, I suppose you haven’t bothered to call your sister lately,” my mom says.
The Irish are known for giving each other nicknames that don’t make any sense unless you know the backstory. For example, my dad grew up with a kid called Bungalow, and they called him that because he had nothing upstairs. In my case, my entire family calls me Byrne after the actor Gabriel Byrne, who apparently my mother has had a life-long crush on. When my dad found out the real reason she’d pushed so hard for the name, he started calling me Byrne to tease her and, oddly enough, it stuck.
“I promise I’ll call her this week,” I tell my mom, making a mental note to do just that.
“Is Alexis meeting you?” my dad asks, knowing full well she’s not. My girlfriend and my parents don’t exactly “get on like a house on fire,” to quote my mom. Whatever the hell that means. It’s a bit of a sore spot between my parents and me, to be honest. I try not to bring her up around them because it occasionally leads to a blowout in which my mom makes it clear that she knows me better than I know myself and that I’ve “got no business settling down with a minus craic like her.” A minus craic is Irish for boring.
The feeling is mutual though. Alexis avoids my parents like they’re planning to harvest her kidneys to sell on the black market. She and I met in our third year of law school, and even though I love her, they most definitely do not. She’s a criminal defense lawyer which doesn’t go over well when a huge chunk of your family is made up of cops. Seriously, three of my uncles, eight of my cousins, and my sister Ciara’s husband all wear the badge.
“Not tonight, she’s still working on that big case,” I say, opening the fridge and crouching down to load a case of beer into it.
“That murderer?” my dad spits.
“He’s been charged with manslaughter, Dad,” I answer.
“Same thing, if you ask me,” my mom says with a sigh. “If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it’s no kangaroo.” I grew up with insightful words of wisdom like this. Seriously, I could write a book.
I shouldn’t bother to explain it again, but of course, in the name of defending my girlfriend, I will. “He hit a stranger with his car by accident. It wasn’t premeditated or anything.”
“Or so he wants you to think,” my dad mutters, pulling a pint. “If I was going to kill your mother here, I wouldn’t draw up a blueprint and have it framed first. I’d make it look accidental-like.”
My mom shoots him a look that makes it clear she’s questioning his plans for her. She fires back, “Not me. I’ve already written up the plans on how your da is going to meet his maker and have them hanging in the ladies’ room.”
“Mary!” my dad yells, “What kind of thing is that to say about your dear husband?”
“You should talk! You’re busy plotting to run me over. Good luck to you, mister. You don’t even have a car. They’ll lock you up sure as my mam made the best soda bread in all of Cork.”
My dad waves off her comment and turns to me. “And how’s your work been then?”
“Busy but good,” I tell him, glad for the diversion from discussing how he and my mom envision killing each other. “The Bulgari case looks like it might settle before we go to trial after all.”
He narrows his eyes. “Which one is that again?”
“How can you not remember?” my mom asks. “He’s only been working on it for the better part of the year. It’s Byrne’s biggest client, Covington Hotel Management. They’re in a fight with that Bulgari fella who owns a posh hotel on the Upper East Side.”
My dad nods. “Oh, right, right. I remember now.”
Covington, my client, has been managing a hotel owned by a man named Enzo Bulgari for a few years now. Covington is now taking over a second hotel on the same block with the intention of running it under their newest upscale brand. There was a non-compete clause included in the contract I wrote up for the Bulgari property three years ago, which, in theory, should have prevented Covington from managing a competing property, but I made sure that the clause left room for interpretation. At the time, Enzo Bulgari agreed to sign it because the other hotels in the area weren’t fighting for the same clients (rich business travelers) and Covington had the best reputation in the business. But all that changed last year when the second hotel went up for sale. One of Covington’s other clients bought it and started immediate renovations that would put it in direct competition with the Bulgari. What they’re doing crosses an ethical line, for sure, but that’s how it is in this business. As bad as I feel for Mr. Bulgari, he’s not my client.
“So the other side is finally seeing the writing on the wall then?” my mom asks with a smile, not understanding the shady dealings that went into it.
My gut churns at what it took to get them to the point they’re at. We’ve pretty much got Mr. Bulgari on his knees, which is one of those parts of my job I don’t relish, especially since it’s his family’s only property and if it doesn’t actually ruin them, it’ll come close. I nod my head, assuring her that the writing is on the wall.
“They’d have to make you partner then, wouldn’t they?” my mom asks.
“I hope so.” I’ve been at Murphy, Norris, and Goldstein for seven years now, straight out of law school. While I like the work enough, I’d also love the kind of money that comes with partnership. And to be honest, so would Alexis. We decided not to get married until we’ve both made partner. She got “the call” six months ago, and since then, she’s been getting a little impatient for me to do the same.
“They’d be foolish not to make you the boss, after all the business you’ve brought them,” Mom says, wiping the counter with a wet rag. “I’d like to see how they’d do if you left.” She says this like the whole company would crumble without her sainted Gabriel.
“I’m afraid they wouldn’t even know I was gone,” I tell her. “They’d still have a hundred and twenty-four attorneys on the payroll.”
“Psh! They’d be over and done without my sweet boy holding things together for them,” my mom tells the man at the bar. “Refill, love?” She could teach sales at Wharton. She’s about to convince a man who came inside to get out of the heat of a late June day that he wants a hearty bowl of stew. “And maybe some stew and nice fresh bread to go with that whiskey?”
His eyes light up. “Now that you mention it, I am hungry.”
She raps on the counter with her knuckles, then says, “Coming right up,” before disappearing into the kitchen through the swinging door.
“What about you? You want some supper?” my dad asks.
Shaking my head
, I tell him, “I told Alexis I’d meet her later.”
My phone buzzes and I pull it out of my pocket, wondering if she’s already done. But it’s not her. It’s an email from my paralegal, Jane, reminding me that I have a meeting at nine tomorrow morning. Having been in the business for over thirty years, Jane’s an absolute wealth of legal knowledge, but she refuses to learn how to set up Google calendar appointments. I write her a quick thanks, then realize I haven’t looked at a message that Audra, the legal student I agreed to mentor, sent. It’s a photo of a teapot and some pastries. The text reads:
(212) 555-7373: I got a job at the front desk, I start tomorrow, AND they comped me these! Can you believe it? Do you think I can sneak them into my purse? Also, thank you times a million!
“Who’s that from and why’s he so excited?”
“Do you remember my friend Ian? I went to school with him,” I say, while hitting the reply button and typing:
Me: Wonderful! I’m really happy for you.
“Is he the idiot who shaved off all his hair and got a tattoo of a leprechaun on the top of his head?” my dad asks.
“No, that’s Liam,” my mom says, picking up the conversation as though she never left. She slides the bowl of stew and a basket of warm bread in front of the man. “Ian’s the one who gave Gabe the nickname God on account of his initials? Back when they were in primary school.”
My dad shakes his head.
“How can you not—? Ian O’Malley? Ginger with loads of freckles. Always had his finger up his nose.”
“No, can’t picture him,” dad says.
My mom’s eyes grow wide with exasperation. “His mum used to be my Avon lady, remember? She’d get me that bright pink lipstick I loved so much. I’m still mourning the fact that they discontinued it.”
Dear God, Dad, just say you remember him.
When my dad’s face remains blank, she continues. “Deirdre with the dead husband. Well, he wasn’t always dead, I suppose.”
“Nope. No clue,” my dad says as I rub the bridge of my nose while I wait for this to play out.
The Text God: Text and You Shall Receive ... (An Accidentally in Love Story Book 2) Page 2