I go in the back door and breeze into the small, windowless office where employees stash their belongingsto find Cecily standing over her desk, shuffling through a mess of papers. She looks up at me, not bothering to hide the surprise in her dark eyes.
“Jade.” One brow arches as she glances at the clock on the wall. “You’re early.” She sounds unusually pleased.
I smile and cross the room to put away my purse.
“Is everything okay?” she asks warily.I knew it.
“Everything’s great. Just wanted to get an early start. Like the new hair?” I turn my head, slowly tucking a loose strand behind my ears so she can’t help but notice how unadorned they are.
“Oh. Yeah. Looks nice. You got rid of that fuchsia craziness you had going on. Your natural hair color suits you.” She grunts like it hurts to give me a compliment.
“Thanks.” I don’t tell her that it’s not totally natural—I’m sporting some fresh rose-gold highlights, but my hair is French braided back into a bun, so it’s hard to tell. Her approval makes me miss my fuchsia hair, but I’m forcing myself to transition back to my natural strawberry blond because monthly salon dye jobs are a luxury I can’t afford anymore. “Well, I’ll go get started.”
“Jade, before you go: I hired a new server who’s starting tonight. Introduce yourself, okay? Let’s be welcoming.”
I feel my smile plummet. Is she kidding? Every time I’ve asked her about moving up to server, she’s insisted we don’t need more servers, and now she’s gone and hired some new chick without even mentioning it? This bitch!
“That’s my job,” I tell her through clenched teeth, then turn on my heel.
I’d respect Cecily a lot more if she just told me I was too much of a bimbo to be a server and to fuck off back to the hostess station.
As I cross the restaurant floor, I’m already makinga mental list of the bottles of hair dye I have back home—next time Cecily sees me, she’ll be greeting my pink hair again. I think I’ll do a light candy pink. Like an old lover, it’s the color I always go back to for comfort.
I’ve just reached the front when Lori, a longtime server, leans conspiratorially on the hostess stand and smiles.
“Someone’s excited to be here. You ate an edible before you came in, didn’t you?” I ask.
“Don’t need one. Did you see the new guy yet?”
“The new server’s a guy?”
“Oh, yes he is,” she says breathily, raising her brows for effect.
So the new guy is hot. “Congrats, he’s all yours.”
“You sure? You might want to get a look at who you’re rejecting before you give me first dibs.” She straightens up and looks past me. “Check it out.”
I turn around.
Reeve Dalton is walking onto the restaurant floor clad in a crisp white shirt and black tie, the uniform for all waitstaff at Somerset Grill.
I couldn’t be more surprised if Elvis was the new waiter.
Reeve cracks a joke to Jorge, the server next to him, and laughs, then spots me and lifts his chin in recognition. Meanwhile, I haven’t blinked.
I clear my throat loudly and turn back to my station. “Like I said,” I tell Lori, “he’s all yours.”
She scoffs in disbelief. “You know who he is, don’t you?”
“Of course. I’m at Shafer; worshipping our football heroes is in the student handbook under code of conduct.”
“What, you don’t think he’s gorgeous?”
“I never said that. I don’t think he’s a very nice person.”
“He doesn’t need to be. Look at him!”
I busy myself pulling up our reservation schedule. “No, thanks.”
