I laughed. “How did you—”
“I heard you say that to the ladies at table 34 before. I was clearing table 32.” He was even more beautiful when he laughed, which was rare.
“Oh.” I laughed again. An hour before, I had brought the three ladies their order, and as I unloaded plates and glasses off my tray, they had paused their lively conversation and were silent.
“Please, go on,” I’d told them with a smile while placing sodas in front of them. “This silence is giving me performance anxiety.”
They had laughed good-heartedly and complimented my skill, which wasn’t my intention, but it was nice to hear either way.
Turned out that Oliver had overheard that.
Oliver was now on his way out of the room. He stopped in front of me. “Your ears are blushing. It’s cute.” He scrutinized my face until our gazes locked.
I blushed even more. With Oliver Madden’s green eyes focused on me, I had to remind myself that I had a boyfriend. I didn’t think he even knew about Zane, and at that moment, I didn’t care.
In my periphery, I noticed Oliver reaching out. The strap of my black bra had fallen off my shoulder. Without removing his eyes from mine, Oliver hooked his finger onto it and dragged it up my arm, back to its place, chafing my skin all the way up.
My mouth went completely dry. The warmth that had begun in the pit of my stomach when I’d found myself alone in the back room with the most enigmatic and beautiful boy in school now became a bonfire that spread in my chest and sent tongues of flames down my body.
Just then, my name was called out by the shift manager.
Startled, I turned my head toward the voice, grabbed a clean apron, and ran outside to find that a new table had arrived.
Zane and a bunch of his friends had driven from Wayford to Riviera to see his girlfriend at work. The guilty hug I greeted him with might have been a tad warmer than I would normally allow myself at work. He greeted me enthusiastically then immediately turned to the menu and discussed it with his friends while I stood there, still ablaze, waiting on their table.
“Your boyfriend?” Oliver asked when I returned to the kitchen with the large order. Though his expression was as withdrawn as always, I could detect traces of surprise on his face.
“Yes,” I mumbled, blushing deeper.
My mother had been right. After Zane and I had broken up, he told his friends that I “put out.” A rumor spread in school that I slept with at least three of his friends. Now I was the fat girl whose mother cleaned houses and the school, and who slept around. My few friends tried to fight that rumor with me, but it eventually died out on its own because everyone accepted it as a fact, as if it was expected of someone like me.
Obviously, I hadn’t told my mother about any of that, nor June, who had been working hard to fund her way into college and trying to “become better.” June, whose name I’d just seen written in calm mauve and sage above a store after turning the corner in Wayford’s main street.
Instead of braking the car and going in to see my sister, I stepped on the gas pedal. I had known she was going to open a second branch here, but since I made sure to speak to my family as little as possible since Christmas, to avoid discussing my housing situation, I didn’t know where exactly in Wayford it was located.
I needed a little more time before I could face my sister and ask for a huge favor.
I had always dealt with my messes alone. While I had let my family help me back when the twins were small, I didn’t allow them into my struggles now. Since my mother didn’t have a driver’s license, September was too busy to drive her, and June had her own life, they never dropped by my place unannounced. That enabled me to lie by omission about the eviction. Only Vi and Sylvie knew.
And now Oliver did, too.
Chapter 8
Oliver
“Oliver, Blanche LaPointe is on the line.” Bruce’s voice reached me not only through my phone but also through the open door of the meeting room I had set my office in for the day.
“I’m busy. Ask her to just send the contract.”
“Okay, sir. Oliver.”
Bruce was new, efficient. If only he’d remember that I hated being called Mr. Madden or sir. The people I worked with found it endearing that I asked them to call me by my first name. It wasn’t.
“You know that when I call your office line, it’s about business, so why are you having your secretary screen me?”Blanche texted my private number.
“I know you have a good handle on everything,” I texted back.
She owned and managed a French design company I was the majority shareholder in and, based on my recommendation, was about to merge with a small American-based 3D-rendering company that I had recently bought the majority stocks in, as well. It was a good deal for both companies, but some of the Silicon Valley company’s more veteran shareholders, who weren’t happy with me buying the majority stocks and calling the shots, had objected to the deal.
