“I’m away a lot … I recently bought this … You’re working here?” he asked, looking around as if making sure there was indeed a party going on around him. A party I worked at.
“Yes.” I grinned, raising my hand with the tray, as if to remind us both of its existence.
“I … don’t want you to work here.”
“Oh.”
“No. I mean … you should not be working, not here. You should be …”
If I had thought of him as living a new life among the jet set, he was probably thinking of me all these years as a married mom with a college degree, who wasn’t waitressing at parties.
“Amy, your caterer, is two people short, so I’m helping.” I didn’t add that I wasn’t just doing this out of the goodness of my heart and that I needed the money, too.
“Of course!” He seemed rattled, as if I had reminded him of some reality he was ignorant of. He wet his lips, and his gaze drifted around, as if he was wondering who all these people were and what they were doing in his house, needing other people to wait on them. He then brought his eyes back to me.
I almost flinched under that green depth. His eyes always had that effect on me. Looking into Oliver’s eyes was like being entranced by Aurora Borealis, knowing how rare and barely graspable it was.
“Let me take this …” He reached for my tray.
“No, no, that’s okay.” I shifted my arm out of his reach. “It’s not heavy. Look at all that tiny food.” I chuckled, happy to avert my gaze, thinking of the heavier trays and people I lifted at the nursing home. “I didn’t know this was your place,” I added in an effort to dispel his discomfort. “I only figured it out once I saw the name on the mailbox. There could only be one Oliver Madden here …”
In the world.
“Ollie,” Marcia called, and we both looked at her.
I knew he hated that nickname. The muscle in his jaw twitched.
“I hate it when he calls me Ollie,” I remembered his words when we were both six. “You’re Oliforever,” I had said at fifteen.
Oliver half-turned toward her, and I had a chance to quickly glide my eyes over him—the tall, strong, wide-shouldered, vast-chested man he had become.
Then those intense green eyes were again on me. God, I almost preferred the back of his head to be directed at me.
“I’d better get these to the hungry people around here,” I said.
“Can you stay after? I would love to … catch up.”
“Sure.” I smiled, though I didn’t really feel like catching up. That would require me to tell Oliver howIhad turned out. Not that it was anything bad, but it wasn’t anything great, either.
He put his left hand on my forearm. No ring. “Thanks. And please … let these people starve. I don’t care. They’re too well-fed, anyway. I’ll find you when this is over.” He then took a deeper breath, and I could practically see the mask donning again. He strayed toward the cocktail dress and the man, and I continued to stroll around with the emptying tray before returning to the kitchen to get the next one.
“What’s the occasion?” I asked Amy, who was busy instructing two other waitresses.
“A fundraiser, I think, or a party for the local chapter of Save the Children.”
A sudden fist grasped my heart and stomach.
“Marcia Beaumont contacted me,” Amy added. “She and Patty Delaney organized the whole thing; said she twisted his arm to let her host it here as long as she promised not to honor him for his substantial donations. She tricked him, the old bat.” Amy cackled hoarsely.
I smiled. From what I knew of Marcia Beaumont and Amy, they were about the same age, and both were pushy and stuck their noses everywhere.
“Even tonight, Mr. Madden said I should arrange everything with Marcia. Or I should sayOliver,because he asked me not to call him Mr. Madden,” Amy added.
Unsurprising.Mr. Maddenwas his father, and Oliver was so different from that man, and not just in looks.
I lifted the freshly-filled tray then stepped out to the music and chatter of the hall. I smiled, served, recommended, and searched for Oliver. Now and then, as I walked in and out of the kitchen with different foods and drinks, or collected empty glasses and discarded cocktail napkins, I saw glimpses of him standing with one group or another. He was sometimes smiling, but just like back then, he looked alone even in company. He didn’t seem to belong, not to the place, not to the people, not to anyone in particular. There was a thin sheet of ice that separated him from the rest. Which was strange, because his hand on my forearm had been warm, and his eyes blazed green flames, as they always had.
At around eleven p.m., the crowd thinned, and I went to the kitchen to help with closing everything and carrying boxes out to Amy’s delivery van. I removed the white apron, untied my hair, and threw a quick gaze in the side mirror of her van, just to make sure I still looked presentable after seventeen hours on my feet. Thank goodness for my comfy flats.
