He saw her expression, the turning over in her mind of the word important.
“Okay,” she said. “We have a date.”
“Yeah,” Zack confirmed, his heart sprinting. “I just have to work out how to stop touching you.”
Chapter 12
Sorrell checked her lipstick in the small mirror and used her fingers to blend the bronzer she had used to try and contour.
“You need a better brush for that,” Gwensi said, her Welsh lilt sounding stronger compared to the flat, broad vowel sounds of the Severton residents.
“I’ll put it on my list next time I go into Leeds,” Sorrell said. “Unless you leave me yours. It’ll be easier for you to buy a new one.”
Gwensi laughed. “Turn around, let me fix that poor attempt of drag queen seduction.”
Sorrell faced her, trying not to laugh. Out of the two of them, Gwensi was the girly girl, the one who had been into the latest make up trends and fashion, while Sorrell had paid it little more than a passing glance, relying on Gwensi to make sure she looked more beautiful than disaster.
“It’s no biggie,” Sorrell said. “No one’s going to notice.”
Gwensi lifted a single eyebrow and got to work blending and then highlighting. “How many texts per day are you exchanging?”
“I don’t know, I haven’t been counting,” Sorrell kind of lied. She kept checking her phone to see if Zack had texted, and usually he had.
“I reckon you’re into the twenties but I bet it’s more. Is he definitely going to be at his brother’s bar tonight?” Gwensi did something with highlighter on Sorrell’s eye socket area.
“He said so. He and Jake usually go there for a Friday night.”
“God bless men and their routines.” Gwensi finally lowered the brush. “And your four sets of guests are all happy and content and you have a night manager, which means you can let your hair down.”
Sorrell nodded and tried not to feel nervous. She’d barely left the hotel since the previous week, the date with Zack never materialising due to her ending up with more guests than she’d imagined and flu hitting Sunrise with a sledgehammer. He’d been short-staffed as it wasn’t solely the residents who were poorly; the staff had been hit too, which meant he’d ended up putting in a few night shifts himself.
“By letting my hair down, you mean I can leave the premises and be made a drink by someone other than me?” Sorrell said. “Although I’m up early tomorrow to cover breakfast.”
“Actually, you’re not. You have the whole day off tomorrow,” Gwensi said. “That cute bartender from your man’s brother’s bar is covering breakfast and overseeing changeovers. The correct words for you to say now are ‘thank you.”
“How did you manage that one?” As far as Sorrell knew Gwensi and Abby hadn’t met.
“Facebook and your phone. Don’t know what’s going on with her, but she seems to need the money. And from what you’ve said, she’s a good worker. Not that I know much about anything other than counselling small children,” Gwensi said.
“And clearly working out my password to get in my phone,” Sorrell muttered. “I have to pay her though. And if I’m not working, I’m paying someone to do those hours for me.”
“But you have three times the number of guests this weekend than you were anticipating, thanks to the Young Farmers’ Pram Push. What the hell is that anyway?” Gwensi shoulder-pushed Sorrell out of the way of the mirror and checked her own reflection. Her dark curly hair and flawless skin was what little girls thought princesses looked like, and Gwensi was that, until she opened her mouth and a cuss word came out. Then she became the girl from the Welsh valleys who was never going to be anyone’s princess.
“It’s apparently where the young farmers make prams and push them round Severton from pub to pub.” The place seemed to conjure up weird events every week. “So what you’re saying is that rather than saving the extra profit towards renovating the annex into a restaurant, I should have somemetime,” Sorrell said.
“Yep. Not every weekend or every evening, but we don’t need you heading towards the point of exhaustion because of a hotel and I know what you’re like.” Gwensi glared dramatically. “That sounds like the taxi.”
The night was cold; Zack’s predictions of snow looked like they were about to become true given the heaviness of the clouds Sorrell had noticed before night had fallen. She pulled on the thick woollen coat that had arrived via the internet the day before and opened the door to the bite of the chill air.
“It’s a good thing they build us tough in Wales,” Gwensi said. Her jacket was thinner and Sorrell didn’t hold out hopes for her survival should they be stuck outside for any length of time.
“Let’s see if the tough girl from Wales can manage with the alcohol from Severton,” Sorrell said, yanking her Gran-made scarf off a peg and wrapping it round her neck.
The bar was comfortably busy with most people only having to wait a few minutes to be served. Scott had seen them as soon as they’d arrived and gestured to them to take up a table that had been reserved. It was one of the bigger ones, which suggested Scott was definitely expecting his brothers to arrive.
“Hey!”
Sorrell saw Scott’s expression turn into something resembling Jason Momoa in a bad mood before she could turn round to greet Keren who looked like winter personified in fur lined leather boots and a white faux fur coat.
