“Cool bar,” Elijah said now, obviously studying it at the same time I was.
“Who is that?” Raya mouthed to me.
“Raya, this is Elijah,” I said. “Elijah, Raya.”
“Oh!” he said, thrusting out his hand. “Hi. So nice to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you.”
So muchwas a bit of an exaggeration, but he was nothing if not polite.
“Um… who are you?” she asked, obviously confused.
“I’m…” He must’ve been as lost about our status as I was.
“He’s a friend,” I said, since he obviously didn’t want to put a label on us.
“That she kisses,” he added.
I laughed.
“Oh, really?” Raya said.
“Let’s move this reunion to the back,” I said, realizing how unprofessional we were being with tables of customers so close.
“You guys haven’t talked much in the last several weeks,have you?” Elijah asked as we walked toward the back of the restaurant.
“Only every single morning,” Raya said.
I cringed. This wasn’t going well. Should I have mentioned Elijah to Raya? We’d just barely started kissing… like two weeks ago.
“You talk to her every morning and she’s never mentioned me?” he asked, more surprised than hurt, it seemed.
“What you need to learn about Sutton, if you haven’t already, is that she’s very much a down-to-business type of woman.”
“Idoknow that about her,” he said.
“Hello,” I said. “I’m right here.” They had both started talking about me in the third person, so I felt like the reminder was necessary.
“And she’s pretty private,” Raya said, like I hadn’t spoken.
“This is the back hallway,” I said, trying to change the subject.
“Oh, you need to meet Lucas,” Raya said to me. “Our new server.” Then to Elijah she said, “Sutton hired two new servers from three hundred miles away.”
“Youhired them,” I said.
“Sure I did.” She winked. “Oh, and thanks for taking care of the potato issue. And the inventory we did the other day helped a lot.”
“Good,” I said, pushing through the swinging doors into the kitchen.
Chef was standing over some steaming pans at the stove, and he looked up as we entered. A smile broke out on his face. “Sutton? You’re back?”
“Just for the weekend.”
He moved the chicken he was searing onto a paddle and slid it into the brick oven.
“And this pretty boy right here,” Raya said, nodding with her head, “is Elijah.”
“Hello,” Chef said. “Welcome.”
