“Just watch,” I said.
Louisa played her part perfectly, clasping her hands and watching excitedly, while she got his autograph, bouncing on her toes when the golfer handed it over. And then she swept in with the whisky menu, which the men took and started browsing with intent. She thanked them again for the autograph and apologized for bothering them. Flashing me a conspiratorial look, she moved on to the woman in the thousand-dollar heels.
“Wow! Those are beautiful shoes,” she said brightly. “Who designed them?”
The woman looked up from her group and smiled back. “Thank you, dear. They’re Christian Louboutin,” she said loud enough for all her friends to hear and instigating much cooing and coveting around the table, which of course, was exactly what she’d been hoping for.
“You ladies must be here to enjoy the cocktail hour,” Louisa said. There was no cocktail hour. “How about I get you a round of mimosas?”
The woman beamed at her. “That would be wonderful.” She folded up a fifty and pressed it into Louisa’s palm as a tip. “Thank you so much!”
Louisa returned via the golfer’s table with an order for three Laphroaigs and punched them all into the system. “We just turned over $400,” she whispered excitedly, pulling down the Scotch from the top shelf. “Francois, can you please help me with the mimosas?”
Francois went behind the bar, and Nyah turned to me when they were out of earshot. “Did that go better than you expected?”
I shrugged. “A little. I knew she’d get one of them but hoped for both.” I turned to Nyah and pinned her with an intent look. “You see what I’m trying to do, right? Louisa is a natural. We need more like her. They just need some more training, really.”
Nyah sighed. “Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “I’m impressed. And you’re right, there are always opportunities for front-of-house to do some tactical upselling.” She gave me a moment to enjoy the praise before continuing. “One thing though, did you watch the door while all of this was happening?”
“No,” I replied coolly, glancing toward the door.
There was nobody there.
“There was a party of twelve—hotel guests, it looked like—who came through the lobby and looked inside. Then they left, probably because they didn’t see a table large enough to accommodate them.”
That landed hard.
“If Louisa hadn’t been flirting and upselling, she’d have seen them and guided them inside to wait while she pushed a few tables together. Becausethat’swhat she’s been trained to do.”
“Oh!” I ran my finger around the collar.
“Marketing is about 5% of hotel management. The rest is just doing the work—making the beds, taking the bookings, serving the drinks. Your father sent you here to learn, not to teach. What you just showed us is impressive, but I’m sorry, if you came down here to discover how the bar operates, then you failed.”
I watched Nyah walk away and remained at the bar long after she was gone, staring into my glass and feeling utterly deflated.
Leavingthe hotel earlier than usual, I walked in the park until the tension in my chest loosened. By the time I met my mother for dinner, I’d replayed the entire day enough times to be thoroughly irritated all over again.
We met at Tangerine, one of her favourites. The maître d’ greetedher by name and led us to a quiet table. She appeared immaculate as always—elegant, composed, and entirely unreadable.
“I just can’t seem to win with that woman,” I said after the waiter poured the wine. I took a long sip. “She’s the most annoying, bossy woman I’ve ever met. Her know-it-all aura is starting to get to me.”
“Is she that bad, dear?” my mother asked, her voice calm, almost gentle.
I twirled pasta around my fork. “Can you believe she wanted me to work in housekeeping?Me.”
She nodded absently, pushing her salad leaves around her plate. “I’m surprised by that. Hearing about Nyah over the years from your father… well, he’s done nothing but sing her praises.”
Something in the way she said Nyah’s name made me look up.
Her jaw had clenched, her eyes sharpening just slightly.
A thought crossed my mind that I didn’t like much. Did she think something was going on between Nyah and Dad?
“I remember the day he came home after he’d first met her. His eyes sparkled and, as the months passed, they continued to do so whenever he met her. He would tell me about their conversations.” She bit the inside of her lip and paused, studying me. “Do you know anything else about her?”
“I don’t know anything about her,” I said carefully. “Other than Dad extolling her virtues.” I downed another sip of wine. “She’s pretty, I’ll give her that, but her attitude is a massive turnoff.”
My mother’s eyebrows rose, and I knew immediately I’d said the wrong thing. That one word—pretty—had probably set off a chain reaction in her head.
