She turned to the walk-in cooler and pulled out another tray of prepped fish fillets, lifted the plastic, and sniffed.
“Grouper, right?”
“Yeah.”
“This is okay,” she said, placing the tray on the stainless steel table. “Did it come from that same guy?”
“Tommy? I guess.”
“Okay, well, tell the servers that we had a problem and we’re going with the grouper for the special instead. Same preparation, herb-and-citrus gastrique, and what else on the side?”
“Grilled asparagus and cheese grits,” Rocky said. “These fancy people love their grits.”
Felice could remember a time when the only thing her aunt Sherise could afford to buy and cook was grits. Three times a day, sometimes supplemented with some greens cooked with a little bit of fatback. Grits were definitely not what she’d consider a delicacy.
“All right. They can have their grits.” She wiped her hands on a kitchen towel. “Later on, me and Mr. Tommy Betz, we’re gonna have a little talk.”
“KJ? KJ Parkhurst? My man! Is that you?”
He had been dreading this moment. It was inevitable that one of his friends, either from prep school in Atlanta, from college, or a neighbor, or anybody, really, from his past, would find him here, in the pro shop, dressed in his Saint-branded shirt and shorts, folding and refolding shirts, shorts, and socks.
He spun around and found himself facing a guy about his age, shorter and chunkier, with Oakleys pushed back into his shaggy hair. He was with an older man, his father, probably, and KJ knew he knew him, sort of. Maybe this guy had played lacrosse for a rival Atlanta school—Lovett, or maybe Marist?
“Oh, hey…” KJ’s voice trailed off. He was hoping the guy’s name would come to him. “How’s it hanging?”
“Goin’ good. I mean, I stunk up the front nine, but it’s all gravy, right?”
“Absolutely. It’s just a game, that’s what my granddad says.”
The other guy. Maybe his name was Nash? Yeah. Nash something. He’d coached the kid in a summer junior league camp put on at Westminster.
The older man moved to the other side of the shop to examine the selection of putters and wedges.
“So, uh, are you, like, working here now?” Nash asked.
KJ straightened up. “Hell yeah. The money’s good and the hours don’t suck. Gives me time to work on my game, ya know?” He lowered his voice and nodded at Olivia, who’d been drafted to fill in when someone called in sick. “And the ladies are fine, ya know what I’m sayin’?”
“I hear that,” Nash said, giving him a fist bump. “Say, KJ, I heard from my buddy Miles that you’d quit Wake. I told him that can’t be right.”
“Taking a little sabbatical is all,” KJ said. He gestured at his leg. “Messed up my knee this year, so I thought, what the hell, might as well head down to the Saint, catch some rays. But I got bored just sitting around my granddad’s house, playing video games all day. The boss here is an old family friend, and he’d been bugging me to come work for him, so I finally said okay.”
“Cool,” Nash said. He reached down, unfolded one of the polo shirts KJ had just folded, studied it, then tossed it aside before rejoining his father at the cash register.
“Good seeing you, man.”
KJ picked up the shirt and refolded it. “You too, asshole,” he muttered.
Livvy was brazenly eavesdropping on KJ’s conversation with the customer.
What a load of bullshit,she thought.
The night before, while KJ and Garrett were hanging out in the lounge area, sucking down beer, KJ had tipsily admitted that he’d been kicked off the lacrosse team and flunked out of school. He’d also confessed that his presence in staff housing was a direct result of his father’s “sentencing” him to spend the summer working and getting his shit together.
Livvy didn’t actually dislike KJ. Yes, some of the time he acted like the rest of the entitled assholes who made up a certain percentage of the Saint’s guests, but unlike them, he could, on occasion, be generous, even thoughtful, offering her the last slice of pizza, or, aslast night, stopping to give her a ride home when he encountered her walking back from the restaurant.
He’d even offered her a ride this morning, after she got the call directing her to report to the pro shop instead of the Verandah.
Livvy rang up the customer’s purchases: two golf shirts, a golf club, and a leather belt with a design of embroidered whales. The total came to a whopping $1,422. The old man gave her a noncommittal nod and left the shop while Livvy fumed.
