Submitting in Vegas (Vegas Morellis 3)

Leaning back in my seat, I tell her, “I don’t know what to buy a one-year-old little girl for her birthday. Do you think she’d like a nice cognac?”

Now that she knows I don’t have a real problem, she cocks an unimpressed eyebrow at me. “You have a baby. You know babies don’t drink cognac.”

Spreading my arms in an exaggerated display of helplessness, I say, “I think you need to buy Skylar’s present for me. I’ll give you some cash, you do the shopping.”

“No.”

“Come on. It’s fun to spend someone else’s money. You’ll enjoy it.”

“You just said you don’t want to go home,” she points out. “Go shopping instead. You can take care of Skylar’s birthday present and have some peace and quiet. Two birds, one stone.”

“All right. But only if you go with me.”

Laughing lightly, she gestures around the dining room. “I can’t go with you. I’m working.”

As if to prove her point, a woman at one of her tables starts looking around for her. Virginia is a great waitress for everyone, not just me, so she goes and does her job.

Checking my watch to see what time it is, I consider how I can get her out of work. There’s probably a 7 o’clock person, so I could tell them to stay, and tell the hostess to stop seating her. I can have her shift over when I’m leaving, and she won’t even know it.

Yep, that’s what I’m going to do. I don’t know who works which shift, so I slide out of the booth and head to the employee area to check the schedule.

Ah, Christ.

Sighing, I hang the schedule back on the wall and search the floor for Felix. Since they were over by the bar when I came in, I assumed he was tending the bar tonight, but apparently he is the 7 o’clock server. That’s less exciting. Since she went and hired the little prick back, I have to treat him like every other employee, but since he found out I was sleeping her, he has not warmed back up to me at all. He’s just polite enough that I can’t accuse him of being a dick, but with a deliberate sheen of “fuck you” in his eyes every time he meets my gaze.

Plus I’ve reviewed the occasional security footage of them together to see what they talk about, and he openly admits to not liking me when I’m not around.

He’s standing in front of a table, nodding as he assures them he can serve their dish without garnish, that’s no problem. Polite asshole. Everything he does annoys me. I even hate the way he doesn’t use his order pad. Virginia doesn’t either, and it’s fine when she does it, but I want to tell him to use his. He’s bound to fuck up orders if I don’t though, and I’d rather him give Trent reasons to write his ass up, so I keep my mouth shut and wait for him to turn around.

His expression tightens when he turns around and sees me standing here.

“Out on the floor tonight, huh?”

He nods, slowly approaching. “Yep. Gotta go put this order in.”

“Of course. I’ll walk with you.”

I know he’d prefer I didn’t, but he keeps his mouth shut and keeps walking.

To be honest, I don’t know why the little fucker came back. After I waited at his apartment building and put a gun to his head for bringing my ex-almost-girlfriend back to his place, you’d really think the kid would have just opted to take a different job. Yet, here he is, sauntering around my fucking restaurant.

“So, Virginia mentioned she trained you on the floor, huh? How do you like it?”

“It’s cool,” he says. “Virginia’s real good, so it was nice training with her.”

I can’t help smiling at his deliberately obnoxious wording. “She is good, isn’t she?” I murmur. “Well, listen, since it’s busier than projected tonight, the closers could use a little extra help. Trent wanted me to ask if you’d be willing to stay until close instead of leaving at seven.”

He puts a hand out and shoves open the door to the kitchen. My hand shoots out to catch it and I follow him. “Sure, I can stay,” he says.

“Perfect. I’ll go tell the hostess.”

That was easy enough. He’ll be pissed when he realizes he’s filling in so Virginia can leave with me, but it’ll be too late for him to change his mind. That probably won’t work again, but that’s future Rafe’s problem.

Also, I need to talk to fucking Trent about how often that little bastard works with Virginia. Why does he always schedule them together?

I guess it’s probably because she works six nights a week. Maybe I should start telling her t

o take Sundays off. We could do a family dinner at my house with Sin and Laurel, that way I would still see her, but she’d get a night off.