My breath rushes out. “What’s up with restaurant managers and cocaine? I had to fire two guys at my last restaurant who couldn’t get their habit under control.” I motion toward the door. “There aren’t any of those here, are there? I haven’t met with the floor managers yet—I’ll be doing that next week—but if there are cokeheads on staff, I want to know about it. I’d rather let them go as part of the transition than have to deal with firing them later or, God forbid, finding someone overdosed in the coat check room.” I shudder. “That happened to me on my first job out of culinary school. I thought the guy was dead. It was so scary. Almost as scary as—”
I break off with a swift breath and wince my way into a smile. “Never mind. I’m talking too much again. I should let you go. It’s been a long day.”
“It has, but I like talking to you. I could walk you home, if you want, and we could talk on the way.”
I shake my head. “Thanks, but I have to lock up and make a couple phone calls first. But I’ll text you about the gala later. Make sure you have all the dress code details and stuff.”
He closes his locker and takes a step toward the exit. “Okay. Thanks. Then…I’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow,” I say, forcing a grin that falls from my face as soon as he steps outside.
Shit! I almost spilled my guts about my evil ex before the first date, and I’ve already promised myself that I’m not going to talk about Phillip. Not to my staff, not to any new friends I might make, and certainly not to a potential boyfriend. I don’t want anyone in my new life knowing how much shit I put up with from my ex before I finally called it quits. Or how damaged I was by the end of our relationship.
I’m not that person anymore. I’m strong, focused, and determined to build a better life for me and my daughter than the disaster we left behind in San Francisco. I’m a woman who has her shit together and her priorities in order.
Weak Me is dead and buried, and I refuse to allow her to stick so much as a pinkie finger out of the grave.
But as I turn off the lights and lock up for the night, I can feel Old Me squirming in her coffin, murmuring something about the past being the best predictor of the future and warning that my heart can’t be trusted, and neither can beautiful men.
Chapter Ten
Cameron
The dress code text from Natalie arrives at ten ’til seven.
My freakout begins not long after.
I’ve just finished calling the fourth tuxedo rental place—and been told they’re also out of anything close to my size—when Harlow bursts through the front door with a war cry that makes me flinch and startles Jess awake on the couch.
“Who’s happened, what’s there?” she mutters as she bolts into a seated position, swiping drool from her chin. The moment she spots Harlow taking a victory lap of the living room, pumping her fists in the air, she shoots me a worried look. “Is she on drugs?”
“I’m not on drugs; I’m in a new study group!” Harlow shouts as she continues to canter around our small space. “Dumbie Number One flunked out and Dumbie Number Two is so clueless our professor finally had pity on me and assigned him to the TA for special help and put me in another group. And they’re all wonderful people, and I’m saved! Now I won’t have to go to prison for murder before I graduate.”
“That’s good,” Jess says. “But you should probably stop running around before the people downstairs start banging on their ceiling like they did when Evie was trying to learn ballroom dancing.”
On cue, one of the guys below us thuds what I’m guessing is a broom handle on the ceiling and shouts in a deep voice, “Some of us are trying to sleep, assholes! Keep it down up there.”
Harlow mutters, “It’s not even eight o’clock, weirdo, even toddlers are still awake,” but she stops gamboling about and plops into the new armchair by the couch with a happy sigh. “So, that’s my day. Best. Day. Ever! At least best day without cock in it.” She points a finger Jess’s way. “You should get on that cock-finding mission, Jess. I’m telling you—a good cock is more fun than any video game, and it’s free. No in-app purchases, no waiting to join a war party, no sexist comments when you don’t shoot the bad guys fast enough.”
“I always shoot the bad guys fast enough,” Jess mutters, “but thanks. I’ll put that on my list as soon as I’m on the other side of my latest work disaster. I have a meeting with management on Monday. So, by Tuesday, I should either have a new team, or be out of a job. Either one should allow more time for hunting cock.”