His date cringed.
Rush gritted his teeth. “Stop!”
“No, I wo—”
He lifted me off my feet. Before I knew it, I was being literally carried out of the bar area.
Kicking my legs, I screamed, “What do you think you’re doing?”
He didn’t answer me as he continued on to the hallway by the stairwell and put me down before backing me up against a wall.
His eyes were searing into mine, but he said nothing as customers brushed by us to enter the rooftop area.
Still bleeding jealousy, I panted. “Who was that woman?”
He stared at me for several seconds before he finally spat out, “That’s not a woman. That’s my mother!”
A rush of blood suddenly coursed through my veins.
No.
This couldn’t be happening.
“Your...” I cleared my throat. “You’re lying. That’s not…she’s…I just…oh…oh, no…no.” I held onto my head with both hands. “I didn’t just say that…in front of your mother?”
“Yes.” He nodded. “Yes, you fucking did.”
I was panicked. “Oh God. Rush, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
Rush looked like he was ready to blow.
“Get back to work,” he demanded. “And stay the fuck off the rooftop.”
“Rush…” I pleaded.
Seething, he started to walk away, leaving me in the hallway. He turned around, and when he saw I hadn’t moved, he barked louder, “Go!”I didn’t know how long I’d been staring into space before Oak interrupted, “You okay, Gia? You look pale.”
It was just about closing time. Rush hadn’t come downstairs once since I’d made an ass of myself—no pun intended—in front of his mom. Even though I’d wanted to just go home, somehow, I’d managed to muddle through the rest of my shift.
Turning to him, I felt like crying. “I screwed up, Oak…in a really big way.”
Oak pulled up a chair next to where I was standing. “Want to tell me what happened?”
“I really don’t want to say.”
“Let me guess. This has something to do with the boss?”
Rolling my eyes, I said, “How ever did you know?”
“Wild guess.” He sighed. “I don’t even know what happened, but I suspect it involved Rush blowing his top over something?”
“Oh, he blew his top, alright.”
Oak looked almost entertained by my dilemma.
He began to tell me a story. “So…my daughter, Jazzy...she’s in fifth grade, right? I got called to the school the other day because there’s this boy who’s been bothering her…teasing her, pulling her hair…stuff like that.”
“Yeah?”
“The boy’s mother showed up at this meeting, too. You know what she told me? She said all this kid talks about at home is Jazzy. He seems to have a crush on her, but he has a funny way of showing it.”
I joked, “What ever are you getting at, Oak?”
He raised his brow. “I think you can draw your own conclusions there.”
Feeling flush, I said, “Well, tonight had nothing to do with Rush’s feelings or lack of feelings toward me. Tonight was one-hundred percent my fault.” Blowing out a breath, I decided to tell him what happened. “I assumed that Rush’s mother was his date earlier, confronted him in anger upstairs, and said something really bad in front of her. I can’t ever take it back, and I’m pretty sure he wants to kill me now.”
“Ouch. Okay. Wow. Well…first of all, I suspect the boss wants to do a lot of things when it comes to you, Gia, but murder isn’t one of them.” He laughed. “Anyway, how bad could it really be? What did you say that was so awful?”
I shook my head. “I can’t even repeat it. Ironically, I was paraphrasing something he said to me privately. I want to throw up.”
“Well, let’s back up for a second. The good news is…Melody is very down to Earth. She probably laughed it off. She doesn’t strike me as a prude. I’m sure Rush has explained the situation to her by now.”
“What situation? That he has a nutjob working for him who yells out sexually explicit things in the middle of a crowded bar…in front of his mother?”
“Sexually explicit? Dang. Sucks to be you.”
“Yeah. Dang. It does.”
“I’m kidding.” He laughed.
Sighing, I said, “Seriously, I don’t even know what I would say to her if she were standing in front of me.”
His eyes gestured to behind my shoulders. “Well…now’s your chance to find out.”
What?
I slowly turned to find Rush’s mother standing there.
My heart dropped. “Oh…hello, Mrs.…Ms. Rushmore.”
“Please call me Melody, Gia.”
She knew my name. Then again, Rush had yelled it out in a failed attempt to stop me from making a fool of myself.
God, she was really pretty. Her shoulder-length, light brown hair was colored ombre, blonder at the ends. Her blue eyes were glowing. She sort of reminded me of a young Goldie Hawn. And she was short—like me. It was weird to think that this little woman pushed a big guy like Rush out of her.
“Hello.” I smiled awkwardly.
Oak seemed amused. “Good to see you, Miss Melody. Looking beautiful tonight, as always.”