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“Didn’t hear what?” Lena asked, appearing stealthily behind me.
“That your father’s rotgut drink might have caused me to get pregnant once,” Rosa said loudly before anyone else could speak. “I swore that man would never get me to try his basement liquor ever again.”
“I’d try it,” Slim said. “He just never offered me.”
“That’s because you didn’t bat your eyes and ask nicely,” Rosa teased.
I looked up to the bar, where Colleen was holding court, passing out drinks and calling out to Julia behind her for more. She seemed to be enjoying herself, but there was a hint of something else in her expression. A sadness that was as deep and filling as an ocean. I felt for her.
Wandering away from the table on the auspices of finding the bathroom, I headed closer to the bar. The crowd was beginning to lessen and a space had opened up in front of Julia. I looked back at my table, but the group had fallen in on each other, chatting away and mostly blocked by the pillar the table was leaned against.
I cracked my neck and took a few steps closer to her, and when she looked up, I could see her jump a little. But then the smile pressed up the corners of her mouth, and I couldn’t help noticing how different it was even from the one she used at work. This one was genuine. Real.
There was even a little color on her chest, just above the collarbone, rising up her neck that suggested that she was even happier to see me than her smile said.
“Mind if I sit here for a minute?” I asked.
“I thought I wasn’t your employee for tonight?” she grinned. “What will it be?”
ChapterFifteen
Julia
Ireally didn’t expect him to sit in front of me after his quip about me not working for him, but now that he was here, I was happy about it.
Weirdly.
Not that it was confusing that I had a thing for him. That was a lie I stopped telling myself weeks ago. I knew I had a crush on my boss, and I chalked it up to being something completely normal to do. He was rich, successful, authoritative, and absolutely incredible-looking. Of course, I was going to have a thing for him. Then after that kiss, which neither of us had discussed since, it was pretty evident that I was going to be feeling things that I wouldn’t be able to act on, if nothing other than I was pretty sure I was a dime a dozen to someone like him.
Crush or not, I had to be a professional, and I thought I had done a pretty remarkable job of not letting it get to me. Not when he ordered me around to do stupid menial tasks. Not when he had me rewrite press releases or internal memos over and over rather than just tell me what he wanted me to say. Not when he had me run for coffee for the fifth time that day rather than fix or buy a new coffeemaker.
I kept my cool and controlled myself better than I thought I would be able to. And now, rather than having a bit of a break from that stress and pushing through an entirelydifferentstress of having to run a bar, I was getting both at once. My boss was sitting in front of me, smiling in a way that he never did at the office, loosening up with a couple of drinks under his belt, and eyeing me in a way that made me think of that night he kissed me, and how much I wanted more of that.
“You know,” he said, looking critically at the glass I had just placed in front of him, “I’m normally not much of a beer guy, but this is really good.”
“You’re not?” I asked. “Not high-class enough?”
He grinned.
“Not that,” he said. “Just too many carbs. I never really got into it because it just seemed like empty calories and carbs. But this is really smooth. Goes well with these fries.”
“So, you’re telling me you’re just now discovering the joy of empty carbs and calories?”
“Perhaps I am.” He laughed. “I’m ruining days of workouts with this, but damn if it isn’t tasty.”
“Welcome to Southie,” I said. “Most people in this bar haven’t seen the inside of a gym in ten-plus years, but they polish off a plate of our fries and a few beers every couple of days.”
“You say that, but I look around and I don’t see many people looking like they need a diet,” he said.
“That’s because these people work,” I said. “With their hands. Outside. Hot, cold, rain, snow, doesn’t matter. These people are outside, working their asses off. They burn the calories off.”
He nodded, and I realized it sounded like I was making a judgement on him. I wanted to apologize, but at the same time, I kind ofwas. He lived a cushy life, wearing a suit all the time and overlooking the city like a god. He didn’t know what life was like down here, the ants that scurried along the harbor from his point of view in the tall buildings. He didn’t know what it meant to struggle, to fight, to have to use your back and your knees to make sure you got food on the table.
If he walked out of the bar tonight with a slight bit more appreciation for people who lived that kind of life, all the better.
The bar was starting to thin out, and most of the regulars had either settled in where they were going to be until last call, or had already wandered off home for the night. It was starting to feel like old times, albeit with one big difference. Dad wasn’t around to be loud and funny and intentionally lose money on his pours because it made his friends happy.
Instead, I had Mom, holding court as she yammered on with some of the regulars and mostly left me alone with Hunter. I pulled out the cutting board and set it on the bar, grabbing some limes out of the container and a knife. If I was going to have a few minutes of downtime, I was going to make myself useful.
