Chapter 10
CHAPTER 10
T here was officially no denying it. Kent Parker was the most arrogant, self-centred, egotistical man Gemma had ever come across. And she had come across a few. She felt her hands clench as she stood there, and the muscles around her neck and back tightened. Across the coffee shop, a couple of remaining customers were looking at her. Had they heard what had happened before, she wondered? Were they waiting for her to explode at him for a second time? The pair looking at her had their phones out on the table. Perhaps they hoped to catch her outburst on camera, then place it on the internet where it could go viral. Well, she wasn’t going to lose her cool again. She was still drawing in a long breath, hoping to force her pulse rate down, when Kent spoke again.
“That won’t be an issue, will it?” he said.
Her fists clenched tighter.
Really?
Gemma couldn’t believe his gall. She had met a lot of men who believed that having testicles gave them the automatic right to speak down to women, and unsurprisingly, she placed them a little above a venomous tree frog in terms of creatures she wished to interact with. But he was taking the biscuit.
“First, they are not your staff,” she said.
She knew how it worked in posh restaurants, where the chefs were the top dogs, designing all the menus and bossing all the wait staff around like they didn’t know what they were doing, but that wasn’t the same there. This was her place. Well, it was Oscar’s, but she ran it, and the way she ran it would not change because some man who thought he was god’s gift was now employed there.
“Second, this is a farewell to George. A chance for the people who have worked with him, some of us for nearly a decade, to say goodbye to him. This is a chance to share our favourite stories and laugh and probably cry too, because after today, I won’t come into work and talk to one of the nicest men I’ve ever known. Sophie and I won’t have a man we view more like family than a friend to talk through our worries with, because even though people say things won’t change after they leave, we all know that’s not true. Today is a chance for us to tell George that this place won’t be the same without him. That’s what his leaving do is. It’s not a chance for you to come and wheedle your way in with the staff or to share all the notes you’ve scribbled down on that damn tablet of yours. This evening is about George. So yes, actually, it will be an issue if you come along. You start work here tomorrow with Sophie, and it would be great if you stayed away until then.”
With everything she had wanted to say out in the open, Gemma expelled a long breath. She had failed, that was for sure. So much for promising herself she was going to keep her cool. Something about Kent got under her skin in a way she had never known anyone else to do. Just his presence was enough to make her skin itch, and he could see it by the look on his face.
“I seem to have overstepped a mark, inviting myself tonight.” He clenched his hands in front of him. “I realise that now and I apologise.”
Gemma grunted. If he thought she was going to apologise f or the way she had just spoken, then he was sadly mistaken. She had meant every word she’d said.
“Is there anything else you wanted?” she asked instead.
Kent shook his head.
“No, no. I’ll see you Monday then, Gemma.”
“Yes. I’ll see you Monday, Kent.”
A moment later, he was leaving and walking towards the river.