Chapter 21Cody
21
Cody
“You look nervous. Why do you look nervous?” Bree grilled me with suspicion in her gray eyes the moment I opened the door to Ari’s.
She looked over my shoulder as the creak of my truck door sounded, and I jumped, the warring emotions inside of me duking it out and only coming up with one clear course of action.
To deflect and flee.
With mild apology in my heart that belied the ruthlessness of my actions, I yanked Bree’s bandana down over her eyes and scurried past her into the restaurant and half-heartedly yelled, “Hah!”, ignoring the half a dozen zingers that flashed through my mind like they were written on a marquee.
My nerves were too brittle to choose one in time, which was probably why I didn’t see Liem’s Aunt Ari until I was crashing into her.
“Oh my!” she exclaimed as she bounced off my chest. I steadied her with a quick apology as she adjusted her skewed cat-eye glasses and looked me up and down. “You!” She pulled me into a quick, tight hug, the beaded necklace that was attached to her glasses tickling my face. “You’re just as beautiful as I remember, and I’m so glad you’re here! You’re helping out today?”
Well, if that wasn’t just the boost of self-esteem I needed, as well as a reminder that I would be working alongside most of Liem’s family today.
Not strangers on a cruise ship. Not co-workers who seemed intent on deliberately misunderstanding me.
But people like Ari. People who, even though I didn’t know them well, hugged me with such genuine intention that I didn’t recoil.
But at the same time, the stakes were fucking sky high. I wanted to impress all of them. In a moment of hubris—likely thanks to very nearly flustering Liem Lott, a true feat—I’d texted Bree and Vinh while I was changing into Vinh’s clothes to confirm that they were okay with me helping at the restaurant today. Vinh might have answered differently than his “Yes, that’d be great” if he’d known I’d been pulling his underwear up and over my ass as he sent it, only to gracelessly pull them off in the parking lot of his family’s restaurant.
There was still some fear lingering in the background, though. Fear that I wasn’t capable of truly being a help. But being smushed into Ari’s bosom had dissipated it somewhat, and the genuine smiles that Liem’s parents and even Vinh gave me in greeting helped even more.
“Here,” Vinh said, presenting me with a black apron.
I took it and glanced at Bree as she materialized beside him, bandana headband back in place and a glint in her eye—one that said I’d need to watch my back this morning. I wasn’t sure if she would pull something here, but she could be a sneaky snake when she wanted to be.
I folded the apron in half, wrapped it around my waist, and tied it in the back, the procedure as familiar to me as pulling a shot of espresso. “I’m not stealing someone’s apron, am I? Isn’t that similar to Bree’s thing? Taking other people’s clothes? I wouldn’t want to step on her aesthetic.”
The irony of all this pleased me greatly.
Bree gave me an unimpressed look. “I got that for you, you turd.”
I smiled, secretly loving this evidence that Bree was planning to ask me to help at some point. “Thanks, Cher.” I pulled my phone from my pants pocket to transfer it to the apron’s but noticed an unread text from my dad.
Dad
Enjoyed our run yesterday and today, son. Looking forward to tomorrow.
Dad
Drink lots of water, we’re doing weights tomorrow too.
My smile surprisingly stayed on my face as I typed out a quick reply to let him know I felt the same, a sense of peace filling me as I locked the screen and slid my phone into the apron pocket.
I looked up to find Bree watching me curiously, but I just shrugged and then straightened like a soldier when Liem swung through the saloon doors with his own apron around his waist. He came to an abrupt halt and beamed as he took us all in, looking as pleased as I’d ever seen him. Unless another Lott relative was hiding somewhere, it seemed we were all congregated in the small dining area. Monny was seated behind the counter, his prosthetic leg leaning against the wall behind him, and Mrs. Lott was unlocking the front door, having just flipped over the Open sign.
I really had made Liem late.
Mildly panicked, I automatically sought out Vinh. “What’s my assignment?”
His dark eyes, twins to Liem’s, twinkled as he said, “I’m not the boss.” With a small smile and kiss on the cheek for Bree, he turned on his heel and went back into the kitchen.
Smug as shit, Bree tugged my elbow to the ordering counter. “You’ll be with me for the start. We usually take turns serving or working in the kitchen, but you’ll be up here the whole time, as you haven’t had the Vinh Lott kitchen safety training.”
I bumped her with my hip. “This will be just like old times.”
She smirked at me. “Nice shirt.” Her eyes trailed down to my pants then, and her eyebrows rose in surprise and recognition. Thankfully, she skipped making a comment in favor of hurriedly communicating a few instructions about procedures before we threw ourselves into the madness of Fat Tuesday on the Gulf Coast at one of the only breakfast spots in town.
If I were found dead at the end of this rush, and this were a very niche game of Clue, I’d wager it was a hungover tourist in a bayside biscuit shack with a plastic spork.
Never in my twenty-three years of existence had I encountered so many people feral for biscuits.
Feral for Sinbad, feral for Larry the Lobster slot machines, feral for crab-leg-and-prime-rib night at the Fortuna buffet, sure…. I’d seen those.
My feet ached from the morning runs and serving the insane number of locals and tourists alike who came in specifically demanding to try the Mardi Gras special displayed right beside the register on a tabletop chalkboard easel that read:
MARDI GRAS SPECIAL: MONNY’S DREAM BISCUIT
The biscuit was green and purple, and I wasn’t sure if calling it a biscuit was accurate. During the first short lull of the morning, Monny had insisted I try one, and I had to admit, after devouring three in quick succession with a bemused Bree looking on, that they were delicious. They tasted like a King Cake, a biscuit, and a scone had a butter-and-food-dye-forward baby, and I was hoping there would be some left for me to take back to the boat at the end of service.
The little treats had given me a boost into the next wave of customers, and eventually a grand switcheroo took place after a heated but hushed argument between Ari and Monny. It ended with her forcing him into his wheelchair and rolling him out the back exit for a break, me taking over the register briefly during the change, and Liem swapping places with Bree, who went to the back to sort out a break schedule for everyone else.
She gave my shoulder a squeeze and me a thankful smile as she left, and then Liem appeared by my side, tying a clean white apron around his waist. There wasn’t time to talk as a new rush of customers came in, but we shared a long look that spoke of camaraderie, among other things.
Things I couldn’t think about right now.
My eyes flicked between customers and Liem near constantly, and from the moment he delivered his first platter of food, I moved from entranced to full-on hypnotized.
His movements were beyond graceful, and the smiles he offered came so easily, each one turning me green with envy at those receiving them.
And then there were the boots.
How did he make a simple pair of black boots look like that?
Even the healing cut in his eyebrow—which I had inspected thoroughly and surreptitiously at the gazebo this morning—only enhanced his aura. He was a combination of soft pinks and dark blues, like the perfect spring morning when you woke early with raw, unencumbered excitement in your heart for the day ahead.
At one point when I caught sight of that cut again, I remembered his scraped palms and stood up, only to sit down again. He would say something if his hands hurt, wouldn’t he? I hadn’t noticed any discomfort earlier when I ran my fingers over the palm of his left hand, which had been the worst of the two.
Our eyes continued to meet at irregular intervals, and I made no move to hide my interest.
Yeah, Ti Bet. I was looking at you.
I may not have been in the correct life space to go balls out with a new relationship, but that didn’t mean I wanted him to think it was from lack of want.
Or of desperate need and desire.
Because Lord Almighty, I wanted, needed, and desired—and it was fucking desperate. And considering my current below-the-waist apparel situation, it would have been so much smarter to stop watching him so intently.
Forcing my gaze to the customer in front of me, I did my damnedest to be the best, most attentive biscuit peddler in Bay Springs.
Several orders and more small talk and botched attempts at French Cajun slang than anyone should ever have to experience later, I treated myself to a look at Liem for a job well done.
My heart sped as I found him at the front of the dining room, turned mostly away from me, and the buzzing and burning in my body told me what my brain was taking longer to process.
The person standing in front of him and chatting him up was a little too close to be casual.
This was what I got for looking away.
Huffing a long breath, I clenched my fist around the pen I’d been using to absently doodle on an order book and cursed the heavens that the damn EMT had wormed his way in here. He was dressed in his uniform and apparently having a slow day, considering he was here in Liem’s space instead of out there doing his job.
God, I needed to get it together, but I wasn’t used to dealing with these feelings.
People had hit on Austin on the cruise ship all the time, and not for a second had I cared.
A new, angry dragon had awakened in my chest and was ready to spit fire and burn it all down when the EMT reached up to brush away the smear of flour on Liem’s cheek.
That was my flour.
My cheek.
I rose from my seat to stalk over there and—well, I wasn’t sure, exactly, but I figured I had a dozen steps to figure it out.
Before I even made it to three, Bree and Vinh pushed through the saloon doors.
“Time for your breaks,” Bree said with a pat on my shoulder, and I exhaled harshly, looking past her at where Vinh stood beside Liem and the EMT to—I assumed—communicate the same message.
Liem nodded and smiled faintly at his brother, but then the EMT jockeyed for his attention again, and I blew through steps four through twelve, not bothering to think through my actions along the way.
Not a person on this Earth was surprised.
Except the EMT, that was, whose eyes widened in shock when I suddenly loomed over them. I hooked my finger into Liem’s apron and tugged—just enough to make my intentions as clear as mud. “Break time, Ti Bet. Labor laws.”
To my utter delight, Liem made no objection and only offered a measly goodbye wave to the dude as I towed him by the apron straight through the saloon doors and the kitchen. I paused briefly to lean over the prep table and swipe my finger through some errant flour left there, thankful that Ari, Monny, and Mrs. Lott were so deep into fulfilling orders and fussing among themselves that they didn’t spare us a glance.
I hooked my finger deeper into Liem’s apron and tugged again, leading him out the back door and kicking it closed with my foot. Down the ramp we went and further into the muggy midmorning that was about to get either a whole lot clearer or even more muddled.
Liem said nothing, and when I glanced at him over my shoulder, his eyes were amused but not cautious.
Good.
I scouted the area around us for somewhere private, the slight lapping of the water from the Bay and morning birdsong barely registering as I decided on our destination. Halting suddenly, I revolved around Liem like the sun he was, using my grip on his apron to turn him to face me.
His lips were parted as I unhooked my finger from the inside of his apron and splayed my hand over the bottom of his ribs. I counted three long breaths under my palm before I pushed against him, urging him to step backward. The ground-sweeping branches of the weeping willow tree brushed his shoulder after a few steps, and I reached past him with my free hand and swept them aside, creating a doorway for us to walk through.
I didn’t stop ushering us into the willow’s depths until Liem’s back met its trunk.
Only the slightest hitch of his breath under my palm gave away his surprise as my hand slid down his ribs to his hip, and I ran my thumb across the sharp bone there as I took my sweet time looking my fill.
His dark-brown eyes and pink, parted lips were already burned permanently into my memory, but the tiny pieces of hair that had escaped his braid were new, and I studied each and every dark strand. Then I moved on to the metal bar through his eyebrow, the healing cut on the other, and then to the apple of his cheek.
There.
Holding his gaze, I grasped his face and painted a streak of flour across his cheekbone with my thumb.
He inhaled through his nose and shivered through a ragged exhale, his nipple piercings straining against the thin material of his shirt. But still, my gaze didn’t move from his as I searched them.
As I let my desire show.
My hope.
That I wasn’t making a mistake. That it wasn’t too soon.
Only then did I shift my gaze to the flour I’d drawn, and with slow, deliberate movements, I rotated my hand and cleaned it away with a brush of my knuckles.
Mine.
We shared breath after breath as we stayed like that, encased in the willow and its gracefully billowing branches. Liem’s arms almost mirrored them as they hung forgotten by his sides and drifted with the breeze.
“Liem,” I whispered.
His breathing stopped altogether then, and mine stopped with it, not willing to go on alone.
Now that he knew I was looking, it was time to show him. To give him a reason to wait for me. To not give up on me or let me go.
As breathless, countless time passed, a hint of vulnerability clouded his gaze, so foreign and misplaced on his beautiful face as he whispered, “Is this about Jeremiah?”
“No,” I answered immediately. “This—” I stroked my thumb across his cheekbone and then trailed my index finger down the curve of his ear, slow as molasses. “This is about not being able to live another second without kissing you, Cherie.” I snaked my other hand from his hip to his lower back and splayed it there. “Yes?”
“Yes,” my angel sang back with such conviction that my body sang, too, igniting in anticipation as I tipped Liem Lott’s head back and crashed my lips to his.