Chapter 8
BLAKE
Eli looked as rough as I felt. His hands were jammed into the pockets of his slacks like a kid as we cut across the restaurant. I’d joined him because I knew him, but also because he was on the opposite side of the group as Cassandra.
“You all right?” I asked.
“Nope. My sister hired my ex,” he said.
No mincing words—I appreciated that. “Want me to play point?”
Eli glanced over at me, looking almost physically pained. He must have been able to tell I was in a shit mood too, because he gave a wan but grateful smile. “I appreciate that. What’s up with you? You look like you got bad news or something.”
“It’s nothing.” Even if I could say anything to Eli, which I couldn’t, the situation was so complicated I wouldn’t know where to start.
“Do you have sisters?” he asked. We were trailing behind the rest of them and hopefully out of earshot.
I shook my head. “Two brothers.”
“Well, they both suck, sometimes. But sisters… I swear to god Cass hired Reese on purpose. Just to make me suffer.”
I made the mistake of looking toward Cassandra now. She was up ahead at the doors to L’Aubergine, and I happened to get an outrageous view of her perfect, round ass.
And he wanted to talk about suffering.
I looked away as quickly as I could, lest Cass’s brother see me ogling her. Luckily, he was too absorbed in his own shit.
The restaurant was dimly lit, but once we crossed the threshold, I could still see the way Eli scanned the room, as if heading into a war zone.
“I thought it would be okay,” he said. “Reese is the manager, so it wasn’t like I’d see much of her being in here.
But then Cass tells me she’s going to be working our fucking table? ”
“They’re short-staffed,” Chelsea said.
I hadn’t noticed her also trailing behind, on Eli’s other side. She held her phone out in front of her. It pinged and buzzed like a damned arcade game. I wondered, briefly, what it was like to have a social life.
“Short-staffed? Whose fault is that?” Eli asked, his voice bitter. He was lashing out.
I cleared my throat, hoping he’d remember he wasn’t just griping to his sister. Not that he seemed to care about expressing his personal shit to me.
“Actually, Reese is selflessly pitching in because the server has some kind of new childcare issue on the weekends,” Chelsea said. “So you know, it might not be all about you?”
“See?” Eli said to me. “Sisters.”
Chelsea rolled her eyes and went back to her phone. Once she’d moved far enough ahead, Eli leaned in and said, “I’m getting shit-faced tonight. It’s the only solution.”
Up ahead, Cassandra arrived at a table by the massive plate-glass window. Golden sunlight streaming through the glass lit her up like an angel.
I harrumphed. “Maybe I’ll join you.”
Eli grinned.
It was a terrible idea, of course. Not only because Eli was a client. There was something about me and overdoing it that didn’t mix more than most people—if I drank too much, I remembered nothing the next day. Not a person, not a conversation.
Not a fake wedding proposal.
That’s why I almost never overdid it. But tonight, the thought of obliterating anything resembling feelings or memory was deeply appealing. I definitely wouldn’t do that at a client dinner, though. I didn’t think.
The table we’d arrived at next to the massive window was similarly sized to the one in the boardroom we’d sat at last week. I slid in next to Lila, with Eli on my other side. Our backs were to the glass, while Cassandra, Jude, and Chelsea sat across from us.
“Where’s Griff?” Jude asked.
“He left town,” Cassandra said, sounding annoyed. She picked up the menu. “Another one of his mysterious trips.”
So maybe it wasn’t just me pissing her off. I knew the thought was more hopeful than likely.
“Like father like son, huh?” Eli said.
Chelsea glanced up from her phone. “At least Dad calls us sometimes.”
Cassandra scoffed. “Yeah. To warn us about ghosts.”
Next to me, Lila was looking around the room with a hungry expression I recognized. One that had nothing to do with food.
As if on cue, she leaned in and whispered, “This family may be a whole mess, but this place is screaming potential.”
For some reason, this made me bristle. “Not everyone’s got a perfect family.” I don’t know why I felt the need to defend the Kellys. Maybe because there was something appealing in their messiness. Something familiar.
Lila blinked. “I think I know that, Blake.”
You’re being an ass, Harrington.
“Sorry,” I said. “You’re right about the potential.
” This place did have it, hugely. L’Aubergine was nearly there already.
The view of the valley was its main feature.
But the rest of it looked in decent shape, too.
There were around fifty candlelit tables scattered between here and the bar on the far wall, which was tastefully lit, with a well-dressed bartender currently adding ice to a martini shaker.
The sound as he shook it provided a percussive background to the clink of dinnerware and soft jazz music.
“Do you ever have live music?” I asked Eli, my eyes on the stage at the other end of the room, near the bar.
“We used to,” he said, his voice tight.
I wasn’t sure how that was a touchy subject, but then I saw the woman from the hallway—Eli’s ex—approaching our table.
“Hello, Kellys. And Harringtons.” She smiled. “Lovely to see you all, and welcome to L’Aubergine.” Reese was smooth and practiced, taking our drink orders without writing them down. The only time she faltered was when she didn’t meet Eli’s eye as she took his.
Chelsea started chatting to me and Lila, this time asking us questions about some of the other businesses we’d worked with. For a while, it seemed like the night might actually go okay. Eli brightened up after Reese left, and even told the story about how he met Lila in economics class.
“I gave you girlfriend advice,” Lila said.
“If only you’d stuck around to give wife advice, too,” he said, glancing up at Reese. She must have come after his divorce. A rebound, maybe. No wonder it didn’t end well.
Jude told a story about how he’d given girlfriend advice to one of his team members at the world open, and the girlfriend had dumped his opponent the next day.
“You threw the game!” Chelsea said.
“No way! It was good advice. She just liked me.” He grinned, and Cassandra threw her napkin at him.
Even I warmed up enough to talk about the time I’d joined a lacrosse team in college.
After Lila and I went public on our engagement—for her parents’ sake—I couldn’t stomach staying on in our co-ed soccer team, where everyone naturally expected us to act like an engaged couple.
After that, I found I preferred solo sports.
Track. Boxing. Swimming. Things where I could compete against myself.
Then a friend told me about lacrosse, and how it was a surprisingly violent sport.
“There was one small league, and they were extremely serious about it,” I said. “I got knocked out at our first practice. Never played again.”
Jude laughed hard at that one.
After Reese came back with our drinks, Lila cleared her throat. “I’d like to make a toast.”
Usually, this would be me, especially considering I’d invited everyone to dinner.
But she must have thought I wasn’t up for it.
It was fine. I held up the Bordeaux she’d ordered for both of us when I said I didn’t care what we drank, glancing over at Cassandra.
I was on my second glass already. That dress of hers left far too little to my imagination, and with her arm up, she looked like some kind of sexy royal.
Maybe Lila was right to have me sit down, in case I gave a toast to Cassandra’s cleavage.
“I’d like to raise a glass to this exciting new venture,” Lila said. “I see great things for this project, and I appreciate the Kelly family trusting us with this review. I know it’s not easy going under the microscope, but I promise, we’re going to have a lot of fun, too.”
When I looked at Cassandra next, her eyes were on mine. They quickly went back to Lila. She still didn’t trust me, I realized. Or maybe it was that she just didn’t like me.
While everyone drank to the toast, I downed my overly large sip to my thoughts.
Chelsea made a toast next. “I wish Mom were here tonight. Dad, too.”
I knew their father, who’d been uninterested in running the business, was somewhere overseas. I didn’t know why, but I was sure I’d learn over the course of our stay.
I drained my wine, glancing over at Cassandra once more, but her eyes were on Eli, who was standing up.
“What is he doing?” she hissed as he strode across the room toward the bar.
Jude shrugged. “Looks pretty obvious to me.”
When Eli came back a few minutes later, he was double fisting what looked like two double scotches.
“Those both for you, big guy?” Jude asked.
“No. One’s for my friend Blake here.” Eli handed me one of the glasses.
Cassandra’s jaw was tight, and I could feel Lila stiffen beside me too.
“Easy,” Lila said under her breath.
“I’m fine.” I took a generous gulp. While things had been improving a few minutes ago, having daggers shot at me by two of the three women at the table wasn’t exactly enjoyable.
“Anyway,” Chelsea was saying on my other side, to Lila, “We don’t do weddings here. Everyone asks, but Cassandra’s not into them.”
“The only reasonable thing I’ve heard about my sister tonight,” Eli said, taking a long sip of his own drink.
“I’d love to do them,” Chelsea said. “But we’re pretty full with conferences and other parties, so it’s not a huge thing.”
“Weddings are something we might want to consider,” Lila said. “Select weddings, anyway.”
I could practically hear both Eli and Cassandra grit their teeth, while Jude shrugged. “Makes no difference to me. I love weddings.”
“Oh really?” Cassandra asked.
“Sure. I’m just never having one myself. But happy to crash!”
“You’ll change your mind one day,” Chelsea said. “Mark my words.”
Jude laughed at that. “Not likely.”