Chapter 4
FOUR
ELEVEN YEARS AGO
Josie
I tag along with Alice while she waits on tables so I can learn how it’s done.
We take drink orders for a table of girls talking about last semester’s college classes, and then turn to face the group of windbreaker boys in the back.
A couple more have joined the original four now, and I blink when I realize one of them is Christopher Langley’s son.
Alice shoves me in their direction. “Might as well throw you into the fire. See if you can do this one on your own.”
I approach the table with my pad of paper and pen poised to take their orders, and half a dozen sets of eyes turn to assess me. Maybe it’s because I’m new here, but I get the distinct feeling I’m being scrutinized.
“Hi, I’m Josie and I’ll be your server,” I say, just like Alice taught me. “Can I get you some drinks?”
Christopher’s son opens his mouth, but before he can say anything, a tall, blond guy with a chiseled jaw leans on the table and gives me a cocky grin.
He’s good-looking in a clean-cut, rich guy sort of way, and I have a feeling he knows it.
“Hi, Josie,” he says, enunciating each syllable of my name. “I’ll have a gin and tonic.”
I blink at him. He doesn’t look twenty-one to me. Plus, Alice said the guys in windbreakers are part of the sailing club, and most of them are around our age.
“Um,” I say. “Can I see your ID?” Since we’ve been out on the patio, we haven’t waited on anyone who ordered alcohol yet.
It’s one of the reasons Alice doesn’t like working out here.
Five-dollar sodas don’t earn big tips. The girls at the next table all ordered iced teas.
But I’m sure I’m supposed to ask for ID if I don’t know how old someone is.
The blond guy pats the pockets of his windbreaker. “Damn. I left it in my duffle bag in the locker room.” He shrugs. “It’s okay. My family has had a membership here for years. You can go ahead and put it on my tab.”
I press my lips together. I don’t know what his family being members has to do with his gin and tonic order, except that maybe he’s warning me that he has more power than I do in this situation.
I don’t want to lose my job by arguing with the son of a valued member of the club.
But on the other hand, I don’t want to lose my job by illegally serving alcohol either.
I glance around for Alice, but she’s talking to the girls who ordered the iced teas.
I wish we could switch places. They were so polite to us.
“Leave her alone, Cal,” comes a voice from across the table.
I turn back to find Christopher Langley’s son glaring at the blond guy.
Cal shrugs. “What am I doing, Ian? I’m just ordering a drink.”
Christopher Langley’s son—Cal called him Ian—narrows his eyes.
“You know what you’re doing. She’s not allowed to bring you a gin and tonic.
Quit being a dick and putting her on the spot like that.
” Then to me, he says, “I’m sorry. You can bring him a Coke.
” He waves a hand around the table at the other windbreaker guys, who are all watching this conversation with interest. “You can bring us all Cokes.” He leans in closer to me.
“And if you feel like spitting in Cal’s, you’d be totally justified. ”
His resemblance to his father comes into focus now that I’m not crashing into things.
The sharpness of his cheekbones, the fullness of his lower lip.
But while Christopher’s face was almost granite in its intensity, Ian’s expression is relaxed and open.
His eyes crinkle at the corners like we’re in on the joke together, and a flutter stirs somewhere beneath my ribs. I hold back a smile.
“I’ll take a lemon with mine,” Cal cuts in, his overly loud voice breaking into my thoughts.
I tear my eyes from Ian and head across the bar to put the order in. Alice swings by as I’m collecting a tray of Cokes from the bartender.
“You good?” she asks.
I nod, not wanting to admit I got tripped up on my first solo table. “Yep.”
Halfway back across the patio with the guys’ drinks, I notice that they’ve abandoned their table. My gaze scans the outdoor area, and I find them on the dock checking out someone’s sailboat. What am I supposed to do with this entire tray of Cokes?
“You can just take the drinks over to them,” one of the girls at the iced tea table leans over and offers helpfully. “They’ll probably be looking at that sailboat for half the afternoon.” She rolls her eyes like she’s well-acquainted with this particular group of guys.
“Thanks,” I say, and head across the grassy lawn to the dock. I set the drink tray on a bench and start to hand them out when Cal steps across the wooden planks and towers over me. “You’re new here, right?” he asks.
“It’s my first day.”
He nods. “I have a question for you, Josie.”
“I’ll do my best,” I say, hoping it’s a question I can answer and not something about the menu that Alice hasn’t covered yet.
But Cal doesn’t ask about the food. He leans in and gives me that cocky grin, the one that in this short time, I’ve already started to dread. “Does the carpet match the drapes?”
A couple of the other guys chuckle.
“I—what?” I swing my gaze to the building, but there aren’t any drapes hanging across the wall of windows.
Ian steps up next to Cal. He’s not laughing like the other guys. “Shut up, Cal,” he snaps.
Cal gives him a nudge in the side. “Don’t be such a prude, Ian.
” He turns back to look at me. “Does the carpet match the drapes?” Cal repeats.
“Are you a natural redhead? You know…” His gaze drifts from my face to below my waist. “Everywhere?” Cal waves a hand in front of his crotch, just in case I still don’t get it.
One of the guys snickers again.
I thought running into a chair was embarrassing, but that was nothing compared to the mortification that washes over me.
I’m used to the attention I get for having red hair, and as I’ve gotten older, more of that attention has come from men.
I know my copper-colored locks are unusual and seem to tap into some sort of weird male fantasy.
My mom said the same thing used to happen to her.
But I’m at work and everyone is staring at me.
And this is awful. I feel my face flush redder than the stripes on Cal’s windbreaker.
Ian grabs Cal’s arm. “Shut. Up. Right. Now. Cal.”
Cal holds up his hands. “Jesus. I was just kidding.”
Ian’s face hardens. “Apologize to her.”
Cal shoves Ian in the shoulder and gives a hollow laugh. “She knows I was kidding.”
He wasn’t kidding. Not in a way where he was including me in the joke, or that I’d ever find funny. He was trying to humiliate me in front of the other guys, and it’s working. If I were anywhere else, I’d tell him exactly what I think of him.
But I’ve wanted to work at the club since I was a kid and we used to go out on my mom’s friend’s speedboat and drive past the dock.
It seemed so glamorous, all the fancy people sipping cocktails on the patio while the sun set over the bay.
Little did I know they were just prep school boys on the patio, and there was nothing fancy or glamorous about them.
I’m not going to let one of them ruin my summer or make me lose my job. I pull back my shoulders. “I don’t need an insincere apology from him. It’s fine.”
Ian doesn’t back down. “It’s not fine.” He steps closer to Cal. “Apologize to her.”
“Okay, okay,” Cal sputters, inching backward. “I’m sorry. It was a joke.” He looks at me. “Alright?” he asks, but there’s more than a hint of sarcasm in his tone.
“Sure. Whatever,” I mutter.
“See?” Cal says to Ian. “She’s fine.” His smile hovers in front of me, declaring that he knows he won.
All I want to do is get out of here. I pick up the last Coke on the tray, the one with the lemon that Cal requested. He’s standing with his hands on his hips, feet wide, posing like the smug jerk that he is. “Come on, bring it over,” he says, snapping his fingers.
A slow-burning anger ignites inside me.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I step forward and pretend to stumble, tilting the cup toward the center of Cal’s chest. The cold liquid hits him directly on his sailing club T-shirt.
A dark stain spreads across the white fabric as a deep sense of satisfaction spreads through me.
But the feeling is short-lived because in the next second, Cal staggers backward, his heels hitting the edge of the dock and eyes going wide in an almost comically shocked expression.
I didn’t realize he was standing so close to the water.
His arms windmill, but he’s already falling ass-first into the frothy surf.
A splash flies up and rains around us as whoops and cheers rise up from Cal’s friends.
I can’t believe I just did that. I stare helplessly as Cal pops up out of the water, red-faced and flailing. What was I thinking? I stand frozen, regretting all of my choices including the one where I took this job in the first place. Which is fine, because I’m pretty sure I’m about to lose it.
“What the hell? Jesus, this water is freezing.” Cal paddles to the edge and pulls himself up, rolling onto the dock like a seal. Ian grabs Cal by the shirt and hauls him to his feet.
My gaze whips to the bar area, where everyone’s eyes are trained on us, including Alice’s, the bartender’s, and a dozen different customers.
Is there any chance anyone will believe this was an accident?
Is there any scenario where I won’t be blamed?
“I—I didn’t mean to push him,” I stutter, but my voice is drowned out by the sounds of the boys’ laughter.
It won’t matter what I meant to do. I stumbled, I flung the Coke at Cal, and he ended up in the water.
Every single guy on this dock saw me, and I doubt any of them will come to my defense this time.