Chapter Twenty #2
“We hear you’re a corporate attorney,” Tessa said.
“Very impressive.” She forced herself not to think about Xavier and the last three days he’d spent in conversations with lawyers, or the reason for it.
Her interest was pointless now. Whatever went on at Hello, Marketing had nothing to do with her anymore.
Her clients and coworkers, the extended family she loved, was out of her life for good.
She only had herself to blame. Yes, Xavier had been cruel, but she hadn’t been her usual self. A month ago, she’d have easily agreed to take on the added workload and assist Peyton with the L and L pitch. Xavier would’ve been happy with her, not threatening to fire her.
She’d started this. She needed to accept it and move on. She also needed a plan, because the moment this night ended, it was back to reality for Tessa.
“Sam opened Fox and Hound with his love of puzzles and mystery books in mind,” Vera said. “Personally, I like a good legal thriller, but Sam has always gone straight to the whodunnits. Anything to challenge his busy mind. I’m still shocked when I remember he left engineering to open a restaurant.”
“You own this place?” Tessa asked.
Sam nodded.
“You studied engineering?” Hallie asked, her mouth turned down in disbelief.
“Yeah.” He gave a soft self-deprecating laugh. “I didn’t think there was any money for me in the restaurant industry, and I had big dreams for my life.”
“He was never interested in anything other than food,” Vera said. “While his schoolmates got internships in their field, this guy kept working at pubs and local restaurants.”
“So you chased your dream,” Kate said, a note of hope in her voice. “And it all worked out.”
“It certainly did,” he agreed.
“Hallie is an amazing chef,” Kate said.
All eyes turned to Hallie, and she blanched.
“Really?” Sam asked. “Where are you working?”
Hallie narrowed her eyes at Kate, who smiled pleasantly back. Within minutes Sam and Hallie had fallen off a ledge into a deep discussion about produce and the local farmers’ market.
Eventually, Vera politely excused herself to mingle, and Sam stepped impossibly close to Kate.
He lowered his head to her ear. “I wanted to call you,” he said. “I set the napkin with your number on the bar, and it got drenched in the downpour. The ink bled. I called six different versions of the number I guessed had been there before giving up and letting fate handle the rest.”
Tessa listened closely, trying not to react to his words.
Kate shivered. “Fate, huh?”
“Destiny,” he said. He offered her his phone.
She added herself to his contacts.
A few minutes after he returned to work, a server appeared with a tray full of drinks and placed it on their table. “From Sam,” the server said, then walked away.
“Holy grail,” Hallie said, leaning in to evaluate the options. Several were marked as soda.
Tessa bumped her shoulder against Kate’s. “Sam seems nice.”
Kate laughed. “Yeah. I was overconfident when I thought he was a bartender. Now, suddenly, he owns this place? And has an advanced degree in engineering?”
Hallie sipped from a purple drink. “I like how he talks.”
Kate bit her lip. “I like our clandestine rooftop meetings.”
A pair of women in Tweedledee and Tweedledum costumes approached with microphones and cameras. “Excuse us, are you Mick Kate?”
Hallie laughed. “MC Kate.”
“Just Kate is perfect,” Kate said, turning on her charm. She shot a scolding look at Hallie, then laughed and raised a finger to let her friends know she needed a minute.
Hallie slid a blue drink in Tessa’s direction. “This one is called a Mad Hatter. Tell me if it’s blue curacao or some kind of blue raspberry flavoring. If there’s tea in it, that might be butterfly pea flower powder. Aesthetics are important, but flavor is too.”
Kate returned, cheeks pink and eyes wild. She downed the drink, then gasped lightly.
Tessa frowned. “Everything okay?”
Kate shook her head. “Nope. They just went live and asked why I’m posting content so obviously opposite my brand.
I choked and blurted something about growing and changing and wanting a simpler, softer life.
Then I said I wanted to finally live up to my handle, MC Kate—Main Character Kate.
And for me, that involved a garden and yard chickens. ”
Hallie wrinkled her nose and shot Tessa a cringing look.
“Well,” Tessa said, wondering how to spin this quickly.
“It’s amazing that you found a way to announce your new content from this big event.
Now everyone will understand and be excited about it, instead of wondering what’s going on.
You took the opportunity to set the story straight in a really fun way. ”
Kate swallowed the contents of an orange shot glass. “Quick, tell me something to distract me.”
Hallie raised her shoulders to her ears.
Kate looked at Tessa. “Anything. Please.”
“I quit my job today,” Tessa said. The words left her mouth before she’d considered saying them. Her eyes widened with the shock.
“What!” Hallie waved her hands wildly between them. “When did you plan on telling us? That is huge, enormous, very big news.”
“After the party,” Tessa said. “I don’t want to be a rain cloud on Kate’s night.”
Kate passed Tessa a shot glass. “Try it. It tastes like citrus.”
Tessa delivered the wiki version of her day and her feelings about it, then swallowed the shot. “I didn’t want to quit,” Tessa said. Her bottom lip quivered, and her voice cracked. “I felt like I had to.”
“Silver lining,” Hallie said. “You can date the hot client now.”
Tessa puckered her brow, fighting an onslaught of emotion. “I might not ever see him again. What am I supposed to tell my clients tomorrow? I know I promised to help y’all, but I can’t now. So good luck!”
Hallie looked at her phone screen as she sipped her soda.
“Bryce’s mom wants the wedding photographer to remove the purple from my hair when he touches up the photos.
” She glanced at her friends, then back to her screen.
“She’s worried that I’ll regret the look in a few years.
She means when I grow up. Bryce asking me for approval means he agrees with her and wants me to be the bad guy, right?
Otherwise, he’d have shut her down instead of asking for my blessing?
” Her gaze bounced from Kate to Tessa, then she set her phone aside.
“She’s also requested I return to the bridal salon with her for a private dress fitting when her sisters come to town as some kind of special meet-and-greet moment, and I’m thinking about shaving my head now. You guys want to dance?”
Tessa felt her eyes and mouth go wide.