32. Scarlett #2
“Alright.” He nods. “Two questions. One, where is that? Because I assumed we’d just eat at one of the restaurants here. And two…is that one of those all-you-can-eat places?” The second question literally makes him cringe, which only earns a grin from me.
“One, it’s about ten minutes from here. On the pier. Overlooking the ocean and a cute shopping area. And two…yes. Yes, it is.”
“Ugh,” he mutters. “You do know how many people breathe on buffets, right?” he asks.
“No more people than you have in a standard commercial kitchen. I mean, at least this restaurant has sneeze guards,” I tell him.
“The idea of my food needing a sneeze guard just…I can’t.” He shakes his head.
“Too bad. Because I told them we are coming and they said dinner is on them. They are all over social media. And you don’t actually have to eat from the buffet.
You can order other entrees as well. Which I also took the liberty of doing,” I tell him, and this time it’s me holding out a hand to help him up.
“Well look at you,” he teases, though there is still a decent amount of uncertainty about the restaurant in his voice. “Getting wild while I’m sleeping. You forget that I can and usually do handle all of these things, right? I mean, no offense, but I’m your boss. It’s kind of my job.”
“No offense taken. Because I know you’re my boss, but I also remember you giving me the day off.
And you seem to forget that I make a living researching and finding restaurants and places to visit, stay, and explore.
And I am telling you, everyone says this place should be on the list. Apparently their crab and lobster aren’t just boiled but grilled and seasoned. I hear it’s divine.”
“And if it’s not, you pay a flat rate,” he says and I just roll my eyes.
“Let’s go. You’ll feel better after you eat something.”
I watch Morgan from across the table, and I can’t help but smile. As he digs into a grilled lobster and dunks it in butter, he chews slowly and nods multiple times.
“Alright, fine,” he says. “It’s amazing.”
“I told you it would be,” I say, grabbing a crab leg and breaking it in half.
“Alright, but how did you know?” he asks.
“I told you. I research,” I say. “I look at the reviews and the reposts.”
“Okay, but a lot of places pay for good reviews. It’s still a gamble,” he says, grabbing a crab leg for himself.
“I don’t look at the big reviews. I look at people with normal accounts who tag where they are.
Date nights. Girl’s night out. Dinner with the family.
Once the algorithm picks up what you’re looking for, you can’t lose.
People trust food bloggers sure, but the opinion they really value, the post that’s going to make them pick Captain’s Cove over Red Lobster or even a five start resort…
is the average guy or the uncool girl who stumbled in and decided to post about it because dang these lobster stuffed mushrooms are to die for. ”
“They really are,” he chuckles even though that was part of my pitch. “And you know what else?”
“Hmm?” I ask with a full mouth.
“You are really, really good at what you do,” he says.
“Not just the sales part of it all. I mean, obviously you’re good at that.
And words. And public face. But just in general.
Your passion for living this carefree, whimsical life is genuine.
Like, even if you weren’t getting paid for it, you’d still be doing it.
You’d go to a food truck selling tacos by the beach over the most popular restaurant in the city.
You’d shop somewhere local over the name brands.
It’s real. It’s…” he trails off on the last part, his eyes going somewhere else as he chews the inside of his cheek, deciding on the next thing to say.
But it’s not because he can’t find the words.
I can tell by the shift in his expression, the way he’s rubbing his utensils with the pads of his thumbs, neither setting them down nor continuing to eat, that he knows exactly the words.
He’s just deciding on whether or not he wants to say them. Here. Now. To me.
Morgan clicks his tongue and sets things down, then reaches for his drink and sits back. “It reminds me of how I grew up,” he says.
“You traveled a lot,” I say. It’s not a question, and we both know that. It’s no secret that the Bale family is made up of multiple generations of travelers.
“Yeah. More than not, actually. In fact, I don’t have a single childhood memory that doesn’t include a passport or a hotel key,” he says.
“Is that good or bad?” I ask.
Morgan bites his lip as he thinks about that. “Both?” he asks. “Actually, we used to stay at a lot of bed and breakfasts too. Sometimes even hostels. Those were actually some of my favorites.”
“Really?” I ask, genuinely surprised at that. Somehow I can’t picture Morgan Bale sleeping in a room with communal showers and a shared kitchen.
“Oh yeah.” He nods, and there’s something magical in his eyes. “I think because it felt like you were fully inside the culture at that point. And my parents were amazing at making any place feel like home. They were also amazing at making friends anywhere we went.”
“They sound like amazing people,” I say.
“Yeah.” He smiles, his eyes somewhere else entirely. “They really were. They loved it all so much that when my dad inherited money he didn’t even know existed, he put it into a hotel. The one in–”
“San Diego,” I answer for him.
“You really did your homework,” he says and I blush.
“Sorry,”
“So I’m sure you know about the explosion of success.”
“Bale Resorts is the top in the industry and growing,” I say.
“Yeah. Even though its peak really was around the time I was starting working for the company. But that was also when things fell apart.”