Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 116708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 584(@200wpm)___ 467(@250wpm)___ 389(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 116708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 584(@200wpm)___ 467(@250wpm)___ 389(@300wpm)
Gwen
I stared at the stack of papers in front of me, willing myself to pick up the first one. It was just past three o’clock, and all I had accomplished for the day was walking through the front door and turning the lights on.
I hadn’t replied to the vendor emails that had been in my inbox for days, checked the budget spreadsheet for the week to make sure I was still on track—or no more off track than usual—or even dived into finalizing the menu.
What I had managed to do while sitting in Truett’s booth was think about the man who had somehow managed to set my head spinning all over again.
“I’ve been waiting all fucking day for you to ask me that.”
That sentence had been echoing in my head all day. Well, that and what had happened after.
His mouth on mine.
His beard deliciously scratching my chin.
His massive body engulfing me, setting me on fire in ways that I had forgotten were possible.
The way it felt so good, so natural, so…everything.
I’d not only let him kiss me, I’d asked him to.
And if I was being honest, I wanted more.
It was that realization that had me reeling.
I hadn’t been thinking straight. I was no longer using any form of logical thought when it came to Truett West. And that was terrifying, because I’d barely survived the first time he ruined me.
“Sugar, whatcha doin’ just sittin’ there?” Lucille asked, snapping me out of my Truett trance.
“Jesus H!” I jerked, clutching a hand to my chest.
“Whoa. Somebody’s jumpy today. You wanted me to stop by at three, right?” She walked across the restaurant, a gorgeous emerald-green skirt brushing her knees, and slid into the opposite side of the booth. She dropped her ridiculously large purse onto the floor beside her.
“Yeah. Sorry. I’m just a little out of it today.”
Her shrewd gaze appraised me, but she didn’t press any further. Flicking her gaze to the stack of papers in front of me, she asked, “You started without me?”
“If you count gathering the papers, then yeah. Otherwise, no.”
She slid the stack of applications toward her and snatched the first one from the top of the pile. “Jenny Cooper. Nope.” Tossing the application to the floor, she picked up the next one. “Mabel Dean. Absolutely not.”
Just like the one before, that paper fluttered to the floor.
“Ah, Eddie Jackson. He’s not bad. Maybe.” She set that application to the side, and then a hearty laugh escaped her throat. “This is a joke, right?” She waved a paper toward me. “Shawn Tully? No way in hell.” She crumpled the paper into a ball before throwing it onto the ever-growing pile of rejected applicants.
“Stop,” I protested. “You’re not even reading their experience. We don’t exactly have a ton to choose from.”
I’d put a “help wanted” ad in the paper and a sign on the door a few days earlier, and while the first day had me excited thinking I’d be fully staffed in no time, the applications had trickled off since then. With Lucille’s automatic rejections, it was looking like she and I were going to be running the whole place by ourselves.
Just add that to the world’s most overwhelming to-do list.
“I don’t need to read their experience. I’ve lived it. Jenny job hops. That girl has worked at every single restaurant in this town, including this one. Twice. She’ll schmooze ya, make you think she’s gonna be the best employee ever. Then one day she’ll have some drama with her oldest kid’s baby daddy and not be able to come in. The next day it’ll be the same thing, except with the baby’s dad.” She lifted her finger in the air to amend. “Not the same man, either. Then it’ll be her middle kid causing trouble at school and she has to leave to go pick him up ’cause he got suspended. That one has a different daddy too and he works outta town, so he’s no help.”
“Single moms need jobs too,” I told her. “Us women need to stick together.”
“Correct. You didn’t let me get to the part where she steals money from the register and gives out free food to every person she so much as went to preschool with.”
“Say less.” I bit my bottom lip.
“And then there’s Mabel. She’s at least a hundred years old. That woman has lost all of her marbles if she thinks she can do anything in a restaurant other than sit at a table and aggravate the customers while she talks about her bunions and her ancient cat that refuses to die.”
I couldn’t help my giggle. “How is that any worse than the story you told me about your last colonoscopy?”
“Girl, I’m just letting you know what you have to look forward to in a few years. Besides, you weren’t trying to eat breakfast when we talked about that. You think anyone’s gonna want an order of pancakes with a side of cat vomit stories?”