I drank up. Given my mostly empty stomach on account of the earlier nausea and cramping, it was going straight to my head. “There are people with far more experience managing a restaurant out there.”
He stared at me for a moment then got busy grabbing a couple of bottles off the wall, pouring out shots into a cocktail shaker. “When we started this place, we just wanted to earn a living and have somewhere to hang out with our friends. Nell wanted to run her own kitchen, cook what she liked. I’d worked behind a few bars, figured it was pretty much just more of the same. We were naive as shit.”
While he spoke, he worked, mixing up something new. I watched, fascinated. Ice went into the cocktail shaker along with the alcohol then on went the lid. Silver flashed back and forth before my eyes as he shook the concoction. Next, out of one of the fridges below the endless shelves of bottles behind him came an elegant frosted martini glass. In went the liquid, poured through the cocktail shaker’s strainer. The drink was off white, cloudy. Eric pierced a single red rose petal, then the fruit of a lychee, with a little stick of bamboo, tied with a knot at one end. He carefully added the garnish.
“Try that instead,” he suggested, sitting the fresh creation in front of me. “Might be more to your taste.”
“Thank you.” First I studied it from various angles. The cocktail was a work of art. If I had my new cell on me, I’d have taken a picture. Not that anyone currently cared what I was drinking for dinner. “It’s beautiful. I don’t think you’d get that at your normal dive bar.”
“You’d be surprised.” He smiled. “But we’re not your normal dive bar. Drink.”
“Right.” I carefully raised the glass to my lips. Ice cold and syrupy sweet. It definitely had lychee liqueur in it and vodka. This mix tasted like heaven served up in a swanky glass.
“Lychee martini.”
“Whoa. Eric, I love it. I want to bathe in it from now on,” I said, only partially joking. “What are you, some kind of clairvoyant mixologist?”
He laughed. “No. I just know women.”
I snorted. “Don’t they all.”
We shared a smile. Though in all honesty it was probably closer to a smirk on both our parts. The battle of the sexes waged ever on.
“How’s things going with Vaughan?” he asked, downing his Old Fashioned. And yeah, my currently nonexistent relationship with my temporary landlord was so none of his business.
“Banged any waitresses lately?”
“No. You’re not interested in me.” The man made flirty eyes at me. You had to give it to him, he had the sexy heated promising looks all locked up. A total professional man whore. “Sadly.”
I drank my drink and otherwise kept my mouth shut.
“I’m having to go further afield to find new partners.” He reached for a bottle of scotch. Top shelf. What did I tell you?
I still had nothing to say.
“Getting back to my point,” he announced. “Nell and I didn’t know a shitload about running a place like this. Pat wasn’t much better. They’d been running the tattoo parlor for a while, but that didn’t involve working as closely with suppliers, managing stock to the same degree. And none of us are really great at schmoozing. But you are.”
“Really? You seem like a people person.”
One side of his lips kicked up. “Hmm.”
“Eric, this is all very interesting. And for the record, just as I told Nell, I think this business is solid and has a good future ahead of it.” I took another sip of my stiff drink. This conversation needed it. “But I don’t see me as being part of that future. I have other plans.”
“Starting somewhere else selling houses.”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s what I know.”
“But is it what you love?”
I shrugged.
He shrugged right back at me.
I drank.
“Well, that’s a shame.” A new Old Fashioned sat by his hand, but he started in on making another cocktail just the same. “Good staff’s hard to find, especially people who fit in here. Someone we can pretty much all get along with. This work, dealing with people all the time and more than occasionally taking their shit, isn’t for everybody. I told Nell I’d try and talk you into staying. Consider yourself talked to.”
“Okay.”
“Drink up,” he repeated. “Boyd will be in the kitchen for a while. I’ll make you a Caipirinha next. See if you like that one too.”
Oh boy. Hangover, here I come.
*
Thursday had morphed into Friday by the time I stumbled in the door. Vaughan sat on the sofa, the lone piece of furniture left in the living room since the sad demise of the coffee table and an old sitting chair during the men’s epic battle. Men were such idiots. Meh to them.