“Okay! Good luck, Captain.” She squeezed Grant’s hand, then rushed down the white steps to the passengers.
Grant took a deep breath, attempting to quell the butterflies that were now dive-bombing his stomach. Searching for Rog’s headset while Tommy moved to the controls, Grant found himself staring at the tequila bottle. Figuring his anxiety warranted a double dose of tranquilizer, he swiftly poured himself another shot and knocked it back. This time he did allow himself to cough a few times as the fiery liquid scorched his throat. He strapped on the headset and nervously turned on the microphone.
“Ladies and gentleman, welcome to Eaton Tours. We have a stunning architectural cruise planned for you this evening.” Grant was relieved to find his voice clear and strong, without a hint of trembling.
Tommy fired up the engines and began backing the ship away from the dock as Grant continued, “Sophie will be serving your drinks tonight. If there’s anything at all you need to make your cruise more enjoyable, please ask Sophie. She will take care of you.” He grinned, pleased with himself for retaliating just a bit. She’d gotten him into this mess, and he’d better not regret it later.
*
“Here you go,” Sophie smiled, passing two cokes to a father and son sitting aft on the ship.
The man returned her smile as he passed the beverage to his wide-eyed son before digging into his pants pocket and handing her a ten-dollar bill.
“I’ll be right back with your change, sir.”
Appreciatively eyeing her shapely legs, he murmured, “Keep the change.”
Sophie’s smile widened as she pocketed the money, quickly calculating that he’d tipped her five dollars. At this rate, maybe she wouldn’t need a higher-paying job. “Thank you!” She blushed with pleasure.
She returned to the bar to mix martinis, listening to Grant describe Chicago’s architectural wonders as they slowly passed above their vantage point on the ship. Not only was he breathtakingly handsome, his magnetic voice was charming her with every word. Deep and throaty, with just a whisper of tremulousness, his voice was warm and silky smooth. It lowered with intensity when something piqued his interest, as if he were sharing a precious secret with the listener.
“Straight ahead is the Trump International Tower and Hotel,” Grant informed the passengers. “Donald Trump initially planned a one-hundred-fifty story structure, but after the nine-eleven attacks, we all know why he changed his mind and created a wider, stair-step version of the tower. However, not all architects are shying away from super-tall skyscrapers, as we will discover near the end of this cruise when we visit the construction site for the Spire.”
Sophie began mixing cosmopolitans for a group of women on the third bench, but she listened intently as Grant continued.
“You may be interested to know that Chicago native Bill Rancic, winner of the first season of the television show The Apprentice, oversaw the construction for Trump Tower. This was his reward for managing to escape hearing the Donald say, ‘You’re fired!’”
Sophie giggled softly as Grant nailed the Donald Trump impression. To her delight, she noticed some of the passengers chuckling too. Captain Madsen was apparently a hit.
“To your left is Millennium Park. From the river, you can just make out the pavilion, which stands one-hundred-twenty feet high. The outdoor amphitheater has brushed stainless steel ribbons arching over the stage, with steel pipes extending in a crisscross pattern over the grass.”
She paused her martini-shaking, fascinated. Where was he getting this stuff? Roger mentioned none of these facts during the first three cruises of the day.
“Architect Frank Gehry designed the pavilion to draw the crowd into the stage, making them feel part of the experience. I hope you are feeling drawn into this cruise right now. Who here is visiting Chicago for the first time?”
Multiple hands shot up in the crowd. “Well, I bet this won’t be your last visit,” Grant said. “What a remarkable town, this City of the Big Shoulders,” he said, then continued quoting from Carl Sandburg’s poem, “Chicago”:
Come and show me another city with lifted head singing
so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.
He quoted poetry too? Sophie’s jaw dropped. This was quite possibly the perfect man.
“But my favorite part of Millennium Park has to be Cloud Gate, affectionately known as ‘the Bean’ to Chicago natives,” Grant’s melodious voice asserted. “British artist Arnish Kapoor conceived of this shiny steel structure, which reflects the images of visitors and clouds overhead. Cloud Gate inspires a vision of liquid mercury, like a giant drop of silver wine falling from Zeus’ massive glass in the heavens above. It is truly a work of art.”
Grant was thoroughly enjoying himself, feeling so high that he never wanted this cruise to end. He was amazed at how natural it felt to spout off tidbits about his favorite Chicago haunts, and he was also thrilled that the facts he had read in Roger’s architecture book came back to him so easily. Guiding the tour was much better than driving the ship.
Sneaking a glance at Tommy, who had his hand on the wheel, nervously scanning the river for evening traffic, Grant poured himself another couple of shots. If he felt this good after two tequila shots, surely a few more would make him feel even better. The amber liquid did not even burn his throat anymore.
As they continued the hour-long cruise, Sophie found herself repeatedly lulled into a trance by his honey-smooth voice. Then, realizing she was inattentively staring into space, she would force herself back to the harrowing bustle of bartending for more than one hundred passengers.
How was it that she’d never heard these fascinating stories about the city before? She supposed her workaholic father had been too busy to teach her about their hometown. She now knew that skyscrapers were first constructed in Chicago following the Great Fire of 1871, and some were designed with an inner and outer core for stabilization in strong winds.
Sophie was so busy with the drinks that she didn’t notice Grant’s voice begin to change. It had become more warbling and less precise. His words blended into each other as he stretched out particular syllables languidly—turning from honey to molasses. His commentary also became a little goofy.