She paced her apartment, cleaned out her closet, worried about doing laundry and missing his call, paced some more, and as the sun faded in the sky she found herself sitting on her couch staring mindlessly at some nature documentary and feeling a little blue. With Maxine on a date and Sarah at her parents’ house, she found herself feeling lonely, too. With her schedule, living with her two sisters, and constantly having to interact with people, she had always enjoyed solitude.
Had she done or said something to offend Tony? Did he not like the way she reacted to his story? Did he regret introducing her to his friends?
Turning the television off in disgust, she surged to her feet. She would not be reduced to this emotional state of neediness by a man. She had survived twenty-six years without Antonio Viscolli, and she’d go on surviving without him.
Working herself into a good angry fit, she decided she would go ahead and do laundry, whether that meant that she’d miss his phone call or not. Not that she expected him to call this late, anyway. While she sorted her laundry and shoved it all into a bag, she muttered to herself all of the reasons why she’d spent so many years avoiding a relationship with anyone.
As she walked down to the laundry room and, with way more force than the chore required, shoved her clothes into the available washers, she built herself back up, reminding her inner self that she had tuition to pay, rent coming due, a car about to die on her. A man, or a relationship with a man, or a non-relationship with a man, did not fit into her schedule in any way at the moment.
With three machines loudly chugging away at her clothes, she left the laundry room with much less furor than she had entered it. She slowly walked up the flights of stairs to her apartment and let herself back in. As she contemplated maybe fixing something to eat, she noticed the red light blinking on the answering machine, signaling an incoming message.
Her heart skipped a beat before it started pounding. She rushed to push the button, and felt an immediate deflation of emotion as she heard Hank’s gravely voice.
“Robin, Hank. I need to talk with you before your Benedicts shift tomorrow. Ten is a good time. If you have to work breakfast first, try to just make it as soon as you can. No need to call me back unless it’s to tell me a better time. Thanks. Have a good night.”
Never, in all of the years that she’d worked for him, had Hank ever called her in to meet with her. Frowning at the answering machine, Robin replayed the message, trying to glean some hint as to what he could possibly want to talk about with her. He’d pulled her into his office too many times to count for various reasons over the years – checking on her, she knew. Making sure she was emotionally handling everything in her life to his satisfaction. She allowed it because she loved him. But never had he called her at home, nor asked her to come in for a scheduled meeting while off shift.
After a night spent tossing and turning and tossing some more, worrying about Hank’s call and fretting over the lack of a call from Tony, she finally quit trying to sleep and got up early. She braided her long hair, dressed herself in the first uniform of the week, her Benedict’s lunch uniform, and headed to Hank’s.
Hank’s did not open until four on Mondays. Instead of a lunch shift, the kitchen staff received orders, stocked shelves, freezers, and refrigerators, and planned specials for the week. As Robin came in through the kitchen door, she had to twist aside to avoid colliding with a harried produce salesman who stamped quickly away from Casey’s rage over, she assumed, the asparagus he clutched in both hands and held above his head.
Instead of exchanging their standard greeting, she avoided becoming Casey’s target in the absence of the salesman and headed straight to Hank’s office. She rapped her knuckles on the closed door in quick succession, waited for the bark of command to enter, and opened the door. As she opened the door, she had to step aside as two men in paint splattered coveralls left the room. When Robin entered, she stopped short to find Tony seated behind the desk and Hank in one of the chairs before it. The bare walls no longer sported photos of Hank in the Navy, plaques, awards, or posters. Instead, fresh white paint glared back and made the room seem smaller. The standard piles and stacks of papers and books no longer cluttered the top of the desk. The bookshelf had all personal knicknacks and Tom Clancy novels removed and in their place sat books whose spines bragged of financial or management success.
She took all of this in as she came farther into the room, but it confused her. Her understanding was that Hank would stay for a few years. “What’s up?” she said. She looked at Hank first, then Tony, then back to Hank.
Hank spoke. “Jessica, my youngest daughter, fell down the stairs Saturday night and broke her femur.”
Robin gasped and took the chair next to him. “Oh no.”
“Marjorie’s already there. She needed to go down and take care of the baby.”
“Of course.”
“I called Tony on Sunday and we’ve been here since five this morning working everything out.”
Robin shifted her attention from Hank to Tony. “What everything?”
Tony didn’t look like he’d been at the office since five. His shirt looked crisp, freshly starched, and his blue tie speckled with tiny gold icthuses looked sharp against the whiteness of the shirt. “Hank is declining the five year management position. He’s decided to go ahead and leave.”
Robin saw little bright lights in front of her eyes as a little swirl of panic start spinning in her chest. “I – ah …”
Hank reached over and engulfed her hand in his. “Marjorie didn’t like that clause, and she and I have been trying to come to a compromise about it. When the contracts to sell the restaurant were signed, we kept it open. Jessica is going to be down and out for a long time. With her husband’s ship deployed, there’s nothing else we can do but go be there for her and help her.”
Little beads of moisture formed on her upper lip. “But -”
Tony leaned back in his chair. His fingers fidgeted with the gold pen that lay on the clean white blotter in front of him. “Hank and I have spent the last few weeks immersed in personnel and personalities and positions. He and I are both in agreement.”
“Agreement?” Did she miss a chunk of the conversation?
“Effective today, the bar is closed.” As if on cue, Robin heard the sound of a saw fire up from somewhere in the restaurant. “We’re tearing it out and opening up more seating in its place.”
A little tinge of irritation helped slow down the spiral of panic. “Great.” She’d known it was coming, though. The news didn’t surprise her. Only, she still hadn’t figured out what she’d do instead. “I guess I have the evening free, then.”
Tony smiled. “As nice as that prospect is, I’m afraid that you’re going to be a little busier than normal.”
“Oh? Why is that?”
“I need to go out to California. I have a venture there that’s still on shaky ground, and there’s a hotel in Manhattan that I’m in the preliminary negotiations with that’s going to start taking up a lot of my personal time.” He spun the gold pen between his fingers like a tiny baton while he studied her face.
With shaking hands, Robin pulled her tin of mints out of her pocket and popped one in her mouth. “Look – you don’t need to explain.”
He tilted his head and gave her a confused look. “No. Let me finish.” He hooked a foot over his knee. “Here’s the problem. Hank’s leaving about a month earlier than anticipated. We tried to look at resumes for a manager but neither of us were pleased with what we’ve seen out there. None of them have what I’m looking for.”
She felt the frown crease her brow. “What’s that?”
His eyes were intense, serious, while he looked at her. “Your experience. Your love of this place. Your drive.”
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I talked it over with Hank. He’s in complete agreement.”
Hank squeezed her hand and released her. “Absolutely.”
“Complete agreement
about what?”
Tony quit spinning the pen and smiled a very charming smile. “About you.”
A kind of fearful excitement tried to course through her veins, but she stamped it down. “What are you getting at?”
“I want you to run Hank’s for me. I want to hire you on as the manager so that I don’t have to worry about losing what it is that makes it Hank’s.”
She snorted. “Yeah, right.”
“I’m absolutely serious.”
She looked in his eyes and saw that he was. “Look, Tony. I’m just a barmaid, a waitress, and a high school dropout. You don’t want me running this place for you.”
“What does any of that have to do with anything? A person with your experience?” He felt the anger and only partially tried to keep it in check. “I didn’t ask you about your educational background.”
“Well, it’s a good thing you didn’t. I’ve never even gotten my GED.”
“So?”
Now she laughed. “So, hire some guy who has a bunch of education and is trained for the position. A Viscolli company doesn’t need some two-bit bartender running anything for it.”
Tony’s temperature rose a few degrees. He felt as if, in insulting her, she had personally insulted him. No one talked about Robin that way. “You think that I give ‘two bits’ about diplomas and accolades? If I wanted that, I could have had my pick all week. I want you.”
Robin looked from one man to the other and felt heat flood her cheeks, trying to find the right words. “Look, Tony. If you’re doing this just because we – ”
He cut her off. “Robin, one of the reasons I’m what I am is because I don’t mix my business and personal life. It will cut you off at the knees every time.”
“You’ll be laughed out of the Chamber of Commerce if you hire me.”
“You think?” Taking a different approach, he slowly stood. “Do you think I’m qualified to run my company?”
Obviously not liking his advantage, she stood as well. “Obviously.”
“I used to Dumpster dive to eat my one meal a day,” he chided. Instead of continuing on, he took a deep breath and closed his eyes, praying to find the right words. “My point, mi amante, is that if the Chamber of Commerce were going to find something to laugh at me about, it wouldn’t be because I picked the best, most qualified person in this entire city to run my newly acquired restaurant.”
His words, the naked sincerity that weighed them down, penetrated Robin’s very blood and beat through her veins in a rush. Robin had needed the reminder. Wow! She thought she hadn’t forgotten, really, what he had disclosed about his past on Saturday. Somehow, though, she could barely reconcile those facts with this Tony; smooth, cultured, in charge. He commanded the room even over Hank.
When Tony talked about having to go to California and New York, she thought he’d been in the midst of firing her and ending their relationship. Now she had an opportunity to work even closer with him. That prospect alone promised some really unexplainable appeal for her.
Could she let herself harbor some tiny hope that even she could rise above her own personal birthright? Could someone one day meet her and not believe how she had lived her whole life? Would she one day find herself transformed as completely as a caterpillar to a butterfly? As completely changed as Tony had changed? Could she become a brand new creature?
She sat, looked between the two men again. “What now?”
Tony admired his own personal restraint that kept him from throwing back his head and laughing with glee. “Now, you look over my offer, the contract, haggle over the salary, get at least fifteen percent more, then you go to dinner with me tonight to celebrate your new promotion at work.”
Hank’s laugh reminded her of his presence. “I will take that as my leave to go. I have a lot of packing to do. Tony,” he held his hand out and Tony leaned over the desk to shake it. “It has been an absolute joy to work with you.”
“And you, sir. May God bless you and keep you.”
He looked at Robin as he sat back down. “You still look a little dazed. I’m going to give you a draft of the contract and let you read over it. I need you to put in your notice at Benedicts. This is more than a full time job.”
“I can’t afford -”
Tony felt the smile on his face, excited for her, anticipating her surprise over the salary offered. He had left the contract writing up to Barry, so even though he’d have personally padded it just because he loved her, Barry didn’t and nothing was nonstandard. Even so, he had a feeling that the number hovering just under six figures would more than satisfy her current living situation, tuition notwithstanding.
“Just take this and read it. If you have any questions, I’ll be happy to answer them.” He held out the eight-page contract and waited for her to reach out and take it.
She stood as she did and said, “Okay. Thank you.” She turned to leave, as if dismissed or dismissing him. He wanted her to stay with him and chat some more. He wanted to spend a portion of this insane morning with the soothing calm of her presence.
“How was your day off?” he asked.
Robin spun around. Her eyes flashed anger, which confused him a little bit, but her voice remained calm. “Fine.”
“What did you do with your time?”
“Nothing,” she said, rolling up the bound pages in her hand. “Absolutely nothing.”
Tony raised an eyebrow, thinking that he’d discovered the root of the anger. “Is there something specifically wrong that you’d like to talk about?”
Robin advanced on him, waving the rolled up contract in front of her like a rapier. “You take me out every single day for a week. I work two jobs and in the brief hours each day I normally have to decompress and refocus my energies, I ended up with you. Suddenly, on the one day off I have for the entire week, I don’t hear a word.”
Ah. Clarity. “I asked if you wanted to come to church with me.”
“So because I declined coming to church with you, you blow me off for the entire day?”
“Of course not. I don’t just put on a tie and spend an hour in a building, Robin. My entire Sunday is spent in holy communion with God. There are two services on Sundays, and as the treasurer of the church board, I had a presentation to give to the church body regarding some land acquisitions, so I stayed for both services. I also teach a Sunday School class. By the time I leave the church building, it’s late afternoon and I typically end up in the home of one of the staff members, enjoy a light lunch and some low key fellowship, then head back into the church building for evening worship.”
As he spoke he watched her face fuse with color. Tony stood and moved quickly around the desk so that he could reach out and touch her, take her hand in his and look into her eyes as he spoke. “I wanted to spend the day with you. I thought about you all day long. I wished you’d been there to hear the music, to listen to the amazing sermon that I heard twice, to have lunch with me and my friends.”
Robin felt her hand momentarily tremble in his. The back of her throat burned and she had no idea why. She cleared her throat and pulled her hand away. “Okay. I’m sorry that I was so upset.”
Before she could turn back around, he grabbed her hand again. “You’re still a little upset. I’m sorry that you didn’t understand what my Sunday is like. I should have been more clear. While I enjoy thinking about you wanting to hear from me, I don’t enjoy having unintentionally let you down or hurt you in any way.”
Robin looked into his eyes and saw the sincerity and – something else. Something warm, wonderful, inviting. She saw safety, security, peace. Her heart started pounding. Blood roared in her ears. She wondered how he couldn’t hear it, it sounded so loud.
He stood close enough that she could feel the heat of his body. Even so, she wanted to be closer to him still. She stepped forward until the tips of their shoes touched. Not knowing which one of them made the move to close the last of the gap, she found herself wrapped in his arms, his mouth on hers.
>
The initial punch in his gut from finally holding her and touching her spread until his whole body fairly tingled with want to get closer to her. Her cool lips almost immediately warmed under his, softened for him. He forcefully pushed back his desire and instead just reveled in the amazing feel of her lips, of her hands on his back, of her scent that surrounded him.
She was tired, worn out, still disturbed by the unfamiliar emotions she’d had assault her for a steady week. That was the reason her head started spinning, why her limbs trembled. His mouth felt hot, demanding. Wonderful.
His teeth nipped and she gasped. Taking advantage of her open mouth, his tongue swept inside. A feeling she didn’t recognize streaked straight to her stomach and her knees buckled. But he was there, his arm caught her weight, pulled her closer until they were practically one.
He pulled away when she whimpered. The sound was so small, so desperate, that he sensed enough was enough. While he was willing to release her mouth, he wasn’t quite ready to release her all together. He pressed his lips to her forehead, then pulled her face to his chest.
His heart pounded under her ear. She should have felt embarrassed, now that the room had stopped tilting. Instead, she was in awe over the fact that simply kissing her had caused such a reaction in him. His arms were strong and secure around her, and for just a moment, she let herself seep into him, let herself lean into his strength.
Then reality came flooding back.
He sensed it the instant before her body tensed. With great reluctance, he relaxed his arms and stepped back.
“I’m sorry,” she said, stepping backward until there was at least two feet between them.
Tony laughed. “I’m not. I’ve been wanting to do that since we met.”
Her lips felt a little numb and a lot tingly. She resisted the urge to touch them. “I need to go to work now.”
Tony bent and picked up the forgotten contract. “Please accept my offer and put in your notice today.”
How could he jump back to business as usual just like that? She had no cognitive thinking happening right now. Nothing inside of her jumbled up mind made any sense. “I need to go.”