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I say, “Don’t worry. She’s not crazy. That’s what she calls me.” I give him an apologetic smile.
He raises his eyebrows in surprise. “Nickname?” he asks.
“More like an inside joke.” I give him a halfhearted smile. His is more of a grimace.
“Okay,” he says, and starts to back down the street “See you bright and early tomorrow. We’re really glad to have you on board,” he says before he turns and dashes back up the street.
“Was that Remi Wilde? Oh my GOD. Do you know what his nickname is?” Cass asks just as I turn to face her. Her face is flushed and her hair is sticking to her face is sweaty strands.
“Yeah, that was Remi. And what was his nickname?” I ask when she doesn’t offer it up.
“The Legend. His mind, his prowess on the basketball court, between the sheets,” she chortles and waggles her eyebrows and then moves in for a hug.
I pull back. “I don’t really want those visuals of my new boss, thanks. And let’s just imagine that, hug, okay?” I eye her sweaty shirt. “Did you run from your office?” I ask her and give her a quick up and down.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she retorts, but desists in her attempt to hug me. “It’s hot as fuck and I had to walk for ten minutes to get here,” she says.
“You look like you’ve been walking for an hour,” I quip and grin at her.
“You just wait until you’ve been standing without shade in the middle of the afternoon in Houston, TX for more than three minutes,” she snaps and pulls at her shirt.
“I’ll make sure to avoid that particular situation. Can’t walk around looking like I work in a sauna,” I tease her one more time and am rewarded with a scowl.
“I’m hungry, let’s get a table.” I pull the brass handle of Twist’s glass-paned double doors open.
“Its like a fancy saloon,” she says as we step inside the restaurant. The cool air-conditioned, dark paneled room does look like something out of a western movie. But instead of sawdust littering the ground, there’s a gleaming mahogany brand with the crowned horse logo of Rivers Wilde on the floor right under the wagon wheel chandelier in the center of the restaurant.
Instead of a bar that runs the length of the wall, there’s a stage in the front of the room, complete with a red velvet curtain behind the wall of bottles. There are no seats in front of the gleaming countertop. It’s just two bartenders, one man and one woman, making drinks and setting them on the bar where waitstaff picks them up. “Shut Up and Drink” is burned into the wood of the bar.
“Wow, I’ve never seen anything like this,” I marvel.
“Hey ladies, welcome to Twist,” a small, dark-haired woman with a hugely pregnant belly approaches us when we step into the main dining room. “Your first time here?” she asks knowingly.
“Yes.” I smile back.
“Yeah, your openmouthed, wide-eyed stare kinda gave it away.” She laughs good-naturedly and then reaches for two menus that sit under a green chalkboard—“open secret” scrawled on it.
“That’s our oxymoron of the day. Well, of the week or whenever someone thinks of one and changes it. Feel free to contribute. Every week, I pick my favorite and the author gets a free entrée,” she says excitedly.
I pick up the chalk and scrawl “bittersweet” while she marks something down on her hostess stand.
“You want a booth or table?” she asks.
“Booth,” we say at the same time.
“Awesome, come this way. And I’m Angie. My husband, Jackson, and I are the managers.” Her soft brown eyes twinkle with pride. I can see why. It’s a wonderfully unique place. Nearly everyone we pass looks up to greet her and tips their heads at us as we make our way through the wide aisle between the tables in the front of the huge space.
“If you need anything,
just shout. But your server will take real good care of you,” she says happily and puts the menus down on the stone tabletop of the booth she stops at.
“Actually, I need the ladies’,” Cass says.
“Just walk past the bar and down the corridor. You’ll see it on the left,” Angie says.
“Be right back. Will you get me some water, please?” Cass says and drops her bag on the floor.
“Thank you,” I say as I slide into the curved, butter yellow leather covered seats of the booth and smile up at her. The high-backed seats wrap around the table and we can’t see our neighbors on either side.
