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When we get to the edge of the stage, Gloria goes up ahead of me and, for once, she’s not a complete failure of a human being.
“If I could have your attention, please!” she says, and she gets it. The lounge quiets down. “Thank you all so much for being here. For those of you that don’t know me, I’m Gloria Price, and I work for one of the most amazing women in this city.
“Now, I bet a lot of you don’t know that Janie Hall came from next to nothing. She wasn’t born rich like some people on this street were,” she jerks a thumb in the direction of Ferry Lights, and that gets a rueful chuckle from a few of the more in-the-know folks in the crowd. “But she was born with grit, and determination, and a dream—and a little bit of badass bitch!” She laughs, and so do some in the crowd, but my face is simply frozen in a professional smile that might read decently in a picture.
“And she took those things,” Gloria goes on, “and used them to hog-tie the life she wanted for herself. She graduated a semester early after paying her own way through college and taking a workload that most of you men would probably crumble under, frankly. She opened up Red Hall just a year after she graduated, and can you believe what this place has become?” More cheering. Gloria waits. “So it is my honor and privilege to ask her to come up here and stand with me now to celebrate this incredible, momentous step forward for the Red Hall Lounge! Come on up here, Janie Hall!”
The gall of that girl. Even if I fire her after this, everyone will assume that she’s the spokesperson for the lounge, whether I renege on the deal and make my own announcement or not.
She offers me her hand to help me up on stage, but I ignore it, and walk up and past her.
Gloria doesn’t miss a beat, though, and follows me to the display, where she stands beside me, smiling and waving to the crowd.
Now that all eyes are on me, I turn to her, smiling as pleasantly as I can manage. “Let’s have them get a few shots of just me for the announcement, and then I’ll call you back up. Make it look like a surprise.”
Her smile falters just a bit, and she looks uncertain. Then she looks suspicious. “Don’t fuck me,” she mutters. “I’ve got Reginald Ferry’s people on speed dial.”
“Didn’t I mention?” I ask. “Jake knows. Now go wait offstage until I call you back up.”
We shake hands, and even hug, but as she leaves me there I can see murder in her eyes. Maybe she guesses what I’m planning, and maybe she doesn’t. Frankly, it won’t matter a minute from now.
When she leaves, the photographers begin calling my name, and I have to spend a few painful minutes staring at flashes and holding up bottles until everyone’s got their shot. It leaves me light-blinded, and the track lights pointed at the stage don’t help either.
Once they’re done, I laugh a little. “All those flashing lights!” I say to the crowd. “They don’t prepare you for that in college, that’s for sure. Thank you all so, so much for being here. I can’t even begin to say what it means to me—”
The lights clear a bit. Just enough. I never look directly at the crowd when I do these public-speaking things. Instead, I look a little over them, sweeping my gaze so it seems like I’m looking at everyone directly. At that moment, I’m looking out over the crowd and at the door.
My heart skips a beat, and I suddenly forget everything I’d planned to say. I mean to pick up where I left off, riff a little, get myself back on track, but when I try to speak the only thing that comes out as I see, even from the stage, those smoldering eyes, is:
“Jake…”
Chapter 75
Jake
“Jake…”
Janie breathes my name over the microphone, and as one every face in the Red Hall Lounge turns to me. I hear my name echoed in whispers. “Jake Ferry.”
“What’s he doing here?”
“Get this on video.”
“Oh, shit…”
Even as I make my way toward her, I can see how her face lights up. I wasn’t sure it would happen like this. I thought that maybe when I got here I’d find out she just wanted to discuss some kind of arrangement. And for all I know, that’s what she intended.
But now that we’re in the same room, looking at one another, my heart swells. I can see in her face that she feels the same way I do.
Which is a very good thing, because I came here intending to put everything on the line. There are bloggers and journalists here, and already cameras are flashing. What will Jake Ferry do? Does Reginald Ferry know about this?
He will soon enough. It’ll be too late by then. I wish I had time to discuss all of this with Janie, but frankly no one can possibly doubt that she made all of this—Red Hall, the launch party, this hot sauce line—happen on her own. I had nothing to do with the building, or the popularity of the place and I’m more than willing to say that here and now, on camera, for all the world to see.
And I’m willing to say a lot more than that.
The blonde that accosted me the first night I came here on Reginald’s orders intercepts me at the stairs up to the stage.
“Jake Ferry, as I live and breathe,” she says, batting her fake eyelashes. “Your daddy is going to shit when he—”
