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I stiffen my spine as I brace for what is to come. Yes, Mia’s first day was not the best, but she was thrown in the deep end on a busy night with no training. She stuck it out, and I tip my hat to her on that one. I know that in time, she will get better.
The boys give me pitying looks as they make their way over to Mia, greeting her with kind smiles, which she returns, balling the rag she was using in her hand as they speak to her, but I feel Danny’s eyes boring into the back of my head.
I swallow before turning to face him, standing straight with my head tall, ready to take on whatever he may say, ready to defend Mia if needed. But Danny only meets me with a thoughtful look, his mouth pursed, before saying the last thing I expected him to say, “She’s tough.”
I blink. “What?”
He crosses his arms over his chest, nodding to himself. “She fucked up a lot tonight. Any other person might have run home crying from the pressure, but she didn’t. She knew she was doing a crap job, and she stuck it out.”
I nod, suspicion in my eyes. “Yeah, she did.”
Danny nods again, letting the silence linger before calling out for the boys and Mia, drawing their eyes to us as he waves them over. “Come over here for a second.”
He proceeds to get out five glasses and pours some amber liquid into them as they make their way over to us, a question in their eyes as Danny pushes a glass to each of us. “I think it’s time to cheers our new worker.”
He holds up the glass and gives Mia a soft smile.
Her eyes light up, surprised, as she watches each of us raise our glasses to her with encouraging smiles. “Really? But I kept screwing up.”
Travis scoffs. “Yeah, you did. The customers couldn’t stop screaming at you, but you didn’t let that stop you from doing your job. We all noticed.”
She smiles, light sparking in her eyes as she raises her glass, a blush dancing across her face as we all cheers, before throwing back our drinks.
Danny clears his throat, drawing everyone’s attention to him as he tells her, “Another thing, don’t let customers talk to you like they did tonight. I heard enough of them swear at you, and I was close to throwing them out. We may be giving them drinks, but we don’t serve anyone unless they ask us nicely and treat us with respect. My customers know this, and they knew you were new, so they wanted to see if they could get away with it. Next time, just don’t serve them until they ask nicely, and they’ll get the picture.”
She blinks, confused by this. “But what about ‘customer is always right’?”
Danny scoffs. “We serve drunks, Mia. None of them are right.”
We all laugh, and it takes a moment before Mia nervously chuckles alongside us, a look of ease slowly creeping onto her beautiful face, a look I don’t think I’ve ever seen, and my breath is almost stopped in my lungs at the sight.
Yes, working with her and living with her… I am most definitely screwed.
CHAPTER 19
MIA
It was another long night working at the bar, but this time, customers actually treated me with respect, after an hour of not being served and getting the hint. I also had an hour before my shift of training to do certain tasks around the bar and where to find things. It was a lot of information at once, but the guys were each very patient when I asked questions.
I only broke one bottle in a whole shift, which is an improvement, and here I thought I was gonna have some time to sleep in a bit. But as I lay in bed, curled up in a ball with my face buried in the pillow, the incessant shrill of my phone going off by my head rips me from the clutches of sleep.
Who the hell could be calling me at this hour? I finally open my eyes and am blinded by the bright sun shining through the window behind my bed. I hiss against the sun’s rays, throwing a hand up to shield some of it and grimacing as I blindly reach for the phone and answer before checking who it is.
“What?” I groan sleepily through the phone before flopping myself on my back, throwing my hand over my eyes.
A familiar laugh sounds through the other line. “Glad to see things haven’t changed that much since I’ve been gone.”
I pull my hand from my face and frown up at the ceiling. “Harper?”
Another laugh sounds as Ava says from the phone, “The one and only. She just called me, and I had to make it a group call.”
I push myself to sitting as I smile into my phone. “Oh my God! How is it over there? When are you coming back? School's already started.”
Uneasy silence meets me from the other line, and an unsettled feeling sits in my stomach. “Well, that’s actually why I’m calling.” She pauses. “I might not be coming back.”
Silence lingers again as I blink, open and closing my mouth, unsure of what to say and unsure of whether I heard her correctly.
“What?” Ava asks for me, sounding just as confused as I am.
