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Holly grinned at me after a moment. “You never know.”
* * *
Friday,the restaurant was open—thankfully—and as hard as I tried to keep my head in the game and focused on the cooking, I couldn’t. I kept wondering if he would show up tonight once the kitchen was closed, or if he would keep his promise and avoid me.
I was torn on what I wanted. I did want to see Harvey—probably more than I cared to admit—but I also wanted to honor his wishes. He was upset with me; maybe he was glad that I had picked Blake. However, his attitude didn’t suggest that. It suggested that he had been hurt. I couldn’t blame him; I guess I would have been too. Could we end up being friends?
Before everyone left, I gathered them around and handed out a paper for them to sign. “Hey, guys, I need you all to sign these. The insurance company is requiring us to put cameras up. There will be one in the main kitchen, one near the fridge and freezer, and one at the back door.”
Nate, my grill chef, frowned. “Why do they want cameras?”
“After what happened earlier this year with the two employees stealing, they require us to put them up as our policy renews.”
“Why do we need to sign this?” Maryanne, my meat chef, asked.
“Because we need to give permission for them to record sound. We won’t do anything with this unless something goes missing. It will all be recorded, and then I can go back and look at it if there is a problem. But I’m not expecting any other problems.” I grinned and laughed as if I trusted all of them.
The problem was, I had trusted them, but now as I glanced around, I wasn’t sure who I could trust and who I couldn’t. God, sometimes it sucked being the boss.
David, my dishwasher, and Wallace, the junior chef, glanced at one another, but it was David that spoke up. “Do we have to sign these?”
“If you want to continue to work here, yes,” I stated. Wallace shrugged, but David frowned and then signed the paper.
A few read the form in detail, but most of them passed around a pen and put their John Hancock on the paper without much thought.
I collected the papers and said goodbye to them all. In my office, I set them down and tapped my finger on them. Which one of you is responsible for making my customers sick?
Anton was going to get the waitstaff to sign theirs tomorrow. He questioned me about the insurance, and I’d finally let him in on the real reason for the cameras. He asked if Randolph knew, and I told him that Randolph told me to do what I needed to do to fix the problem. That was good enough for Anton.
So now, the employees were gone, and I sent a text to a phone number that everyone was gone. I was surprised when Harvey and another man arrived, and I hoped that they didn’t notice my hands shaking.
I went into my office as soon as I could, hoping to keep myself busy with paperwork that had piled up, but all I could think about was the man in the other room. His voice traveled down the hallway, and I listened like a woman starved for conversation.
He laughed a few times, husky chuckles that oozed right down my spine and into my groin. I rubbed my hands over my face and heard a cellphone ring, and then talking, but I couldn’t make out the words until I heard Harvey tell him to go.
I saw Alex rush out the back door and stared at the wall. Oh, my god! I’m alone with Harvey now. Like alone. Like just the two of us. Was this my chance to tell him that I’d made a mistake? My heart started to race as I stood and peeked out the door.
Was he freaking out too? I stared at him for a moment as I stepped out and asked what happened. He looked as nervous as I felt as he explained why Alex had left.
I suggested that I could help him, but didn’t expect him to accept it. I assumed he would get all macho and tell me to hide in the office, but he didn’t. I happily went to make us some coffee. When I came back, I found him on the ladder, his t-shirt hiked up so that his smooth abdomen was visible. I’d had my hands on that stomach. Oh, my god. I almost licked my lips.
“Coffee is on. What can I do?” Besides begging you to come down that ladder and kiss me again. He stared at me for a minute, and then he looked away and suggested I talk about my job.
Okay, safe subject. Good idea. I started telling Harvey how I started cooking at the age of four, and by ten, I was inventing recipes and never stopped. He seemed genuinely interested and asked questions, chuckling at some of my responses. Each time he did, I had to shift a little to ease the tension building in the base of my spine.
How long was this going to take? Would he be upset if I excused myself and went back to hiding in my office? I wasn’t sure I would be able to stick this out.
I went to get the coffee and brought back his mug. When I handed it to him, there was a mysterious glint in his eye as he stared at me. It both excited and scared me, and I stepped away and went to stand on the opposite side of the work station so that it was between us.
“So, I believe your sister said you were in the military.”
He nodded and set his mug down. “Yeah, I did twenty, hurt my shoulder right at the end, and retired.”
“And now what do you do at the security company? I mean besides install hidden cameras.”
He smirked. “Actually, this is not what we normally do.”
“What?”
