Eeny pursed her lips. “Mm-hmm.”
“Don’t you have some work to be doing, Eeny?” I said, exasperated by the turn in the conversation.
She shrugged. “I’m just sayin’, if LaDonna and that scandalmonger Marybeth are spendin’ so much time throwin’ their hussy selves in his direction, it ain’t because he’s ugly.”
“No, it’s because he’s stinking rich. And besides, you called him a werewolf. You can’t think he’s handsome!”
She clucked like a hen. “Oh, honey. I think all this time you’ve been without a man has made you blind.”
From across the kitchen, Hoyt let out a hoot of laughter.
I looked at the ceiling and sighed. “Lord, why do I even employ these people?”
Hoyt hooted again. “I’m guessin’ that’s one of them ‘moot’ questions, ’cause we both know you wouldn’t have a dessert menu worth eatin’ if it wasn’t for me—”
“Oh, shut your pie hole and get back to work, Hoyt!” bossed Eeny, propping her hands on her wide hips. “I swear, if I have to hear one more time about your mad skills with pastry dough, I’ll keel over and die!”
Hoyt, who’d been in love with Eeny for going on sixty years and had been getting rejected for just as long, sent her a lazy grin and a wink. “Aw, c’mon now dawlin’. You know it ain’t my dough-kneadin’ skills that make you weak in the knees.”
“Ack,” said Eeny, rolling her eyes. “You’re delusional, old man.”
Hoyt grinned wider. “And you, suggie bee, are a sassy li’l blackberry. C’mon over here and give old Hoyt a kiss.”
“Pffft! Don’t hold your breath!” said Eeny with a flip of her hand.
Then Pepper breathlessly burst through the kitchen doors.
“Bianca! He’s asking for you!”
My stomach turned. I didn’t have to ask who she meant.
I peered out to Jackson Boudreaux’s table, expecting to see him throttling one of the busboys, but he was just sitting there with his arms crossed over his chest, glaring daggers at nothing in particular.
The man gave the term resting bitch face a whole new meaning. He looked like his face had caught on fire and someone had tried to put it out with a fork.
I said, “What does he want? Did Marlene already bring him the check?”
“Yes! And then he called me over and gave me this!” Pepper triumphantly held up a crisp hundred-dollar bill. “And when I asked what it was for, he said all meanlike, ‘I don’t like to see a woman cry.’ Can you believe that?” She giggled in delight. “If I’d known I’d get a Benjamin as a tip if I cried, I would’ve been bawling on the customers from day one!”
I ground my teeth together. The nerve of that man, trying to buy Pepper off for him being an overbearing prick!
Unfortunately, it was working.
But I wasn’t about to let him start throwing his money around as payment for his terrible behavior. I might not be rich like him, but I had my pride. Nobody was buying me off. All his wealth didn’t impress me one bit.
In fact, he could take his money and shove it right up there with Pepper’s bucket of crawdads!
“Eeny,” I said firmly, pointing to the cobblers I was plating, “make sure these get out to table six. I’ll be back in two shakes.”
“Uh-oh,” she said, warily eying my expression. “Somebody get the fire extinguisher. I think poor Mr. Boudreaux is about to go up in flames.”
I muttered, “Poor my patootie,” and pushed through the kitchen doors.
I made a beeline to his table, stopped beside it, and didn’t smile when he looked up. Cool as an iceberg, I said, “You asked to see me?”
I’d be professional, but I wasn’t going to kiss his uppity butt, even if he could sue me and get me bad reviews. I didn’t like being disrespected and spoken down to, and liked being threatened even less. Had he simply been polite, this evening would have gone differently, but here we were.
Staring with open hostility at each other.
Neither of us said anything. The moment stretched out until it became uncomfortable, and then intolerable. Staring into his eyes was like being physically attacked.
Finally he broke the awful silence by saying, “There’s an error on my check.”
“No there isn’t.”
His brows, thick and black, badly in need of manscaping, lifted. “There must be. It shows nothing due.”
“Correct.”
His cold blue gaze burned into mine. “I’ve been sitting here eating for hours—”
“Believe me, I’m perfectly aware how long you’ve been here and how much you’ve eaten.”