Unexpected warmth spread through Debra at Meg’s concern. She wasn’t used to people caring about her welfare. “Don’t worry. Bullying I can handle.” Her determined smile slipped a little. “It’s friendliness I have less experience with.”
Meg’s chuckle warmed Debra even more. “We’ll team up with one of the younger girls tonight. Cathy and I will see you’re okay. I’ll give you this—you’re a quick learner, Debra.” She glanced around to ensure they were alone. “If you ever need a job, I reckon waitressing might just be your calling.” With another of her weird cackles, she disappeared down the hallway to her own room.
****
Some of Meg’s instruction must have sunk in. Debra grinned as her table settings were carefully inspected by the chatty young local not long out of school. Cathy’s cheerful personality made it easier to accept her slight corrections without embarrassment.
Too caught up earlier coping with Meg’s instruction to delve into matters pertaining to the running of Riversleigh, Debra grasped at the chance to begin digging for information now.
Cathy grinned across at Debra while they transformed table napkins into attractive swans. “Riversleigh has changed so much since the resort was built. Unless there was an opening on one of the fishing boats, or the supermarket, or at the paua shell factory, there just wasn’t any work.”
She reached into a box and pulled out more neatly ironed napkins, folding at least three to every one of Debra’s as she chatted. “My brothers and sister all left home when they finished school. It broke my Mum’s heart—at least that’s what she tells me. Leaving here would have broken mine, too. I’m a real homebody,” she winked. “I love working here.”
Cathy stopped folding and gazed out the window with a far-away smile. “Toby and I are saving for a house. It would take years longer if we had to live in the city.”
Debra bit her cheeks, hard, to smother the urge to laugh. Cathy meant Invercargill when she said “city,”—hardly comparable to London or New York for exorbitant real estate costs.
Debra dropped her gaze. Her fingers fumbled as she deplored her moment of arrogance. Forget it, a voice whispered inside her head. You’re here to get information, not make friends. “Does your boyfriend work at the hotel, too?”
“He’s a porter for now, but not forever. Jase signed both of us up for extra-mural classes at the polytech.”
Debra couldn’t control her eyebrows. She was aiming the conversation around to Jase McEwan but hadn’t expected it to take this type of turn.
“We grabbed at the chance. It’ll mean pay rises for us, but Jase says it’s about more than money. He says it’s important to get recognised qualifications. His father made him keep studying, even after he became an All Black. He used the off-season to do his practical hotel training. He’s told us without his dad pushing him he wouldn’t have anything now—no degree or no other job to fall back on.”
Debra digested this unexpected fact with a frown. Perhaps checking Jase McEwan’s portfolio would have been more pertinent than assuming his sporting reputation had scored him the job.
“Jase is going to cross-train us. I’m starting in reception next month.”
Cathy blushed a little at Debra’s murmured congratulations. “When Toby is eighteen, he’s going to train as a barman. Jase says the wider our experience, the better wages we can demand.”
Cathy continued to talk. Her hero-worship became more obvious with every sentence. By the time they were summoned for the pre-dinner briefing, Debra decided if she heard one more “Jase says” she might strangle her mentor.
She’d have to talk to someone else if she expected to get any dirt on Jase. Cathy clearly thought the sun shone out of him.
****
Debra felt steely eyes upon her as she crossed the dining room and knew instinctively who they belonged to. Her skin warmed. She felt her whole body respond to Jase’s prolonged stare. Her heart raced any time she allowed herself to remember their contacts.
Thank God he’d been nowhere in evidence during the dining service. The bulk of their guests, a bus load of European tourists, had already left the dining room. There were only a dozen or so guests left, including her mother, who had invited Joyce and husband Ian to join her.
She allowed a small smile to play around her lips, having caught Karin’s look of surprise—amazement, more like it.
Karin would never have expected me to be capable of doing this.
Meg and Cathy had covered a couple of times because of her lack of speed, but she hadn’t caused any havoc during dinner. Her chin jutted out.
In fact I’ve done a great job,
she considered.
Great enough so I don’t need to worry about anyone watching.
With a deep breath and keeping her back firmly turned on his prying gaze, she still prayed she wouldn’t do anything to attract Jase’s closer attention.
****
Jase had been surprised at the improvement in the new waitress’s service when he was in the dining room earlier chatting to guests. He dismissed his earlier concern about her employment. However now she caught his eye again. Not because she’s doing anything wrong.
Jase swallowed. His attention had little to do with anything except hormones. She was so very attractive. And the dark uniform, possibly a little on the tight side, accentuated her curves very nicely, thank you. He didn’t even try to look away when she glanced in his direction and their gazes locked. Time ceased as his pulse rate quickened.
Her smirk as she hoisted a tray of wine flutes up to her shoulder irritated him. Clearly she found his regard amusing. His lips tightened.
He kept his narrowed gaze on her as, after what seemed like an intense but short conversation with George’s head waitress, she headed across the floor toward Karin Laurie’s table.
Within a couple of paces Jase detected movement on Debra’s tray. A faint wobble that experience had taught him would soon increase and cause a debacle. The breath caught in Jase’s throat. Disaster loomed.
Well before his sprinting legs could take him anywhere near close enough to prevent the shambles, as if in slow motion, the tray tipped first one way and then the other. The flutes took on lives of their own and acting like lemmings they fell to their death on and around the table of the hotel’s owner.
Karin Laurie’s guests both leapt to avoid the cascade of red wine and orange juice but she stayed remarkably still after an initial shocked jolt. Sliding to a stop beside her, Jase was horrified to see her clutching her leg, red of an alarmingly different hue from the wine slowly oozed between her fingers.
Snatching a white handkerchief from his top pocket he knelt beside her, uncertain whether he should touch the woman. With a wry grimace she took the offered cloth and placed it against a cut close to her ankle.
Jase shot a murderous glare at the reason for the sudden silence throughout the restaurant. Now the centre of attention, the waitress stood stock still, her eyes and mouth open in dismay.
“Get this cleaned up,” he snapped.
“The tray...” Her eyes were on their guests. “I…I…”
“Get!”
Thank God a competent waitress appeared next to Debra and whispered something in her ear which sent the klutz tearing off toward the kitchen.
“I’ll have reception summon a doctor, Mrs. Laurie. I can’t apologise—”
“Don’t be silly, dear boy.” She dabbed the cut and peered down at it. “It’s only a scratch.”
George supervised the clearing away of the debris while Jase escorted the group to a nearby table. The return of the culprit with a container for the broken glass drew his glare again.
Her guilty glance in his direction slid away as soon as their gazes touched. As he continued to placate the guests, furious whispering hummed between the maitre d’ and his waitresses.
Karin touched his arm. “Jason, stop glaring daggers at that poor girl. It was an accident. Relax.”
Jase threw his head back. Relax? When one of his staff had just doused guests with an interesting mix of red wine and orange juice? The colours were blended on Joyce Harper’s white top and all over Karin Laurie’s expensive cream skirt. Not to mention the possibility the glass could have slit an artery instead of making a slight nick on her ankle.
“Is she new? I haven’t noticed her before?”
“Yes,” he muttered. “And likely to be very short-term, I suspect.”
“It was an accident, Jason. Don’t harangue the poor girl. It could happen to anyone.”
Not in my hotel. His expression must have conveyed his continuing anger at the laxness of his employee.
“Look at it like this, Jason.” He couldn’t believe her eyes actually twinkled. Sitting there with liquid sprinkled all over her lovely clothes and blood oozing from her leg, her eyes sparkled with merriment. “If anyone had to have a tray of drinks upended over top of them, isn’t it fortunate it was me?”
Some of Jase’s ire trickled away. If she can look on this mess with humour...
Debra’s stilted apology when she approached the table some moments later resurrected Jase’s annoyance. While her words of apology were acceptable, her tone and body language could only be interpreted as haughty.
Thankfully, Mrs. Laurie didn’t appear perturbed by the assertive nature of their newest waitress. She sent the girl away with a kind smile.
After assuring himself that Mrs. Laurie and her guests were comfortable, Jase picked up the first aid kit he’d had delivered and employed, and marched toward the kitchen.
Where is that Debbie?
He sighted her, apparently helping the pastry chef. Good! George has sent her where she can do less harm. Her body stiffened as if she sensed his approach. He stopped at the pastry kitchen door.
“Debbie, a word please.”
Her face tightened, but she stalked toward him, her head high.
Before he could open his mouth on all he intended to say to her, his cell phone rang.
As the on-duty maintenance man blurted out a problem with plumbing on the third floor, and the possible flooding which he feared might eventuate, Jase was torn. The urgency of the plumbing matter quickly asserted itself as Jase’s priority. He muttered, “Another time,” before rushing to the third floor.
****
“The boss has his eye on you,” George sidled up and whispered in her ear as Debra picked up a full coffee pot.
“Oh God, not again.” Last night’s fiasco blazoned across her mind in glorious Technicolour.
“Forget last night,” George ordered. “Just don’t give yourself away.”
Debra took an unsteady, deep breath. “Like tipping coffee over someone’s head?” she whispered back.
“Yeah, that would do it.”
“Or argue when a guest complains about the food?”
“Not in my dining room.”
“I’ll try not to injure anyone else.”
“I’d appreciate that.” His face was deadpan but Debra caught the teasing twinkle in his eyes.
George was an amenable boss. He managed to kid and joke with his staff, teasing them unmercifully at times. His being privy to her real identity didn’t preclude Debra from the teasing edge of his tongue.
She sensed his respect for her was no greater than his respect for any of his staff. She filed away George’s obvious potential for advancement in the back of her mind for later.
Right now she had to get all the way across the dining room with two heavy coffee pots and fill up numerous cups for the Japanese guests sitting near the windows—all without tripping over, dropping anything, spilling coffee, or upsetting guests. All with Jase’s eyes locked on her.
Ignore him, she commanded as she gingerly poured coffee from the full pot to the first of the guests enjoying their breakfast. Or seeing that isn’t working so well, imagine him in his underwear.
Her hand wobbled and coffee slurped over the cup and splashed onto the tablecloth. Hastily placing the pot on an empty table behind her, she grabbed a napkin and urgently mopped up the spill, apologising in fluent Japanese as she did so.
The delighted smiles from around the table helped restore her confidence and she managed to serve their coffee without further incident.
A glance across to where Jase stood, now talking with George, caused her hand to tremble again and her pulse rate galloped until she’d torn her eyes away. Imagining Jase McEwan in a pair of tight little briefs did nothing to ease her agitation.
Struggling to calm her heightened breathing she continued to refill coffees and express her hope the guests’ ongoing journey would be enjoyable, before returning to the kitchen.
“George wasn’t aware you spoke Japanese.” The words close to her ear were almost an accusation.
Debra replaced the empty coffee pots on a nearby trolley and turned. She blinked a couple of times and was relieved to see Jase was again fully clothed.
Debra’s hackles rose at his subtle suggestion she might be hiding something. “The question never arose.”
The force and unexpectedness of Jase’s smile robbed her of intelligent thought. His mouth opened in a dazzling show of perfect white teeth highlighting the natural tan of his skin. Her breath caught somewhere deep in her chest and all she could do was stare.
“Are you fluent?”
Debra’s head nodded and she croaked an explanation. “I did a student exchange when I was in high school.” What’s the matter with me? Take control. Her voice strengthened. “I spent a year in Kyoto.”