Page 13 of Promise Me Ever After
She wrinkled her nose. “Sort of forgot. Emily and I worked a bit later than usual to get the seating plans for the charity event finished. I have a feeling that Fortunes for Favours is going to be a success.”
“Probably.” I sipped my tea. The confession I’d made to Georgie earlier was true. I was worried about being ‘bought’ by someone who had unsavoury motives. Unless it was her, of course.
“Emily said she met your new front of house manager today. Georgie something? Is she nice?”
I sighed. I’d forgotten about that connection. That was the trouble with working in a small town. Everyone knew everyone.
“Yeah, she’s fine. Used to run a posh place in Bristol, I think.” I shrugged.
“You should find out where it was. Might be handy for you if you fancied a change.”
I snorted. I wasn’t about to ask Georgie if her old place of work had vacancies for me.
There were plenty of other things I wanted to ask her first. Like, if she was single.
5
Georgie
The next weekand a bit flew by until the Fortunes for Favours event. Shifts at Anna’s Kitchen merged with helping Darcy out in the shop and planning her hen night. It looked like, as discussed, there would be two. One for the ‘mothers’ and one for the ‘friends’. As maid of honour, I got to organise and go to both. Lucky me.
In another interesting development, every shift I worked with Alex Kane, the more flirty banter we had.
We’d been out with Sid, Marianne, and a couple of the other waiters, one night to a local pub after a particularly slow shift had closed the restaurant early. The six of us had created a pool competition and Alex and I naturally paired together. Initially, I’d pretended not to have a clue what I was doing, so Alex had to show me. The feel of his body pressed against mine as we bent over the table while he showed me how to line up a pot had sent me into a minor meltdown. He hadn’t made a move though, even when we won the mini competition.
I recalled his worries about tonight’s event.
Would the well-to-do ladies of Ealynn Sands really want him to do the naked butler thing?
Darcy, Fraser and I had got tickets and we arrived shortly after seven, dinner starting half an hour later.
“Fraser, can you take our coats and check them into the cloakroom?” Darcy asked the minute we got inside. She shrugged off hers, passed it to him and indicated for me to do the same.
“Sure.” Fraser took our two coats and headed off in the direction of reception, leaving us alone.
“Are you okay?” Darcy reached out and squeezed my arm. “Today can’t have been easy.”
My heart contracted. Up until now, we’d managed to avoid talking about the elephant in the room. I’d spent most of the day in bed, trying to distract myself from the fact I should’ve been getting married. My emotions were all over the place, one minute angry as hell, the next wallowing in self-pity. Binge watchingFriendshad helped a bit, except I’d blubbed like a baby when Rachel ran into the coffee shop in her wedding dress in the first episode. It had taken me every ounce of energy I possessed to haul my arse out of bed, put on a dress and makeup and pretend I wanted to be here. But I didn’t want to let Ellis and Tess down, so here I was. I closed down any further talk of how I felt by saying, “I know I need a drink.”
Darcy waved at one of the waiters circulating with trays of Buck’s Fizz and snagged us a couple of glasses. I took a sip, knowing this was only the start of the evening and I should pace myself.
“Cheers!” she said, clinking her glass with mine. “Here’s to finding a hot man and forgetting what today was supposed to be about.”
At the mention of ‘a hot man’ my mind immediately went to Alex. I wondered where he was and how his prep was going.
“Hey.” Darcy clicked her fingers in front of my face. “Where did you go? Tell me you’re not thinking of that dickhead.”
“Ha, he wishes.”
“Good.” My little sister nodded approvingly. “Let’s go and see how popular I am.”
We made a beeline for the table where people were making their bids on the Favours. Darcy wanted to check how her prize of a personal shopping experience at Itsy Bitsys was going.
“Thinking of making a bid?” Ems came up behind me.
“Oh, God no!” The words came out a lot stronger than I’d meant.
“Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence, sis.” Darcy elbowed me in the ribs. “Hi, Ems. How do you think it’s going so far?” She gestured to the table, awash with favours.
