More Blazing Bedtime Stories by Julie Leto & Leslie Kelly

Author:Julie Leto & Leslie Kelly [Leto, Julie & Kelly, Leslie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Encounters
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2009-11-01T00:00:00+00:00

“DON’T LOOK NOW, Princess, but that sexy, dangerous-looking drink of water in the corner is eyeing you like you’re a rare burger and he’s a reluctant vegetarian dying for some meat.”

Penny Mayfair cringed as her friend and boss, Callie, used the nickname her late father had given her as a kid. Princess.Pretending she hadn’t heard, she loaded two ham-and-egg specials and a dozen side orders onto a serving tray. Idly hoping the cook hadn’t left any eggshells in this order, she turned away from the heated, pass-through window of the diner’s kitchen.

“He didn’t want me to wait on him,” added Callie, who owned this place. Having been Penny’s late father’s girlfriend for many years, Callie was the closest thing Penny had ever had to a mother. The woman, a romantic at heart, was never happier than when she was matchmaking. “Asked for you twice!”

Penny frowned, glancing across the packed diner. Every table was full and she was doing double duty today. Gina, the other full-time waitress at Kallie’s Kuntry Kitchen, had called in sick. As usual. Gina was a wild child who always hooked up with a guy named Jack Daniel’s or his buddy Johnny Walker on Saturday nights. So she was never in the mood to serve Jimmy Dean on a subsequent Sunday morning.

Callie was an angel, but her arthritis made waitressing a real chore for her. Meanwhile, Glen, the cook, was in a rotten mood because somebody had sent back a too-runny omelet, so he was intentionally ass-dragging on every order.

Not the type of day when Penny Mayfair felt like dealing with demanding customers.

“He’s at table eighteen.”

“Can’t he see I’m busy?” she said with a weary sigh.

Not waiting for an answer, Penny snaked her way to table twelve. She slung the plates full of food at the two oilfield roughnecks who’d ordered enough breakfast for a family of five.

“Thank ya, Princess.”

“Shut up, Eddie.”

“Aww, that any way to talk to your best tipper?”

“Here’s a clue for you,” she said with an amused eye-roll. “Leaving me a note on a napkin saying, ‘Here’s a tip, bet on horse number two,’ doesn’t earn you a lot of points.”

Eddie, a good-natured good-old-boy who parked himself at the same table every time he came in, snorted and slapped a hand on his knee. He and many of the other guys who worked out at the oilfields came into LeBeaux a couple of weekends a month, looking for the closest town that boasted a bar.

LeBeaux had three. Which was two more than the number of banks and one more than the number of restaurants.

On Saturday nights, guys like these tried to hook up with girls like Gina. On Sunday mornings, bleary-eyed and obnoxious, they showed up here.

“I got a tip for ya, baby,” said Eddie’s dining companion. “Say yes and you won’t regret it.”

He grinned, but good humor didn’t light up in his eyes the way it did Eddie’s. This guy was a stranger. His reddened nose and bloodshot eyes, plus the reek of whiskey that surrounded him like Pigpen’s cloud, told her he was a hard partier.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.