A Generous Tip

Anyone else would have stormed out then and there and been done with it. But the man across from her was Dane Hunter—the very man she meant to have, by whatever means it took. Nothing good would come of crossing him.

Eva forced down the sullen feeling rolling in like a thunderhead and sat again. Brows drawn low, she stared a hole through the table.

“I’m sorry if I upset you. I must have been a little on edge.”

She offered the apology with a faint shrug of her shoulders, and tacked a light smile onto the end of it in hopes of turning the mood. What came back was only an indifferent silence, bitter enough to fill her mouth.

“If you don’t say anything, I’m the one who looks ridiculous. Look at me. Are you angry?”

Only then did she meet the quiet gaze he finally returned, and she curved the corners of her eyes prettily.

“You’re scaring me. You really are mad. Come on, let it go. I made time to come out when I’m busy, and now the mood is like this. It hurts my feelings.”

“I’m not angry. Just eat.”

Even against Eva’s coaxing voice, Dane’s eyes stayed cold. She lifted her wineglass to her lips and, from the corner of her eye, shot a glare at the waitress standing on the floor below.

Why should I have to be on guard against some worthless little nobody like that? The unease clung like a leech and would not let go, and every nerve of suspicion stood on end.

It was well past ten when Zena left Tori’s. She meant to take the bus, but Luke insisted on driving her and steered her toward his car.

“I’m just dropping you off on the way. Get in.”

Zena glanced down at the watch on her wrist. If she walked to the nearby stop and waited a little, the bus would come. She was grateful for the offer to take her all the way home at this hour, but it was a burden, too.

“I’m fine. The bus is almost due.”

“I’d be passing near your place anyway if I drove alone. What’s the problem?”

“Still. You gave me a ride last time, too. If you keep doing this, I’ll feel bad.”

“If you feel bad, get in. I’ve got something to say.”

“What?”

“Just get in.”

With no other choice, Zena opened the passenger door and climbed in. Inside the closed car, the smell of cigarette butts hung thick.

“Thanks. I’ll owe you.”

Settling into the driver’s seat, Luke flicked a glance at her arm as she buckled her seat belt.

“How’s the burn from earlier? Still red.”

“I put ointment on it. This is nothing.”

“You look wiped. Close your eyes for a bit. I’ll wake you when we get there.”

Zena turned her face to the window without a word. At this late hour, her tired reflection showed in the pitch-black glass.

A few hours earlier, Zena had run into Eva coming out of the restroom. She had expected the woman to head up to the second floor, but Eva crossed the hall and came straight toward her instead. As the distance closed, a heavy perfume, as if freshly sprayed, stabbed at the tip of her nose.

Chin lifted, looking down at Zena, Eva said nothing.

“Is there something you need?”

Zena felt her blood quicken, but she kept her expression in check.

“No, nothing much. Don’t bother coming up. Just settle the bill here.”

Eva opened the clutch in her hands with nails finely set with stones, drew out a checkbook, and set a slender pen to the paper. Casting an arrogant look at the name tag on Zena’s chest, she moved her wrist.

“The check is a separate tip for the young lady who worked so hard today.”

“Thank you.”

“How old are you? You look awfully young.”

“I’m twenty-two.”

“A student?”

“Yes.”

Eva let out a small hum through her nose and lifted her lashes.

Surely a child this young isn’t Dane’s type. Young or not, the girl’s face had never been near cosmetics, and there wasn’t a single common blemish on it. And in a qipao that clung tight, her lean figure and her proportions stood out. It was a face anyone might turn to look at once in passing, so it was only natural the men who came here would notice.

Even so, she was just a girl waiting tables in a restaurant. There was a difference in level. With Eva Lambert herself standing right in front of him, he showed interest in a green little waitress like this? The more she thought about it, the more her pride stung.

“Take it.”

Eva held out a black card and the check. Zena’s eyes dropped, without thinking, to the amount written there, and opened as wide as they could go.

…!

VIP customers were generous with tips, that was true, but no one left a tip like this. Wondering if the number had been written by mistake, Zena parted her lips toward Eva’s retreating back.

“Ma’am…?”

Eva stopped and half-turned, as if to ask what.

“Is there a problem?”

“I’m sorry, but the tip—there might be a mistake…”

Eva had deliberately left a larger tip than usual. She let a few seconds pass, then opened her mouth as if she had only just understood.

“Oh. That.”

Zena said nothing.

“He said it was a shame, you working with an injured hand.”

“…What?”

Eva glanced toward the upstairs balcony and added the rest. Fiancé? For a moment Zena lost her words. It was as if someone had thrown cold water in her face; her mind snapped clear. Guilt made her flinch, the way a thief’s own feet go numb—she felt as if she had been caught in the middle of something illicit.

“He can’t walk past someone who looks pitiful. He told me to at least leave a generous tip.”

Eva blinked her long lashes and smiled the smile of someone who had everything. Without meaning to, Zena tightened her bandaged hand.

Was it pathetic—a woman who, only two days ago, had begged to be taken on as a sugar baby and been refused, now working as a waitress? The face of the man who had treated her injured hand with a serious expression passed through her mind. So did the warmth of the hand that had wrapped gently around hers.

God. This is the worst.

It would have been better if he had simply pretended not to know. She was humiliated enough without being laughed at this openly. She did not want this kind of pity, the kind that ground down what little pride she had left.

“Thank you. That’s very kind of you.”

Resisting the sensation of her heart being pressed down, Zena forced her expression into order.

Some ten minutes later, Eva Lambert came slowly down the stairs to the lower floor, her arm linked through Dane’s, a smile so radiant it looked artificial spread across her face. She had won that closeness by claiming her heels made the steel stairs precarious, but they lacked nothing of the look of a tender pair of lovers.

“Did you enjoy your meal?”

Zena hid her injured hand behind her and offered a polite greeting. Eva answered by pressing her body even closer against Dane, without a gap.

Dane’s handsome face, which had been turned forward, angled toward Zena. Their eyes met.

Before those unwavering, quiet eyes, the effort to stay composed came to nothing. What had happened in the private room kept overlapping in her head, and her stomach rolled as if with motion sickness. Ignoring the heat climbing her earlobes, she held her chin high against the urge to let it drop.

“I’m tired. I want to go to the hotel and rest.”

Eva drew the corner of her mouth into a charming pull and tightened the hand that had caught Dane’s arm—after calculating that, to a stranger’s ear, it would sound like the promise of a heated night between them.

“Thank you. I hope you had a pleasant evening.”

Wanting out of the uncomfortable moment even a second sooner, Zena greeted them again. The oddly awkward air held until Dane moved his feet once more.

“What are you thinking so hard about? You’ve been drooping since earlier.”

A puzzled light gathered in Luke’s eyes as he held the wheel and kept glancing at her.

“I’m just a little tired.”

Zena quickly put on a calm face, as if nothing were wrong. Worry over Ryan had kept her from any real sleep. But unless it was a worry that could be eased by sharing it, it was better to keep her mouth shut.

When they were nearly home, she spoke as if she had only just remembered.

“Oh, Luke. Didn’t you say you had something to tell me?”

“Right. You free tomorrow night?”

“Why? Something going on?”

“Friends and I are throwing a house party. Wondered if you could come.”

“I don’t know. I don’t think I can…”

She fell briefly silent, looking as if she were weighing it, then let the end of the sentence trail off. The mere thought of facing Liam Carlson tomorrow already had her stomach in knots, and she hesitated to make any plans after that. Right now her head was full enough just trying to find a way to save Ryan.

“You don’t have a shift tomorrow, do you? Emily and Shannon said they’d stop by too.”

“I’ve got something else to take care of.”

She was sorry she couldn’t accept the invitation readily, but there was nothing for it. Luke’s face turned sullen, and he put the cigarette that had been tucked behind his ear between his lips.

“Tsk. Playing hard to get again. Just drop in for a minute. You can hang out a little and go.”

“I’ll let you know, depending on how things go. Sorry.”

The moment the car stopped, Zena got out of the passenger seat as if she had been waiting.

“Thanks for the ride. Take care.”

“Try to think of it as a yes, if you can.”

Luke lit the cigarette, drew the smoke in deep, and called it at her back.

The next evening, Hunter & Carlson Castle.

A clerk in a suit fixed his gaze on Zena as she entered the lobby. Jeans, a white T-shirt stamped with a university logo, white sneakers, a backpack—she gave off student from every angle.

“I’m here to see Mr. Liam Carlson.”

Remembering how, the first time she had come to meet him, she hadn’t been able to get through the lobby and had broken into a nervous sweat, she felt more than a little cowed.

“May I have your name?”

The clerk asked it while drawing over the chart of visitors’ names.

“Zena Lee.”

He picked up the receiver, pressed a button, and put a call through at once to the CEO’s secretarial office.

“Please leave your ID here and collect it when you leave. After you get off on the fifteenth floor, transfer to the elevator at the end of the corridor on the left, then tap this card on the sensor for the seventy-eighth floor…”

The elevator’s glass wall held downtown and Lake Michigan like a painting. The speed at which the view split vertically and climbed was dizzying. Feeling her ears go dull the higher they rose, Zena swallowed.

At last the doors opened. She stepped carefully inside. Three women seated at a long desk looked up at the same time. Like the fashion-plate assistants attending a difficult editor in The Devil Wears Prada, every one of them wore a perfectly fitted, stylish suit and flawless makeup.

“I’m here to see Mr. Liam Carlson.”

“Are you Ms. Zena Lee?”

One of them glanced down at the visitor chart and confirmed her identity again. Zena nodded, her neck stiff with tension.

“The office at the end of that corridor.”

As she turned the way the secretary indicated, a report went out over the phone behind her.

The moment of facing Liam Carlson was right in front of her, and she grew more anxious still. Her unwilling steps made the floor seem to sway unsteadily beneath her.

Her feet stopped before a mahogany door.

Zena let out a breath and raised a hand curled into a loose fist. Knock, knock.

“Come in.”

At the voice leaking through the door, a dry swallow went down on its own. She tightened her grip on the handle. The heavy door opened with a click, and she stood where she was, unable to do anything about her parting lips.

It was a space whose beauty had been pushed to the extreme, enough to make her forget for a moment why she had come. Set against the clean marble floor, the ceiling was a grand play of structural force, like a staircase joining the sky. As if she had stepped into an enormous work of art, the room—built to bring out the beauty of line—proved in a single stroke that this was the stronghold of world-class architects.

Liam Carlson sat at a vast desk before a wall of glass. The dim downtown view unfolding behind him meshed perfectly with the dark tone of the interior.

“Come in. Sit.”

He lifted his eyes from the papers and indicated the sofa with a jerk of his chin, then watched Zena’s profile as she crossed to it at his direction, as if appreciating the view.

With every step, her abundant hair swayed of its own accord. Even unadorned jeans and a loose T-shirt could not hide straight, smooth legs, or a figure full of womanly grace. And that dark expression—the kind that stirred a man’s protective instinct. Liam lifted one corner of his mouth.

As expected. I do have an eye for jewels. A woman with an air like this—any man would have to be well disposed toward her.