Page 26 of Whiskey

“Because I don’t want her and Ezra hearing what we’re talking about,” Vivi stated as she breezed in with a pile of shirts in her hands.

“Is this going to take long? I’ve got a date,” Hennessy said.

Vivi stared at each of them before talking. “It will take as long as I need it to take. We have a couple items to cover.”

Whiskey covered his mouth with his hand and looked down at the table. If he looked at Hennessy glaring at his wife and his wife giving it back to him, he’d burst out laughing. Vivi might be at least six inches shorter than all of them, but his woman had a spine of steel. She was a fantastic mother, and she’d even started having everyone make sure they came to Sunday lunch. The bar didn’t open until later on Sundays, so they could have family time with everyone.

“Okay, so first of all, I need your opinion on the colors of these shirts.” Vivi held up three shirts with their bar logo on them, but the colors were a neon pink, neon green and a strange shade of purple.

Dillon and McClure were shaking their heads no. “Whiskey, control your woman. I am not wearing that nasty neon green or that obnoxious neon pink.”

A chorus of me neither echoed around the room.

Vivi grinned and then pulled the neon green out. “Perfect, then you’ll never have to wear it when you work unless you lose a bet. I’ve decided that there has to be some type of penalty for the losers, or you all will continue betting on every little thing.”

Hennessy stood up and held his hands out to Vivi. “Now, Vivi, we don’t bet that much.”

“Hennessy, you and McClure were betting how long it would take me to get riled up in the bar the other day by rearranging all the liquor bottles. Well, you succeeded. But it took an hour and a half to get them back in order. I don’t care if you continue betting, but twenty percent of the winnings will go into a fund for charity from today forward and the loser will have to wear the bar logo on this neon green shirt with the back printed with ‘Ask me why I’m wearing this shirt’. Maybe you all will think twice about doing annoying stuff that makes more work for other people.”

Whiskey stayed quiet because Vivi had this handled. They’d actually discussed curtailing the betting because Vivi had been so irritated with cleaning up their prank. He was all for anything Vivi wanted to institute.

“Now, on to my second item. I’ve hired an extra bartender since we seem to have too many nights one of you has to fill in. She’ll be starting next week.”

Whiskey listened to his family voice their concerns about bringing in someone they’d never met to work with them. Vivi explained it was someone she’d met and thought would be good for the job. Every time they had an excuse not to hire her, Vivi had a rebuttal.

“Will you all just be quiet and let Vivi finish? She hired a bartender, which everyone agreed was part of Vivi’s duties when she took over helping with the bar. Vivi, please continue,” Peck said.

“On that note, I’ve raised the waitresses’ salaries to be above the salaries for starting barbacks.”

“Why do we need to raise their salaries? They get tips.”

Vivi nodded. “The barbacks and bartenders get tips too. The waitresses are the only ones who share their tips.”

“That’s the way it’s always been,” McClure stated.

“And for some reason, our waitresses are all women. The barbacks and bartenders are all men. I guess I need to start telling Bailey right now that she should always expect to be valued less than the men she works with. Why? Because it’s always been that way, so why should we try to change it? Is that the environment you want to create for our employees? I realize no one brought it to your attention, so you didn’t know. But you know now.”

Vivi hadn’t warned Whiskey she was bringing this up, but he was glad she had. He felt horrible that they’d never realized the disparity between their employees.

“I think we need to give all the waitresses a bonus on the next three checks commensurate with what you think they were underpaid for the last year and what they’ve given away when they shared their tips. I feel about as low as I could be realizing we’ve been doing this for years. Thank you for bringing it to our attention. Boys, do we need to have Vivi go over our pay scales at all the other businesses and make sure we aren’t underpaying?”

His woman’s smile shone bright as his Uncle Burt not only supported Vivi but thought how they could expand what she was doing. Suddenly everyone was thanking Vivi for doing it and hugging her. His family had become her family. He loved seeing Vivi blossom in this environment. She’d decided she wanted to take some business classes from the local community college and help in the bar when she had time. She loved being a mom and getting time with her kids, but Vivi had been stifled and not allowed to do anything. She was getting to spread her wings and Whiskey adored seeing his woman smile when she learned something new.

Vivi had even tried to set up his dad with one of the women who came in from time to time. His dad had smiled but shook his finger at her and said he didn’t need help with hookups. He’d hightailed it out of the bar when Vivi said she wasn’t setting him up for hookups but for her kids to have a grandma.

“I’ve got snacks upstairs for everyone warming in the oven and crockpots. Let’s head up there,” Crewe stated.

His brothers and cousins dropped a kiss on Vivi’s head and raced up the stairs. They didn’t want to miss any food. He waited until it was just Vivi and him. He opened his arms and she walked into them.

Vivi let Whiskey’s arms pull her close. His scent wrapping around her. The same one she’d never get tired of smelling. It was the first thing she really noticed after she had begun to believe she was safe. Safe in the arms of her biker with the tattoos and the beard.

“You did great.”

“Only because you showed me it was okay to dream.”

She leaned her head against his chest, listening to his heart beat. Sometimes she almost felt like it was a dream, but then Whiskey would pull her into his arms and she’d remember this was her life.

She and Whiskey needed to plan a date night. She’d loved the picnic on the side of the road where he rode into her life. Maybe they should take one again. Her rescuer didn’t come on a horse but on an iron steed.

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