Page 52 of Firecracker

She couldn’t believe what Tyler had just said.

I’m attracted to you.

She hurried into the staff room where she stored her purse in a locker, and set her hands on her face. Okay, okay, it’s not like that was a huge shocker. Yes, she’d felt it too. But it was out of the question for them to act on it.

She’d brought up the issue of Michael’s death, but that wasn’t really the problem. She’d fallen out of love with Michael before he’d died; he’d changed so much. Nonetheless, shehadgrieved his death, of course she had. She’d also grieved the loss of so many other things…the life she’d thought she had, the future she’d thought she would have, the friends she’d thought she had, her home. Not to mention the loss of her innocence. Maybe innocence wasn’t the right word for it…naiveté? She didn’t like to think she was stupid, but she’d certainly been blind to what had been going on.

Andthatwas the problem. She’d been an oblivious idiot. Michael may have not been a model husband, but as his wife and partner, she’d failed him. Never again would she risk doing that to someone else.

It had been a long time since she’d had sex, and damn Tyler for making her feel that hot, achy knot of need low down inside her. For making her imagine his big naked body moving against her…inside her…his hands on her skin…gah.

She sucked in a long breath and let it out, then straightened her shoulders. She was stronger than that. She could ignore those thoughts, those feelings. She could be around Tyler and remember the geeky, tongue-tied kid who’d hung out at their home. Not the sexy firefighter with big muscles who saved dogs and ran to find a little old lady’s lost wallet.

She headed out to start her shift, focusing on the things she needed to remember…menu items, table sections, what was in the Irish Breakfast.

“Liam hired another waitress,” Sorcha told her as they stood next to each other at a counter in the kitchen.

“Oh, that’s good.”

“Yeah. Maybe now I can have a day off.” Sorcha grimaced.

“I guess you’ll need to train her.”

“Yes.” She sighed and picked up a stack of menus. “Hopefully she catches on as quickly as you did.” She disappeared.

Arden blinked. She’d caught on quickly? She still felt like a bumbling fool most of the time.

Was there anything she could do to help Sorcha?

As everything was quiet at the moment, she walked over to the bar where Liam was. “Hey, I heard the good news. When does the new waitress start?”

“Not until next week.”

“You know what would be good?”

“What?”

“A service manual.”

“A what?”

“A service manual. Some kind of guidelines in writing. Service goals, steps of service, performance expectations.”

Liam gaped at her. “Well, sure and good, but where am I going to get something like that?”

She sighed. “I don’t know. Sorcha is the one who knows the most—”

“Hey. This ismyplace.”

“I know.” She smiled at him. “You know a lot too, but she’s the one who trains new waitresses.”

“Yes.”

“But she’s so busy working and training new people, I’m sure she doesn’t have time to work on something like that. The thing is, if you had a service manual, it would make training new people so much easier for her. I can tell you, it would have helped me when I was starting.”

“This would be your business degree coming out.”

She laughed. “I guess so.”

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