Page 18 of The Player in New Zealand
There were six of them, so I cracked eggs, shook my concoctions, and toasted the tops. I carefully placed the drinks on a tray and carried it over to the booth. One of the guys elbowed another and soon they were no longer listening to Tane but watching me as I set the tray down on the edge of the table. Five sets of eyes watched me with interest. One of them nudged Tane.
“Claire,” Tane said, exasperation coloring his voice. “I said no. It’s a waste of our stock.”
“It’s not a waste if you drink them,” I said evenly, placing a martini glass in front of each burly man. “And I paid for most of it myself. Worst case, you don’t like them. Fine, then I’ll be back in ten minutes to collect the glasses and dump them out. But if you do like them... then maybe I’ll come back and all the glasses will be empty.” I cocked my hip and lifted the empty tray over one shoulder. I put on my most dazzling, fakest smile ever and winked at Tane. “Enjoy your drink, sir.”
As I put the tray away and settled back behind the bar, the front doors opened and a group of four came in, shaking off wet raincoats and laughing before settling in at the bar. It was more than ten minutes before I got back to the booth with the empty tray, but I did it with extra swagger and smugness.
“My, my, you boys must have been parched.” The glasses were empty, save the candied orange slices. “You can eat the oranges if you want.”
One of the younger guys, with blond hair and tattoos on his knuckles, picked the slice up experimentally and took a nibble.
He hummed as he took a bite. “Chewy.”
Soon all the guys were picking up their oranges delicately with their thumbs and forefingers, the thin slices nearly disappearing between their thick, sporty fingers.
I leaned a hand on the table. “What do you think? You want another?”
Young Guy raised his hand like he was in school.
An older guy with a beer gut, his black hair streaked with gray, lifted a finger. “Can you make one this weekend when I bring my wife in?”
I winked at him. “You betcha.”
Tane grumbled under his breath.
“I’m sorry, what was that,sir?”
“Fine. Yes. You can try a drink special this weekend.”
A smile broke out on my face, excitement fluttering in my stomach.
Older Guy perked up and gave me a thumbs-up.
* * *
I’d been working hardduring my two months at the bar, and things had shifted a little between Tane and me. He was still quiet and liked to give me a hard time, constantly making me pour his beers. It should have annoyed me, but he clearly found it amusing, so I rolled my eyes and poured him a beer and said, “Here you are,sir.” Sometimes, instead of drinking in the back, he sat at the bar.
The one thing was that Iris was starting to worry me. While she wasn’t putting pressure on me, we’d had a phone call and I’d heard Chris in the background. She kept shushing him, but my gut told me it was about the money I’d borrowed. I tried to shake it off and focus.
The drink special was happening Saturday, and I came in early to line up the drinks. I premade the simple syrup, stocked up on candied orange slices, checked the torches, and redrew the special on the chalkboard about fifty times until it didn’t look like a two-year-old had written it.
“It looks great,” Marissa, one of the bartenders who worked with me often, assured me. We had already gone over the recipe together, and she’d been enthusiastic and patient. Younger than I was, Marissa was a Kiwi and had been working at the bar for almost a year. “Tane and Nina are going to love it.”
As customers started filing in, Marissa and I told everyone about the cocktail. Some locals grumbled, raising eyebrows at the chalkboard and asking what the new beers were instead, but on a Saturday night the bar slanted toward the younger or tourist crowd anyway. We were soon running low on the ingredients.
Nina was busy outside, keeping an eye on customers interested in a round of axe-throwing before they drank. But at one point, Marissa nudged me and lifted her chin toward the back, where Nina was standing in the open door, waiting to catch my eye. She gave me a big grin and a double thumbs-up.
“That’s one happy owner down,” Marissa remarked as she passed me to head back to the storage room for a resupply. “Now, where’s the other one?”
I wondered that too. Some of Tane’s friends were here already. The older guy Tane hung out with—Evans—had come with his wife in the early evening and enjoyed the drink out on the back porch. The weather was perfect, the bar was crowded, and the drinks were selling out quickly.
“Where is he?” I asked when she returned, as if Marissa knew more than I did.
She frowned. “Dunno. But I bet Nina is going to be pissed if he doesn’t show. What a cock-up,” she said, clear disapproval in her voice.
Half an hour later, I stared at the last serving of the drink mix. Tane should have been here. This was his drink, but I didn’t think he was coming. “Motherfucker,” I mumbled under my breath and drained the bottle, serving the last of the special to a customer.
Hours later, when the crowd was starting to thin, my eyes caught on a familiar face at the end of the bar. Tane had arrived.
