Camry grabbed Max and started brushing the sand off his legs. “Rocket science isn’t all you think it’s cracked up to be,” she muttered. “You going to stand out here shivering all afternoon, or help me clean up these mutts?”
Camry spent the next two days trying to persuade Fiona to call her parents, all the while making sure she didn’t soundlike a parent for fear the girl would take off on her own again. But all her efforts got her was a roommate who suddenly didn’t seem in any hurry to leave.
She’d been stunned speechless the first night, when Fiona had emerged from the shower wearing the clothes she’d lent her. The girl was breathtakingly beautiful; her wavy, waist-length hair was actually strawberry blonde, her complexion was flawless, and in clothes that fit her far better than they did Cam, her figure would have made a dead man sit up and take notice.
Hell, if she was Fiona’s daddy, she wouldn’t waste her time lecturing the girl, she’d lock her in her room until she was thirty!
She’d had second thoughts about taking Fiona to the Go Back Grill that first night, but since she had only three eggs and some outdated mayonnaise in the fridge, Cam had been forced to take her to work. So she’d sat the girl at the end of the bar to keep an eye on her, then stuffed her full of greasy, fattening food.
By the second night, she’d talked Dave Bean—who owned the Go Back Grill—into letting Fiona bus a few tables to pay for all the greasy, fattening food she’d been wolfing down as if she had a hollow leg.
But it was Sunday afternoon, and Camry was feeling more like a worried parent than a roommate as Fiona got ready for work. That’s why she had Dave on the phone, giving him hell for giving the girl a permanent job!
“You can’t have a sixteen-year-old on staff at a bar, Dave,” Cam growled into her cell phone. “Child Services is going to come after you for hiring a minor.”
“That’s not what you said last night, when you kindly pointed out that her busing tables was perfectly legal,” Dave growled back. “Make up your mind, Cam.”
“It’s only legal when I’mworking there. Hey, wait. If you hired her, what name did she put on the W-2 form?”
“Fiona Smith.”
Camry snorted. “She had to give you a Social Security number. What is it?”
“Now, Cam, you know I can’t give that out to anyone.”
Camry looked around to make sure Fiona was still in the spare bedroom getting dressed, and turned her back and lowered her voice. “But she’s a runaway, Dave. I called the police Friday, but they don’t have any missing teens fitting her description. I need that number to find out who she really is so I can call her parents.”
A heavy sigh came over the phone. “I know. But you’re putting me between a rock and a hard place here. I promise, first thing tomorrow morning I’ll turn Fiona’s W-2 over to my accountant and ask him look into it. But it’s probably a bogus number, just like Smith is obviously fake.”
“Yet you hired her anyway.”
“Because I’m desperate to find bus staff. Kids today don’t want to work for an honest wage; they want Mommy and Daddy to just hand them money. And besides,” he said, lowering his own voice. “I didn’t dare say no when she asked me for a job, because like you, I want her hanging around long enough for us to find her parents.”
Cam sighed in defeat. “At least it’ll buy us time. But how am I supposed to keep an eye on her when I’m not scheduled to work? She’ll be running around your bar, being watched by every single andmarried male in the joint.”
“It’s Sunday night, and I have nearly every table reserved up until nine,” Dave countered. “And you know why? Because all the flyers I’ve been passing out have let everyone know that I’ve classed the place up and hired new staff.”
“Then I want to come to work tonight, too.”
“Betty’s covering the bar tonight.”
“Then I’ll wait tables.”
“I’m still recovering from the last time you waited tables. You’re a good bartender, MacKeage, but you suck as a waitress.”
“I promise, I won’t dump anything on anyone.”
A pained sigh came over the phone. “I’ll keep an eye on your kid. She’s just busing tables.”
“She can bus on Fridays and Saturdays.”
“But I’ve never had more than two reservations on a Sunday night.”
“Which must mean you need extra staff.”
He sighed again. “You promise you won’t get smart-mouthed with my patrons, or dump any food on them?”
“Scout’s honor.”
“And you’ll wear one of my new waitress uniforms?”
“Those . . . thingshanging in the back room are uniforms?” She snorted. “I thought you wanted to turn the place into a familypub, not some pseudo-colonial bar with waitresses dressed like wenches. “
“Go Back Cove was supposed to have been a hideout for pirates back in the 1800s, and I’m simply playing up the old legend. I spent all last night and this morning redecorating the place.”
“Fiona is notwearing a low-cut blouse and one of those leather bustier thingies. I swear I’ll call Child Services myself if you put her in one of those sexist costumes.”
“I have mostly bus boys,Cam. Fiona can wear jeans and a T-shirt, just like they do. But,” he said before she could say anything, “you can wait tables tonight if you’re willing to wear the new uniform.”
Dammit, dammit, dammit. She didn’t want to dress up like a wench!
Then again, she didn’t want Fiona going to work without her, either.
But if she tried to talk the girl out of going to her new job, that made her no better than Fiona’s parents. And she’d be damned if she was going to mother the child.
“What’ll it be, Cam? You coming to work or not?”
“I’ll be there,” she snapped, hitting the End button when she heard Dave chuckle and slinging the phone at the couch.
“Are you going to stay and have supper when you drive me in?” Fiona asked, walking into the room. “Because there’s still nothing in the fridge.”
Camry closed her eyes and counted to ten, suddenly having a whole new appreciation for her own mother, who had managed to raise seven girls without losing her sanity. She opened her eyes, and, yup, her roommate was still dressed like a prostitute. “Um . . . is that one of the outfits your father objected to?”
Fiona looked down at herself, then smiled at Cam. “Yeah. He asked me if I’d stolen it off some hooker the last time he took me to New York City.”
“Well . . . at the risk of sounding like your father,” Camry said with a crooked grin, choosing her words carefully, “is there any chance I could get you to wear an oversize T-shirt and a pair of myjeans tonight?”
Camry held up her hand to forestall the objection forming on Fiona’s lips, took a deep breath, and jumped right into the quagmire. “It’s not that I don’t think that’s a fabulous outfit, but you’re working in a bar,Fiona. And you’re certainly old enough to realize that some men, when they’ve had a little more beer than they should, forget this is the twenty-first century and that women were not put on this Earth merely for their entertainment.” She shrugged. “I know it’s archaic, but I also know that you’re bright enough to realize that sometimes we women are better off downplaying our assets instead of . . . accentuating them.”
Oh God, those words could have come straight out of hermother’s mouth!
Fiona stared at her for the longest time, saying nothing, then suddenly smiled. “Okay,” she said, spinning around and heading back into the bedroom. “Can I wear your black jeans?”