CHAPTER TWELVE
Griffin
I’m already sick of listening to Adam talk about the trouble we got into at the frat back in the day. He and Dawson don’t realize that I invited them to dinner so I had an excuse to hire the catering crew. If I really wanted to go over old times, we could’ve gone out to a bar. Or I could have left the past in the past where it belongs. Clearly to Adam, though, those were his glory days.
Dawson tries to steer the talk to business. He wants my backing on a startup. I didn’t realize this was a hazard of ringing up old friends, but there it is. It may cost me a good deal of money. I’m slightly more interested in his combination auction and dating app than I am in tales of keg stands past. Apparently, the object of the app is to find someone you want to chat with during an auction of nostalgic memorabilia—old Transformers and CDs and crap. So the app appeals to both lonely heterosexuals and hoarders.
My eyes keep flitting to the kitchen door. I’m looking for the blond. The other waitress brought our water goblets. I wanted to shoo her away with a wave of my hand. When our salads come, it should be Kate bringing them. If she still works for EA two months on. If she agreed to come. If she hasn’t found a better job and a better man. My fists clench at that thought.
I must have nodded at some point because Dawson seems encouraged and is talking more animatedly, waving his hands. I’m not investing in his stupid idea. He’s just a prop so I look less like a stalker when I close my own club for the night and hire a caterer for a dinner. If it was dinner for one, that would look too creepy, so I invited friends. Friends who seem to think I have some interest in what they have to say when it couldn’t be further from the truth. I want to see her again. I’m fidgeting. I feel feverish, restless. I remember her hands on my rib cage. I remember her smooth thigh in my palm as I pulled her leg higher, going deeper with every thrust. I drain my water glass.
It’s her.
The door swings open, and I see her. As soon as I see the back of her head, her buttery golden hair, I scold myself for ever thinking anyone else could be her. I’d know her anywhere just from the swing of her hair. She turns with a tray in her hand and smiles. My mouth is dry and every muscle tenses. My body remembers her.
She looks amazing. Ripe and pink and even more luscious than the last time I saw her. I want to knock the tray out of her hands, rip her shirt open, jerk her pants down, fall on my knees and fill my mouth with the taste of her. My heart thuds in my chest. I harden instantly, aroused before she is even close enough for me to smell the sweet vanilla of her skin.
She gives Dawson his salad first and smiles at him. The bastard. I hope his startup fails. Then she serves Adam, says she hopes he enjoys his salad. I hope he chokes on his fucking salad because she smiled at him warmly. She turns to me at last. I see the jolt of recognition, the way she jerks back a few inches like the recoil of a gun. She turns pink to the tips of her ears. The flush extends down her neck. I want to kiss her throat. She doesn’t meet my eyes. She is gone in seconds.
I stare after her. Then I eat my salad in five swift bites. I want them to finish eating so she can bring the next course. Adam seems determined to examine and savor every leaf of lettuce on his plate, damn him. After a few minutes of watching them chew and Dawson trying to talk about demographics, I summon the wine steward and ask him to send the waitress back out.
He sends the other girl. She asks what she can do for me. I have to make myself be polite and not answer, you could go the hell away and send Kate out. I watch her flip her hair and push her breasts out and try to flirt with me.
“Could you send the other server out. There’s a problem.”
“I’m sure I could help you with whatever you need,” she says, “Caleigh can’t come out. She’s sick.”
Adam ostentatiously pushes his plate away. “Ugh, I don’t want to catch anything. It’s really irresponsible to employ contagious waitresses.”
“Don’t worry. She’s not contagious, sir,” the waitress says, “Caleigh’s just pregnant.”
Pregnant.
Fire blazes in my vision.
I’m on my feet, knocking my chair back.
Mine.
The word mine pumps through my body.
It’s primal. A caveman impulse, this possessiveness.
I have to know.
I already know.
Mine.
I cross the huge room swiftly, the other waitress chattering at my elbow and rushing to keep up with me. I charge into the kitchen where there is only a chef, a manager. No one else. No blond. No one who belongs to me.
I throw open the alley door, but she’s not out there. When I turn back, I see two purses on a shelf—one for each waitress—so she hasn’t gone far. She hasn’t left the building.
I’ll find her.
Then I’ll know.
Then she’ll know. That she’s mine.