Chapter 13
“You’re going to wake him up!” came the whispered hiss as the sounds of someone, probably several small someones, snuck past him on their way to the kitchen.
“I’m starving,” eleven-year-old Sebastian announced, which was seconded by his twin brother, Johnny.
“There’s no food!”
“I told you that we should have hidden some!” came the accusing whisper from one of the twins, which one, he wasn’t sure and he really didn’t care since there was no chance in hell of him falling back to sleep now, not after they’d mentioned food.
A quick glance at his watch had him rubbing his eyes and sitting up on the couch with a heavy sigh. It was seven in the morning, he was fucking exhausted and with a houseful of Bradford children on the prowl there was no way that he was going to get any sleep anytime soon.
“Go get dressed,” he told them, deciding that he might as well take the boys out for breakfast before they woke up the rest of the house.
The boys didn’t need to be asked twice, not when food was involved. Grinning hugely, the boys shoved each other out of the way and raced back to the room they shared with their cousins. He didn’t have to tell them to be quiet, because they knew better than to wake anyone else up.
Hoping to get them fed and back here before nine so that he could go make a certain neighbor blush, he went back to his room, took a quick shower, dressed, attached his gun holster to his ankle, and opened his bedroom door to find his cousin’s boys waiting for him. He cocked a brow in question and the boys nodded, letting him know that they’d told their mother where they were going.
Gesturing to the front door, the boys preceded him and in minutes they were in his truck, and pulling out of the driveway. As soon as they reached the end of the road, the boys were sighing with relief and turning the radio on.
“What are you in the mood for?” he asked, taking in the restaurants along the beach-lined streets and noted that their options were limited at this time of the morning.
“Food!” came the response from both boys, making him chuckle.
Having had enough donuts and fast food egg sandwiches to last him a lifetime, he kept driving until they came upon a diner that looked promising. “How about pancakes?” he suggested, already pulling into the small parking lot.
“God, yes,” Sebastian said, sighing heavily with relief.
“You boys paying?” he asked, cutting the twins a look to find them watching him with calculating looks that would probably scare anyone else, but since he was a Bradford twin himself, he simply chuckled and gestured for the boys to get out.
Before he had a chance to close his door, the boys were there by his side, fully alert and dragging him towards the diner. They’d barely managed to get through the door when the boys were saying, “Three, please,” startling the hostess.
“Three, please,” he said with an apologetic smile as the waitress shifted her attention to him and-
Christ.
-smiled invitingly.
“Three it is,” she murmured as her gaze dropped to his left hand in search of the gold ring that would save him from situations like this before looking back up at him and murmuring, “Right this way.”
Resigning himself to the hour of bullshit ahead, he turned to follow her and couldn’t help but smile when he spotted his delectable neighbor sitting in the booth by the back window, glaring at her daughter and his new BFF, who were sitting separately several booths away, looking at menus, and pointedly ignoring her.
Feeling his lips pull up into a predatory grin, he gestured to Mikey. “You boys remember Mikey, right?”
“Dad won’t let us play catch with her,” Johnny said, looking excited.
“For good reason,” he said, absently touching the damaged side of his face.
Nodding, Sebastian said, “I’d give anything to throw like her.”
“Maybe she can give you some tips,” he said, already shoving the boys in that direction.
“But-” the waitress said, gesturing towards an empty booth near the hostess station.
“We’ll be joining our friends. Give both checks to me, please,” he said, not really caring that the glaring woman probably wouldn’t be happy with his company.
“Mikey, you remember the boys, right?” he asked, shifting his attention from the woman, who he couldn’t wait to torment, and smiled at the little girl that was nodding.
“Eric,” he said, noting the man’s glower before shifting his attention back to the woman that was no longer glaring, but openly panicking as she wrestled with a menu, trying to open it as she did a piss poor job of hiding behind it.
So. Fucking. Adorable, he thought with a heartfelt sigh as he shifted his attention back to Mikey and Eric. “Would you mind a little company this morning? I wanted to talk to your mom about the renovations,” he said, already shoving the boys towards the booth.
With a shrug, the boys sat down and helped themselves to menus as Mikey absently nodded and returned her attention to her menu all while Eric watched him with a curious expression that he didn’t really care about, not when he had an adorable little thing blushing behind him.
“Excellent,” he murmured, making his way to the woman that was trying to hide behind an upside down menu and most likely praying that he went away, but since that really wouldn’t work for him, he swiped a menu off a nearby table and sat down across from her.
“What would you recommend?” he asked, as though she wasn’t currently trying to inch her way towards the end of the bench and make her escape.
When it became obvious that he wasn’t going away, she grumbled something as she dropped her menu on the table and glared at him.
“Everything here is delicious,” she said with a glare as he sat there, watching her and murmured, “It definitely is.”
*-*-*-*
Oh. God, she thought, sitting there staring at the man that was devouring her with his eyes as she struggled to come up with a suitable response only to sigh with relief when Mary, their waitress who incidentally hated her, walked over.
“Good morning. I’m Mary and I’ll be taking care of you today,” she said, pointedly ignoring Kasey as she glanced at Reese and-
Frowned?
“Good morning, Mary,” Reese said, thankfully shifting his attention to their waitress and giving her a chance to clear her head and think of something, anything, to get out of this before she did something mortifying.
“What are you in the mood for?” Mary asked after a slight hesitation and a quick look over her shoulder towards Pam and Jenny, who were standing by the cash register, watching them, which had Kasey rolling her eyes even as she shifted closer to the edge, deciding that hiding in the bathroom for an hour was the only sensible solution when the bastard answered.
“I don’t think it’s on the menu,” Reese said, shooting her a wink that had her blushing, damn him!
Deciding that they needed to clear a few things up, meaning that she was going to make a bigger ass out of herself, she said, “Mary, could you give us a few minutes?”
“Sure thing,” Mary said in a daze, throwing Reese a curious look as she walked away.
“Desperate to have me all to yourself?” he murmured with a knowing look that was going to get him kicked.
Deciding not to take the bait, she cleared her throat and said, “Reese-”
“I thought I was Yummy,” he said, cutting her off with a smoldering look that left her flustered, that is, until she saw it.
His lips twitched.
She narrowed her eyes on him as a sinking suspicion crawled up her spine.
He was playing with her.
The bastard was actually playing with her!
Oh, thank God! she thought just as quickly, nearly sagging with relief, because she honestly wasn’t sure what she would have done if he’d been serious. This she could handle, she thought with a sigh as she returned his smile, more than ready to play this game as she signaled for Mary.
“I think we’re ready to order.”