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Sebastian arches a brow her way now. “Your…stepdaughter’s team?”
“Soon. She’ll be my stepdaughter soon,” Elodie adds.
“When’s the wedding?”
“Very, very soon,” I add, without thinking, because fuck him. “We can’t really wait much longer.”
It’s not at all what I’ve said to Felix, but I don’t care right now.
“I hope I get an invitation,” he says.
There’s no reason on heaven or earth why we’d invite this guy, but I say, “Of course you will. Now, can I get you a blackberry mule with winter melon? It’s our most elite cocktail. For VIP customers.”
Guys like him think they deserve the best.
“Perfect,” he says.
When he’s served, he sits down at a table with a man who looks like him, and they eat, drink, and rub me the wrong way.
But there’s no time to linger on him when Felix arrives near the end of the night, clearly pleased as he surveys the shop. “I had a feeling about you two. I see you met Silver,” he says, then rattles off the names of other local foodies who were here. “Keep it up for the next few months.”
When the doors close a few minutes later, and everyone’s gone, I’m spent from the night, the games, the pretend, and all the uncertainty.
I want to clean up and crash.
But I also know I need to thank Elodie for saving my ass with Celeste. When a text lands from my grandma with a photo of two tired girls conked out on a couch, I show it to her, then say, “Let me treat you to some rosemary fries.”
She looks like she wants to say no. Like maybe she figures no is the safe answer. But instead she says, “Yes. Also, those were the names of the shops where I got my bandana, my necklace, and my lipstick.”
It takes a beat for me to realize she noticed earlier that I must have been wondering. It takes only a second more for me to realize she must notice everything.
22
A LITTLE CAVEMAN
Elodie
Sticks and Stones closes at midnight, so the place is still bustling when we grab a booth in the far back, past the pool and Ping-Pong tables. In seconds, a woman with a pixie cut arrives to take our order.
“Rosemary fries and a chicken sandwich with sriracha times two,” she says after we place it. “Aren’t you two lovebirds the cutest?”
Gage startles for a second. Then he adjusts, adding a mostly genuine smile. Ohhh. His employees don’t know this is fake, of course, but he’s still adjusting to people assuming we’re a couple. He drags a hand through his hair, a sign he’s a little stressed, but I hope she doesn’t know his tells like I do. “Yup. We both just have good taste,” he says to her.
“We do,” I second, then she heads off. When she’s gone, I ask, just to be sure, “She doesn’t know?”
“Nope. And I feel bad lying.”
“I get that.”
“Well, except to Sebastian,” he says with a growl.
I still feel like I need to take a shower because of that guy. But I want to deal with the tension between Gage and me first. I can’t let it take up so much real estate. I’ve been noodling on his we good comment since this afternoon. I didn’t want to get into it then. I do now, especially after the awkward moments between us tonight, the uncertainty in how we spoke to each other.
But before I can even begin, he takes over with, “Elodie, I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you earlier.”
His tone is laced with regret. But I don’t know exactly what he’s talking about. “What do you mean?” I ask carefully.
He rakes his hand through his thick hair a second time, messy at this late hour, unkempt and a little wild. A lot sexy. “You were worried you didn’t have enough chocolate, and I made it seem like your concerns were nothing. I was only focused on me. And Celeste. And then I didn’t even know how to handle her. You saved me with the sparkling water. Thank you. I was in a big hole there. Felt like I was on the mound with the bases loaded.”
