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No, no, no.
It’s not fair.
I get to be normal too.
I turn to him and throw my arms over his shoulders, savoring the way his eyes widen and his lips twist into a smirk. We’re standing at the rear entrance of a restaurant and the stars are watching, not as brightly as they did when this all started, but still stark, still there, and as we gaze at each other I almost blurt out something silly, something that would change everything.
I love you.
Instead, I whisper, “I better know how to drive you wild. I wouldn’t want you getting a wandering eye now, would I?”
He stalks closer and leans down, and we taste each other. For a second, I’m sure I can feel his seed in his saliva, desperately and hungrily trying to take possession of everything I have to give.
“There’s only one place my eye will wander to,” he snarls. “And that’s you, Kelly. Let’s go inside. I’m starving.”
“For the meal?” I tease.
He side eyes me, smirking. “And other things.”
He leads me up a flight of metal stairs and then another door miraculously opens for us, showing a hallway flooded with light and, at the end, a darker room toward which we walk.
The room turns out to be the upper part of the restaurant, a table and chairs laid out on the second floor, overlooking a small balcony that stares down upon the restaurant.
The table glistens with the light of three candles and our places are already set, rose red napkins folded, a vase of actual roses completing the effect.
“Good enough?” he grins, wolfish, watching me look.
I arch an eyebrow, trying to play it cool, trying and failing.
“Maybe.”
“A hard lady to please,” he says, chuckling. “Alright then. Let me play the gentleman I promised I would.”
He walks to my chair and pulls it out, nodding down in an over the top dramatic way that makes me almost snort giggles. I clamp my hand down over my mouth as I sit down, and he pushes my chair in.
By the time his six foot seven frame descends opposite me, I’ve almost got the laughter under control, but I’m painfully aware of the dorky snorts still trying to escape.
“Sorry,” I murmur. “You must think I’m about the grossest person ever.”
“What, because you’re laughing?” he mutters, waving a hand at the periphery of the room.
A waiter approaches, standing back stiff and slightly removed, reminding me of a character from a Victorian novel.
“Drinks?” he says.
“The champagne we discussed, please.”
“Of course, sir.”
Kane nods and the man retreats.
“You discussed special champagne?” I joke. “Does it give you the ability to fly or something?”
“Oh, it’s magic, alright,” Kane says, leaning across and taking my hand, running his thumb across my knuckles so that firelight dances inside my skin.
“But it has a much more special trick. It makes beautiful women accept just how beautiful their laughter is, snorts or no snorts.”
I laugh again, and here comes the dorkiness, snort-snort. I shake my head, reaching for the water that’s already laid out, taking a sip.
“I guess you got your wish,” I say.
“If it makes you feel any better,” he replies. “I’ll add a funny little noise to my laughter.”
“Oh, but your laughter already does sound funny,” I counter.
“How’s that?” he smirks.
“Kane, you’re Mr. Gruff. Everything you say and do sounds like you’ve got a bag of rocks in your throat. But in a good way. In a …”
I flush.
No more nerves.
“In a sexy way. So when you laugh, it’s just the same.”
“Rockmouth,” he says, shaking his head, smirking, chuckling lightly. “I guess we’ve finally found my club nickname.”
“You never had one?” I ask, nodding a thanks to the waiter as he brings the champagne. I discover what’s so special about it, as I read non-alcoholic on the side. “I know from Dad – um, Dad’s club – that you guys have nicknames. I guess I sometimes wondered what yours was.”
“You did?” he asks, as the waiter pours.
I glance at him, biting my lip, waiting for him to retreat and wondering if my knock-knock heartbeat will let me make the revelation.
But tonight is already taking on a dreamlike quality, every moment infused with an anything-can-happen energy, and when the waiter leaves, I just say it.
“I had a crush on you,” I whisper. “A big time crush, I guess you could say, when I was younger. I’d sometimes see you riding around town and think, you know, just think, Okay, this is bad, he and my dad hate each other, but he’s also really hot and I wonder what it’d feel like to have those leather clad arms around me. Bad, right?”
“I never knew,” he says. “I can’t say the same, of course. I saw you a couple of times when you were younger, Kelly, but you always just seemed like the shy girl with her head buried in a book. No offense.”
