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“Well, a damn soda is, like, seven bucks—” she started, only to be interrupted by Devon’s deep voice.
“You order whatever you want, okay? Don’t worry about price tags. Not tonight.”
“You know,” Eva began indignantly, “money may not matter to a hotshot like you, but it does to real people like me. I don’t like waste, and that’s exactly…” She flipped her menu open again and trailed her index finger down to the beverage listing, “…what seven dollars and fifty cents for a Coke is. It’s waste.”
She expected her outburst to return a look of anger, or perhaps even frustration, from Devon. Instead, he sat looking at her with a satisfied grin on his face. This confounded her as much as it surprised her, and she wasn’t sure if his smile should be interpreted as condescending or not. She’d misread him before, so she allowed herself to remain calm while waiting for him to speak. With his menu still in hand, he looked around the restaurant impassively, taking in society’s most privileged as they sat stuffing themselves on overpriced food in between bragging about their various successes. After a long moment of silent observation he turned his eyes back to her.
“Do you like it here?” he asked with a curious look on his face.
“I do, but… this place isn’t me, Devon.”
He nodded his understanding as he glanced around the room again, and Eva detected a slight hint of disgust radiating from him.
“Good,” he replied.
“Excuse me?” she asked, genuinely confused by his unexpected reaction.
“This place isn’t me, either,” he said with a grin, tossing his menu down on the table. “You want to get out of here?”
“What? No, we just got—”
“Let’s get out of here,” he cut her off as he pulled out his wallet and threw a one hundred dollar bill down on the menu. Rising to his feet, he extended his hand and she instinctively took it while also popping up from the table. He ignored her protests as they rushed out of the restaurant, hand in hand, with him leading the way.
The second they were outside, Devon grabbed his cell phone from his breast pocket and dialed his driver. Parking at Tavolino’s was valet only, so before their date he had instructed his driver to simply drop them off at the restaurant and wait for them just down the street. He explained this to Eva as the two stood outside and waited for the town car to pull up. It didn’t take long, and when it arrived Devon once again opened the door for Eva to climb inside. Only ten short minutes after entering the posh establishment, they both found themselves in the back of Devon’s vehicle for the second time. Eva sat in bewilderment as her erratic date leaned forwar
d and whispered something into his driver’s ear.
“What was that all about?” Eva demanded to know as Devon sunk back into the seat next to her.
“I think places like that make me more uncomfortable than you,” he said as he loosened his tie.
“Wait, what?” Eva asked, totally perplexed by this startling admission.
“Pfft,” he sounded. “I can’t stand places like that. They’re not my style, and I know they’re not yours,” he chuckled.
“Are you being serious right now?” Eva questioned skeptically.
“You have no idea,” he said flatly. “Places like that make my skin crawl.”
“Yeah, well, you came into my restaurant the other day so you must not hate ritzy places all that much,” she pointed out.
“Please. I was only there because it’s where I was supposed to meet a potential business partner. Remember when I mentioned buying a few buildings in your neighborhood? Yeah, well, I was supposed to be investing with a guy but he no-showed,” Devon explained as the car pulled away from the restaurant.
“So that’s why you hung around there so long,” Eva realized aloud.
“Exactly. I didn’t mind waiting around because you were there, and there‘s just something about you,” he said with a smile. “But eventually I got impatient, got upset, and that’s when I rammed into you like an idiot.”
“Did you ever meet up with the guy?” she asked in genuine interest.
“Not that day, no. I started heading home, then decided to go check out those buildings one more time to decide if I even want to invest in them. That‘s when I saw you walking home.”
“I see,” she replied. “But you did get in touch with the guy?”
“Yeah, turns out we had our days confused. I would have bet my life that he told me the eleventh, but he swears he told me the twelfth,” Devon said as he shook his head. “It was probably my fault. I need a secretary.”
“Wait, you have a driver but no secretary?” she questioned in shock.
“Well, I did, but I let her go a while back,” he answered.
