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“Of course. I’ll be back in a moment, sir.”
What was he doing? “I can’t drink wine and go back to work.”
“Then don’t go back.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re absolutely outrageous.”
“No, I’m determined to teach you to have some fun, and since when can you not have a nice glass of wine at lunch?”
“It’s against the rules.”
“No, that is outrageous. We’re in Louisiana. We’re all supposed to drink like fish.”
“The library doesn’t seem concerned with that.”
“The wine will complement the food perfectly.”
He really was used to always getting his way. “I suppose you’re going to order my food for me as well?”
“Trust me,” Lance said.
There were plenty of things I wasn’t ready to trust him with, but I’d trusted him with my body last night. It had been all I could do not to give him my very soul. This was just lunch.
Okay.
The server brought bread-and-butter along with our bottle of wine. Lance tasted it and deemed it perfect.
“Go on. Try it,” Lance insisted when she poured a glass for each of us. I did. It was smooth with dark berry flavors, not too tannic or heavy.
“You like it, don’t you?”
“I do. Thank you.” He pushed the bread plate toward me, and I took a piece along with some of the herbed butter. It tasted like a buttery cloud. After my second bite, I realized Lance was watching me instead of eating. “What?”
“You.”
“I’m just eating bread.”
“You’re eating bread like it feels almost as good as what we did last night.”
I felt myself blush. “It’s delicious but not quite the same.”
Lance took a piece of bread for himself. Silence stretched between us, and it hit me that this was like a date. When he’d said he would take me to lunch, I thought we would just pick something up or eat a sandwich somewhere quickly. I hadn’t expected all of this. Why had he brought me here?
Because he likes you.
Lance laid his arm on the table and wiggled his fingers. I reached for him, and he pulled my hand into his. “What are you thinking about?”
I marveled at how he could go from demanding to tender so easily. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me. I brought you here to bring you joy, but you look sad or confused or something.”
“I was just thinking about how this is like a date, and I… I am confused.”
“About what?”
“Why would you bring me here? I mean, you already know I…” My words trailed off as his expression tightened.
“Please tell me you didn’t think you owed that to me last night. You said—”
I shook my head frantically. “No, that’s not what I meant. I don’t know why you’d”—I waved my hand around—“think you’d need this whole seduction routine.”
“This isn’t a seduction routine. This is me wanting to give you something nice, wanting to show you there’s more to life than work. I enjoy being with you.”
I stared at him for a few moments. “I thought you were with me because I needed protection.”
“That’s part of it.”
“What’s the other part?”
“Is it that hard to imagine I might want to keep you?”
“Keep me like a pet? Like Tony?”
“No, though most people would be thrilled to live the pampered life Tony has.”
I rolled my eyes and laughed. “Yes, it is hard to understand. You didn’t seem to like me much when we first met.”
“I didn’t like that you wouldn’t give me what I wanted, but I thought you were sexy as hell.”
I stared at him, open-mouthed. “What?”
“Julian—”
The server came back then. It was all I could do to summon a polite expression. Could her timing be any worse?
Lance ordered a few small plates for us to share. After our server walked away, I turned to him. “What were you going to say?”
“I don’t remember.” He wouldn’t meet my eyes, so I was sure he was lying. Lance really was a puzzle. I fiddled with my napkin, finished my bread, and then before the tension grew so thick it choked me, I spoke. “What’s going to happen to the necklace?”
Lance glanced around, and I realized I needed to be cautious. “Most likely we will have to give it back.”
“Back to the museum?”
Lance shook his head. “Back to the men who took it.”
“But that’s not—”
Lance shook his head. “This isn’t the place to talk about it, but my family, all of us, are worth more than the necklace. I’m not putting my life on the line just to have it back on display.”
“Wouldn’t you be an accessory to the theft or something?”
Lance smiled. “That would be so far down on the list of things I could be convicted of it would hardly be worth pursuing.”
I studied him for a moment. Like this—sitting in a nice restaurant with delicious food on the way, just the two of us—it was hard to remember who he really was and what he could do.
