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42
SAVANNAH
POISON - RITA ORA
When Aidan placedhis hand at the bottom of my back as we walked into Glas, the whole room fell silent.
This had happened to me before—not in reaction to my presence, of course. But this kind of thing wasn’t unusual when my dad and the band were around.
All eyes were on us.
I was pretty certain that if I sneezed, everyone would react as if a gun had been fired.
The notion amused me, but I could sense Aidan's surprise as the maître d' shuffled us over to the table in the center of the restaurant that was on a kind of dais.
It seated six, but there were only two chairs which were clustered beside each other at one of the corners; I had a feeling that that was at Aidan's request.
As we reached the raised platform, the air changed again.
Aidan naturally commanded attention, but this was definitely different.
Charged.
Anticipatory, almost.
Were they expecting a floor show?
The maître d' held out a hand for us to take our places at the table, and as Aidan dragged out the chair for me and tucked me in once I was seated, low level conversation slowly started back up again.
My lips curved as Aidan sat down beside me, and I listened with half an ear as the maître d' prattled on about the specials of the day and the wine list.
When I accidentally knocked my napkin onto the ground, I leaned over to pick it up which was when I noticed him put his hand on the edge of the table as I straightened up.
My insides were already melting, but that slight act, so small, put me in major trouble.
Especially when I saw that it was absentmindedly done.
His focus was on the maître d’, not me.
But his awareness was such that he didn’t want me to knock myself on the table and had taken steps to prevent that from happening.
Inwardly, I preened then returned my attention to the menu before I transmogrified into a complete and utter bowl of mush at the table.
I let Aidan pick the wine because I was a heathen and didn’t really care about pairing fish with red wine instead of white, and I made my choice so that when he returned to uncork the bottle, I'd know what I wanted.
As he rushed away, and having selected my meal, I turned into Aidan and remarked, "I didn't expect to see you today."
He arched a brow. "Why not?"
"Thought you'd be busy." I peeped a smile at him as I grabbed his hand. "I'm not complaining. Feel free to torment me any time."
His laughter, when it came, was light and free; more silence spilled into the restaurant.
I had my confirmation that rumors had spread about O'Donnelly Jr.'s methods of retribution.
The quiet filled me with relief in all honesty.
It meant that the message had been rammed home, and that, for the moment, we were safe.
