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Perhaps I might have if her hand hadn’t come up to rub against my bicep.
“It’s okay,” she whispered in my ear. “I’m okay.”
She repeated it like a mantra in my ears over and over again as I waited for the panic to subside. And it was only a few minutes later, when the panic subsided, that I realized I had been shaking the whole time.
* * *
“Excuse me, waitress,”I called from my spot at Table 2. “I have another question about the menu.”
Kayla turned around to give me a “really?” look. I put up my hand and smiled even as she rolled her eyes in annoyance. She seemed to debate whether or not to come over, and that was more restraint than I expected. I was pretty sure the next time I called her to my table for irrelevant shit, she was going to deck me.
Faith was babysitting Hunter this morning, so I decided to follow Kayla along to the restaurant for two reasons. The first was safety, and the second was simply to enact my diabolical plan to get her to stop being so stubborn about this whole working thing. I didn’t mind the fact that she wanted to be independent so much as I minded that she was doing something she obviously hated just to prove a point. I could support it if she were doing something she enjoyed, like writing. But instead, she spent eight hours on her feet going from table to table and making shit in tips. Furthermore, she thought I would let her continue doing that for the foreseeable future?
Yeah, not fucking likely.
But of course, if I had told her any of that outright, her pride would have gotten in the way, and she would have simply ignored me or argued that she was an independent woman wanting to make her way in the world. So I had no choice but to set out on Plan B, which was to annoy her into quitting and letting me take care of her.
So far, my plan didn’t seem to be working. Granted, the day was just beginning, but she seemed to be holding up well. No matter what inane thing I asked for or what comment I made, she would only shoot me a dirty look and then walk away to do my bidding with a tight smile. Even when I told her that my spoon looked like it had been washed with tepid water and I only liked spoons washed in hot water, she simply glared at me.
“Seriously?” she had hissed, and I thought she would give in then or hit me. But instead, she took a deep breath, gave me a tight smile, and then walked away to get me a new spoon.Hmm, this is a lot harder than I thought.It seemed the more I tried to irritate her, the more she resisted being irritated, and that challenged me more.
But as she stomped over to the kitchen now with a tray of dirty plates in hand, one of the patrons moved his chair back, intercepting her and cutting into her path. She didn’t have enough time to pivot, which caused her to drop the entire tray on him.
The clattering cacophony was deafening.
The man immediately stood up, outraged.
“What the hell?” he practically screeched. “Are you stupid or something?”
“I’m sorry,” Kayla said. “I wasn’t watching where I was going.”
It annoyed me that she took the blame for something that was his fault, but not as much as when the bastard said, “Damn right you weren’t.”
He looked down at his soiled shirt. “Damn, they just hire anyone these days, don’t they?”
Kayla’s jaw tightened. “As I said, sir, I’m sorry.”
“Well, ‘sorry’ doesn’t cut it. How are you gonna pay for the damage caused?”
Okay, I’d had enough of this. I got up.
“This is a fucking expensive shirt,” the asshole grouched as I approached. “The stains don’t come out just like that—”
“Hey, buddy,” I said, giving him a tight smile as I stood behind Kayla. “You might want to turn it down a notch. It was an accident.”
“Who the hell are you?” the man questioned.
“Someone you don’t want to fuck with,” I responded, the anger already simmering, turning my tone murderous. “Now, tone it down.”
“Tone it down?” The bastard must not have been smart because he dared to step up to me, putting Kayla in harm’s way. “Do you have any idea who I am?”
“No, and I don’t give a damn,” I shifted, smoothly moving in front of her to stare down at the man instead. “But if you ever address her like that again, I will show you who you are.”
His eyes showed some fear at the threat, and I had been in enough fights to know that fear usually had one of two reactions. It either made people smart enough to cut their losses or dumb enough to get ballsy.
The asshole was the latter. “You have no idea who you’re messing with. You and that bitch—”
That was as far as he got before I grabbed him, jerking him off his feet by his collar. I heard some of the patrons around us gasp in shock, including Kayla, but I didn’t care. My anger had turned into full-blown wrath. This man had insulted my woman, and everything in me demanded I teach him a lesson.
