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Right after you feed us!growled her stomach, and okay, yeah, last night’s handful of chips and queso weren’t going to cut it for fuel. The diner at the end of the block was cheerily lit, catering to the prework crowd, and she steered her feet toward the door, grateful that she had her credit card information stored on her smartwatch for occasions exactly like this. Anyway, she was a total sucker for breakfast. Lucy slowed, taking a second to catch her breath before making her way inside the diner.
But then she found herself face to face with a very tall, veryfamiliarfirefighter, and just like that, the breath she’d just gotten under control went haywire all over again.
8
Sam had to be dreaming. It was the only explanation for the fact that one minute, he’d been headed back to his favorite booth in hisveryfavorite diner, and the next, he was literal inches away from the very woman he hadn’t been able to get out of his head for days, as if he’d conjured her out of thin air.
Christ, even in her running gear, with sweat dotting her forehead and her amber-brown cheeks taking on a pinkish flush from the cold, Lucy was fucking beautiful.
Also, frowning.
“Well, well,” Sam said, sliding into his most charming smile in an effort to both counter her expression and block out the heat that had formed in the vicinity of his dick. This woman wasn’t for him, and she definitely wasn’t for his dick. No matter how much she’d haunted his thoughts over the past week. “As I live and breathe. What brings you to my favorite breakfast spot, de Costa?”
The words seemed to snap her out of her shock, her brown eyes blinking once, then twice. “Your favorite…what?”
Sam gestured to the diner around him, the earthy smell of fresh coffee mingling in with the clink of cutlery on plates. “You can’t beat Daisy’s for breakfast. I mean, the Fork in the Road is good, and all, but this place”—he paused to inhale, his smile growing by default—“has the best pancakes in the city.”
“Thebest?” she asked, and damn, she could dish up some doubt.
But he was certain. “Hand to God. But if you’re skeptical, you’re welcome to join me and see for yourself.”
Sam pointed to the red, faux leather booth he’d momentarily abandoned so he could go wash his hands, the pot of coffee his server, Gigi, had left for him steaming away in a stainless steel pitcher on the gray and white Formica table.
“Oh, no.” Lucy shook her head, her smile perfectly polite. “I wouldn’t want to intrude on your breakfast.”
His snort slipped out, perfectlyimpolite. “Come on, de Costa. It’s not intruding if I invite you, and I think we both know I’m enough of an asshole not to ask just for the sake of decorum. Plus, we’ve had, like, hundreds of breakfasts together at the fire house. It’s not like we’d be sailing into uncharted water.”
She paused, and common sense warned Sam not to push. But, much to his family’s chagrin, he’d never been a common sense kind of guy, and fuck it. He might as well be honest with her.
“Look, you’re still mad at me, and this is maybe kind of awkward because of that. If you’re still pissed and you don’t want to have breakfast with me, I understand. No harm, no foul. But if you’re hungry and nottoopissed to occupy the same space as me, I’m really more than happy to share my booth. I won’t even try to buy your breakfast as a flimsy apology for getting you benched. Scout’s honor.”
For the longest moment, Lucy paused. Then she said, “Faurier, please. It’s a statistical impossibility thatyouwere ever a Boy Scout.”
Sam barked out a laugh, because of course, she had him dead to rights. “Okay. That’s accurate. But the rest is all true.”
“Better pancakes than Hawk’s?” she asked, and he laughed again. Every Sunday they were on shift, Hawkins made a full breakfast for everyone in the fire house, and everyone always ended up happy and full.
“I’ll deny having said so, but”—he shrugged, holding his hands palm up—“how ’bout you come order a stack and find out?”
“Fine,” she said, “but you should know that I have very high standards for my pancakes, and I’m not above telling Hawkins you talked smack about his breakfasts if these fall short.”
Surprise sparked through Sam’s chest that she’d said yes. It must’ve shown on his face, because she added, “Come on, Faurier. I might be mad, but I’m not a complete bitch, and rules are my thing, not drama. You’re here, I’m here. We’re both hungry. It would be stupid for us not to share a table.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” he said, leading the way over to his booth and sliding over the brightly colored banquette cushion as Lucy settled in across from him. She flipped over the coffee mug on the Formica in front of her, filling it to the brim before passing the carafe over to Sam.
“Did you seriously go for a run in this weather?” he asked, although it was likely a stupid question, given her head-to-toe running gear. “After all those stair drills yesterday? Are you sure you’re feeling okay?”
She went wide-eyed for a fraction of a second before shrugging and taking a long sip of coffee. “I wanted to get a workout in.”
“You do know that the gym has perfectly good treadmills in places where it isn’t subarctic, right?” Sam asked. He knew, because that’s where he’d been before he’d stopped at Daisy’s.
Lucy rolled her eyes, but it wasn’t lost on him that she buried a smile in her coffee mug. “I’m aware of the gym and all its amenities,” she said. “But there’s no such thing as weather that’s too cold for a run. Only runners who aren’t dressed properly for it. Anyway, I don’t mind the cold. It helps keep my head clear. And, by the way, you’re not an asshole.”
Shock made him misjudge the edge of his coffee cup, the carafe hitting the ceramic mug with aclinkand sending a splash of coffee to the table. “Sorry?” he asked, making quick work of the spilled coffee with a pair of paper napkins from the dispenser against the wall, but Lucy didn’t blink.
“A minute ago, you said you were enough of an asshole that you wouldn’t ask me to join you if you didn’twantme to join you. But you’re not an asshole.”
She delivered the statement at the exact moment Gigi walked up to the table, her heavily penciled eyebrows lifted halfway to the bangs on her wig—platinum blond with lots of volume, today. Tomorrow, who knew? “Welllll,” she purred, her gaze darting between us as her smile took off. “Looks like I chose a great moment to ask if you’re ready to order.”
