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“Good running into you, Austin. I’ve heard of sacking the quarterback, but I think that’s a little bit much for me. Good luck at the playoffs,” she said, clearly not amused.
Bonnie sauntered off and the heat from Austin’s hand was the only thing that registered in my brain. I don’t even think I heard the music playing until Austin sat back in his seat, shaking his head at Bonnie as she strutted her stuff right out the door.
I chewed off a few bites of my rib and wiped my fingers with the paper towel again, deciding it was better not to ask him why he’d held my hand. Obviously, he wanted Bonnie to think he was taken so she’d clear out. Austin resumed devouring his rack of ribs. Except men didn’t hold theirs daintily like women did, using their fingertips. He held them caveman style.
Maybe it was strategic so he could sexily turn up his hand and slowly suck off the sauce from his thumb.
Or maybe I had an overactive imagination and shouldn’t have been noticing such a thing.
“Seven?” I asked.
His black lashes winked over his wolfish blue eyes. “Wishful thinking.”
I was seconds away from bringing up the topic about my boss when I remembered April sitting in a pile of taffy. A laugh began to bubble. Then there was my mother and sister being kidnapped, staying in a house full of strange men, realizing I was a Shifter (and going into heat, no less), discovering my brother was a murder victim, and then my father being a criminal on the run for diamond theft.
My unbelievable life finally erupted into a burst of maniacal laughter. It graduated only briefly to the infamous Beaker laugh before tapering off into tears. Austin watched me with apprehension, because nothing was funny. He must have sensed it was one of those moments when a person has a very public display of a nervous breakdown. A few people turned to look, but he ignored them.
“You okay? Shit, I’m really sorry, Lexi. I haven’t been the most sensitive person with everything going on.” He set down his rib and wiped off his hands. “Ivan should be calling me tonight. He said if I didn’t hear from him by midnight, then either he was dead, or Hell had finally frozen over.”
“I hope so,” I said.
“He’ll find her,” Austin reassured me. “And if he doesn’t, I’ll find her myself.”
“I think my boss is sick,” I finally said, taking a long sip of my glass of beer. “A neighbor said he has cancer and went to the hospital. That’s why the bills haven’t been paid on the store. I didn’t know it was that bad.”
He sighed, rubbing his clean-shaven jaw. The talisman around his neck was tucked inside his white shirt and he had styled his hair handsomely. He still looked like he could drag anyone in the parking lot and kick their ass, but I didn’t see that side of him when I looked into his eyes. I just saw Austin.
I still wanted to mess up his hair with my fingers.
“Don’t worry about the store. I sent the twins over to clean up.”
“You what?”
“You shouldn’t be doing all that work yourself.” Austin glanced at his watch. “They’ll be there until one o’clock and then head back to the house. I keep a tight watch on my pack.” He turned his fork between his fingers and set it down. “Don’t look at me that way, Lexi. Just accept my help.”
And I did. I accepted it because at this point, my only support system was a bra. “Thanks. I hope April knows what’s going on; she might have a problem with two strange men showing up to clean.”
“Shouldn’t be a problem,” he said, eying my plate. “They took Ivy with them. Women are more trusting when another woman is around.”
“Lovely. You sent Ivy into a sweatshop environment to scrub a dirty floor? She’s really going to want to stay with you now,” I said sarcastically.
The coleslaw was just as good as I remembered and I must have cleaned it off my plate in five scoops.
“Never did know where you put it all,” he murmured, setting down his fork.
“Well, you can probably tell now. I’ve put on a few since you last saw me.”
He snorted and stuffed a roll in his mouth. “In all the right places.”
There was that tingle again.
I wrapped my lips around the prongs of my fork and looked up. Austin wasn’t just watching me, his eyes were glued to my mouth, and I became self-conscious when a piece of cabbage stuck to my bottom lip. My hand flew up to cover my mouth and the awkward moment passed. The music changed over to a song by Pink (“Try,” I think it was), and a paper wrapper from a straw sailed by us and landed on the floor.
Austin smiled nostalgically and rapped his knuckles on the table to the beat of the song, lost in his thoughts. “This is nice,” he finally said.
“Yeah.”
I think I knew what he meant. We were always linked by Wes, and it was getting easier to be together without his ghost hovering between us.
