Fools (Licking Thicket 3)

“Not kidding.” Dunn grinned. “Decided to go all out. Table for two at the Steak ’n Bait, seven o’clock.”

In a town the size of Licking Thicket, there wasn’t much need of fine dining. Birthdays and anniversaries, retirements and new babies meant popping into the Tavern with some friends, or heading over to the cute Indian place, or getting takeout pizza, or frequenting a half dozen other restaurants around town that had hardly any wait and no dress code.

But if you wanted a really special experience and weren’t afraid to pay for it—the first date to impress all first dates, or an apology to end all apologies, or a place to propose to your sweetheart—there was only one candlelit, fine-linen, wear-your-clean-boots establishment in the area that had been the scene of so many proposals they kept a tally of “Yesses” on the giant sign out front: Licking Thicket’s own Steak ’n Bait.

I’d been there after each of my graduations, and again for my grandmother’s ninetieth birthday. I knew Dunn had been there when he made the All-State baseball team and again when his sister, Gracie, got engaged.

We had never, ever gone there together. I’d never dreamed we would.

Except now suddenly we were, and I was so excited I stopped breathing for a minute or so.

This was highly irresponsible of me, as a medical professional and whatnot, but holy crap, what were you supposed to do when the man you loved wanted to have a candlelit dinner for two to discuss some life-changing revelations involving the both of you?

Dunn grabbed my shoulders in his two hands and shook me lightly.

“Tuck?” he demanded, his face so close to mine that I could see gold constellations in his green eyes. “Y’okay?”

I sucked in a breath and nodded… and then kept nodding like a skipping record on Meemaw Wright’s old record player. “No. Yeah. I’m totally okay. I’m… I’m great. The greatest.” I was floating. Flying. Soaring. “I’ll be ready at six-thirty.”

When Dunn picked me up, I’d almost talked myself all the way down from excitement to steady caution.

“He’s straight,” I’d told myself as I’d chosen my favorite outfit—a chunky white sweater that made me look “glowy,” according to Ava Siegel, who I trusted to know such things.

“So straight,” I’d told the mirror, after I’d gotten out of a fresh shower and styled my hair perfectly.

“Super-duper straight,” I’d whispered into the chilly air as I’d waited for Dunn on my front porch after Vienna had left and I’d locked the place up tight. “And that’s fine. I wouldn’t want to change him! I just want him to be happy.”

But then the man had shown up in a forest-green button-down shirt I hadn’t seen him wear since the Lickin’ Dinner Dance last summer, and a pair of navy pants that cupped his ass like they were in love with him too, and when he’d looked across the cab of his truck at me and said, “You know I’d never do anything to jeopardize our friendship, right, Tuck?” I’d lost my grip on the helium balloon of my emotions again, and my heart had squeezed so painfully I’d lost my breath.

Fact: We were at a date restaurant.

Fact: He was sure as heck dressed like this was a date, with no muck boots or fishing vest in sight.

Fact: He kept darting me glances across the table and acting all squirrelly and uncomfortable, which had never happened between us before. And while this would normally not be a good thing, it was yet more evidence that somehow, improbably, impossibly, Dunn Johnson had asked me on a date.

Sweet Jesus, Meemaw had been right all those years ago. Miracles really did happen.

“I think we should have a bottle of prosecco,” I told the server impulsively when she came to take our drink orders after dropping off water and warm rolls. “What do you think, Dunn?”

“Oh, uh. Yeah,” he agreed, tapping his fingers on the snowy-white tablecloth. “Good idea. Anything you like. And I’ll have a shot of Jameson. Neat.”

Uh… okay. That was sobering. Dunn wasn’t a big drinker any more than I was. Also worrying was the way his gaze ping-ponged around the restaurant, like he was too nervous to look at anything too long, especially me.

“Dunn, you know you can talk to me, right? You can tell me… anything. Literally anything. And I’d never judge you. Or push you,” I added, thinking that maybe fear of the unknown was tripping him up. “I can be patient, you know?”

Dunn’s eyes came to rest on my face, and he smiled. “’Course I know that, Tuck.”

“Then tell me what all this is about.” I reached into the basket to grab a roll, then twirled my hand in the air to indicate the beautiful restaurant and the reservation. “Spill your guts, please.” Before I lose my mind.