“Where is she now? Can I meet her?” he smiled.
I shrugged, flirted, “If you play your cards right.”
“Do you worry that you’ll relapse?” he asked. It was a fair question, but he clarified anyway, “Just to be clear, I’m not scared that you have an eating disorder in your past. We all have baggage. I mean, as you know, I’m not brave enough to tell my brothers I’m an artist. Not that that’s the same.” He rolled his eyes at himself, “I’m trying to say, I’m just curious how you feel about it.”
“My parents were my trigger. As long as they’re nowhere near me, I don’t worry about having an eating disorder.”
“I’d say that was sort of sad, but it sounds like they aren’t worth knowing. And you made new family.”
I did. Claire was my family.
He reached for my hand under the table and I threaded my fingers with his. The waiter came over. We ordered dinner and a bottle of wine. I got the trout and Luke had some creamy pasta dish, reminding me that he was a vegetarian.
I tore a hunk of bread off the loaf in the basket that the waiter left behind and asked, “So, how does a cowboy wind up only eating sprouts?”
He shrugged, “Hypocrite, I guess. I’m just a bleeding heart. I can’t kill ‘em, so I can’t eat ‘em. But I still make a living off them. It’s really an atrocity,” he laughed.
I laughed too.
He spoke with such passion, “How can anyone take me seriously? My brothers call me Patty. Short for hamburger patty. It’s just ludicrous.”
“They’re tough on you,” I suggested.
“Sometimes,” he shrugged. “Honestly, I think I’m tough on me. The teasing is all in good fun and it doesn’t always bother me, but I don’t want to disappoint them, ya know? We run this ranch together. And we really support each other. I just don’t want them to feel like they can’t count on me, like the ranch doesn’t matter to me...”
He was talking seriously. Thinking deeply about his relationship with his brothers, something that he had clearly identified to me as important to him and also complicated, so while he spoke, I instinctually rested my hand on his knee to comfort him. But as soon as I touched him, he stopped speaking. He licked his lips and pulled a tight breath through his nose. It took me a second but I realized my hand on his knee was a catalyst. My touch turned him on, so much that he lost his train of thought.
Not trying to be slut-shaming, to each their own, but I didn’t normally do the kind of thing I did next, yet with Luke, something came over me. I slid my hand higher and felt his thigh muscle tighten under my fingers. I looked up into his eyes and watched his Adam's apple bob as he gulped in anticipation. He certainly didn’t seem horrified. I moved higher. He sucked in another breath. And then, he was in my hand, thick and hard under the denim of his jeans. I made a sound, a low hum of appreciation, an animalistic sound, announcing my own excitement. He got harder.
Through gritted teeth, he joked, “Check, please.”
I laughed and released him, pulling up my hands to cover my face. “Oh my God,” I said, hiding behind my palms. “I can’t believe I just did that.” I was pretty sure I was blushing from head to toe. I peeked out from between my fingers to look at him.
He had a cocky grin on his face as he threw his arms behind him on the back of the booth and flopped his legs open so that his knee crashed into mine. “Not complaining,” he quipped. He turned towards me, dipped down, and nibbled on my ear, sending shivers down my spine. Then, he dropped his hand to my knee before he breathed out, “Do I turn you on too, Maddie?”
Yes. So much yes.