“This looks amazing,” I said as she finished bringing all the sides out. “You really didn’t need to do all this.”
“I wanted to,” she said. “You deserve something nicer than frozen stuffed peppers.”
“Hey, I love stuffed peppers,” I said.
“Then you should have them the way I make them. From scratch,” she said.
“Uhh… yes,” I said. “Yes, I should.”
We dug in, and it was even better than it looked. I kept gushing about the food, and she kept blushing and telling me to stop. I wasn’t flattering her, though. It really was damn good.
“So, how was work?” she asked.
“Well, I told the guys about me wanting to go back to school,” I said.
“How did they take it?”
“Better than I could have imagined,” I said.
Her eyes grew wide, and a smile stretched across her face. “Really? That’s so great!”
“Yeah, they were really encouraging,” I said. “They all said they would be sad to see me leave the family business if it gets to that, but they wanted me to be happy.”
“Well, your brothers are all grown,” Becca said, piercing a piece of chicken with her fork. “They can handle themselves now. I am just so happy to hear they were supportive.”
“I just wish I hadn’t been so nervous to talk to them,” I said. “I shouldn’t have been.”
“That just shows how much you care about their opinion,” she said. “That’s not necessarily a bad thing.”
“Maybe,” I said. “I do feel bad about leaving them, you know?”
“You could always stay at the bar if you want,” Becca said. I tried to read her face, to see if there was disappointment or disapproval in that gaze. There was none. She wasn’t judging me and was genuinely trying to help me. I started to feel a connection there with her, something I tried desperately to deny but was growing with every day. Something far more than just sleeping together. “You could stay there, or you could pursue something else. Either way, what matters in life is that you are doing something, pursuing something, that makes you happy.”
She smiled, and I felt the emotion overcoming me. I wanted to hold her, to touch her, right then and there. I put down my fork and leaned over the corner of the table that separated us.
“Thank you,” I said. “You’re right.” I held out my arms for a hug, and when we broke the embrace, I placed a soft kiss to her mouth. I lingered there, tasting the red wine and salt on her lips. It was velvety, and decadent, and intoxicating. Just like her. “Thank you for supporting me.”
“Anytime,” she whispered, inches from my lips, and then we locked them again. When our kiss broke, we returned to our meal, an undeniable smile between us and our feet touching under the table.
20
Becca
A full day had passed since he’d told his brothers about his plans, and he was lucky enough to have the entire next day off. It meant some research during the day, running some errands including a grocery store trip, which I assisted him on and tried to sell him on the benefits of having separate shampoo and conditioners. After the dinner I cooked the night before, he said he felt like he should do something for me as well and offered to take me out to a nice restaurant, but after getting home from the grocery store and tumbling into a shower together that lasted far longer than strictly necessary, we were both more inclined to have a night at home.
The table was set with candles, and the lights were turned down low. Soft music played from a radio in a distant corner, and a couple of fresh bottles of wine from our foray into the wilds of mass grocers were on the table. He opened one and poured us both a large glass, and we clinked them together as he checked the app on his phone to let me know when the food would arrive.
It was a cop-out, he said, but I enjoyed it. It was so cute to see him go out of his way to show me a nice time, even though I didn’t want to go out and would have been perfectly fine with a pizza and pajamas.
A knock on the door got me standing, and he grinned as I kissed my forehead. The smile on my face immediately faded away when I saw who was standing there.
“What the hell is going on here?” Nick asked, looking over Tyler’s shoulder to see me at the table, the candles glowing in the darkness and the glass of wine in my hand. From the darkness, “That’s Amore” was playing, and I instantly regretted being cute and putting on the Italian Restaurant mix on my streaming music app.
“It’s nothing,” Tyler began, but Nick brushed by him into the living room. I flipped on the light as he turned on me.