the art aquar­ium and I strug­gled to keep my mouth closed. I was ac­tu­al­ly in Boston. Home to Boston Col­lege and MIT, the Boston Bean and Boston cream pie, site of the in­fa­mous Tea Par­ty and a mil­lion oth­er his­tor­ical events. Whit­tak­er could re­al­ly take me places.

The restau­rant was tucked in­to a quaint neigh­bor­hood on the north side of the city, where brown­stone build­ings abound­ed and old-?fash­ioned street lamps flick­ered over stone-?cov­ered streets. A tuxe­doed valet took the keys to Whit­tak­er's car and he of­fered his arm again as he led me through the door. A crum­bling cor­ner­stone near the side­walk read 1787.

Once we were in­side, an­oth­er valet slipped my coat from my arms and a third led us to a ta­ble in the back cor­ner, close enough to a roar­ing fire that we could en­joy its warmth, but far enough away that we wouldn't get over­heat­ed. The con­ver­sa­tion in the room was hushed, ac­com­pa­nied by the sounds of tin­kling chi­na and sil­ver­ware. As I sat in the cush­ioned chair, I tried not to stare at the di­amonds that dripped from ev­ery fe­male neck and wrist in the room. Nev­er in my life had I been in a restau­rant so el­egant, sur­round­ed by peo­ple for whom mon­ey was no ob­ject. If my par­ents could see me now.

“Mr. Whit­tak­er. A plea­sure to see you,” a tall, mus­tached man greet­ed us. “Would you like to see the wine list?”

“That won't be nec­es­sary, John,” Whit said. “We'll have a bot­tle of the Baro­lo '73 we had for my par­ents' an­niver­sary.”

I blinked. Wasn't there still a le­gal drink­ing age in this coun­try?

“A fine choice, sir. Beth will be right over with your menu.” He ex­ecut­ed a slight bow and moved sound­less­ly away.

188

“No card­ing?” I asked.

Whit­tak­er chuck­led. “Reed, please.”

All righty, then. I crossed my legs un­der the ta­ble, bonk­ing the un­der­side with my knee and caus­ing all the dish­es to jump.

“Oops. Sor­ry,” I said.

“It's okay,” Whit­tak­er said in a qui­et, sooth­ing voice, the one that sent pleas­ant re­ver­ber­ations right through me. “Just re­lax.”

“Right. Re­lax.”

I rest­ed my el­bows on the ta­ble, then quick­ly yanked them away. Was the el­der­ly wom­an at the next ta­ble glar­ing at me, or was that just the nat­ural state of her face? Un­der the white table­cloth, I fid­dled with the chunky gold bracelet Ki­ran had lent me. Luck­ily, Whit­tak­er didn't seem to no­tice my con­tin­ued fid­get­ing. He leaned back and smiled as a slim man in a black vest poured ice wa­ter in­to our glass­es. For the first time, I no­ticed there were three stems of var­ious sizes be­hind my plate. Ap­par­ent­ly we were to do a lot of drink­ing. That led me to the or­nate sil­ver­ware, of which there was far too much. Two spoons, three forks, two knives. What could they pos­si­bly be used for?

“Would madam like a bit of bread?”

Sud­den­ly an­oth­er man was hov­er­ing over me, prof­fer­ing a bas­ket full of rolls. They smelled in­cred­ible and I could feel their warmth on my face.

“Uh . . . sure,” I said, reach­ing for a brown bun.

The man cleared his throat and I froze. “If madam would like to se­lect one, I would be hap­py to serve her,” he said.

189

“Oh.” My face flushed and I glanced at the old wom­an. Now I was sure she was glar­ing.

“I'll have the brown one, please,” I said, ut­ter­ly de­feat­ed.

“The pumper­nick­el? A fine choice,” he said with a tight smile. Then he pro­duced a pair of sil­ver tongs from be­hind his back, plucked the roll from the bas­ket, and placed it on my bread plate. No fair hid­ing the tongs. If I had seen them, I might have known.

“For you, sir?” he said, turn­ing to Whit­tak­er.

Once Whit had made his se­lec­tion, the bread guy slid over to the wall, where he stood next to the wa­ter guy, just wait­ing to be sum­moned at any mo­ment. I couldn't be­lieve these were ac­tu­al jobs. What did these men put on their re­sumes? Ex­pert Starch Dis­trib­utor? Pro­fes­sion­al Thirst Quencher?

As soon as the bread guy was free and clear, a pret­ty blonde stepped up and hand­ed Whit­tak­er a leather-?bound menu.

“Wel­come to Triv­iat­ta,” she said. “My name is Beth. Please feel free to ask any ques­tions.”

“Thank you, Beth,” Whit­tak­er said, look­ing over the menu.

She turned and start­ed off.

“Uh, Beth?” I said, stop­ping her in her tracks. “I have a ques­tion.”

Tags: Kate Brian Private
Source: readsnovelonline.net