I dug the spoon in the sorbet and took another bite to cool my rising temper while thinking about how I had dashed around looking for that damn cologne.
“I was so irritated as I had to make another trip to go collect the stuff as the company I ordered from couldn’t deliver it in time,” I raised my eyebrows and glared daggers at him. “And I did all that on the remote possibility that you might attend the wedding!”
I dumped my teaspoon on the table and called the waiter over to get the next set of dishes to try.
“I’m sorry,” Damon shocked me by apologizing and not coming back with some snarky comment. “I should not have jumped to conclusions.”
“What color was the card on your gift basket?” I asked him.
“White,” Damon told me.
“That wasn’t your basket,” I told him. “Your basket had a green card on it.” I frowned. “I wonder who got your basket?” That was even more irritating because there were special gifts for the best man in the basket. “I’ll check when we get back to the hotel.”
“It’s fine,” Damon sighed. “I love this salad.” He pointed to the carpaccio.
The rest of the entrées went about without incident until we got to the second of the main dishes to try. That was when Damon finally used some pepper, and to his surprise, salt poured out. He just closed his eyes and cursed before opening them and surprising me by laughing.
“Are there any more surprises for me?” Damon asked me with a grin.
I was about to tell him as I was feeling bad and a little childish. But before I could say anything, he took a big chunk of the very dish I wanted to warn him about. As his mouth closed over the food and he bit in, I saw his eyes widen. I was sure if he was animated, steam would’ve been pouring out of his ears. His eyes started to water as he pulled the fork out of his mouth and had no option but to swallow the mouthful before he sputtered and his face turned red. Within about a minute, there were beads of perspiration popping onto his brow.
“I was about to warn you that that dish had ghost peppers in it,” I pulled an oops type of face.
Damon went to grab the water but I warned him not to drink water as it made it worse but he wasn’t listening to me and downed it. I flagged down a waiter and got him a glass of room temperature milk.
“Are you trying to kill me now?” Damon accused me around his coughing. “Who in their right mind would eat that shit?”
“Drew,” Todd loomed over them. “It’s one of his favorite dishes.” The corner of his mouth lifted into a half grin. “Here.” Todd put a disgusting looking yellowish milky drink in front of Damon. “You’re supposed to eat it slowly and drink this eggnog chaser between bites to stop the chili from biting you back.”
“Eggnog,” Damon cleared his throat again.
“It’s like eggnog,” Todd shrugged. “I call it that so people will try it. It’s not as bad as it looks. It will take the burn off your tongue and throat.”
“So, you two planned this?” Damon looked at myself and Todd.
“No, actually, it was just a funny bonus,” I grinned. “But Todd here did bet me that you’d once again fail to read the card next to the dish that warns you about the ghost peppers.” I pointed to the card lying next to the plate.
“That’s why I prepared a big glass of my eggnog for you and not the usual shot glass to be sipped when eating that dish,” Todd grinned. “But, well done.” He patted Damon on the back. “You’re the first person to shovel in a whole mouthful of the dish and not vomit or pass out.”
“Thank you?” Damon gave Todd a comical look, making Todd laugh.
“I’ll be back with the desserts and some of the specialty beverages,” Todd looked at Damon. “Thanks for giving me a name for the spiced cappuccino. I’ve renamed it the volcano cappuccino in your honor.” He laughed as he walked back to the kitchen.
“Wow, so my pain and embarrassment got me an honorary coffee!” Damon rolled his eyes.
“I think it’s nice and shows he is finally forgiving you. Maybe he saw that Celeste was no longer of any concern to him,” I grinned and got a dirty look from Damon.
CHAPTER 10
Damon
Carla had been getting really sneaky with her little tricks. A few of my events had not turned out as they should've. Things I had ordered were delayed or delivered to the wrong function. In the meantime, Carla’s functions had suddenly become epic. The woman had even gone on a jungle zip lining adventure while the men got stuck on a boring bus tour of the island. It was supposed to have been a plane tour followed by skydiving. But somehow the bookings had been muddled up. A bunch of sixty-year-olds had had the time of their life seeing the island from above and then jumping out of a plane.