“Just one?” the hostess asked. She was pretty, with a short blonde bob and a nice smile.

“I’m meeting someone here, sugar.” I grinned, and hers grew, but then I remembered I’d crazily agreed not to hook up with anyone and again wondered what in the hell I was doing. And did that mean he expected me not to flirt? It was basically my automatic setting.

“That would be me. He’s meeting me here,” Elijah said, and I realized he was standing beside me.

The hostess grabbed two menus. “Right this way.”

The second she seated us at the booth and walked away, Elijah gave me his disappointed face.

“Oh God. What did I do now?”

“Guilty conscience?” he asked.

“No. You’re giving me your disappointed face, where you scrunch up your eyes, your forehead wrinkles, and your mouth goes from cute and pouty to grumpy scowl.”

His brown eyes widened, and his mouth dropped open. “I don’t do that. I don’t have a disappointed face.”

“You totally have a disappointed face. Believe me, I should know. You give it to me as often as you do your annoyed face or your angry face.”

“Ugh. Whatever. I could be home watching true-crime documentaries, you know. I don’t have to deal with this.”

I leaned in and gave him a half-smile. “We’re here for you, sugar. Remember that. And here comes the annoyed face.” I dropped my head back and laughed. He was so predictable.

“I don’t have an annoyed face. Oh my God, we’ve been here a minute, and you’re already driving me crazy.”

“That’s because I call you on your shit.”

He sobered and looked at me, this time with an expression I couldn’t read. I prided myself on being good with people, watching and understanding, so I didn’t like it when someone confused me.

“Do you guys know what you want to drink?” the waitress asked.

“Something with a lot of alcohol,” he replied.

“Darling, do I really drive you to drink?” I gave my best innocent face.

“Darling? What even is that? Did we step into Regency England?”

“Sweetie?”

“Elijah.”

“Stud,” I countered, because it was fun to tease him.

Elijah turned to the waitress. “Can you put him at a different table?”

I laughed again. Christ, he was fun. There was something about him that I enjoyed, but I definitely wasn’t unpacking that now—or ever.

“You guys are cute,” the waitress said.

“Well, I am.” I winked.

“So, a bottle of tequila?” Elijah countered.

“I’ll take a diet Coke,” I told her.

“A Dr. Pepper for me,” Elijah added.

She nodded, told us she’d give us a minute with the menus, then walked away. Elijah held his in his hand. He was wearing a cropped tee, and I was annoyed I hadn’t taken the time to admire it more when we were standing up. He had great abs, firm muscles beneath smooth brown skin. His eyelashes were thick, sooty, fanning against his face as he blinked. There were a lot of secrets in those eyes, and I couldn’t help wondering what some of them were. I’d acknowledged that ILWMBF fascinated me, but the truth was, Elijah did too, even though I couldn’t put my finger on why. He continued to peruse the menu as if I weren’t there, and his pink tongue sneaked out and licked his bottom lip, which was really fucking kissable.

His eyes darted to mine. “What? You’re looking at me weird. Why are you looking at me weird?”

“You’re a paranoid person, aren’t you?”

“What? No I’m not.” I cocked a brow at him, and he added, “Fine, maybe a little, but you put me on edge for some reason. I’m not like this with everyone.”

Well…that was interesting, wasn’t it? I didn’t call him on it, though. Instead, I asked, “What are you going to get?”

He eyed me suspiciously for a moment. “Cheeseburger and sweet-potato fries. You?”

“I think I’m going with the wings and real fries.”

“Sweet-potato fries are real,” he countered. “You like arguing with me.”

“Aren’t you the one who just argued with me?”

“No. You said real fries because you wanted to get a rise out of me. You don’t fool me for a second.”

Okay, so maybe he was right, but I rolled my eyes instead of agreeing with him.

The waitress returned with our drinks and took our orders before leaving us alone again.

“So, tell me a little about you and Danny.”

He answered with, “How do you know so much about this?” then looked around and lowered his voice. “The whole thing, I mean—the advice you give people, and even this.” He motioned back and forth between us.

“I pay attention, I guess.” When I’d thought about this evening, I didn’t imagine Elijah asking me any personal questions. Most of the time, he hadn’t seemed very interested in me, so I was thrown for a loop. I hoped it didn’t go deeper than this. I didn’t want to do things like talk about my parents—about how they’d been together and miserable and continued to make each other miserable their whole lives; about the fighting and the cheating and Dad moving out and getting back together and all the mistakes I’d seen them make. The lessons I’d learned from it.

Tags: Riley Hart Stumbling into Love Romance
Source: readsnovelonline.net