72
Lisa
The driver of the Rolls Royce pulls up to a smooth stop. “We’re here, ma’am,” he says in a thick French accent and I have to wonder if Diesel actually hired this guy from France just to drive his car or if he’s just pretending to be French. It isn’t like I’d be able to tell the difference.
I slide out of the backseat with the help of the driver and look up at the...
“Is he fucking kidding me?” I say out loud.
“Excuse me?” the driver says, closing the door behind me.
“Nothing,” I mutter.
With a nod, he walks around to the driver’s side and drives away, leaving me in front of…the Clover Club.
Before you say, “But Lisa, the Clover Club is this amazing place with live jazz music and these cocktails to die for,” yeah, I know. I’ve been here before. The boring suits like to take their dates to places like this.
This does not qualify as a dangerous place. I stalk up to the front door, letting the doorman open the door for me before I sweep inside. This really is ridic. The dark woods and exposed brick lend a sophisticated air to the place, as does the tie on the maître d’.
If this is living dangerously...
Just as the maître d’ opens his mouth to ask me if I have reservations, Diesel slides his arm around me. “George, she’s mine,” he tells the man, and leads me back to a private table in the back. Sure enough, a man playing the alto sax is serenading the restaurant, and I stare at Diesel.
“You think this is some place dangerous?” I ask him. “This is the Clover Club!”
“I noticed,” he said with a chuckle. “Let’s order, shall we?”
The waiter, in a black suit and tie, came up to the table, and I let Diesel order for me, since he seemed to know the menu here from memory. After the waiter disappears to retrieve a bottle of red wine, I just stare at Diesel, eyebrow cocked, total imitation of Ashley. Hey, it works on me; it can work on him!
“Brooklyn is dangerous,” Diesel says. “Did you know that there is this really long history of killings that have happened in Park Slope?”
The waiter smoothly slides our wine glasses between us and then disappears again.
“Down by the Atlantic Pacific Avenue,” he insists, when I continue to just stare at him disbelievingly. “They’ve been going on for years. I have to protect you from all of that.” The jazz musician continues to wail on his saxophone and I tilt my head toward him.
“Going to protect me from the evil musician who might blow his sax a little too loud in my ear?” I ask sarcastically.
“Deafness isn’t something to joke about,” Diesel said, mock seriously. “I could always save you from him.”
“By asking him to go into the other room?”
“Yeah, pretty much.”
“Don’t bother. I think my eardrums will survive the night. But I appreciate your willingness to battle for me.”
“Anytime,” he says with a swagger in his voice and I laugh and I know I shouldn’t be encouraging him but I can’t help myself. He really is full of shit, but since he’s the sexiest man I’ve ever laid eyes on, I forgive him for it.
After eating a sumptuous four-course meal that includes escargot—because that’s something only outlaws eat—we finally head outside, the maître d’ bowing as we leave. “Put it on my tab, will you?” Diesel asks as we pass by. He nods his head in acknowledgment, and then we’re outside, the evening air rushing over us.
“Well, it’s really too bad you didn’t come here on a motorcycle,” I tell him with a teasing grin. “I would’ve gone home with you and fucked if only you’d lived up to your bad boy promises. I already told you, outlaws don’t ride in Rolls—”
A Harley pulls up to the curb, the engine idling loudly and the
n the valet cuts the engine and puts down the kickstand. The sudden silence is almost as deafening as the engine had been. He hands the keys to Diesel.
“Here you go, sir,” he says, a little wide-eyed with excitement, but trying to pretend that he rides Harleys every day. He isn’t fooling me. He pulls down on his jacket as he heads back inside, smoothing back his hair casually.
Diesel smiles a naughty grin at me. “You were saying?” he asks, swinging his leg over the seat.