“I was hoping.” She chuckles, unrolling the bag with extreme determination laced on her face and grabbing a few fries before tipping the bag toward me. I dig in, not shy about grabbing a handful.
“Best fries,” I speak with my mouth full.
“So good.” She hums with her eyes closed. There’s nothing mindful or demure about the way she attacks her food. She’s a hundred percent on that.
“One more stop but this one requires a bit of driving for the cake. Should we eat this stuff first?” Since we already established we have no boundary with food, I reach across the center console and steal a fry from the bag that is still on her lap. Then I circle the parking lot, parking in the back.She’s not hesitant as she snacks, adding another fry as she chews the first one down.“So, I know you lost your camera, but other than that, how do you like your internship?”
She finished her fry before saying, “I like photography.”
“Is that all?”
“And hockey.”
“Fair enough.” I reach into the bag from Red Barn and pullout a foil-wrapped kabob. I take a bite before I ask, “Do you have any questions for me?”
She pauses, not rushing her question, giving me just enough time to wonder whether I should have opened the floor for questions. “Why did you ask me to get food with you?”
“I was hungry.” Easy question. Even if it’s not the whole truth. I’m not going to say that ever since I first saw her, I can’t stop thinking about her.Thatwould be weird to say.
“Is that all?”
“Maybe I wanted to talk to you.” I risk another side-eye, pulling my lips into a smirk.
We help ourselves to handfuls of fries. A pleased smile forms on her lips. “So, you say you procrastinate everything but hockey. What else do you do to procrastinate?”
“Good question.” I scratch the top of my head, wondering if I should acknowledge the single biggest weight of pressure I feel every day. The pressure I get from Bill to do everything perfectly. “At the moment, basically anything but hockey.”
“This is so good.” She bleeps out a chuckle as she unwraps her own kabob. I struggle not to stare at how her lips turn up as if we’d just done something masterful.I keep my gaze locked on her as she smiles through each bite. With her hair over the shoulder like that, she looks like a model posing for a food commercial. It’s the kind of beauty that exists only when a girl doesn’t know she’s pretty. I can’t stop watching her. Before she catches me gazing at her, I say, “So, three restaurants; that’s going to be our thing.”
“Right,” she says, her tone drenched in sarcasm. “Because we need a thing.”
I raise an inquiring brow at her while I wad my empty wrapper into a ball and stuff it into the sack. “You just never know.”
She follows my lead, rolling up her empty wrapper and stuffing it into the sack. “I’m full but we still have cheesecake waiting for us at the next place. Should I call to cancel it?”
“Oh no.” I shift my car into gear and drive out. “We are in this together. No quitters.”
“You’re kidding.” Her hand drops to her stomach. “I can’t eat another bite. You have to remember I’m half your size. Maybe three restaurants works for you, but I’m going to be sick.”
She’s all talk.
There’s no way anybody can resist the brownie explosion cheesecake when they see it.
When I get the final sack from JD’s, I don’t open it, and she holds it at bay, refusing to look at it, citing a belly ache. I exit the parking lot. “So, serious question. Since this cake has both brownie and cheesecake, if you could only have one, which one would it be?”
“You can’t ask me that.” She playfully frowns at me. “That’s like asking who my favorite child is.”
“It’s not even close to the same thing. Plus, you don’t have kids.” A smirk tugs at the corners of my mouth, but I hold it back, pretending to be serious. “Cheesecake and brownies are renewables. Children are not. They are irreplaceable.”
Surprise edges in her facial expression, and I can tell by the way her lips pinch together that she’s holding back a rebuttal.
Or maybe I stumped her.
I arrive at the arena parking lot, and since there’s only one car, I assume it’s hers. She doesn’t say it isn’t when I pull up beside it and park. She starts to open her door, but I hand her the sack, and say, “Good thing it’s both cheesecake and brownies. I won’t make you choose.”
“Nah.” She pushes the bag back at me. “It’s yours. You paid for it.”
I hold a firm hand out toward her. “Save it for later when you are thinking about me.”
