“Of course. Certainly. Anything you’d like, Mr.—Simon.”
“Is there possibly something without cheese or cream or butter on the menu this evening?” He drops his voice. “Dairy and I don’t get along.”
Jake’s eyes bulge. “Oh, fuck, I forgot,” he whispers.
“I didn’t,” I tell Simon.
He beams at me. “Yes, I noticed. So observant and thoughtful.”
“If they have ground beef in the kitchen, I could make you a burger.”
“Like the one you made us the other day?”
“As long as the beef’s good.”
“That would be?—”
“I can make a burger,” Jake interrupts.
I squint at him. “But can you?”
“I can make a goddamn burger, Bea.” He huffs, squeezes his eyes shut briefly, and then forces a smile at Simon as the murmured conversations around us stop completely. “Apologies. It would be my honor to make you a hamburger.”
Simon’s eyes are positively twinkling. “Thank you kindly, old chap.”
“My pleasure. I’ll—I’ll get right on that. Ask for Jake. Anything you want.”
“May I please have whipped honey butter and sourdough bread?” I ask.
Jake’s eyelid twitches.
Someone at the table closest to the door snickers, then coughs.
“We only have?—”
“Oh, I adore whipped honey butter,” Simon says. “In small quantities. Heavy on the honey. Light on the butter.”
Jake’s jaw clenches. “Right. Yes. Yes, of course.”
I give my ex-boyfriend the fakest of my smiles. “Thank you so much.”
He growls and turns to the door, trips over his own shoelace, straightens, and marches out of the room.
Every other couple stares at us.
“Are you sabotaging his grand opening, Bea?” Quincy whispers into the silence from across the room.
Simon laughs again. “Sabotage? Rather think we’re helping the old boy out with publicity.”
I make anmmof agreement over my champagne even as I become fully convinced that Simon has known about me and Jake and my real plans all night.
Maybe it’s not that bad.
Maybe he’s really this happy and nice and he has a petty streak or a protective streak or asomething.
Quincy cackles.
A woman at the next table frowns at him, and Wendell shushes him.
