It sailed right off Keith’s head, and smacked into a server carrying a tray full of food.
CHAPTER8
Aterrible moment of silence followed the crash, and into that silence, Keith’s stag whispered,Oh no.
The server wore fettuccini and marinara, noodles and sauce dripping from his eyebrows to his hips. He hadn’t actually dropped the serving tray. It might have been better if he had, because instead, in a flinch reflex, he’d clutched it toward himself, raising his arms to protect his face from the object flying at him.
He had a mushroom in his hair.
Most of the food and tableware had then smashed to the floor, drenching him with Italian food and sodas on the way. Keith could see one plate still caught between the poor guy’s ribs and the edge of the serving tray. The server looked down at it, and in resignation, simply moved the tray away from his body.
The final plate slid to the floor and broke with a single sharp crack.
It was as if that noise released the rest of the sound in the restaurant. A combination of horrified, distressed laughter and worry filled the air. Keith was on his feet somehow, his chair knocked over backward, and he realized his hand was extended like he would catch the flying antlers. He whispered, “I am so sorry,” which didn’t even begin to cover it, and took a couple of steps toward the poor server. “Are you okay? That food must have been hot. Oh my god. I am so sorry.”
The server, not unreasonably, backed up a step. Keith guessedhewouldn’t want him coming near him either, if he’d just attacked someone with a set of felt antlers. “No—don’t—I’m fine—” The server looked down at himself, sopping with food and drink, and gave the deepest, most resigned sigh Keith had ever heard. “The sodas cooled the food off. I didn’t get burned.”
By then most of the restaurant was on its feet, people babbling to offer help that really wouldn’t be much help at all. The entire waitstaff and several other employees were there, surrounding the poor guy Keith had accidentally assaulted. Somebody was already cleaning up the mess, and Keith was just standing there like an embarrassed idiot who didn’t even dare look at his date.
Stacy put her hand in his, and very quietly said, “It was an accident. Are you okay?”
Keith still couldn’t even look at her. He spoke partly to her, and partly to the poor guy who had five people mopping somebody’s dinner off him. “I just got my hair cut,” he explained miserably. “It was really long, and it used to take a lot of effort to move it. I moved my head way too fast. I am so sorry. I’ll pay—for everything. For their dinner.”
He looked around to see whose meal had ended up on the floor, and found a family whose tween daughter’s eyes still hadn’t un-rounded from the shock of it all. She had both hands over her mouth still, in fact, and a little brother whose expression was perfectly torn between horrified delight at the mess, and the dawning realization that his dinner was all over the floor. Keith said, “I’msosorry,” again, and the mother, whose pose was very like her daughter’s, jerked her gaze to him.
He must have looked incredibly pitiful, because a trace of sympathetic humor replaced her dismay. “It’s not theworstmess I’ve ever seen,” she told him, then, brightly, added, “and at least it’s not our fault.”
Keith put his face in his hands. Or in his hand, really, because Stacy was still holding the other one, and when he tried to pull away she held on more tightly. “It’s okay,” she murmured. “It’s a god-awful mess, but it’s okay, okay?”
He managed a nod and offered an apologetic smile to the family whose dinner he’d ruined. “Honestly, your dinner is on me.”
“Au contraire,” said the waiter. “Their dinner isdefinitelyon me.”
A burst of laughter rattled around the restaurant like a shot, and suddenly it all seemed a little less awful. The waiter had a rueful smile, like he just hadn’t been able to resist the comment, and Keith said, “I amsosorry,” to him again.
“I’ll live,” the kid promised as he headed into the back to change his clothes and, Keith hoped, go home for the night. A replacement dinner came out almost as soon as the floor was clean, and within a few minutes the room was bustling with chat and service again, as if Keith hadn’t stopped the entire evening with one disastrous fling of his head. He and Stacy sat down again, and it took all his nerve to even look at her.
She had a little smile, but not one that laughed at him. Her dark eyes were worried, and she put her hand out toward him, as if wanting to offer comfort. “I’ve seen a hundred people toss their heads like that after a big chop. Never to such effect, though.Areyou okay, Keith? That was a lot.”
“I honestly don’t think I’ve ever been so embarrassed in my life. That poor kid. He’s going to smell like garlic for three days. His shoes were saturated. Oh, God, I should buy him new shoes.” Keith put his hand in Stacy’s, but covered his face with the other one again. “This has been a hell of a first date.”
“It’ll make a great story for the grandkids.”
Keith’s head popped up to find Stacy a little wide-eyed and startled at herself. “I mean, not that I’m, uh. Thinking about grandkids. It’s just the kind of thing people say. Right?”
“Right.” Keith wasn’t at all sure it was the kind of thing people said on first dates unless they were with their fated mates, but she didn’t know about that part yet.
We can’t tell her, his stag whispered in alarm.Not afterthat. She’ll want to know if the antlers were for me and she’ll never think I’m beautiful or handsome if she knows. She’ll hate me!
I have to tell her sometime!
Do you?The stag sounded almost wistful. Keith wished, really wished, that he could separate the big deer out from himself for a minute so he could gape at it properly. He had genuinely never heard of a shifter animal arguing against telling their mate the truth.
Of course I do! She’s my fated mate!
But I’m anembarrassment.
Keith could not, at that particular moment in time, argue with that. He managed a weak,She’ll understand,but none of this would have happened if the silly beast hadn’t needed antlers so badly that Keith had agreed to wear a felt set he could throw across the room with a vigorous shake of his head.
