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“Is there any side you don’t want?”

“Anything sounds good to me, baby.”

Bonnie quickly checked out the wine list and found the cheapest glass of red wine to go with the beef option. The glass was thirty-five dollars. Heck, there were three bottles of wine that were over a thousand dollars. Who in this world had that much money to spend?

When their waiter came back to the table, Jase ordered Dorothy’s lager. The waiter turned to her and asked her what she would like to drink. “Water’s fine.”

“Are you sure?” Jase asked.

“I’m not a big drinker,” she smiled.

“Okay. In that case, we’re ready to order our entrée. Bonnie, how do you like your meat cooked?”

“Medium to medium rare.”

“Can we get the Chateaubriand medium rare, and whatever sides the lady chooses?”

Fuck!

Jase just ordered something that was more than the Japanese beef! At least the sides were reasonably priced, but seriously, shouldn’t they come as part of the meal?

“We’ll take the asparagus and the Yukon Gold potato cakes,” she added.

Bonnie felt her palms begin to sweat. She hated the idea of Jase going to so much trouble on a date that she was mostly going on because of Farah.

Liar!

Okay, maybe there’s more to it, she admitted to herself.

“You doing okay?” Jase asked, as he cocked his head to look at her.

“I’m fine,” she rushed to assure him, but knew that she was failing miserably.

“Bonnie, tell me what’s wrong. Maybe I can fix it.”

She took a deep breath, then blurted out what was bothering her. “I’m worried you’re spending too much money. I would have been happy with a hamburger, and I just don’t want you to go into debt taking me out on a date.”

Bonnie clapped her hand over her mouth and looked at Jase with wide eyes. She could see he was struggling not to laugh.

“I said that, didn’t I?”

“Oh yeah, you did. Now I know where Lachlan gets it.” He let loose a chuckle.

Bonnie sighed. “Amber knows when and how to keep her mouth shut. She got that from my dad. Lachlan and I are just like my mother. She was a true redhead. Lachlan and I just have red highlights, but it results in the temper and us sometimes running our mouths.”

“And their father?”

Bonnie took a deep breath. “I met him at a party when I was a senior in high school. I was the typical dork, straight A’s. I never drank or did any drugs. The worst thing I had going for me is not the best judgment in friends. I went to some party that they begged me to go to, then they left without me. Barry ended up talking me into drinking, then took me home. He took me out a couple more times. There was always alcohol involved, but I just thought that’s what older kids always did.”

“Did he hurt you?”

Bonnie looked up and saw Jase’s expression was locked solid. A muscle was twitching along his jaw.

“No, absolutely not. It was all my idea. He told me everybody did it, and I wanted to be like everybody else, so we…” Bonnie looked down at her lap again. “We did it. I didn’t like it. After that, he never called me again.”

She took a deep breath and smiled at Jase. “My parents were wonderful. They never sounded or acted the least bit disappointed. When I told Barry I was pregnant, he swore he’d never touched me. My parents went to his parents, but they wouldn’t respond. When I went through my parents’ papers after they died, I saw dad had hired an attorney to go after him for child support, but then he must have realized the same as me that Barry would have access to the twins. He knew that would not be a good thing, so he dropped it.”

Jase reached across the table and gently pried her hand out of the fist she had made and tangled their fingers together. “How long ago did your parents die?”