In a Badger Way (Honey Badger Chronicles #2) - Shelly Laurenston Page 0,71
to carry you from the car to the restaurant.”
Shen heard Stevie bopping down the stairs, which surprised him. He’d mostly only seen her barefoot around the house, so he didn’t think she could walk in high heels. Much less bop down the stairs.
But when he turned around, he found that Stevie wasn’t wearing any of his sister’s giant-heeled designer shoes but sneakers. Converse, specifically. Sparkly Converse. Plus jeans, a T-shirt that read, “Shut your piehole,” and her hair in a messy ponytail.
“What are you wearing?” Shen had to ask, laughing.
Instead of being insulted, Stevie did a little spin on that bottom step. “You don’t like?”
“I like, but I thought you were meeting this guy for drinks at that fancy restaurant in Old Westbury? That’s a rich area.”
“Right. He’s trying to impress me. I don’t care that he’s trying to impress me. I want him to know I don’t care.”
“And you want me there . . . ?”
“You’re my security. I need you to make sure he doesn’t punch me in the mouth.” She grinned. “Duh.”
* * *
It was a five-star restaurant where she was meeting Wells. He’d said he happened to be out on the Island for an “important meeting” and had just enough time to get together for an after-meal drink.
Stevie was fine with that. She’d rather not sit through an entire dinner with him. And she’d rather meet him at a restaurant than a bar. Meetings in bars, in her mind, often gave guys the wrong idea. She didn’t want Wells to know what she was up to, but she also didn’t want him to think, even for a nanosecond, that he had a chance in whatever hell the world wanted to believe in that he could ever get back into her panties.
Shen opened the restaurant door and Stevie paused a moment to let go the little shudder she’d been holding inside.
“Are you okay?” Shen immediately asked.
“Oh, yeah. I’m fine.”
“Are you sure? We don’t have to do this,” he said in a very low, quiet voice.
“You are so cute,” she said, loving how he continued to kind of blush when she did.
“Get in the fucking restaurant so we can get this over with.”
Giggling, she walked inside. It was a very nice, very elegant restaurant. She stood out among the wealthy diners, but she didn’t care. Maybe they thought she was a CEO from some Silicon Valley start-up.
“May I help you?” the hostess asked, her snobby gaze giving Stevie the once-over.
“I’m here for Matt Wells. Name is Stevie MacKilligan.”
“Yes. Dr. Wells is waiting for you.”
The hostess started walking and Stevie fell in behind her. As they moved through the restaurant, she turned around to face Shen, now walking backward.
“Tomorrow morning, I have therapy. Can you take me?”
“Sure. I can pick up Kyle afterward.”
“Great. But before you get Kyle,” she remembered, “I need to go see Oriana at her rehearsal.”
“Why?”
“Do I ask you questions?” she shot back.
“You ask everyone questions. Remember the yogi?”
“He was short-tempered and rude.”
“Which yogis are known for.”
Stevie bumped into something and realized it was the hostess, who’d stopped walking.
“Sorry.” She moved around the annoyed woman and Wells pushed away from the table, stood.
He was tall. Nearly six-four. With golden blond hair and gold-green eyes. And a cat. Lion male, specifically, which had been part of the problem with their relationship. Some lions were fun and interesting. And some you wanted to shove in a furnace just so you could watch them scream about their burning hair as they were dying.
“Stevie,” he said with that handsome smile.
“Matt.”
“Matthew,” he corrected. “I still prefer Matthew.”
“Uh-huh,” she said.
Stevie reached to pull out a chair, but Shen was already there, doing the job. She glanced back at him and saw that his whole disposition had changed. He’d gone from her adorable panda to the guy hired to play the Secret Service agent in a blockbuster summer movie.
He was even wearing his sunglasses. Sunglasses! At night! Inside the restaurant.
She bit the inside of her mouth so that she didn’t laugh and took her seat. Then Shen stood behind her, his hands clasped in front of him, his gaze continually scanning the restaurant.
It was ridiculous and hilarious and she was loving every minute of his lunacy because she knew exactly how much it was annoying Wells. And completely relaxing her in the moment.
“It’s so good to see you again, Matt,” she lied.
“You, too. And it’s still Matthew.”
“Is it? Because you’ve always looked so much like a Matt to me.”