your food, though, Errin.”
She frowned.
I took one last sip of my drink then waved a goodbye but stopped short when I remembered the pretzel on my table.
I came back, seeing Errin’s face light up as if she actually thought I’d go through that song and dance and stay.
Picking up the barely eaten pretzel, I walked it over to Ares’ table.
“Don’t let this go to waste,” I said, placing it over her salad.
She looked up at me in surprise.
“Everything okay?” she asked.
And for once, I actually wanted to tell someone everything.
“I’m… no.” I paused. “Eat the damn pretzel.”
Then with that, I tracked down my waitress and had my food delivered to Ares’ table. Then had Ares’ food bagged up in case she actually did want it and paid for everyone’s dinner but the asshole she went out on a date with.
Chapter 4
I saw that.
-Karma
Ares
My belly was full of steak and baked potato, and yet another potential boyfriend was crossed off my list.
After watching me eat almost the entire fucking pretzel that Hayes had left at my table, Kelly, the ex-police officer that now did his own PI—private investigator work—had gotten really pissy.
Who was that? he’d asked.
After my explanation of a family friend, he’d been quite content to let it go.
Only, when my order of grilled chicken hadn’t come out, but a medium-rare steak, and I’d actually told the waitress not to take it back when Hayes had actually ordered it, he’d gotten pissed.
Like, beyond pissed.
So pissed, in fact, that he’d asked for the check.
When only his steak had come out on the ticket, his eyes had gone cold.
Which was why I was laughing now.
Because Errin had seen and heard my upset dining partner. And, since apparently she knew him from the police station, she’d tried to soothe him.
Which was how he and Errin had ended up leaving together, leaving me to tag along wondering how in the hell I’d gotten left on my date when Hayes had been the one to leave.
Honestly, I was more upset with myself than anything.
I sure the hell knew how to pick them.
Even worse, I was kind of giddy over the fact that Hayes had been paying enough attention to me while on his own date that he saw I wasn’t happy with what I ordered on mine.
An hour later found me once again at the store buying tampons.
I’d managed to get all the way home, changed out of my date clothes, showered and into my slouchiest of sweatpants and a tank top that was so tight and short that it showed off a sliver of my belly. I covered that up with a sweatshirt of my dad’s that had been his in high school.
That was when I’d discovered I didn’t have any tampons.
Like, none.
I’d actually entertained the thought of going to my mother’s house and picking those back up, but then I’d have to explain how my date went, and I wasn’t in the mood for that.
Instead, I found myself at my favorite grocery store.
I pulled the hood up high over my head and tucked my face as far back as it would go, so nobody that I might know—or might know my father—would recognize me.
I got to my desired aisle and froze when I saw a very familiar man staring blankly at the diapers that the tampon aisle shared with the baby aisle.
“I don’t know,” Hayes rumbled softly. “Do you think we should go with the fours, or the fives?”
My lips twitched when the boy who was sitting in the curve of Hayes’ arm slapped him on the chest.
“I don’t know either,” he mumbled, as if the boy had agreed with him. “Fuck your mother.”
I covered my mouth with my hand but couldn’t quite stop the laughter from bubbling out.
Hayes stiffened and turned, his eyes narrowed.
But apparently, he had no problem seeing through my disguise because he released a breath of tension that I hadn’t realized he’d inhaled.
“It’s you.” He sighed. “You know anything about diapers?”
I pushed the hood back on my hoodie and felt my hair fall free and go wild around my face.
Normally, when I was heading out somewhere, I tried to get my hair into some semblance of control. I’d blow dry it, spend twenty minutes straightening