Chapter Seventeen #2
She was already opening her menu. “Starving. I hope they have bread baskets here.”
He grinned and flagged down the server. “A basket of bread, please. With butter?” he asked Cassie.
“God, yes.”
“With butter,” he told the server, and they both stuck with waters.
While they waited, he shot a glance in Schumacher’s direction. His buddy was talking a mile a minute, hands going too, but Schumacher appeared to be paying only partial attention, taking gulps of his drink as he stared at Cassie.
Tristan faced forward and subtly shifted his chair over to block her from view. Cassie didn’t notice, busy perusing the menu. But he felt better. She wasn’t a fucking piece of steak for Schumacher to salivate over.
“So how are you feeling? Tired?” he asked.
Her pretty silver stare lifted to him. “No, I’m fine. Why? Do I not seem fine?”
“You seem totally fine. That’s why I asked.” Though it had occurred to him that maybe Schumacher’s bullshit wasn’t as big a deal to her as it was to him because she was used to dealing with it on the job.
Her lips quirked, and she went back to reading the menu. “You know me too well. But yeah, I’m good.”
He didn’t bring up Schumacher’s behavior because they had to put up with him for another twelve hours or so. And besides, he didn’t want to spoil the time he got to spend with her by talking about that shit. “I checked with Gav earlier. Nothing to report with Becca and Chase.”
“That’s good. What looks good to you?”
Her. Things that would make her want to leave the table. “I’m thinking the short rib. You?”
“I was thinking that too, but I’m leaning toward the seventy-dollar filet now, with the twelve-dollar loaded baked potato and a fifteen-dollar side of roasted asparagus.
” She looked up at him again, a touch of humor making her eyes sparkle in the candlelight.
“You know, since the company’s paying for it. ”
“Go for it.” After putting up with Schumacher, she deserved every bit of it.
The golden, flickering light made her skin glow and painted bright highlights on her inky-black hair. She wore it slightly longer at the front and the sides than at the back.
Just long enough for him to slide his fingers into and grip the strands to kiss her.
The server arrived with their bread and butter and took their orders. Cassie immediately dove into the basket, ripping off a chunk of warm white bread and slathering it with butter.
She shoved a bite into her mouth, groaned softly. “Oh my God, you have to have some of this. It practically melts in your mouth.” She tore off a small piece, buttered it for him and held it out.
Their fingers brushed as he took it. Their gazes locked across the table. And in the flickering candlelight, he saw desire kindle in her eyes, quick like a match strike. That silent yearning she refused to acknowledge.
She pulled her hand back and lowered her gaze as she picked up her water and raised the glass to her lips. He put the bread in his mouth and chewed.
It was probably amazing bread. But he didn’t taste a thing, still stuck on what he’d seen in Cassie’s eyes, and all the visuals he’d imagined of them together that flooded his brain. Every single thing he’d imagined doing with her. To her. And her to him.
He shifted in his chair and ordered himself to stop thinking about her, struggling to hold onto his professional awareness of what was going on around them. Schumacher and his friend were deep in conversation, already digging into their meals.
Somehow, he managed to make decent, non-personal conversation with Cassie over dinner.
He ate everything on his plate, then used a piece of bread to mop up the last traces of sauce and steak juices.
Cassie took one final bite of her meal and set her cutlery down with a sigh, leaving some mashed potato and a few sugar snap peas.
He stared at her plate. Felt the familiar spike of anxiety at seeing the uneaten food.
He tried to ignore it. Couldn’t, that age-old apprehension coming to the surface against his will.
She laughed softly. “Go ahead, be my guest. It’s all yours.” She pushed the plate toward him.
Letting her think he was still hungry, he set the plate in front of him and methodically polished everything off in measured bites. Refusing to give into the anxiety that demanded he wolf it down in front of her before it got taken away.
When he finished and set his silverware down, he found her watching him almost fondly, her chin propped in her hands. “Good?”
He nodded, wiped his mouth with his napkin and downed the rest of his water, cursing the heat rushing to his face. “How’s the other table doing?”
Her gaze flicked beyond his shoulder. “Just finished their mains, and onto the third cocktail. Or at least, Schumacher is.”
Tristan glanced at his watch. It wasn’t that late, but the guy had been drinking all day. He was surprised Schumacher was still standing.
Hopefully Schumacher and his buddy would wrap it up soon, so he and Cassie could escort Schumacher to his room and get some sleep themselves.
No matter what Cassie said, she had to be exhausted.
The two of them had to be up at oh-four-hundred to check the weather reports and finalize everything with the pilot for the flight back to Portland.
The server came and dropped off their bill. Tristan put it on his room and then they sat there killing time, waiting for the others to finish.
After a few minutes of silence, Cassie leaned back in her chair and regarded him. “This is a personal question, so you don’t have to answer, but can I ask you something about your family?”
“Yeah, sure.” He was happy that she wanted to know something personal about him, and he enjoyed talking about his family.
“Were you guys always close?”
“No. I mean, sort of. But not the way we are now.”
Her dark eyebrows went up, curiosity gleaming in her eyes. “How do you mean?”
“We’re a blended family. Decker’s our half-brother, from our father’s first marriage.”
She nodded. “He looks a lot different from the rest of you. And without meaning to overstep, he’s got a kind of stern vibe with you guys. Is it an older brother thing?”
He was more than ready to share this part of his past with her. “Sort of. Our dad died of a heart attack when Gavin and I were seven. Then we lost our mom shortly after that.”
“I didn’t know you were so young.” Her expression filled with empathy. “That must have been really hard.”
“It was. Gavin and I were scared, but it was way worse for Marley and Decker. They raised us, saw us through school, and Decker sent money home to us from his pay after he joined the Corps. We didn’t see much of him after that.”
“But you all moved to Crimson Point to be together?”
“Deck would never admit it, but he wanted a fresh start for us just as much as we did. CPS gave us that chance. And it’s been the best decision we’ve made.”
Her smile was so beautiful it almost hurt to look at her. “I’m really happy for you. Even if Decker is still a tough nut to crack.”
He grinned. “You’re not wrong. He’s always been tough on Gav and me, but he’s mostly bark and no bite. And he’d do anything for any of us.”
She nodded. “I saw that when we were all searching for Carly during the riots. Anyway, it’s great to see you all so close now. Not every family’s like that.”
He detected a note of wistfulness in her voice. “You seem close with yours. You’re really tight with Bristol, and I know you spend a lot of time with your mom.”
“My relationship with my mom is...a work in progress.” She ran her finger around the rim of her water glass, lost in thought. “I want what you have with your family. So I’m trying my best to leave the past in the past. Which isn’t easy for me.”
He was bursting with questions but remained silent and kept watching her. And she rewarded him a moment later by continuing.
“My dad walked out on us when I was four. Left on a work trip one morning, nothing unusual. No clue anything was up. I stood on the front step waving at him as he drove away. That was the last time I ever saw him.”
He imagined her as a little girl, standing there waving at her dad. And the pain she must have felt when he never came back.
She blew out a breath, shifted in her seat. “Anyway, my mom struggled after that. Fell apart for a while.”
Shit, he knew exactly what that looked like and felt like to live with as a child. Watching your only remaining parent become unable to function.
“We moved in with her parents for a couple years, but they didn’t get along, and she kept picking these loser men over and over.
You don’t know what a relief it was when she finally met Bristol’s dad.
Although I didn’t trust him at first either.
But the damage from all of that was done a long time ago.
My mom and I drifted apart for a long while. ”
“What do you mean by damage?”
She looked at him. “Me. I wound up repeating the toxic cycle.” She gave a rueful smile, shook her head. “Hate to say it, but it’s the truth. So you guys weren’t the only ones who came to Crimson Point to start again. This is version Two-Point-Oh of my life.”
He recognized the gravity of her telling him this. She was finally opening up and telling him something real because she was finally starting to trust him. Really trust him. And, shit, it felt good.
“And how’s it going?” he asked.
Laughter glinted in her eyes. “Until last week? Fucking amazing.”
He chuckled, but then her expression shifted, her gaze fixed on something behind him. “Heads up.”