Chapter Thirteen
Thatcher gazed out the window and watched Vickie walk away from the restaurant. She sure was in a hurry. Maybe she had a hot date to get to. He hadn’t picked up on it when he’d seen her in her ranger uniform, but seeing her all dressed up made him sure she was one of those young professional types who always had some sort of event or gala to fill their evenings. Probably had a huge circle of like-minded friends and they stood around at parties in their fancy clothes and talked about fancy things. He was glad he’d never entered that world. Nope. He was happy just the way he was, working hard and fishing in his spare time.
“Sir?”
He looked up. How long had the waitress been standing there? “Yes?”
She motioned toward the half-eaten crab cakes. “Is your girlfriend finished with her food?”
Thatcher jerked his head up to meet the waitress’s gaze. “My what?” He asked, his voice ringing with surprise.
The older woman sighed. “Your gir—l—friend.” She said the word slowly, using three times the syllables necessary. “You know. The pretty lady who joined you for dinner.”
He shook his head. “That was just business. She isn’t my. . .I mean we aren’t. . .” He looked at the waitress again. “It was business,” he said firmly.
“Whatever you say, mister. But I’ve been working here a long time. I can read people pretty well. And your business partner sure did spend a lot of time primping in the bathroom earlier. For it to be just business, I mean.” She waggled her eyebrows at him and moved on to the next table.
Primping? He’d noticed she was gone for a few minutes right after they ordered, but hadn’t thought much about it. Thatcher stared at the bills Vickie had thrown down on the table and the realization washed over him. Had she thought this was a date? He’d been so focused on the Lincoln papers, he hadn’t even given a thought to how a dinner invitation might come across to a woman he didn’t know.
The impertinent old waitress swept past his table again. “Excuse me, ma’am.?” He called.
She turned on her heel, smacking her gum. “Yes, hon?”
He cleared his throat and motioned toward Vickie’s crab cakes. “What you said earlier, about her being my girlfriend. Well, uh, do you think she thought this was a date?”
The waitress raised a drawn-on eyebrow. “I don’t know, darlin’. Did you ask her to have dinner with you?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I asked her to meet me here for dinner. But I never said anything about being it a date.”
She shook her head. “Did you know this woman? I mean, are you friends? Have you known her for a while?”
“No. I met her yesterday.”
“You just met her yesterday and you asked her to join you for dinner.” She drew her brows together. “That sounds like a date to me. When a man asks a woman to have dinner. Unless you have an established friendship already. . .it’s a date.”
“But I wanted to discuss a project I’d like her help on.”
“Did you tell her that yesterday when you invited her?”
Thatcher winced. “No, I guess it didn’t occur to me that I needed to clarify the situation.”
The woman let out a low whistle. “Seems to me that you might’ve misread some signals there.” She motioned toward Vickie’s empty seat. “And her early exit tells me she might not be too happy about it.”
He sighed. Women were still a mystery to him after all these years. Despite many attempts from friends and colleagues to fix him up, he’d always managed to decline. And with the exception of the annual faculty dinner, he rarely dined with a woman. He should’ve known he’d mess up in this situation. Why hadn’t he explained things to Vickie yesterday? “Thanks.” He pulled his wallet from his pocket and removed some money to cover his portion of the bill.
The waitress picked up the crumpled bills Vickie had left behind and held her hand out in Thatcher’s direction.
He placed his money in her outstretched hand. “Keep the change.” He grinned. “Your insight is worth a lot.”
The woman’s weathered face lit up as she smiled. “I do what I can.” She winked. “And I think you might want to apologize to your business associate.” She nodded at him one last time and walked off.
Thatcher left the restaurant and began to walk aimlessly. He needed to clear his head and it was a nice evening. How could he have been so stupid? Of course she’d thought he was interested in her. And to tell the truth, he had found himself having a nice time with her. But then the small talk had made him nervous, so he’d jumped right in about the documents. What a dummy.
She had looked especially nice though. He’d noticed as soon as she walked up. But it hadn’t occurred to him that she might’ve gotten fixed up for him. He’d just assumed she must have plans later.
He crossed Constitution Avenue and slowed his pace. The Capitol loomed to his left and he couldn’t help but stare. He’d grown up near DC and been on plenty of field trips to the area, but he always felt a reverence when he saw the Capitol building, especially when he glimpsed the American Flag flying out front. He made his way over to the reflecting pool and sat down on one of the concrete steps, the Capitol building in front of him. This was one of his favorite spots to run, but that was always in the early morning hours. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen the building at night. It really was a majestic sight to behold as darkness began to fall. The lights illuminated the building in a way that made it almost glow.
Thatcher stretched his legs out in front of him and leaned back on his hands. He would need to apologize to Vickie. It was the right thing to do, and there was no way around it. As someone who’d spent the better part of his life avoiding confrontation, that wouldn’t be fun. Or maybe he could forget it. Chances were, he wouldn’t hear from her again. It wasn’t like they ran in the same circles or anything. So really, he could just drop it. Chalk it up to his awful track record with the female species.
He felt better now that he had a plan. But he still needed a research partner. Maybe the grad student John played racquetball with would be interested. He rose to his feet and with one last glance at the Capitol building, Thatcher set off in the direction of the nearest Metro station. Home sounded good about now.