Page 65 of The Disasters of Dating
“I do like halibut,” he says after swallowing his first bite. “Man, this is good. I could get addicted to it easily.”
“I know, right?” I say before putting a large, some might say too large, spoonful into my mouth.
“Anyway, I do like halibut. But I could just as easily have ordered the halibut burger and been happy. I was being vengeful in a passive-aggressive way.” He glances up at me over the top of his cone. “Sorry?”
I fold my arms and stare at him. I can understand why he did it. That was not my finest hour…or day. “How about if we forget about that day? I don’t think either of us were at our best.”
He takes a bite of ice cream and gives me a closed-mouth grin. “Deal,” he says once he’s swallowed. “Man, I have a serious threat of becoming fat while I’m working here now that I know this exists.”
I laugh. “We have another ice cream place that is totally different but equally addictive.”
He grins. “Does that mean you’ll introduce me to it next week?”
I freeze halfway to my cone, mouth wide open. Do I want to hang out with him more next week? My throbbing pulse seems to say yes, I do want to hang out with him. I close my mouth and lean back. “Sure. What days are you here?”
He lifts a shoulder in indifference, but he keeps his eyes on me. “Same as usual. Fly in on Sunday. Fly out on Thursday night.”
I suck in a breath. “I have Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday off again next week. I’m supposed to do something with my friend, Paisleigh, on Wednesday. But I can change it if I need to.”
He shakes his head. “No. That’s fine.” His brow creases. “And you hang out with your mom on Monday?”
I shake my head. “I don’t think we have a standing night anymore. She has been busy recently.”
He takes a bite of his ice cream, and I get the chills on his behalf. “What if we do something on Monday?”
I watch as a drip starts at the top of my ice cream and runs down until it hits the lip of the cone. It puddles there for a minute before it overflows and makes a mad dash for the cone tip. Just before it gets to the bottom, I lift it and lick up the side of the cone and onto the ice cream. I swallow and suck in another big breath as I see him watching me. He has a very pensive look on his face.
I wipe at my mouth, feeling self-conscious. Do I have ice cream all over my face? To avoid more awkwardness, I smile. “Okay. Sounds fun.” Oh, man. This feels like a heavy decision. And my horoscope warned me I should table such decisions for another time. But do I listen? Nope. Dang that whirling Mercury!
CHAPTER 20
KEATON
The nightlife is for you.
Learn Chinese: ? — Qiú — Ball
Lucky Numbers: 27, 14, 84, 73
I lean backin my chair and put my feet up on the corner of my desk, crossing them at the ankles. “Why did you decide to have Nathan be one of the presidents? I thought he was a bit of a flake.”
Evan runs a hand through his hair. Thankfully, on the video call, he can’t see that my feet are on the desk. Although I doubt he’d care. He’s not that uptight. Or at least he usually isn’t. But I think the wedding is making him a bit crazy. Not Shay, the planning. I think if he had his way, they’d elope.
“In his personal life, Nathan is a total flake. But in business, he’s a shark and a complete professional. I trust him more than the other two when it comes to this.”
I nod. Evan’s friend, Nathan, had been engaged to Shay. But he’d stood her up at the altar. No-showed, if you can even imagine. I mean, who does that? It was the reason Evan and Shay met. She went on the honeymoon without Nathan and stayed at one of Evan’s rental properties in Orlando, FL. Then there was a flood in her rental, and she had no place to go… except for Evan’s. And there you go. Two years later, and they’re getting married.
It’s crazy. But if Evan trusts Nathan with the business, then who am I to refute it?
“Okay. I’ll put him as the CEO of the Kindrix Corporation.”
My phone buzzes, and I look over to see a text from Poppy. I grin.
“Is it from her?” Evan asks.
I glance up at my computer monitor. “What?”
He raises a brow. “I heard your phone buzz with a text notification, and now you’re smiling like an idiot. I can put two and two together.”
