Page 64 of The Scenic Route
He shook his head. “You’ll just call me creepy,” he pouted, although there was a thread of amusement in his words too.
“I’d promise not to call you creepy, but if you say something creepy, I’m calling you out on it.” She shrugged, not really sorry.
With a dramatic sigh, he gave in. “One of the teeth had a composite filling. That wasn’t used until the sixties.”
“Dentistry facts, B? Really?” She did warn him after all.
“I remember facts and dates,” he said a bit defensively. “And I like science. I’m not interested in dentistryspecifically.”
Lou was snickering. “Okay, I sort of get why you married him in Vegas. He grows on you, doesn’t he?”
“He’s adorable,” Felicity said fondly, reaching up to pat his cheek. He looked down at her with a long-suffering expression, but that couldn’t cover up the affection in his gaze.
“Puppies are adorable,” Rory said, sounding confused. “I’m not seeing the adorable here.” She gestured up and down Bennett’s beefy form, and he frowned at her.
Felicity laughed. “Didn’t you see his pout? There’s no way to describe it except as adorable.” From her angle, she could see a flush working its way up his neck, and she felt bad for embarrassing him. “Sorry, B. We’ll focus on dead people again.”
“Yes, please!” Lou’s eyes lit up again. “Where exactly—” Her question was cut off by the door opening, and a trio of high-school girls entered the coffee shop, giggling and chatting as they approached the counter. “Out of time. Too many conversational detours,” Lou muttered as she turned to help the girls.
Rory stood up. “Better get home. I have a shift tonight at the fire station.”
“Oh?” Felicity asked. “Are you one of the gossipy firefighters?”
“Gossipy? No.” Rory made a disgusted face. “Firefighter? I’m working on it. I still feel pretty clueless most of the time.”
With a snort, Felicity said, “I still feel that way, and I’ve been working as a bounty hunter for years.”
With a quick flash of a startlingly pretty smile, Rory turned and headed toward the door.
Bennett lowered himself onto the stool next to Felicity. “New plan?” he asked.
She groaned, stretching her arms out in front of her and resting her cheek on them, her head turned so she could see Bennett. “Forget Dino or dead bodies exist and enjoy our honeymoon suite?” She was thinking more on the lines of room service and sleeping in the soft bed, but the heat that flared in his eyes made her reconsider her phrasing. Clearing her throat, she sat up again. “First, food. Breakfast was forever and one human skull ago.”
As if she were psychic, Lou darted over as soon as the last high schooler took her blended coffee drink. “I forgot to ask if you two wanted anything! I’m a terrible barista.”
“You’re fine,” Felicity soothed. “There was a lot going on. Dead body trumps coffee after all.”
Bennett made a skeptical grunt. “Sometimes.”
Giving him a sideways look, Lou warned, “Setting off the creep-meter again, champ.” Her sunny smile returned the next instant. “Now what can I get you?”
***
Once she’d finished a turkey and avocado sandwich, Felicity’s brain started working better, and everything that was happening seemed a little bit more manageable.
“After all,” she told Bennett, who’d inhaled several sandwiches and an almond croissant as well as a large coffee, “neither of us is dead or horribly injured yet.”
“Been there,” Lou said over her shoulder as she steamed milk for one of the after-school crowd she’d warned them about.
“You’ve been dead or horribly injured?” Felicity asked, needing clarification.
“Neither, but I’ve been in the spot where that’s the only reason the glass is half-full.”
“Gotcha.” Felicity leaned on her elbow as she turned to look at Bennett sipping the last of his coffee. “Our only good lookout spot is now overrun by cops. What’s the plan?”
His eyebrow arched as he set his cup down. “Are you trying to get me to say we should break into the compound?”
“No.” Lacing her fingers together so they wouldn’t give her away with their twitchiness, she wished she had her own cup to occupy her hands. Her sense of honesty quickly got the better of her though. “Maybe.”
