Page 53 of The Fine Art of Faking It
It was a public declaration of war. And Eden was going to fight. She pointed around the room, ready to express her displeasure, when the number on the whiteboard caught her attention again. Something clicked into place, and she shut her mouth.
She knew exactly how she was going to win this war. And it would bring the Beautification Committee down to its manipulative, matchmaking knees.
21
Davis set aside his laptop to answer his room phone. “Gates,” he said, still focused on the balance sheet he’d been studying.
“Davis, it’s Eden. Can you meet me at Peace of Pizza?”
Davis shook his head and looked around the room. He was indeed awake. However, he wasn’t quite sure how to make sure he hadn’t stumbled into an alternate reality.
“Is everything okay?” he asked slowly.
“It’s about to be.”
“Well that’s not at all vague or confusing,” he quipped.
“Look, just come into town, okay? We need to talk.”
With trepidation, Davis changed into his new chinos and a lightweight sweater in marled blue and pointed his SUV in the direction of Blue Moon.
Peace of Pizza was busy as it was most weeknights. Cars filled the parking spaces the whole way around the town square. He parked a block back and, shoulders hunched to the winter wind, pushed into the garlic scented, lava lamp-lit haven that was Peace of Pizza. He waved to Bobby, the dreadlocked owner who made a secret sauce that had pizza chains offering up big bucks for her recipe.
“Your girl’s in the back,” Bobby told him grimly, pointing a dough-covered hand toward a table. He didn’t try to yell over the din and ask what she meant by “your girl.” He spotted Eden sitting at a table for two, drumming her fingers on the checkered table cloth and scowling.
She saw him, and her face lit up. He felt his heart do a slow roll in his chest.Wow. That was a beautiful smile.And for the first time since high school, she was directing it at him.
“Hi—”
Before he could get the whole word out, Eden was on her feet and grabbing him by his coat. Her mouth met his in a sizzling shock of a kiss. Davis would have been less surprised had she decked him. Her lips were warm and oh-so-soft beneath his. The contact lit up every cell in his body. She felt like a warm fire in the dead of winter, bringing his body back to life, bringing his blood to a slow simmer and almost immediately jumping it to a boil. Eden made a sexy little moan and broke the kiss.
This was the moment he’d been waiting for for fifteen years.
Everyone was staring at them. There wasn’t a single sound inside the pizza joint. Except for the pounding of Davis’s heart against the confines of his ribs.
“Uh, what was that?” he whispered.
“Hi, handsome!” she said loudly. “I thought you’d like pizza for our date night.”
Okay. He’d definitely slipped into an alternate universe. Was his name still Davis? He dug through his pockets for his phone.
“What are you doing?” she asked dropping her voice.
“I want to see if there’s an app that can tell me I fell into an alternate reality.”
“Sit, down,” she hissed through clenched teeth. “I’ll explain everything.”
They sat, and Eden took his hand and beamed at him like he’d just finished telling her his favorite thousand things about her. He didn’t know what was happening, but he liked holding her hand and hereallyhoped there was a second kiss coming.
“Can I get a pie for you all?” Bobby asked, approaching them as suspiciously as she would a live grenade.
“Bobby, could you make one of those specialty heart-shaped pizzas for us?” Eden asked with a girlish giggle.
Bobby looked back and forth between them with suspicion. “Sure,” she said finally. “What do you want on it?”
“Green peppers,” Eden said.
“Black olives,” Davis added.
