Page 94 of Playing Dirty

“What can I get you?”

“I’ll have a pizza alla salicia, a pizza marinara and a basket of garlic bread.”

Eva stares at me with wide eyes. “All for yourself?” she confirms.

“I’m not sure why that surprises you after two terms of my eating shenanigans.”

She laughs. “No, I’m not sure either.The Margherita for me, please.”

The woman serving us looks at us like we’re crazy. “Sure, coming right up.” She gathers the menus and walks away.

Both of us burst into laughter. “I think you freaked her out with your order,” Eva says.

I shrug. “Couldn’t care less.”

She laughs and tips back her wine. “Thank you,” she suddenly says out of the blue.

“What for?”

“For allowing me into your group and being so welcoming to me. I have never been happy like this before. I was always miserable.”

I smile. “It’s nothing. We are happy to have you.” I pause for a moment. “At first, I must admit I felt like Nat was taking you under her wing just because we were missing Giorgia this year. I felt like she was trying to replace her, if you get what I mean?”

Eva nods. “Yeah, I can understand that.”

I shake my head. “When I met you, that quickly changed. No one will replace Giorgia. You just added something new to our group.”

“I’ll toast to that,” Eva says, holding up her glass.

I clink mine against hers and we fall into comfortable chatter about day-to-day things. All I can think about at the moment is seeing Archer. I hate to admit it, but that man has clawed his way beneath my skin so deeply I’m not sure I’ll ever get him out.

* * *

I can feelArcher’s eyes on me as I polish off my fifth slice of pizza that evening. Pizza twice in one day is an overload of carbs, but right now I don’t really give a shit.

“You can eat as much as me,” he muses.

“And your point?”

He shakes his head. “No point, it’s just an observation.” He sits up straighter and opens up one box, grabbing his fifth slice to keep up with me. “I can’t believe you went to Fratelli’s for lunch and didn’t mention it when I suggested ordering pizza.”

“Can never eat enough pizza in one day.”

He laughs and takes a bite.

“Plus, this is American-style pizza and Fratelli’s is Italian. They’re totally different.”

He sits back and watches me with a flicker of amusement dancing in his dark eyes. “Right, not similar at all.”

It’s funny how our sense of humor aligns so perfectly. Archer is never serious and I rarely am, except for when in competition and then we both get serious.

“How about a movie?” I ask, glancing at his huge flatscreen TV on the wall.

He runs a hand through his dark hair. “I’m not really that into movies.”

“So why do you have such a huge TV?”

He arches a brow. “For sports, of course.”

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