“Now isn’t that the million-dollar question,” he replies, nudging me with his elbow indiscreetly. “Is it just the two of us tonight, Cal, or should we invite our fetching hostess here to join us?”
I shake my head at his audacity, his boldness having no bounds. Watching Lucia, I find myself unable to tear my eyes away from her as she smiles brightly at us. When I first met her, her natural beauty captured me. It was classic and effortless. Even still, it takes my breath away more today than it did then. I have a sudden need to take advantage of this opportunity to find out more about the intriguing woman who has become a frequent and somewhat perplexing fixture in my thoughts.
“I wish I could, but we’re rather full tonight so I must keep working. I’ll try to stop by your table later though, if it’s an open invitation. Let me show you to your seats and we’ll get you some drinks.” She sweeps her arm out toward the back of the restaurant. “This way, gentlemen.”
Once we’re seated at our table, I pick up the wine list and look over the selection. “Go on, Callum, let me wow you with my wine recommendation,” Lucia teases. I look up to meet her eyes and can’t help giving her a small smirk in reply. “Who am I to stand in the way of your wowing skills?” I tease. Then, leaning toward her, I whisper. “Impress me, Lucia.”
Her eyes flash with heat before she steps back and juts her hip out, pulling a pencil out of her shirt pocket before tapping it contemplatively on her lips. The lips I can’t seem to stop looking at.
She bends down, stealing the wine menu out of my hands before grinning at the two of us. “Do you trust me?”
“My mother always warned me never to trust a beautiful woman,” Grant retorts.
“And you, Callum? What did your mother tell you about beautiful women?” she asks me.
“To let them choose the wine,” I reply assuredly.
“One ridiculously expensive and full-bodied red coming up.” She gifts us a departing smile before turning around and walking back toward the bar at the front of the restaurant.
“Now there’s a woman worth your attention, don’t you think, Alexander?”
I roll my eyes at Grant and grab the menu as a distraction, but that doesn’t stop me glancing over toward the bar and studying the most intriguing woman I’ve met in a long time.
It’s not until we’ve finished our main course that I hear a sweet laugh come from the back of the restaurant, breaking through the continual low hum of conversation. Almost out of instinct, I turn my head toward the honeyed sound and watch in avid fascination as Lucia walks toward our table. Unable to tear my eyes away from her, I shamelessly scan her body from head to black heel-clad toe before slowly returning to her face, her eyes shining with knowing amusement as she walks toward us.
She nods down at our empty plates. “I hope the mains were to your satisfaction.”
The word satisfaction rolls off her tongue and my eyes flare at the slow-rising one-sided smirk gracing her red painted lips. Flashes of the other things her mouth could do cross my mind, and I resist dragging my eyes down her body again, knowing that it would be torturing myself more to do so.
I stand and pull out the chair beside me, placing my hand gently on the small of Lucia’s back. The warmth of her skin singes mine—not the clichéd electric jolt but more like a slow-burning sear that intensifies as more time passes.
“The food was exquisite. Will you join us for a nightcap?”
“I’d love to,” she says, taking the offered seat.
I study her features while I have the chance, pleasantly surprised to find her face full of expression, totally open and honest.
From what I’ve seen so far, there is no façade with this woman. What you see with her is what you get, and it is amazingly refreshing. Yet I sense a hint of something darker, something altogether beguiling about her that lingers just below the surface. It just serves to make me want to find out more about this captivating woman.
I step toward an empty table beside us and pick up an unused wine glass for her
Everything about her screams class and style, not poor struggling student who needed to have a part-time catering gig like she did at our first meeting. Something isn’t adding up, but it’s not suspicious, more intriguing.
“Seems the boss does get to sit down once in a while,” she muses as I push her seat in. Then I have my answer, definitely not a student. “Thank you, kind sir,” she says to me, while Grant pours the wine into her glass.
I can’t comprehend the effect this woman is having on me. Like a shot to my cock, I can’t see anything but her. Later, I will have to reflect on this fact and try to process how a woman I don’t know anything about could achieve that.
“So you’re the manager here?” Grant asks her, leaning back on his chair, and non-conspicuously switching his gaze between Lucia and myself.
“You could say that,” she says on a laugh. “Owner, maître d,’ fill-in waitress, chief cleaner-upper . . .”
She’s nonplussed, and I welcome her ease at joining our table. There are many women who seem to think that since I appear in the gossip pages occasionally, I must be a celebrity, someone who demands attention and special treatment. Then there is also the presumption that I’m rich, desperate, and in need of a trophy wife, much like my esteemed best friend sitting across from me. Jodi was hedging the line between column A and column B. Lucia might just fall into a whole new category.
“How lucky am I to have two handsome men in my restaurant tonight? And a quiet late night at that,” she says, lifting her glass to her lips and taking a slow sip. She offers a hum of approval, grabbing my attention and spiking my libido. A few minutes in close proximity to Lucia has me acting like a horny teenager with a desperate need to take himself in hand.
Thankfully my synapses conjugate in time for me to not look like a total fool. “It was a late night at the office so we decided to grab a bite to eat before heading home.” There, intelligent, friendly, and not at all appearing affected by the woman.
“Well, I’m glad you chose my little hole in the wall,” she replies.
“We’d heard great things and have been meaning to check it out for a while now,” Grant says before lifting his wine glass to his mouth and lowering it back to the table. “So Lucia, if you own this place, why were you catering the function last month?” Leave it to Grant to ask the question I’m most curious about.
“My brother, Gino, he’s the other owner. He runs the catering arm of our business. He was caught short and I had to step in,” she answers with a shrug.
I can’t seem to tear my eyes away from the sliver of glass resting on her plump bottom lip, watching in avid fascination as she takes a sip, not at all shy in savoring the taste of the red wine. Her eyes meet mine and she lowers her lashes but does not hide her slow perusal of my body and it hits me that Ms. Harding is interested in, or at least intrigued by me.
More shocking is the fact I want her to be.
“Mr. Alexander, I’ve actually been thinking about you,” she states, her voice and words instantly knocking me out of my thoughts as I feel her warm skin brush against my forearm.
“Oh, call him Callum. Mr. Alexander makes me think he’s a stuffy old man, and there’s no way I’d be having dinner with someone like that willingly,” Grant pipes up from the periphery.
“Really?” I reply to her, my voice surprisingly level. The mask shifts back into place, my automatic defense mechanism when a beautiful woman presents herself willingly, embracing their perceived shot at becoming another notch on the bedpost of the Bay’s favorite son of the moment.
“You sound surprised,” she muses, before continuing. “I was reading an article in the Tribune this morning about the new project that’s just been announced. I saw that you’re going to be designing it. I usually prefer a classic aesthetic as opposed to the stark and more angular modern designs, but knowing that you’re overseeing this project, I’m sure we’re in good hands.” Shit. She is a fan girl. So much for there being a genuine interest there.