Ohhh.
“There it is.” Max shook his head and picked up his coffee cup again. “But I do have to wonder, why haven’t you had her over here yet?”
Dave’s guard went up again like a reflex. “How do you know I haven’t?”
Max rolled his eyes. “Dude. I’m actually a semi-intelligent person. It’s very obvious you haven’t had a girl over. At all.”
“Because.”
“That’s a good reason.Because,”Max mocked him.
“Why do you and Leslie like her so much?” Dave asked, not caring that he sounded suspicious as hell.
Max’s lips twitched. “Because she cares about you. And she’s fun and sweet and she’s very likable.”
“You didn’t like Nora,” Dave pointed out. “And she was all those things.”
“That girl had crazy pouring out of her and you were the only one who didn’t see it,” Max retorted. “When I saw it come across my Google alerts that Nora had set the place on fire, I can’t tell you hownotshocked I was. She told me that if you ever cheated on her she would burn your life to the ground.” He lifted his eyebrows. “Crazy always tells you their plan.”
Dave schooled his features.
“You didn’t like Mandy.”
“Mandy stole my car and drove it into a pool.” Max blinked at him.
“But you didn’t like her before that,” Dave argued, trying not to laugh.
“Because when I met her, she asked me if you were always so boring.”
“Mandy thought I was boring?” That was the first Dave had heard about it. Why did that sting?
“This is what we’re discussing? Right now? Okay.” Max inclined his head again. “Remember Cassandra? The night I met her she was stealing a bottle of liquor from behind the bar.”
Dave winced. He remembered. But at the time he thought it had been a one off, not a character trait.
“Do remember what she was arrested for?” Max asked but didn’t wait for the reply. “Felony vandalism. She spray painted SLUT in big red letters on the side of a boat that wasn’t yours.”
“She thought it was mine.”
Max didn’t look amused. “And if ithadbeen yours, you would have never pressed charges.”
Dave opened his mouth to protest but Max wasn’t wrong.
Hmm.
Max downed the rest of his coffee like it was whiskey and slammed the mug on the counter. “Please, for the love of all that is holy, don’t let Sabine get away. You have been in love with that girl since the moment you laid eyes on her.”
Dave smiled because he agreed, but still felt the need to argue. It was his nature after all.
“You weren’t there the first time I saw her.”
Max flattened his expression. “Please. I saw the way your entire soul lit up the night she appeared as our server. Why do you think I was so suspicious?”
“You’re always suspicious.”
“Touché.”
They fell into a quiet thoughtfulness for a few minutes. Max took a deep breath and let it out.