Secrets? Sexy ones? A feeling of dread rose in her chest, then fell to her stomach. She somehow had the feeling Ted had recently done some shopping on Michigan Avenue. “Secrets?”
He nodded, then put his hand back on her leg. “Uh-uh. Some of us have some very naughty secrets, don’t we? Like the kind of things we enjoy wearing under our clothes?”
For the first time in her life, Meg O’Rourke prayed her date liked to wear women’s underwear, and he was talking only about himself.
But somehow, she doubted it.
***
Meg’s face was the first thing Joe saw when he entered his family’s restaurant Monday night. He’d come over after returning to The Red Doors to pick up the negligee, not wanting to leave the store hanging. He froze in the doorway, letting in a gust of wind, earning a glare from his mother. The bouncer pulled the door shut and returned to his post as Joe stood there staring.
She had a date. Meg was here with another guy, looking cozy and friendly with a blond dork in one of the booths. She sipped her wine. She smiled. Her golden-brown hair shimmered in the soft light of the candle on the table in front of her. She looked so damn beautiful his heart rolled a little in his chest.
He almost turned and walked out the door, not wanting her to see him for some reason. Then he paused, looking at her again. After only one afternoon in her company, Joe felt able to gauge her mood. Her smile was forced, her body tense, and her face was pale. Her elbow was extended out to her side as if she planned to get up and do a Russian wedding dance. Or else slam it into her date’s gut if he leaned too close one more time.
She’s in trouble.
Instinct moved his feet. His mother’s hand on his arm stopped them. “Joey, you wait right here,” she scolded, lowering her voice to a husky whisper. “This man, he was in here three times last week with different women. He deserves what’s coming. The girl, she can take care of herself.”
Staring at his mother, he didn’t ask how she knew who he’d focused all his attention on. His mother knew everything. She often said Santori women were born with the second sight. The one time he’d dared to remind her she’d been born an Antonelli, she’d thunked him in the head with a plastic soup ladle.
“Just you watch,” she said.
So he did. He watched as Meg bent her head low over the table, reaching her arm beneath it. Then she said something to her date and began to slide down in her seat. He realized she was going under only when her butt hit the black-and-white-tiled floor. “What is she...?”
His mother merely smiled and nodded her approval. “She tells him she dropped something under the table.”
“Why?” He realized why when he saw her boot-clad feet stick out, one after the other, from under the opposite side of the booth. Her feet were followed by ankles. Then curvy calves. As she shimmied out, her skirt was shimmying up. Her gorgeous legs were revealed inch by heart-stopping inch.
She gradually gained the attention of other people in the room. Many stopped chattering and eating to watch the sexiest pair of women’s legs this side of a centerfold emerge like a breech birth from beneath booth number seven. Then her hips, upper body and head popped out. She breathed a visible sigh of relief as she stood.
Damn, he wished he was close enough to hear what she said as she turned back to speak to her date. Or what the guy, who looked very surprised, said in return. He was close enough, however, to see where the guy’s hand went.
Right under her skirt.
This time, his mother’s restraining hand on his arm wasn’t enough. He strode toward their table in time to hear Meg snarl, “Yeah? Well, I think you’d look awful hot and sexy in this!” Then she swung around, grabbed a plate of half-eaten spaghetti off a nearby table, which was thankfully empty and waiting for the busboy, and dumped it all over her date’s head.
The entire place grew so silent you could hear a heart beating. Joe froze where he stood, watching as the man rose from his seat. Long sauce-laden pieces of pasta dangled from his hair into his eyes and plopped on the shoulders of his pansy-ass crew-neck sweater. Joe almost felt sorry for the pathetic S.O.B., who looked around and realized he was the focus of every person in the place. Remembering the guy’s wandering hand, however, he saved his pity for someone who maybe deserved it—like the cleaning person who was gonna have to try to get the red stains out of the sweater and tan pants.
Meg didn’t stick around to hear her date’s response. Instead she whirled on her heel and stalked toward the exit, never shifting her gaze away from the front door. She passed within five feet of him and still didn’t see Joe. Judging by the fire in her eyes, she wasn’t seeing anything but red.
As she reached the door and put her hand on the knob, someone began to clap. He only realized it was his mother when he heard her low laughter. Others in the dining room took up the applause. Finally hearing it, she glanced over her shoulder, obviously mortified as she realized what she’d just done in front of this audience of people.
Her eyes widened as they met Joe’s. The color drained from her face before she turned and walked outside without a word.
“Now you go after her,” his mother said, giving him a little shove of encouragement.
As if he’d needed any encouragement.
Joe immediately zigzagged between the tables, not stopping to say hi to the many regulars who greeted him. He didn’t spare another glance for the spaghetti man, figuring he’d crawled back into his booth to try to clean himself up with some napkins.
He caught up with her a few yards down the sidewalk. “Meg, wait.” Catching her arm, he forced her to stop and look at him. “Are you okay?” Her lips were quivering, her eyes glassy and her cheeks reddened. Such a physical state could have been caused by the cold as well as the embarrassment.
Then she sniffed.
Aw, mm, she’s gonna cry again.
But he was wrong. She didn’t start to cry. Instead, her lips widened into a tiny smile. A giggle spilled out. The giggle turned into a snorty chuckle, then an outright belly laugh.