“You were engaged?” Barrett leaned back in his seat and studied me. “That seems wild to me. And makes me feel old as hell.”
The waiter appeared with our drinks and waited to make sure I liked mine. I took a sip and grinned when the taste of pineapple burst across my tongue. “You were right. I love it. Thank you.”
He winked before hurrying away. I took another longer pull and sighed happily. It was about a million times better than my cheap wine.
“Back to Barry being the best option on a dating app.” Holden winced. “That can’t be true, right?”
My laugh was the laugh of a solider returning home from war, having seen things that the men around me couldn’t even begin to imagine. “Well, he didn’t open the conversation with a dick pic, so that was nice. He also used correct grammar, didn’t call me a bitch once, and didn’t have a picture on his profile holding a fish. He was the only option.”
“There’s a problem with a picture holding a fish?” Barrett stretched his legs out and didn’t move when his knee rested against my thigh. “A fish?”
“It’s a whole thing.” I waved it off and looked up at the ceiling as I thought about what I wanted to say.
When I glanced back down and found all of their eyes on me, I forgot everything in my brain and my mouth just took over again. “My ex, all the guys on the dating apps, Barry, they’re all painfully immature. All the guys my age make me want to join a convent and give up dating for good. Who needs sex when the man you’re having it with wants to ‘do you good’ before his favorite cartoon comes on?”
Dominic laughed into his glass and when he looked at me, his eyes were dark pools of promise. When he lowered his glass, I saw that he was biting his lip and nearly forgot that I was on my best behavior. “Someone said they wanted to do you good? Just like that?”
I grunted. “Honestly, that was the classiest thing my ex ever said about sex. His go-to was to ask if I wanted to tickle his pickle. So, maybe I should chase after Barry. I’m sure he wouldn’t say that, at least.”
Holden leaned forward and rested his chin on his fist with his elbow on the table. “You try to chase after that idiot and we’ll be forced to save you from yourself. By whatever means necessary.”
I cursed the wave of arousal that washed over me. “Moving on from my pathetic dating life. What are you three doing here? Where are your dates?”
“We’re celebrating. No dates. We just closed on a building downtown. We’re opening another restaurant.” Barrett shrugged like it was nothing. “This one is going to be Holden’s baby.”
“You all own restaurants?” My excitement shifted from purely physical appreciation to something else entirely. “That’s amazing!”
“We own a few things together, but the restaurants are the passion projects.”
Holden, still leaning forward to watch me, smiled. “And what do you do, Sugar?”
I shifted in my seat, annoyed at myself for not being able to be proud of my answer. “Write. Currently, I’m just doing a few freelancing gigs.”
“Any passion projects of your own?”
Something about the way Dominic asked had me reaching into my clutch to grab my phone. I opened the small blog I wrote and showed them just the title page before getting nervous and shoving the phone away again. “It’s silly. The gigs I work now? They’re heartless. Just emotionless pieces of information. I’m not allowed to put my own voice to them. Here, though, I get to do what I want.”
“And what do you want, Sugar?”
4
***SJ***
Dominic’squestioncouldbeanswered in a lot of ways. I wanted plenty of things. Some of them would’ve included him, had I allowed myself to dream. Since I wasn’t playing the part of the vixen, I didn’t say any of that.
“I like reviewing food.” I winced as soon as I said it and shook my head hard. “I know. It’s dumb. It started after a few friends threw dinner parties and I jokingly reviewed their food. It became a thing and now, it’s something I really love doing.”
Holden held his hand out. “Hand over the evidence. I need to see if you’re the food critic who once told me that my pasta was chewy.”
I laughed and shook my head. “No way. To handing over the phone and to telling you that your pasta was chewy. I’m not mean. I would never say chewy. I would say…Chef Holden created a pasta that had spirit and the tenacity to keep going, even after a tough beating from a strong set of incisors. See? It’s much nicer.”
He wagged his finger at me. “My pasta has never been chewy. Just so we’re clear.”
“Sure. But has it had spirit and the tenacity to keep going?”
Barrett laughed and stretched his arm out behind me again. “Are you sure we can’t see it? We really love passion projects.”
“I’m sure. I don’t even know why I told you about it. Not many people here know I do anything like that. It’s growing, but for now I’m still writing e-books on how to make the switch from android to iOS.”