Page 48 of Ruled By Fate

Cameron glanced up, surprised to see they’d all been watching. Like most things about the entrancing angel, he seemed completely oblivious to his effect on the people around him.

“Not for many years,” he replied, taking a sip of his water. “I’m afraid I was quite put off after a particularly rowdy time in Paris.”

“Oh yeah?” Mike asked with a faint grin. “What happened?”

Cameron shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Oh, you know. People just lost their heads.”

Brie drained another glass.

It should have been helping, but the more the friends nervously gulped their overpriced wine, the more they began to fidget and stress in their high-backed chairs. And the more they fidgeted, the more they drank.

It was the kind of place that looked great in movies, the kind of place that looked promising when you drove past it on the quaint Virginia road, but in reality, it was so over-the-top pretentious as to make one question why they’d bothered strapping themselves into stilettos in the first place.

Brie stared down at her five dinner forks, feeling rather grim.

“I still don’t know what I ordered,” Mike whispered to Sherry, reaching for his wine glass, only to realize he’d finished it just a moment before. “Seriously, it could be anything.”

“Could you stop worrying?” she hissed back, trying her best to act perfectly at ease, though her elbow kept slipping off the table. “It’s going to be fine.”

“A good lawman never stops worrying,” Cameron interjected with the hint of a Southern twang. “He just learns when to show it and when to keep it to himself.”

The rest turned to stare at him.

“It’s from one of your old Western films,” he said hesitantly. “I thought it might apply.”

Brie gave him a hard stare. The wine had taken hold, and she found herself asking, “Did they teach you that in thanatology school?”

He blushed and looked at the table. “Just trying to make conversation.”

Mike leaned forward with that dogged curiosity. “What do you mean, one of your old Western films?”

Cameron blinked, then gestured to Brie. “She loves them.”

She let out a quiet breath, rubbing the sides of her eyes. “I love them.”

“She watches them all the time.”

“I watch them all the time.”

The four of them lapsed into silence until Sherry shot her a sudden look. “You hate Westerns.”

At that moment, their waitress glided towards them, balancing a silver tray in her emaciated arms. She took one look around the awkward table, then flashed a reptilian smile. “Did someone order the ris de veau?”

That accent is completely fake.

“I did.” Mike sat forward quickly, pleased that he’d memorized the words for that exact moment. “That was me.”

She laid the plate in front of him. “Bon appétit.”

Sherry leaned over with a dubious expression, giving it a delicate sniff. “What is that, exactly?”

Brie glanced over as well while Cameron appeared to be stifling his amusement.

“It’s sweetbread,” Mike said quickly, latching onto the tiny English translation some other flailing American patron had scribbled onto the side of the menu. “It’s just… bread?”

Doesn’t look like it.

“Doesn’t look like it,” Sherry echoed Brie’s thoughts, lifting her eyes to the waitress. “Excuse me, miss. Do you happen to know what that is?”

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