Page 59 of Possession

He released Mason and leaned back, looking up at owner of the restaurant. He responded in Spanish, knowing the man preferred it. “Fernando, how are you?”

“I’m good. Very good. Business has been great. I appreciate you and your friends coming in so often.”

“It’s not exactly a hardship,” Tomas said, giving him a small smile. “As long as you continue making such excellent food, we’ll keep coming back.”

“I’ll do my best,” Fernando said with a chuckle, then looked at Mason before smiling at Tomas. “On a date?”

“We are.”

“I’ll let you get back to it.”

“We were actually just about to head out. Can you have our server bring the check over?”

Fernando waved his hand in the air. “No, your money’s no good tonight. You take your nice young man and go have fun.”

Tomas held out his hand. “Thank you, friend.” After Fernando left, he turned to Mason and switched back to English. “Let’s get out of here.”

They were halfway back to his house when Mason said, “I still can’t believe you left that woman a fifty-dollar tip.”

Tomas chuckled. “The owner comped our meal. What was I supposed to do? Not leave a tip at all?”

“Our bill wasn’t going to be two hundred and fifty dollars.” Mason shook his head, but he was smiling at Tomas in a way he wanted to see all the fucking time. It made him feel ten feet tall.

“You know, considering how much money you make, you’re kind of stingy.”

Mason gasped. “That is not true. I’m just saying, that was a huge tip for a Tuesday night.”

“Everyone could use a big tip every once in a while.” He turned and winked at Mason, who rolled his eyes.

“Is that a sex joke?”

“Only if you want it to be, cielito.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Ridiculously handsome, you mean.”

Laughing, he playfully slapped at Tomas’s arm. “Nope, just plain ridiculous. Now, tell me more about what you do for the club. It’s more than just managing the businesses that you guys own, right?”

“Some days,” Tomas said, reaching over to grip the back of Mason’s seat. “I try to be available as much as possible for members in case they have things they need help with or needassistance on a red phone call. And then sometimes I have Chamber of Commerce meetings I have to go to or other stuff that takes me out into the community. Lately, I’ve been dealing with the new fucking mayor and sheriff.”

Mason glanced at him sharply. “Are they targeting the club?”

“In a way,” Tomas said. “Nothing explicit, but they both ran on campaigns that were basically veiled threats of getting rid of the club. Now the health inspector tried to get Jill’s restaurant shut down, and I had to basically threaten him with legal action to get him to redo it and then stand there the whole time.”

“They made up stuff wrong with her restaurant?”

“Oh, yeah,” Tomas said. “She runs a tight ship and a clean-as-fuck kitchen. When she showed me the list of citations, I about shit my pants. It was all bullshit cross-contamination risk stuff, like people not properly cleaning and spoiled food being kept in the walk-in. It was all ridiculous.”

“That’s crazy. Are you worried about it?” Mason asked, laying a hand on Tomas’s thigh.

He took a breath and let it out slowly as they turned onto the road that the clubhouse was on. “Some,” he admitted, glancing over at Mason. “The guys have to be very aware of what they’re doing, especially when they’re out on red phone calls. Shit’s always tense and potentially dangerous, but when you have the county sheriff looking to make his bones by putting a few of you in jail, things can get dicey a lot quicker.”

“That’s scary,” Mason said softly.

Tomas looked at him. “I don’t want you to worry about it. That’s something that I’m going to handle. Sometimes people just need to be reminded.”

“Reminded of what?”

---