Page 5 of Enchanting Him

Chapter 2

Dylan

The dinner rush is starting to die down when Loren comes back into the kitchen with a huff, making my brow lift at the waitress who has never shown a single ounce of frustration in the four year’s she’s worked for me. She’s become my second in charge of the house whenever the front manager isn’t here so her being annoyed has my back up instantly.

“Everything okay, Loren?” I ask her, sliding the plate I just finished onto the shelf for the staff to grab for table eleven.

“Sorry, just needed to get away from all the stupidity out there for a minute,” she answers, and I lift my brow higher her way. “I got a customer that’s been looking over the menu for like forty minutes and still can’t decide what to get, and as if that wasn’t enough, it seems every single guy from the bar has been coming over to hit on her. It’s not that she’s taking up one of my seats, it’s just making it impossible to get other orders served when the person they’re for aren’t there but over hitting on her.”

“She some model or something?” Tim pipes up asking from the back counter where he’s chopping up more vegetable for our coming orders.

“I don’t think so. Not with that pink hair,” Loren answers and my brow lifts a bit higher hearing that. Most of our clientele are pretty down to earth. They don’t go in for crazy hair styles or colors. We get the occasional one in here since we are a tourist town, but my restaurant isn’t on the main drag, here for the regulars of town rather than them. “I don’t know, she seems a bit odd. I can’t tell if she’s turning everyone down because she’s trying to find someone with more money, or because she just has no interest in them. I mean, the few times that I’ve actually seen one of them approach her has been a bit entertaining. This last one she actually sighed in annoyance towards when she had to look up from the menu again.”

“Where is she?” I ask, curious now because I might not have opened it to rival the premiere restaurants in New York or LA, but around here, we’re one of the better ones for certain.

The menu is extensive, with price ranges to satisfy those in town with the most money even, while still being affordable for those who are lower middle class. Hell, we do a Happy Hour that discounts stuff as well, which brings in even more people that might not have come without them. The discounts don’t bite into my bottom line either. Not when we sell enough to make up for the discount.

“Table seventeen,” Loren tells me, and I slip over to the door, pushing it open slightly to get a glimpse of the woman.

A tingle starts at the base of my spine when my eyes land on the most gorgeous swath of pink and white waves, flowing up my body, wrapping fully around my chest, settling in my heart when her head lifts, letting me see her perfectly gorgeous face. It’s the sweetest oval shape with big, fluffy lips that I want to taste more than anything I’ve ever created. Her pink waves remind me of the morning sunrise with the varying shades. It starts out more peachy pink then becomes a truer baby pink, and I picture my hand wrapped in it, pulling her head back while I claim thoseluscious lips with a hard kiss as I fuck deep into her sweetness from behind.

My cock which has been completely silent for the last ten years wakes hard and fast and I have to fight to stop the growl that works it’s way up my throat seeing another man approach her. The deepest, darkest possessiveness floods me and my hand grips the door tight to keep my feet rooted in place.

My anger stops when my girl’s sweet face tips up towards the man, an almost grimace of a polite smile on her lips when she sees him. They’re too far away for me to be able to hear what she says, but I know already she’s telling him no, which soothes my ire. At least until he leans down, one hand on the back of her chair, the other on the table, and my feet instantly begin to move me towards them.

“I’m sorry, I’m not interested,” I hear her say to the man as I watch her lean away from him as much as she can with the wall at her side.

My hand grabs hold of the man’s shoulder, pulling him backwards, and a bit of surprise hits when I realize I know the guy. “Get lost, John, before I tell yourwifethat you were hitting on someone else.”

“Just offering to show this lovely visitor around town, that’s it,” John lies, and my eyes glower at him as I tighten my hold on his shoulder to keep him from looking back atmygirl.

“She doesn’t needyouroffers. She’s not here visiting, are you, angel?” I add, glancing towards her.Fuck me—her eyes are the sweetest turquoise dream that make me want to drown in her even more.

“No,” she says, giving me a smile, a real smile and I’m so fucking done with it’s not funny.

I’ve avoided women for the last fifteen years, not wanting to deal with them once my first restaurant hit it big. That’s when I was living in New York. A phenom at twenty-three.

I hated all of the attention and ended up selling the restaurant, giving me enough money to move on, start over without worry, and since then, I’ve been making my way down the east coast, opening and selling restaurants until I finally landed here about eight years ago. Something about the place just felt like home and I opened my place.

I met Duncan soon after I joined the town’s Small Business Owner Association. He’s around my age, a couple years younger, but he’d already been here for two years, running his own landscaping business along with his greenhouse. A year later, Dane moved to town and opened his coffee shop. He also roasts his own specialty blends that sell well.

The two of them are my best friends and we get together whenever we can to grab a beer and catch up. We don’t have a lot of time to do it with our businesses but it’s usually amusing when we do go out, especially when we run into other members of the association because even after seven years of us each having our own place, most of them still get us mixed up.

I suppose that’s bound to happen though when all of us have names that start with D, are within two years in age of each other—me being the oldest and Duncan the youngest with Dane just between us—and then all being about six-foot-four and built sturdily. Duncan has the most muscle of all of us thanks to his job, but both Dane and I enjoy hitting the gym when we have the time.

None of us have dated since we’ve been here and I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that like me, the two of them haven’t ever touched a woman sexually—or a man for that matter. I was too busy when I was in my early twenties with getting my restaurant up and running, and when it became a hit, all the women wanted was my money and it kept me far from them. I don’t really know Duncan or Dane’s reason that they don’t date. It wasn’t something we cared to discuss beyond not needing the othersto play wingman when we were out because women weren’t our priority.

Now, that sure as hell isn’t true any longer, because this woman—this girl—is mine. I know it as deeply as I knew that this was meant to be home when I got here, and I won’t stop until she’s mine in every way.

“You’re withhim?” John asks, looking between us, and I don’t bother hiding my smirk when it seems that my girl can’t take her eyes off me the way I couldn’t take mine off her earlier.

“Yes,” she says without a pause bringing a grumble to John’s lips, but I ignore it as I move closer to my girl, taking John’s spot when he leaves. “Thank you…I…”

“Weren’t interested in being hit on by some jackass that already has a wife?” I state, lifting a brow at her as she smiles softly up at me.

“Not in any of them,” she whispers, her eyelids closing cutting off her gorgeous gaze from me and I hate it. I want her eyes on me all the time.

“Eyes, angel,” I demand, my chest puffing up when her face lifts back my way instantly, her eyes opening as a little shiver slips through her. “That’s a good girl.”

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