Page 20 of Stone Rules

“Rule number four” —his eyes dart to the door and back— “don’t play with fire if you don’t want to get burned.”

“Come again?”

“I heard you flirting with them, Charlie.” He moves his neck from side to side, eliciting a cracking sound.

“I flirt with lots of customers, Ethan. You do realize I make a living off tips.”

“Fire,” he says. “Eventually you’ll get burned.”

“I’m a big girl, you know. I can take care of myself.”

He stares at me thoughtfully, chocolate eyes carefully scanning every feature of my face as if he’s memorizing it for future recall. He sighs, clearly wanting to get into it with me, but wisely choosing not to. “You look like a librarian,” he says. “A goddamn sexy one.”

I laugh. I’ve gotten so used to wearing the glasses and the bun, that I sometimes forget about the way I look.

I stop laughing when I see the intensity of his stare. Air crackles between us. The crowded restaurant falls silent to my ears that can only hear the pounding of my heartbeat under his heated gaze. As we stare into each other’s eyes, something happens. Something I can’t explain. It’s like we can read each other’s minds; extrapolate each other’s thoughts.

He wants me. I want him. And it’s written all over us.

“Charlie?” Mindy pokes me from behind. “Can you please finish up your tables before the eye-fucking going on here turns into a full-on porn show?”

Ethan rips his eyes from mine and I blow out a slow controlled breath. “Sit,” I tell him, not able to look back into his eyes lest I be burned by the aforementioned fire. “Give me ten minutes.”

I head to the kitchen wondering what the hell just happened. The way he looked at me, it was more intense than the sex we had on his desk. Another minute of that and I might have orgasmed in the middle of Mitchell’s.

I wet a towel and run it over my face, hoping to tamp down the temperature of my scalding skin.

“Who on God’s earth is that and how do I get one?” Mindy asks, brushing past me to pick up a food order.

“Don’t you know him? That’s Jarod’s cousin. I thought he came in here all the time.”

She raises her eyebrow, giving me a look. “Believe me, I’d know it if he came in all the time.”

“But this is his fourth time here since I started the job.”

“Well, there you go. Mystery solved. It’s not the food he’s coming in for, Charlie.” She walks out of the kitchen with her tray piled high.

Chapter Nine

Standing stunned in the kitchen, I think about what Mindy said.

Not the food. Not Jarod.But he doesn’t date clients. He’s made that perfectly clear many times.

Ten minutes later, I sit down across from Ethan, placing a Reuben with a side of fries and water sans lemon in front of him.

He eyes it skeptically and then his gaze shifts to the empty spot on the table before me. “You’re not eating?”

It takes me a second to catch on. “Oh, right.” I shake my head in amusement. “Rule number two, if I remember correctly. But this isn’t a date. You said so yourself.”

His brow furrows into a scowl. “That doesn’t mean we can’t eat together, Charlie. You must be hungry after your shift.”

I look at his food and realize he’s right. It’s after two o’clock and I haven’t eaten since breakfast. I shrug. “I guess I could eat.” I take my napkin and spread it out on the table in front of me. Then I grab half his sandwich and put it on the napkin.

A grin tugs at the edges of his mouth as he nods to his plate. “You want fries with that?” he asks like a seasoned waiter.

“That’s my line,” I say before taking a bite of my—uh, his—lunch.

I eye the folder on the table and almost lose my appetite remembering why he’s here in the first place. “Is that for me?”

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