Page 16 of A Brother's Secret

“I wouldn’t know, it didn’t happen at this location…” the girl shifted, kind of uncomfortable, and Mali rested her chin on herhand.

She wrinkled her nose in the cute, impish way she’d always had and said, “Oh, well, in that case, I’ll have the catfish.”

I watched her as she placed the rest of her order and ordered what I would like, going through deciding on like the million different sides that they had. The girl took our menus and left hurriedly and I shook myhead.

“Some things don’t change,” Isaid.

“I was just thinking that earlier…”

“Oh yeah? Aboutwhat?”

“You set the table.”

I paused and thought about it, nodding. “We always have dinner at the table.”

“Yeah, that was a tradition that was lost after we had to bounce.” She looked bitter and uncomfortable, shifting in herseat.

“Can you tell me anything?” I asked. She looked around the restaurant and shook her head slightly and I nodded saying, “Fair enough.”

“I’m not trying to weasel out of it,” she shot back defensively and I shook myhead.

“I know you aren’t. We havetime.”

She turned her head and stared out the slats of the wooden blinds, across a short expanse of blacktop parking lot and into a copse of trees across the way. I didn’t say anything else. Something about what I’d just said had her retreating back inside her head… lost in thought. I let her stay there so I could study her profile.

Again, she was stunning. Her body coming into its own as a woman had none of the awkward angles or knobby points she had just been coming out of at the age of sixteen. Her neck was long and graceful to the point I just ached with wanting to put my lips against it, to feel her warm pulse against them, to breathe in her sweet and spicy scent that was just purelyher.

All of the feelings I held when we were teenagers came raging out of nowhere as if they’d never left and it was devastating. It was as if a nuclear bomb blast went off in the center of my being and the blast was simply this is real… It was like it finally hit me, there, in the restaurant of all places that my quest was over. I’d found my princess… but then again, didn’t I have to defeat some mega boss to make hermine?

I ran a hand over my face and shifted in my seat and she turned sharply. Her quick brown eyes roving over my face, quickly assessing, calculating, but whatever she was thinking she kept it to herself.

My phone buzzed at my elbow and I picked it up. Dragon had responded and I frowned slightly at thetext.

D: Well bring it on home. We’ll figure out what to do from there.

I was way ahead of him. I already knew what I was going to do, I just needed my systems and a place to lay low until it was done. I smiled faintly to myself and textedback,

Me: Stay in the cage, P. I gotthis.

He shot back with a quick: We’ll see about that, and I chuckled.

Me: Mali wants a hot shower when we get there. Not sure what can be done aboutthat.

D: YOU stay in the cage. If anything the rest of us got a better idea of dealing with females at this point.

Me: Mali’s different.

D: That’s what every single one of these assholes says about theirgirl.

Me: She’s not my girl, D. She’s just a friend.

D: Sure. That’s why you dropped everything to ride to the rescue.

Me: Fuck you! lol

D: I’ll leave that toher.

Me: Seriously, just a friend.

---