Page 18 of Vengeful Eyes
My brow arches, some element of me wishing she did now I’m remembering a time before this, because she’s managed to get more out of me these past few years than any fucker has before. She might not feel it in any normal way—no dreams or idealistic thoughts of flowers or candlelight, but she gets it every time I rip into her skin irrespective. That’s how I display my feelings for her, has been since I realized how effective she can be by my side. She’s become special to me in a way I can’t hold my finger to.
“How was your day?” I ask, waving for the guys to start serving.
“What?” she replies, looking confused. The waiter leans around her, carrots and vegetables being laid out next to her steak.
“Your day, how was it?” She leans back and crosses her arms at that, venomous eyes that she generally reserves for others suddenly on show.
“All right. What’s going on? I’m not a fool, Benjamin. Don’t treat me like one.” Snarky.
I smirk and let the waiter serve me rather than going back at her attitude. She’ll pull her own head back in just fine without me ordering her to.
“Would you rather I shoved that dress up and got on with the end game.” There’s not one movement or reaction from her, regardless of the waiters around us.
“You don’t need to romance me for that.”
She’s right. She lets me fuck her whenever I choose. She’s never denied me. “I’m not romancing you. I’m… flirting.”
“Flirting?” she scoffs.
“Flirting.”
“Asking me how my day was is flirting?”
I chuckle and cut into my steak, amused at her head as she tilts it about, trying to work out what the fuck is going on. “Yes,” I eventually reply, swallowing the meat. “I wouldn’t usually ask. So, flirting.”
Her knife and fork hover as she tries to understand what I’m up to. I’m not surprised. That’s how her life with me goes, always trying to work out what I need from her.
“Right,” she says, cutting into a carrot. “Well, that’s unusual. And, I suppose my day was fine.”
“Stop drooling over it.”
“What? The carrot?”
“My flirting.” Her cutlery clatters the plate, her knife scraping the china. She backs off from it, her arms crossing again as she stares.
“Are you trying to be funny, Benjamin?”
“Attempting.”
“Why?”
“Life.”
“I have no idea where you’re going with this. Or why. What is it that you want?” She huffs a little,barely containing something she's not going to say. She’s too clever for that shit. She'll hold her tongue, work me over slower. “And what’s with all the one-word answers?” Still, I've never seen this spark of fire from her before. It's interesting, making me question the woman she hasn't been for me.
“Normal. For once, I just want normal, Hope. With you.” Her brows indicate she’s confused. She’s right to be. I’m astonishing myself in all honesty. “Why don’t you wear jeans anymore?”
“We are normal. And what the hell is that question about?”
“No, we’re not.”
“I think I prefer not normal. I can’t read you like this,” she grumbles, picking up her cutlery again. “Be yourself, Benjamin. Stop playing games.”
“Why no jeans?”
“Oh God.” The cutlery clatters again. “You don’t like jeans, Benjamin. You told me that when you picked me up for the first time. You said, and I quote, ‘You look better in a dress than you do in jeans’.”
“You do. Doesn’t mean I don’t like looking at your ass in jeans, though. I like you, Hope. Jeans or not.”
