Page 69 of Accidental Blind Date
“Are you ready?” he asks.
I nod and Dax walks up the steps, holding out his arm. I place my hand in the crook of his elbow, and we start to the car. As we walk, he smiles over, kissing me on the cheek and then softly saying, “Beautiful.”
And as he opens the door for me and watches me slip into the black leather seat of his car, rounding to his side, tossing the keys in the air, and catching them again, I wonder if this is what it was supposed to feel like all along.
Chapter 23
Dax
Don’t stare.
Don’t stare.
Don’t stare.
Fuck it, she looks beautiful and I’m not going to pretend like she doesn’t. So, I stare, while I walk up the steps. I stare as I walk her to the car. I stare out of the corners of my eyes as we drive to the restaurant on the bay. And as we sit outside on the patio, a warm evening breeze brushing her skin and tugging at the locks of her hair that I am sure she worked in vain to make perfect (though I kind of like them wild and free), I am staring at her still. She’s always caught my attention. Ever since that day in the cantina when I saw her waiting, waiting for someone who wouldn’t see what I saw. Someone not worthy of sitting there, sipping cocktails, eating a charcuterie of salsas, and talking allusively about what brought them on the date in the first place.
“Do you like oysters?” I ask as I take a sip of water from a wine glass.
“God no,” she lets out, and Libby is officially the only one at the restaurant not talking in a whisper. But I don’t care. In fact, I nearly spit my water across the table attempting to stifle a laugh. Her lips tip down. God, she’s even lovely when she frowns.“Sorry. I just don’t understand why anyone would want to eat a cold, fishy blob.”
Someone at another table offers a disgusted glare but I don’t care. She makes me smile. She makes me laugh. She makes me happy.
“That’s fine, I’m not really a fan either,” I admit. “But I do think we should order an appetizer.”
“Food before our food. I like it,” she says with a little shoulder shimmy as she reads the menu, and I laugh again.
We order seared ahi and coconut shrimp because we couldn’t decide on just one. I get an old fashioned as she orders something with pear gin and muddled blackberries and every time she takes a sip, she smacks her lips with a smile.
“So, you’ve never been here before?” I ask as we snack on the appetizers.
She shakes her head and covers her mouth with her cloth napkin as she chews. “Not here. Not anywhere like it.”
“You’ve never been to a restaurant on the ocean? Aren’t you from Boston?” I ask and then immediately feel like that sounded very rude.
But Libby is so chill, she doesn’t take it that way. “I’ve been to restaurants around here but not ones like this. More like the little food trucks on the water and pubs around the corner. He didn’t…” she stops, almost as if she isn’t sure if she should be telling the story. I tip my chin up, so she’ll go on. “My ex didn’t like spending money on things like this.”
“He didn’t like good food?” I joke. But it’s not really a joke.
“He believed in saving money. All of it. Food is expendable. Instant gratification. And…bad for you if it’s not in moderation. Rich foods anyways.”
I can tell by the way her body language changes when she talks about him that her ex was not a good guy. From the sounds of it he was controlling and demeaning.
I reach across the table and take her hand. “Well, he’s not here. And I don’t know about you, but I am looking forward to dipping everything in butter.”
A small smile comes back to her pretty lips, and I feel bad for saying anything at all. “I’ll be honest,” I say, taking a sip of my drink, letting the warm fluid calm all my nerves. “Some of the best food I’ve ever had was at the food trucks that set up down by the aquarium.
“Like the fish and chips one,” she licks coconut dipping sauce off her finger before pointing at me.
“Yes!”
“With the spicy seasoning!”
“That one is my favorite,” I agree. “That and a bottle of cold beer and I’m good to go.”
She smiles and I do too. Our food comes, baked stuffed salmon for me and butter scallops and gnocchi for her and for a moment we just relish the flavors. We rave about the fresh herbs and savory sauces, offering bites to each other so we can both taste everything. We end the meal with a slice of strawberry cheesecake. We take turns spooning it off the plate, slowly indulging in the cake and the evening itself.
“You know,” I say as I watch her, “Strawberry cheesecake is the girls’ favorite too.”
