Page 16 of Sam (Eye Candy Ink)

Yeah, I guess he’s right.

“What are we doing here?” Sam asks, leaning back against the door.

“I came to bring you breakfast. They all just climbed in,” I tell her.

“Atlas is getting married!” Mischa shouts and Sam blinks for a second before she grabs the seat lever and lowers the driver’s seat into Atlas’s lap.

She climbs over me and hugs him and I just grin as everyone complains.

“Congratulations!” She tells him as I raise the seat back upright and she settles back into me.

“She hasn’t said yes yet,” he says, playing with his fingers in his lap.

“She will,” everyone says in unison.

“Well, we better get inside,” Zeke says clapping his hands.

They all clamber out of the car, waving goodbye to me. Mischa snags the takeout bag off the floor of the passenger seat and then bolts inside. Sam laughs and chases after him and I smile when I see Atlas and Nico just shake their heads and follow them inside. Zeke is the last one to leave and he watches me from the backseat.

“I don’t think we have anything to be worried about,” he says quietly, before he nods his head at me and follows them inside.

My phone buzzes in my cup holder and I pick it up, smiling when I see Samantha on the screen.

SAMANTHA:Sorry about breakfast. How about you take me out to dinner tomorrow?”

MAX:It’s a date.

That didn’t gothe way I had planned but I got Sam’s surrogate family’s approval and another date with her so it’s still a win in my book. I drive to work with a smile on my face.

11

Sam

I smilewhen Max gets my door for me. He’s always doing that and it’s weird because no one ever has for me before. He also sends me flowers every week and he’s always stopping by with food and snacks. Last week he came by my apartment and changed my burnt-out lightbulb for me. We had made out on my futon for half an hour after that and my lips had tingled for hours after he left.

He stops in to see me when he can and we text and talk on the phone every day. I never realized how strange my hours are until I started dating him. Since we both work more at night, we end up hanging out more in the mornings. We try to grab breakfast or coffee together a few times a week but it’s not the same as an actual nighttime date with him.

I think he must have felt the same because when I told him I had this Thursday off, he had immediately changed his meeting to a different day and told me that he would pick me up at seven. I dressed up for him, wearing the only nice thing I own, a tight black halter dress and a pair of black high heels. All of my tattoos are on display and my hair is still dyed a bright pink color. Max mentioned that he ran to the store this morning and I’m dying to see which color hair dye he picked out for me now. I saw the bag and the Converse box in the backseat already but he didn’t bring it up so I decided to wait.

We’re at some fancy new restaurant that opened up downtown a few months ago. I’ve heard that it’s almost impossible to get reservations but I guess not when you have connections like Max does.

He holds the door open for me and I smile at him as I pass inside. This place is crazy. It’s all tall ceilings and glass windows. A glass staircase leads up to the second floor and there are tables scattered throughout so that the effect is intimate and classy. I can see people giving me weird looks already as Max and I follow after the hostess to our table in the corner. He pulls my chair out for me and I murmur a thank you as I drop down into it and reach for my menu.

“This place is beautiful. Is it one of yours?” I ask when he takes his seat.

“No, I thought it seemed tacky to take you out to one of my restaurants on our first date.”

“Is this our first date?”

“First official date, I guess? Are you counting all of the breakfast dates or when I bring dinner to the shop?” He asks as he picks up his own menu but I notice that he doesn’t open it. Instead, his eyes stay locked on me.

“I wasn’t sure what to count. It’s just that after three dates, I typically go past first base.”

His eyes heat and I smirk at him over the top of my menu.

“I’m counting every time we’ve eaten together then.”

I laugh at that and notice a few people turn our way and shoot me dirty looks.

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