Lola & the Millionaires: Part One (Sweet Omegaverse #2)(96)
“Segal,” the man greeted, his accent thicker than Matthieu’s. He dove into rapid French and passed Matthieu a thin menu.
“Deux grande, s’il vous plait,” Matthieu answered with a nod. “Et un petit poutine.”
The chef ran back inside, and Matthieu passed me the menu. It was a long list of entirely sauces.
“I ordered us both a large order of their fries. The large comes with six sauces, but you can choose more if you want. I can never make up my mind. They have little cup carriers and Paul will just fill them up for us.”
“Matthieu. You’re telling me I lived near a restaurant entirely devoted to dipping French fries in flavored dips and I never knew?”
“Double fried french fries,” Matthieu said. With a brief frown, he added, “Remind me to take my cholesterol pill when we get back. And don’t tell Wes or Leo. They’ll be on me about this.”
I made a soft dismissive sound. Leo couldn’t really talk. He had a sweet tooth that deserved at least two cavities, even if he was meticulous about flossing.
Between Matthieu and I, we ordered just about every flavor of sauce on the menu—including bordeaux wine, figs, and sage!—and poor Paul had an extra set of hands help him bring everything up to the car.
“What if I accidentally drip?”
Matthieu shrugged, a massive cone of french fries settled between his thighs as he pulled the car back down the alley and onto the street. “I’ll get Bertha detailed. Don’t worry. Now tell me what happened with Wendy?”
I gave Matthieu the full rundown of the dinner with Wendy while he drove, and I helped him navigate the complicated chart of dips we’d collected. He didn’t take us back Uptown, but over to the western docks, pulling up to an empty spot and a view of the harbor, freight ships at a distance and the sun setting to our left.
“She didn’t give me a concrete timeline or names or anything,” I said. “Just a very clear picture of how she plans on building her business and what she plans on taking from Designate to do so.”
“Hmm, maybe I’m a little old fashioned for the publishing industry now,” Matthieu mused, twisting in his seat to face me. “I know her plans make sense financially, but I can’t imagine running a company all through social media, with so little actual socializing involved between my employees.”
“That was what I thought too actually,” I said, pointing to Matthieu with a fry. “I love walking into the Stanmore. And getting to know the other people in the departments. Plus…maybe it’s silly, but if everything is digital I…” I hummed and blushed under Matthieu’s intent stare. The sunset was burning over the harbor behind him, creating a strangely romantic picture, and I was about to admit something that seemed a little childish. “When I was little, I used to cut out the things in magazines that I loved and tape them up on my walls. I think most girls did probably. And I just wonder about stuff like that. Like how do you make a wish board to put up on your bedroom wall to wake up to without magazines? Print things out from the internet? It seems weird to me.”
Matthieu was only smiling. “A wish board? Is that…things you want to buy someday?”
“No, I mean, maybe. Kind of. Mostly, it’s like…” I twisted my lips and looked out to the water to think of how to explain it. “I guess it’s like a representation of who you’d like to grow into being? Not necessarily what you own, but an example of the kind of confidence you’d have to have to be the woman who walks down the sidewalk in a red velvet trench coat, or gold lamé lace-up boots, or—oh, you know! Whatever you want,” I said as Matthieu laughed.
“Is that who you wanted to be when you were younger?” Matthieu asked, grinning.
That was who I wanted to be three years ago when gold lamé was still in style. I shrugged in answer and Matthieu dipped another fry, waggling his eyebrows at me.
“A bit,” I admitted. “Mostly I… It wasn’t just clothes. I think I had little collections for everything. Houses. Pictures of guys. Nests, and things I’d learn to cook, and places I’d travel.”
“Nests?” Matthieu’s head tipped to the side, face blank with surprise.
I choked lightly on a fry and winced. Had I said that? I had said that. Keeping my stare on the harbor, I shrugged. “I was definitely one of those betas that wanted to find out they had surprise omega genetics. Even as I got older and it became pretty clear I didn’t.”
Matthieu was quiet, watching me. His foot stretched across the floor to tap mine, encouraging me gently.
“You don’t still want that?” he asked.
A painful stillness took over me, weighing me in my seat, and I turned to meet Matthieu’s gentle gaze. “Last year when Baby’s perfume came in, I think I just realized finally that it wasn’t happening. I’m not special. It was like…it was almost like she took it from me.” Shame burned in my eyes, and I blinked it away. “Or at least, it sank in that it was statistically impossible that two beta friends in their twenties would both suddenly discover their latent omega designation.”
“Why do you think it matters?” Matthieu asked, frowning. “Being an omega?”
“It means you’re wanted,” I said simply, swirling a fry in a peppered parmesan sauce and then glancing up.