The Proposal(14)

“Have you heard from him again? Since his bad texts on Saturday?”

She looked up at him.

“How did you know they were bad?”

He gestured to her face.

“That same worried look that’s on your face right now was on your face on Saturday night when you told your friends he’d texted you. I figured there was something in there that bothered you, and since you’d just rejected him in front of thousands of people, I assumed it was something pretty nasty.” He held up his hand when she started to protest. “I’m not blaming you for rejecting him in front of thousands of people. As a matter of fact, I was pretty impressed that you were honest with him, instead of being nice to him just to make him feel better. But when I saw that look on your face, I figured he wanted to lash out at you.”

She nodded.

“He sure did. Which . . . I like revenge as much as the next person, so I get that, but he didn’t have to keep going.”

He dropped his chicken and sat up straight.

“Is he still texting you?”

She shrugged.

“I’m not sure. The last text I got from him before I blocked him was ‘Watch your back.’ I’m sure he’s just trying to freak me out. I don’t really think Fisher is the violent-revenge-for-rejecting-him type.” She shook her head. “But I should know better than to say that there’s no such thing as one violent-revenge type; anyone can be like that. I didn’t tell Courtney and Dana about that text. They would have freaked out, moved in with me, firebombed his house, and reported him to the police, probably in that order. Unfortunately, he succeeded in freaking me out, if that was his motive.”

He sympathized with Courtney and Dana. He would want to do the same if anyone texted stuff like that to Angela.

He reached across the table and touched Nik’s hand.

“I’m sorry that happened to you. Are you . . . do you live alone?” He shook his head. “Wow, did that sound creepy. What I meant was, are you okay? Are you worried that he’ll come to your house if you don’t respond to him?”

She started to shake her head and stopped.

“I wasn’t at first. I do live alone—I probably shouldn’t tell you that; you’re still a stranger, but hey, you have a good sister, you can’t be too terrible—and I wasn’t worried at all yesterday. But then today, after Fisher’s texts, and then all of the tweets and emails from strangers that were way worse than what he said . . . when I walked into my apartment, well. That was another reason I was glad to leave to go to dinner tonight; it was good to get out of there and have some company.”

He wanted to ask her what was in those messages from strangers that were way worse than Fisher’s texts, but he wasn’t sure if she wanted to talk about it. And he wasn’t sure if he was ready to hear the response.

Two more platters of food landed on their table. He scooped papaya salad and pork belly onto both of their plates.

“I’m glad I could help, but it sucks that he’s made you so anxious about this.”

She took a bite of the pork belly and grinned.

“This is delicious, but also it’s hot as hell.” She squeezed his hand, and he smiled at her. They looked at each other for a long time, their hands still linked across the table. Finally, she broke the eye contact and dropped his hand.

“Okay, please, let’s talk about something that isn’t me. I deserve your best teen-client story, after that.”

He grinned.

“I have a lot of good ones, but my favorite is the kid we nicknamed Santa, because he and his girlfriend tried to hide up the chimney.”

She rubbed her hands together.

“Tell me everything.”





Chapter Four


. . . . . . .



When the waitress brought the check to the table, Nik handed the waitress her credit card.

“This one is on me. I’m still mad at you for paying for our drinks from Saturday. I owed you.”

He pursed his mouth and considered.

“Okay, fine, but you get all of the leftovers. Deal?”

He said that like it was a punishment. Which, considering how spicy some of their leftovers were . . . he might be correct about that.

“Deal. I can have them for lunch tomorrow, in between all of the cupcakes.”

As they walked to her car, he elbowed her.

“Yes?” she said, in answer to his look.

“I know you’re pretty nervous about all of the Fisher stuff. Do you want me to follow you home just to make sure everything is okay? I mean, I’m sure everything is fine, I just thought I’d—”

“Yeah,” she said. “That would be great.”

Why had she agreed to this so quickly, she wondered on the short drive to her house. She usually hated it when men got all protective about her safety, like she was some delicate flower who didn’t know how to protect herself.

But that hadn’t been what Carlos had done, and she’d appreciated it. After her panic from this afternoon, it would be nice to have backup for those thirty seconds it took for her to walk through her apartment. Plus, not to be shallow, but the way Carlos’s T-shirt clung to his biceps . . . she was pretty sure Carlos could take Fisher down easily.

But wait a second. Was she really going to get some dude she hardly knew to do a walk-through of her apartment just because she got a few nasty text messages? That was ridiculous. She was a grown woman; she’d lived on her own for years; she could take care of herself. She should text him right now and tell him that she was fine and didn’t need his help.