Fortunately, we were interrupted by the waiter, wanting our drink orders. Chuck ordered a martini, and Hunter and I both said we preferred to just keep drinking water. It fit the bill of the desperate, soon-to-be-impoverished losers much, much better. Also it kept the mind strong and clear much better than alcohol could, which I just possibly may have known from my own personal experience.
“Good idea,” Chuck said. Under the table, his foot began to trace figure eights along my bare calf. It made my skin crawl, but I couldn’t retreat. “After all, we both know what Ally is like with a little liquor in her.”
Hunter ground his teeth so hard I was pretty sure he would be financing his dentist’s next vacation single-handedly. “Let’s stick to the business at hand, Chuck. Please,” he added with just the right mix of shame and desperation.
Chuck took the bait. “Well,” he said. “When you put it like that.”
His foot traced a little higher up my leg.
We had him right where we wanted him.
Now we just had to get through another hour of this.
#
“Are you two sure you won’t have any more of this caviar? I don’t expect there’ll be very much of it in your future, you might as well take advantage of it while you can.”
“No thank you,” Hunter said with a tight smile that made him look like the victim of an unskilled plastic surgeon. “You go right on ahead.”
“Don’t mind if I do!” Chuck said, and proceeded to down the rest with a disgusting slurp.
Hunter’s and my plates were both nearly untouched. We had lost our appetites nearly forty minutes ago. Not even fine caviar, a French cheeseboard sampler adorned with a selection of organic stone fruits, steak seared to just the point of tenderness, and tiramisu light and fluffy as a cloud off St. Peter’s gates could undo the damage of having to spend time in Chuck’s hideous company.
He’d spent those last forty minutes not only displaying appalling table manners, but leering at me, putting down Hunter with not at all subtle barbs, and being so rude to the wait staff I was honestly surprised none of them had thrown a drink in his face.
At least he had stopped that thing with his foot after Hunter ‘accidentally’ stepped on his toes. He’d had to follow that up with abject apologies, and I was still worried that it might swing Chuck to deny our plea just to spite us, but I was still glad that Hunter had done it. I couldn’t have stood another second of that creep touching me without bursting into tears.
“I’m considering this plan of yours,” Chuck went on. There was a particularly large piece of steak stuck between his front teeth. I tried to ignore it. “It does have certain merits, but honestly, I’d be doing you a huge favor. I’m not sure I can stretch my charity so far.”
He was lying out his ass, of course, but we couldn’t let him know we knew that. I glanced over at Hunter when he didn’t respond immediately. His shoulders and jaw were both clenched tight; putting up with Chuck’s shit was taking a definite toll. I snuck a touch to the small of his back, and he jolted back into the moment, sparing half a second to shoot me a secret smile before his game face slid back into place.
“Of course,” he said to Chuck. “We understand completely. Take all the time you need to make your decision. Only…not too much time?”
I thought that bit of groveling at the end was a nice touch, and by the cat that ate the cream grin on Chuck’s face, he thought so too.
He opened his mouth to reply, and we waited with bated breath to see whether it would be more insults or finally, finally, finally a firm answer—
And then his phone rang.
“You don’t mind if I take this, do you?” Chuck didn’t bother to wait for our answer before picking up the phone. “Oh, hello, Senator.” He raised his voice slightly on the title, making sure everyone in the restaurant could hear exactly how important he was. “I’m so pleased to hear from you, you know you can always count on our support for your campaign. No, now’s not an inconvenient time at all.” He stood, flapped his hand at us in a little ‘wait for me’ gesture, and sauntered off to take his oh-so-terribly-critical call in private.
“I’m going to kill that fucking asshole,” Hunter said the minute he was out of hearing range.
“As long as you wait till we’ve got his money,” I joked.
“I’ll do my best.” His voice was strained.
I took a good look at him. He was wound tighter than a pocket watch, every muscle clenched like he was only barely restraining himself from launching into an attack. I could see his pulse in the vein at the side of his neck. That couldn’t be healthy.
“Okay, pep talk time,” I said, grabbing his hand and pulling him to his feet.
“Uh, okay,” he said, following my lead even as confusion wound its way through his voice. “And the pep talk can’t happen at the table because…”
“Because that table is dead to me,” I said. “Too many bad things have happened to me at that table for me to ever look at it the same way again, and I don’t want to risk this pep talk being ruined by all the terrible memories.”