“Agreed.” Jo nodded and turned back to me. “Can I give Joss your number?”
Joss, I mouthed. “Joss.” I managed to utter the word. “Yes. Yes, you can definitely do that.”
Holy crap. There was a possibility J. B. Carmichael could be my client. That would look amazing on my Web site!
“We’ve lost her,” Logan said.
I rolled my eyes at him. “You have not. I’m here.” I grinned huge. “I’m just happier than I was ten minutes ago.”
He burst out laughing but was stopped from responding by the pretty waitress hovering over him. She grinned down at him, cocking her hip toward him. Logan’s own grin deepened.
I felt an unpleasant sensation in my stomach.
“Can I get you guys drinks?” the waitress asked the table while looking into Logan’s eyes. She was just his type. Petite, blond, with exaggerated curves.
“Water for the table,” Logan said.
“Anything else?”
“Guys?” he asked us without taking his eyes off her.
I wanted to punch him.
Hard.
“I like your tattoo,” the waitress said. “Does it mean something?”
“It definitely means something.” He grinned suggestively at her.
Shannon shot him an annoyed look before turning to us. “A bottle of wine?”
We nodded.
“Red?” Jo asked.
We all nodded again.
“A bottle of the house red,” Logan said. “Maia.” He finally wrenched his eyes away from the waitress to look at Maia. He frowned when he found her glaring daggers at him. “What do you want to drink, sweetheart?”
Instead of answering, she buried her nose in her menu.
He looked at me for answers and I glanced down at Maia, unable to look him in the eye. I had no right to feel jealous or hurt by his flirting with another woman. Maia… she had a right to be confused by how it made her feel. I imagined right now she wanted Logan all to herself. “Diet Coke, sweetheart?” I asked her softly.
She nodded.
“Diet Coke,” I said, snapping open my own menu.
I heard him mutter the drink to the waitress, and as soon as she left, I felt his burning stare. I ignored it and looked up at Jo and Cam. “So Logan didn’t tell me what you two do for a living.”
“I work with my uncle Mick. I’m a painter and decorator,” Jo said.
This surprised me, but I tried to hide it. I imagine looking the way she looked, she was used to people making all sorts of snap judgments about her. “That must be fun working with family.”
She nodded. “It can be, yeah.” She nudged Cam with her shoulder. “Cam’s a graphic designer.”
“Oh? Do you work for yourself or…?”
“Both. I work for a marketing company full-time, but I also codesign with multimedia artists.”
I knew Cole was famous in the tattoo industry because he was the top artist at INKarnate, a tattoo studio in Edinburgh of national acclaim. I wondered if he was inspired by Cam and asked. From there the two of them kept me entertained, with Jo and Shannon interjecting every now and then, but I was very aware of a silently pissed-off Maia at my side and her confused father on her other side.
I was also aware it was time I started taking back my own life, because there was no if anymore regarding whether I was going to end up getting hurt. Only when.
CHAPTER 11
“W
hy are you looking at me like that?” Maia said, throwing Logan and me a wary smile.
She’d come home from school to find us standing in my sitting room, waiting for her. It was a week since I’d gone shopping with Logan, and it was his day off again. We’d spent it putting the finishing touches on Maia’s room.
Logan’s face was perfectly blank.
I refrained from grimacing at him and smiled brightly at his daughter instead. “Logan has a surprise for you.”
I wouldn’t hold his sudden lack of enthusiasm against him, because I knew underneath that stoic reserve, he was a pile of nerves. He wanted Maia’s room to be perfect for her.
Maia’s eyebrows rose at the announcement. “Okay.”
“This way,” Logan piped up, marching toward her. He put his hands on her shoulders, gently turned her around, and put his hands over her eyes. He started guiding her out of my flat. She giggled, and I saw his shoulders relax a little.
I hurried past them to get my door and laughed at them as Logan attempted to guide her out. She tripped on the doorjamb, and Logan’s arms went around her to stop her from falling. She craned her neck to look back up at him, laughing, and he grinned down at her.
“Maybe I’ll just cover your eyes once we’re in our flat.”
She didn’t miss the emphasis he put on the word “our,” and she turned back to me with bright eyes.
“Come on, then.” I hurried ahead and opened Logan’s door.
Once we were all inside, Logan insisted on covering her eyes again, and it took them twice as long to get through the flat to Maia’s room. He guided her in and said, “I hope you like it, sweetheart,” and then removed his hands from her eyes.