Jude’s waiting in a booth and I slide in so quickly that I nearly fall out the other side. At least the chair issue is laid to rest.
“What did Amie say?” he asks as he hands me a paper menu.
I devote my full attention to the Chef’s Specials. “No clue what you’re talking about.”
“You disappeared for the length of a bible. I was beginning to worry that you had climbed out the window.”
I toss the menu on the table. It’s probably a bad idea to eat anything with my stomach in knots. Fiddling with my straw, I shrug. “Why would I do that?”
“Because I practically kidnapped you.”
“No, you didn’t.” I can still be cool. I have the capacity for it inside me somewhere.
“Sunshine, I would have had an easier time at gunpoint.”
The waitress appears interrupting our banter and I order my old standby: Sesame Chicken. Jude orders for an army. When she finally stops scribbling it down, I’m gawking.
“I love Chinese,” he admits. “It’s hard to find around here. Dozens of teriyaki places and no Kung Pao chicken. I’ll take home the leftovers and eat for a week.”
Instantly I imagine curling up on the couch and slurping down cold lo mein with him. The vision twists inside me. Could things ever be that comfortable with him? Not until I corral the tireless butterflies I’ve felt since the moment we met.
“What do you love, Faith?” he asks.
I must be a hell of a conversationalist if he’s forced to ask me leading questions at every turn. He might have dragged me out tonight but I can’t change the fact that I’m here. “Music,” I start and then the answers pour out of me like they’ve been waiting for him to come and ask this question for years, “and the rain, especially when it’s foggy. Coffee in the morning but tea at night. Yellow. Every shade of it. Cats.”
“Cats?” he repeats back. “Not dogs?”
“I like puppies, but I love cats. They’re so wonderfully selfish. They just lie around and sleep, then demand you attend to them.”
Jude laughs and all I can think of is making him laugh again. “You sound jealous.”
“I am jealous,” I admit. “Who doesn’t want to be a house cat?”
“Not a street cat?”
“Been there, done that.” I wave him off. “Living off scraps and taking charity. Yeah, not anymore.”
“Maybe not even cats have it made.” His palm is on the table and I wonder if he’ll slide it across to mine. I haven’t been this aware of a man’s hands since tenth grade.
“I guess not.” I sip on my water vaguely aware of the music playing on an old stereo in the kitchen. The dining room isn’t crowded. Everyone who’s come in after us has left with takeout.
“It’s your song,” Jude points out at about the time I realize that I’m humming.
“By the way, you were right about the words. I looked them up.”
“I know.”
“Really?” I toss my wadded straw wrapper at him and try to ignore how it bounces off his chest. “It’s not easy for me to admit when I’m wrong.”
“What did you want me to say?” He throws it back at me and it lands in my cleavage. Jude’s arms shoot into the air like he just landed a major goal.
I dig it out and place it safely in front of me. “I don’t know. Maybe that you thought so or that you were guessing. That way I wouldn’t have to eat crow.”
“I could say that, but I knew you were wrong.” He’s hardly containing laughter now and this time I don’t want to hear it. Mr. Arrogant has returned in all his glory.
“You’re a cocky son of a bitch,” I inform him in a perfectly nice tone of voice.
He continues to laugh as he pulls out his phone and begins to type something in. A moment later he hands it to me. I skim the lyrics and discover exactly what I’d already told him.
“You’re terrible at being a gracious winner.” I hold it out to him, but he shakes his head.
“Keep reading.”
Scrolling to the end, I find the credits.
Song written by Jude Mercer.
“You forfeit your win,” I announce.
“I never had a pony in the race, Sunshine.”
Narrowing my eyes in the hope that I look annoyed and not humiliated, I lean against the table. “You could have told me how you knew.”
“That would have been bragging,” he says pointedly, “and I didn’t want to come off as arrogant.”
“How did you want to come off then?”
He flashes me a wicked grin. “I can think of a couple ways.”
“Shameless and arrogant,” I mutter, but I’m so glad he’s not sitting next to me right now. There’s a very real possibility that the look he just gave me caused a panty meltdown. I can only hope I’m not stuck to the vinyl covered bench.
“I promise to never correct you again.” He waves a paper napkin in the air.
I don’t like that idea any more. “No! You better tell me if I’m making a fool out of myself.”
“Can I actually tell you you’re making a fool out of yourself?” he asks.