by Mercer Scott
I let the offer hang in the air just so I can watch Cooper’s reaction. I want to see him squirm. But he doesn’t look uncomfortable at all. He looks amused? He looks like he’s about to start laughing? And that’s exactly what he does.
Frowning across the table at him, I watch as Cooper throws his head back and lets out a rip of amused laughter. When he finally stops chuckling, he just shakes his head.
Grant doesn’t look impressed. “You think I couldn’t take you? I’ve been kicking men bigger than you out of this restaurant for the last fifteen years.” This is the first time I’ve ever seen Grant be anything other than warm and friendly.
“Try me, buddy. Just try me. Even with this damn metal hip, I could kick your ass any day of the week,” Cooper warns.
“I told you that you were no longer welcome at the Glass Balls, man.” Grant is glaring down at Cooper like he wants to punch him. “What is one of my favorite customers doing here with this guy? How did you fall in with this jerk, Nat?”
“I didn’t. Fall in anything with him.” My voice is harsher than I meant it to be. There’s no point in being rude to Grant, just because I’m frustrated that I let myself be talked into being on this committee, that I let myself get talked into working with Cooper, and that I let Cooper talk me into coming here with him. Or that I’m just generally pretty damn frustrated at the moment!
Every nurse worth her scrubs is an expert in conflict resolution. And even before I was a nurse, I always hated conflict. Smiling up at Grant to take the sting out of my words, I lean towards him. “I actually don’t know him. Not at all. I’m helping out on this committee for the Maui Veterans’ Hospital, and I was unlucky enough to get assigned to work with him. As much as I’d love to see you throw Cooper out on his ass, unfortunately we have work to do. We’re just here for a meeting and then we’ll be out of your hair. Would it be okay if he stayed here – just this once? I’m really craving your garlic fries…”
Grant glares at Cooper for a long minute, and then turns back to me and smiles. “Anything for you, darlin’. There’s a moratorium on his ban for as long as you need today. But don’t come back, man.”
“Thanks, so much!” I give Grant the biggest, brightest smile I can muster. A smile so big that my cheeks hurt.
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll be back in a minute with those garlic fries.” Grant turns and walks back towards the kitchen, shaking his head.
“What about the beers?” Cooper mutters under his breath with a look of desperation on his face.
“And beers? Lagers, please!” I call out after Grant.
He doesn’t answer me, but I’m confident that he’ll be coming back with at least one frosty beer. For me.
“He’s probably going to spit in your food now. Enjoy!” I tell Cooper, gleefully. “And what could you possibly have done to make the most Zen surfer dude I’ve ever met hate you that much?”
Cooper grins at me. “Hard to believe, right? Glad to know you think I’m a pretty loveable guy.”
“No one thinks that. And definitely not me.” Despite my best efforts to maintain a frown, the corners of my lips are turning up against my will. “Well? What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything. I stumbled on this place the first time they let me leave the hospital. And I’ve been coming back ever since. I’ve been working to befriend that guy and get him to tell me the secret ingredient of his fry batter for nearly six months.”
“Well, something obviously happened to turn your budding bromance into the near throw-down I just witnessed. And you’re welcome. If it wasn’t for me, you’d be on the other side of that door looking through the glass like a sad puppy in a pet store.”
“Thank you, Natalia.” He takes his time saying my name, holding the L hostage with his tongue and sending a shiver up my spine.
“Whatever you did, you’re not exactly helping things by threatening to kick Grant’s ass. And you shouldn’t be kicking anyone’s ass right now, anyway.”
“I was defending your honor.”
“Oh, please! Defending my honor? First, I can defend my own damn honor. And second, who was questioning my honor? No one. Grant was pissed at you, not me. You just needed to prove that you’re a big man and can kick another man’s ass. Even with your injured hip.” I let out a frustrated sigh at the time lost wasted by women around the world because of masculine stupidity. “No one thought you couldn’t. You should probably talk to someone about that.”
“Why do you think I’m in therapy?” Cooper mutters under his breath. Then he glances back at the kitchen. “Shit, I did make it worse. I’m going to have to go back there and apologize, aren’t I?”
I nod. “Yes, you absolutely need to apologize for being a complete dick.”
I wince as soon as I say it. The word dick takes me right back to thinking about him. Dr. Dick. I’m really going to need to think of a new insult.
“Sure you don’t want to talk about it? Talking helps. I should know because like I said, I’m in therapy.” Cooper’s staring at me across the table, and his violet eyes are intense on mine.
“No. I mean, no thank you. Let’s just get back to talking about the committee, okay?” My fingers are crossed under the table in the hopes that he’ll actually cooperate for once and let this go.
“You got it,” he replies, surprising me.
“Ummm… I wasn’t expecting that. Thank you.”
Cooper laughs softly. “I swear I’m not a dick. You just seem to think I am.”
“Ugh! I never want to hear that word again!” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I cringe at how dramatic I must sound. And I cringe at the fact that Dr. Dick is still managing to hurt me from thousands of miles away. I need to not care about him anymore. I need the sound of his name to mean nothing to me. Less than nothing.
“Noted. Won’t happen again.” Cooper gives me a curt nod. If I didn’t already know he was military, that nod would tell me in a split second.
As I glance out the open windows, the tropical air stretches between us, warm and muggy this close to the ocean. I’m embarrassed for snapping at him, but the last thing I want to do is explain why I never want to hear the word dick again. Can’t we just get to work on the hospital project, so that we can both get out of here? Something about being around Cooper just puts me on edge. And I’m already dangerously close to the edge. I don’t need any sexy Navy SEALs tipping me off of it.
“Nat! What are you doing here?”
Veronica’s voice carries across the Glass Balls to me.
Why is this my life?
Glancing up, I see that it’s not just Veronica. It’s Veronica, her fiancé Ty, and his teenage sister, Chloe. The entire Rollins-Graham family is present and accounted for.
Why? Why is this happening to me?
“Hey, V… What are you guys all doing here?” I know exactly how awkward I sound. And I know exactly how this looks. Because it only looks one way. Like I’m on a date with Cooper Hamilton.
I want to crawl under the table and hide from them. From Cooper. From myself. I know that Veronica won’t believe me when I swear that I’m not on a date, even if she says she does. Not after Lara’s gleeful text about Cooper last night. Cringing, I remember my friends’ unanimous advice… the best way to get over someone is to get under someone new. But that is not happening. Not that it would ever happen because I’m done with men forever, but it’s way, way too soon to be thinking about getting under anyone… even a ridiculously hot Navy SEAL like Cooper.
I’d be lying if I said that the idea hadn’t crossed my mind once or twice in the twenty-four hours since I met him yesterday. I am still human, even if I’ve sworn off men forever. But none of the steam ideas that have flashed through my mind are happening. Because I’m done with me. Forever.
Veronica is eyeing Cooper up and down, and I know she’s figured out that this is the hot military man from yesterday’s texts. Lara so helpfully didn’t leave any details out – and how many men have violet eyes? T
he only thing she left out was a photo and his social insurance number. I’m actually surprised she didn’t find a way to orchestrate paparazzi photos. Glancing out the window, I scan to make sure that there aren’t actually any photographers lined up capturing this awkwardness for all eternity.
“Oh, we just picked up Chloe after school, and we all felt like getting something to eat at the Glass Balls.”
“What happened to your event? The one that was so important you had to miss the hospital committee meeting?” I demand suspiciously.
Veronica blushes and a guilty expression flashes across her face. “Oh, we just wrapped up… early.”
“Uh-huh, sure you did-”
“Aren’t you going to introduce us to your friend, Nit-Nat Bar?” Veronica cuts me off and then smiles encouragingly at me like a proud, pageant mom.
“Nit-Nat Bar?” Cooper grins across the table at me.
“You’re not allowed to call me that.” Turning, I glare up at Veronica. “And you might not be allowed to call me that anymore, either.”
If I find out she and Lara set me up on the hospital committee, I’m going to kill her. And I’m going to kill Lara. I’m not going to have any friends at all because I’ll have killed them all. On the plus side, I won’t need to worry about losing my job anymore because I’ll be in prison for the rest of my life.
“You were introducing us to your friend…” Veronica says again.
“There isn’t a friend here for me to introduce you to. So, I’m not exactly sure who you’re talking about.” I glance around me, pretending to be confused. Then I wave my hand in Cooper’s general direction. “This person is Cooper Hamilton. He’s on the hospital committee that you and Lara apparently tricked me into joining today. And lucky me, we were assigned to work together on a project.”
My eyes narrow and I stare at Veronica hard. She’s a terrible liar, so if I’m going to get the truth out of one of them, it’s Veronica. And if I find out they had something to do with me being paired up with Cooper, I really am going to kill them.
Veronica holds her hand out to Cooper. “Hey Cooper, I’m one of Natalia’s best friends, although you wouldn’t know it because she’s being such a brat. It’s nice to meet you. This is my fiancé, Ty. And this is my soon-to-be sister-in-law, Chloe.”
Ty reaches out to shake Cooper’s hand, and Chloe waves at him. They’re all being far nicer than he deserves. Just why he deserves complete strangers being rude to him, I don’t know. I’m sure I could come up with a reason.
“It’s nice to meet any friends of Natalia’s,” Cooper says, just as Grant walks over from the bar carrying two beers and a giant plate of garlic fries.
“More of my favorite customers,” he tells my friends, before turning to glare at Cooper again. Then he dumps the beers and fries unceremoniously in a clattering heap on the table and stalks back behind the bar.
“What’s wrong with Grant? I’ve never seen him like that. Except that time, he and Lena got in a fight, and she wouldn’t talk to him for a week. She had a dream that he did something bad and then held it against him when she woke up,” Ty says, shrugging as if that sounds completely crazy.
“Of course, she did! The poor woman.” Veronica nods sympathetically.
“I hope he apologized profusely for whatever he did in that dream.” If only I’d listened to the bad dreams that I had about Dr. Dick and held them against him, maybe I wouldn’t be sitting here with a heart that feels like it’s been ripped in two. I know he wouldn’t have apologized for my dreams, not that I ever told him about them.
Ty and Cooper look from Veronica and me to each other and back again. They’re staring at us like we’re absolutely crazy.
“It’s a woman’s prerogative to hold against a man whatever he does to her in her dreams. She dreamt it for a reason, so he must have done something to make her have the dream in the first place. It’s how dreams work. That’s just science,” Veronica explains patiently.
“It’s a good thing I love you,” Ty says, pulling Veronica roughly against his side, and leaning down to kiss her temple. “Because you sound straight-up crazy right now.”
“And it’s a good thing you haven’t done anything bad to me in my dreams… yet.” Veronica has a smile on her face, but her tone is a warning.
“Chloe, if you don’t already agree with us, you will when you get older,” I promise her.
Chloe gives me a devious smile, and then says proudly, “Oh, I already do. Once, I had a dream that Ty grounded me and took away my phone for no reason. And I didn’t talk to him for three days!”
“I’m supposed to live in fear of pissing you both off in your dreams now in addition to what I actually do in real life?” Ty shakes his head slowly at his sister before pinching Veronica’s ass and leaning down to kiss her.
Just as I’m thinking how sweet it is to see Veronica and Ty be all touchy-feely with each other, Chloe sighs dramatically and slides into the booth next to me. “Ugh. They do this all the time. I’m telling you it’s all the time.”
Then she dives into the garlic fries like she needs a chaser after seeing her brother and Veronica kiss. It probably does seem gross when you’re a teenager, but not to me. Veronica had some really bad boyfriends. The last one before Ty cheated on her and treated her like crap. Sounds like someone else I know, Dr. Dick.
But Ty worships her, and she worships him right back. You can’t be in the same room with them for two minutes without it being crystal clear just how into each other they are. Ty’s always reaching out and taking her hand or pulling her to him. He’s so affectionate with her in a way that I don’t remember any of her other boyfriends being. And Veronica is the happiest I’ve ever seen her.
“Sorry, kid. We should probably get our own table. It sounds like Nat and Cooper have some work they need to do,” Ty says gently.
“No, no. It’s all good.” Cooper leans back and pushes the plate of garlic fries closer to Chloe. Then he slides along the curved booth, so he’s sitting right next to me. Maybe no one else noticed the sharp intake of breath, but I did. His hip is bothering him, even if he hides it well. “The more the merrier. Have a seat.”
And now I’m trapped between a teenager and Cooper, with no escape in sight. Veronica meanwhile beams at Cooper as she slides into the booth. Ty glances at me apologetically as he slides in behind her.
This is a living nightmare. And even if I’m not sleeping, I’m definitely holding it against all of them.
When Grant comes back to take everyone’s order, he still has a thundercloud over his head.
“Everything okay, Grant?” Ty looks at his uncle with concern in his grey eyes.
I can’t help the giggle that escapes my lips. “He just doesn’t like Cooper.”
“It’s not funny,” Cooper mutters under his breath.
“Wait, what?” Veronica glances back and forth between Cooper and Grant, then stares at Cooper with narrowed eyes. “Why don’t you like Cooper?”
“He knows what he did.” Grant glares at Cooper with his arms crossed over his chest.
“How many times do I have to apologize, man? And I’m sorry about earlier, too.” Cooper stares earnestly up at Grant, but Grant is just not buying it.
“Apparently a few more times. I need to know what you did. Grant, will you please tell us what Cooper did to piss you off so badly?” My lips are twitching when I say the next words. “I already know why I dislike him, but please tell me why you do…”
“Hahaha. Very funny,” Cooper mutters under his breath again, as he shifts in his seat. But this time, I don’t think it’s because of his hip.
“Fine. Fine, I’ll tell you. This jerk came into my restaurant – my place of business, my life’s work – on a date a couple of weeks ago. And they sent their food back. Three times. Three times! I banned the two of them from setting foot in this restaurant ever again. We don’t do alterations, substitutions, or returns at the Glass Balls. The food comes out of that kitchen how I want it
to come out. Eat it the way I serve it, or get out!”
Whatever I was expecting, it was not this… Who returns food three times? Apparently, Cooper and his date – that’s who. Cooper was on a date? No, that’s none of my business.
Turning back to Cooper, I shake my head at him, biting my bottom lip to stop from smiling at how ridiculous this is. “So rude! How could you?”
“You sent food back three times? I have never eaten anything at this restaurant that was anything less than perfection.” Veronica shakes her head at Cooper, but she’s biting her lip to stop from smiling, too.
Cooper holds his hands out in front of him to fend off the verbal attacks. “Look, it wasn’t even me that did it. It was the woman I was with. I begged her not to. My food was amazing. I love this place. Like I said, I’ve been coming here since the day they let me out of that hospital bed. Can’t you just let it go, man?”
“No.”
I’ve never heard Grant sound so menacing. When I just can’t hold it in anymore, I burst out laughing. Thankfully, Veronica joins me, so Grant and Cooper can’t focus all their glaring just on only me.
After a long minute of getting redder and redder while we laugh, Grant turns and walks away. “You can order at the bar when you’re ready.”
“Uh-oh, we made Grant mad!” Veronica says, and then laughs even harder.
I laugh, too, until a horrible thought occurs to me. “Wait, what if Grant bans us, too?”
“He wouldn’t…” Veronica looks panicked. “Ty, you have to fix this! We eat here three times a week.”
Ty shakes his head at Veronica, but he’s smiling. “One, you don’t send back a man’s food. And two, you don’t laugh about it to his face. I’ll see what I can do. V’s a vegan, Nat’s pescatarian. Any food issues?” Ty asks Cooper.
When Cooper shakes his head, Ty stands up. “I’ll tell him to just bring whatever he wants to serve. That should help to smooth things over a bit.”
“If the food wasn’t so damn good, I wouldn’t put up with this crap,” Cooper mutters under his breath.
“But it is…” Veronica says wistfully. “And Ty is Grant’s nephew. We’re family. So, he has to forgive us, right? You, however are on your own.”
