“I’m sorry!” she said, wincing as she picked up her foot, slammed it down on his instep and took off running the second that he let go.
“Forgive me!” she yelled over her shoulder as she ran as fast as her legs would take her, praying that she’d managed to hobble him for as long as it would take her to make it to Main Street and flag down a taxi.
*-*-*-*
“I,” gasp, “hate,” another gasp, “you,” Rebecca finally managed to get out as he carried her back to his truck.
“Stop. You’re making me blush,” he said dryly as he carefully loaded the violent woman into his truck.
He considered using the child safety lock to stop her from running away again, but there really was no need since she’d barely made it two hundred yards before she’d fallen to her knees, gasping for air and begging him to put her out of her misery to save her from the leg cramp that had brought her escape to a swift end.
When she fell over onto her side, still panting like she’d run a marathon instead of less than half a block, he gave her a patronizing slap on the ass and shut the door. Shaking his head, he walked around his truck and climbed in, careful of Rebecca’s head. After pushing a strand of hair out of her face, he started the short ride back to his parents’ house where his parents, Aidan and the two annoying bastards that he couldn’t seem to shake were waiting for them.
“Dying,” the little bully gasped from where she lay beside him.
“Uh huh,” he said absently as he put the truck in park and shook off the slight throbbing in his leg.
The tap at his window let him know that his short reprieve was over and that it was time to face what promised to be a very long and painful night, but that was to be expected the first time you brought a woman home to meet the family, especially his family. Biting back a groan, he rolled down his window.
Smiling, his father focused on Rebecca, who was currently trying to lower herself to the floor where she probably planned on hiding for the rest of the night, but it seemed that she didn’t have enough energy at the moment to complete the final roll needed to achieve this sad goal of hers.
“How was your run, sweetheart?” his father asked when Rebecca gave up with a pathetic groan and a muttered, “Stupid cramp.”
There was a slight pause before she said, “Fine. Um, how are you?”
“Good, good,” his father said as he leaned against the truck door before he shifted his attention to Lucifer. “Listen, your mother wants to go out tonight since the rest of kids weren’t able to make it. Do you think the two of you are up for that?”
A night out with his family?
Not at all, but he couldn’t disappoint his mother, mostly because his father would beat the shit out of him.
Since he didn’t seem to have much of a choice, he opened his mouth to reluctantly accept when Rebecca cut him off and asked, “Is it okay if I pick the restaurant?” suddenly perking up and making the hair on the back of his neck stand up.
But, before he could warn his father that it was a trap, the bastard was telling her yes and walking away, leaving him with the woman who was suddenly sitting up and looking happier than he’d ever seen her before.
Chapter 47
“After tonight,” Lucifer bit out furiously as he glared at her, “we’re through.”
Blinking innocently, she asked, “Is something wrong, pookie?”
“Oh, this is going to be so much fun!” his mother said with a huge smile as she joined them at the large table that the waitress had selected just for them, which just happened to be right in front of the section the restaurant had deemed as the stage.
“So much fun,” Aidan seconded bitterly as he sat down across from her, his scowl never wavering.
Ethan didn’t say anything as he sat down next to his wife, but the scowl on his face really said it all.
“I’m so glad I came tonight,” Jason said, sounding genuinely happy to be there as he sat down next to Trevor, who looked equally amused.
God, it was going to be the best night ever!
It might even make up for the depressing, chaotic day that she’d just had. At the very least it would distract her from the fact that she still didn’t have a job, the balls to ask for her old job back and thanks to today’s near-miss, she’d realized something very important.
She was an absolute failure.
She was twenty-nine years old with absolutely nothing to show for it. By now she should have her own place, a lot more money in the bank, a career, but most of all, she should be prepared to handle an emergency on her own without panicking. Seeing that false positive today had put a lot of things in perspective.
Before today she could have honestly said that she saw absolutely nothing wrong with being a waitress for the rest of her life, but now she realized that had been a little shortsighted. While she still saw nothing wrong with working in a restaurant for the rest of her life, she realized that working as a waitress who was completely dependent on tips was not going to give her the stability that she needed or the future that she wanted.
She needed more and if working in a restaurant was really what she wanted to do, and she was absolutely positive that it was, then it was time to get serious about it. She needed to learn how to run a restaurant and the best way to do that was to finally get off her ass and go back to school. She could enroll in an online program and work towards her degree. It would take some time, but at least by the time that she had her degree she would have options, which was honestly more than she had right now.
“I’ve never been to a karaoke bar before!” his mother said with a huge smile, which was probably the only reason that Lucifer, his father and brother weren’t dragging them out of there right now.
“It’s a lot of fun,” Rebecca promised her with a huge smile just to irritate the man sitting next to her, glaring…just glaring.
She had to admit that it was a little unsettling.
When Aidan mouthed the words, I hate you, she wasn’t sure whether he was talking to her or Lucifer. Not that she really cared since she’d found the perfect way to get mind off of things for a while. She just wished that Melanie had been able to join them, but she had too much work to catch up on.
At least, that was the bullshit excuse that Melanie had given her when she’d called to invite her to join them. Since this was normally the type of thing that Melanie would drop everything for, screwing people over and not the karaoke part, she knew that Melanie probably needed some time to herself to figure things out. Since they still had plenty of time to talk about everything going on, she picked up her menu and wondered what the odds were of getting all the Bradford men up on the “stage” to sing a Katy Perry song were.