Double Standards (7 page)
An irrepressible smile lit Lauren's vivid face. "Oh, I liked the idea of having a big brother. Unfortunately, I didn't like Lenny at the time. We detested each other on sight. He teased me unmercifully, yanked my braids and stole money from my bedroom. I retaliated by telling everyone in town that he was gay—which no one believed because he turned out to be an absolute lecher!"
Nick chuckled, and Lauren noticed that when he smiled, his eyes crinkled at the corners. In contrast to the warm golden tan of his face, his eyes were
a light
metallic silver. Beneath his straight dark brows and thick spiky lashes, they glinted with humor and keen intelligence, while his firm lips promised excitingly aggressive male sensuality. Lauren felt the same delicious stirring of her senses that she had experienced the night before and cautiously lowered her gaze to the tanned column of his throat.
"What about your stepsister?" Nick asked. "What was she like?"
"Gorgeous. All she had to do was stroll down the street and the boys positively drooled over her."
"Did she try to steal your boyfriends?"
Lauren's eyes kindled with humor as she gazed at him across the narrow table. "I didn't have many boyfriends for her to steal—at least, not until I was seventeen."
One dark brow lifted in disbelief as his gaze moved over the classic perfection of her features, over her eyes like shining turquoise satin beneath their heavy fringe of curly lashes, to linger on her thick, honey-colored hair. Sunlight streaming through the stained-glass window beside their table bathed her face in a soft glow. "I find that very hard to believe," he said finally.
"I promise you, it's true," Lauren averred, dismissing his compliment with a smile. She remembered with great clarity the homely little girl she had been, and while the memories were not particularly painful, she really couldn't place much importance now on anything as unreliable as surface beauty.
Tony put two plates down on the red-checked tablecloth, each containing a crusty loaf of French bread that had been sliced lengthwise and piled high with wafer-thin rare roast beef. Beside each plate, he placed a little bowl of beef juice. "It's delicious—try it," he urged.
Lauren tasted hers and agreed. "It's wonderful," she told him.
"Good," he said, his
round, mustachioed face
beaming paternally at her. "Then you let Nick pay for it! He has more money than you. Nick's grandfather loaned me the money to start this place," he confided before bustling off to chastise a clumsy busboy.
They ate their meal in companionable silence interspersed with Lauren's questions about the restaurant and its owner. From what little she could gather from Nick's brief answers, his family and Tony's had been friends for three generations. At one point Nick's father had actually worked for Tony's father, yet somehow the financial situation must have reversed itself for Nick's grandfather later had enough money to lend to Tony.
The moment they were finished Tony appeared at their table to whisk away their plates. The service in the place was much too good, Lauren thought with dismay. They had only been here for thirty-five minutes, and she'd hoped to have at least an hour with Nick.
"Now, how about some dessert," Tony said, his friendly dark eyes on Lauren. "For you I have
canoli—
or some of my special spumoni. My spumoni is not what you find in stores," he told her proudly. "It is the real thing. It is ice cream of several flavors and colors, arranged in layers. Then into it I put—"
"Bits of fruit and lots of nuts," Lauren finished, smiling warmly at him. "The way my mother used to make it."
Tony's mouth dropped open,
then
he minutely scrutinized her face. After a long moment he nodded decisively. "You are Italian," he proclaimed with a broad smile.
"Only half Italian," Lauren corrected. "The other half is Irish."
In ten seconds Tony had pried her full name out of her, the name of her mother's family and had discovered that she was moving to
Detroit
where she knew no one. Lauren felt a little guilty for not mentioning Philip Whitworth, but since Nick knew people at Sinco she didn't think she should risk mentioning her connection with Philip in front of him.
She listened to Tony with a glow of happiness. It had been so long since she had lived in
Chicago
and visited with her Italian cousins, and it felt so good to hear that quaint familiar accent again.
"You need anything, Lauren, you come to me," Tony told her, patting her shoulder as he had Nick's. "A beautiful young woman alone in the big city needs some family she can turn to when she needs help. Here there will always be a meal for you—a good
Italian
meal," he clarified.
"Now how about my great spumoni?"
Lauren glanced at Nick and then at Tony's expectant face. "I'd love some spumoni," she announced, ignoring the groaning protest of her full stomach in the interest of prolonging their lunch.
Tony beamed, and Nick winked conspiratorially at him. "Lauren is still a growing girl, Tony."
Lauren's eyes darkened with exasperation and confusion at his words, and for a minute she idly traced a large red check on the tablecloth with her manicured fingernail. "Nick,
may
I ask you a question?" she said softly.
"Of course."
She folded her arms on the table and regarded him directly. "Why do you talk about me, as if I'm some naive teenager?"
Wry amusement twisted his lips. "I didn't realize I was. But I suppose it's to remind myself that you're young, that you come from a small town in
Lauren was amazed by his answer. "I'm a grown woman, and the fact that I grew up in a small town doesn't mean a thing!" She paused as Tony served her spumoni, but the moment he turned away she added irritably, "And I don't know what gave you the idea that I'm naive, but I'm not."
The teasing light in Nick's eyes was extinguished as he leaned back in his chair and studied her speculatively. "You're not?"
"No, I'm not."
"In that case," he drawled smoothly, "what are your plans for this weekend?"
Lauren's heart somersaulted with delight but she asked cautiously, "What did you have in mind?"
"A party.
Some friends of mine are having a party this weekend at their house near Harbor Springs. I was about to leave for their place when we met today. It's approximately a five-hour drive from here, and we'd return on Sunday."
Lauren had planned to drive directly to Fenster that afternoon. On the other hand, it only took a day to drive each way, and she could easily pack all her belongings in less than a week. She had more than two weeks before she was to start her new job, so time was no problem, and she desperately wanted to go with Nick. "Are you certain it won't inconvenience your friends if I come with you?"
"It won't inconvenience them; they were expecting me to bring someone with me."
"In that case," Lauren smiled, "I'd love to go. In fact, my suitcase is already in the trunk of the car."
Nick glanced over his shoulder and nodded at Tony, signaling for their check. The older man brought it over and placed it on the table near Nick, but Lauren deftly covered it with her hand and pulled it toward her. "I am buying lunch," she stated, carefully concealing her shock at the total on the check—rather exorbitant for the amount they had eaten. As she reached for her wallet, however, Nick laid several bills on the table, and she watched helplessly as Tony swept them away.
Tony saw her dismay and chucked her under the chin as if she were eight years old. "You come back often, Laurie. For you I will always have an empty table and something good to eat."
"At these prices," Lauren teased him, "I'm surprised all your tables aren't empty."
Tony leaned closer confidingly. "My tables are never empty. In fact, you cannot even reserve one in advance unless your name is on my list. I will have Ricco place
your
name on our list." He lifted an imperious arm and three young, darkly handsome waiters glanced up,
then
came to Lauren's table. "These are my sons," Tony said, proudly introducing them.
"Ricco, Dominic and Joe.
Ricco, you put Laurie's name on the list."
"No, please don't bother," Lauren interjected quickly.
Tony ignored her. "A nice Italian girl like you needs a family to protect and guide her in a big city like
Detroit
. You come often to see us—we live on the floors above the restaurant. Ricco, Dominic," Tony ordered them sternly, "
when
Laurie comes, you keep an eye on her. Joe, you keep an eye on Ricco and Dominic!"
To Lauren, who had burst out laughing, Tony explained, "Joe is married."
Repressing her mirth with an effort, Lauren looked at her four appointed "guardians" with happy gratitude shining in her eyes. "Who should I keep
my
eye on?" she asked teasingly.
In perfect unison, four dark Italian faces turned accusingly to Nick, who was lounging in his chair, observing them all with an amused expression. "Lauren tells me she can take care of herself," he said imperturbably as he pushed his chair back and stood up.
Nick said he had to make a phone call, and while he did so, Lauren walked down the hall to the ladies' room. When she emerged, she recognized his broad shoulders and tapered back at a phone in the entranceway. His deep baritone voice was lowered, but one word drifted to her as clear as a bell: "Ericka."
What an odd time for him to be calling another woman, Lauren thought. Or was it? He had said that their hosts were expecting him to bring a friend, and he would have undoubtedly arranged to take someone with him long before today. He was breaking a date!
Nick slid into her sporty Pontiac Trans Am, turned on the ignition,
then
frowned at the generator warning light that glowed red on the dashboard. "I don't think there's anything wrong with the generator," Lauren hastily explained. "On the way up here I stopped and had a mechanic check it. He couldn't find anything wrong, so it's possible it's just a short in the warning light itself. The car is only six months old."
"Why don't we take it up north and see how it runs," Nick said after a brief pause. "That way you won't be alone on the highway en route to
does
go out."
"Wonderful," she readily agreed.
"Tell me more about your family and you," he said as they pulled out of the parking lot.
Lauren turned her face to the front, trying not to show her tension. The little web of deceit she'd woven was already growing larger and more entangled. Since Nick knew people at Sinco, and she'd deliberately omitted mentioning her college degree on her application, she was hesitant about telling him she'd been at college for the last five years. Staring out the window at the splendid glass
Detroit
. Now she was going to carefully "forget" the last five years of her life.
"Was that a tough question?" Nick joked.
His smile did crazy things to her heartbeat. She wanted to lift her hand and lay it against his hard jaw and to trace the line of those sensual lips. His shirt collar was open at the throat, and she wanted to touch the dark hairs that curled crisply just above the deep V of the third button. Even the scent of his spicy cologne was teasing her senses, inviting her closer. "There isn't much more to tell you. My stepbrother, Lenny, is twenty-four now, and he's married and starting his own family. My stepsister, Melissa, is twenty-five, and she got married in April. Her husband is a mechanic who works for the
Pontiac
dealer where I bought this car."
"What about your father and stepmother?"
"My father is a teacher. He's brilliant and wise. My stepmother is very sweet and completely devoted to him."
"If your father's a teacher, I'm amazed that he didn't urge you to go on to college, rather than letting you work as a secretary."
"He did," Lauren replied obliquely, vastly relieved when Nick was obliged to direct his attention to the intricacies of changing lanes and negotiating the wide curve that brought them down the entrance ramp onto Interstate 75. The expressway took them through the inner city before the scenery changed from urban factories and housing to small suburban homes, followed by a huge shopping center and far more opulent suburbs. "What about your extra clothes?" she asked suddenly. "Won't you need to pack a suitcase?"
"No. I keep some clothes at another house in Harbor Springs."
The breeze through the open car window lightly teased his thick, coffee-brown hair. Although it was cut and styled to lie flat at the sides, it was just long enough at the nape to brush his shirt collar—just long enough, Lauren reflected wistfully, for a woman's fingers to slide through it.
Her fingers.
Tearing her eyes from his profile, she pulled her sunglasses down onto her nose and turned her head to gaze at the passing scenery on the interstate, only dimly aware when the endless suburbs gave way to long stretches of open countryside. Nick positively radiated bold sexual expertise and confident virility. Even now she was disturbingly aware of the length of his hard, muscled thigh only inches away from hers and the way his powerful shoulders seemed to dwarf her. Everything about the way he looked, and the way he looked
at her
, warned her that he could be very dangerous to her peace of mind.