Pepper laughed, going up on her toes to kiss the man on both cheeks before turning to introduce Dimitri. “Dimitri, this is Tony Salivora. He’s the owner of this fine establishment and makes the absolute best pizza and pasta in the city!” She turned to Dimitri. “Tony, this is my…friend, Dimitri Bosalis. He’s never been here, so you have to be nice to him.”
Tony laughed as only an Italian man could, hugging Pepper close as if she were his long-lost daughter.
In response, Dimitri’s fingers curled into fists, wanting to punch the man for daring to be so familiar with Pepper, even though he knew that he didn’t have a claim to her.
Yet!
The word popped into his mind and he reeled in reaction. What the hell did “yet” mean? Dimitri wasn’t a possessive man! He preferred his privacy and hadn’t ever considered allowing a woman into his life beyond just an affair. But “yet” implied something more than an affair. It implied that he wanted…more! Dimitri never wanted more than a casual affair!
While Dimitri tried to figure out what the hell was going on in his head, the restaurant owner led them over to a corner table by the window. “I bring you the usual?” he asked, teasing Pepper.
“Absolutely!” she replied, beaming up at the fatherly restaurant owner. “Dimitri will have your lobster ravioli.”
Dimitri leaned back in his chair, lifting a dark eyebrow towards her. “I will?”
She nodded seriously and, for the first time, he noticed her pointed chin. He’d been so obsessed with her intensely blue eyes that he’d barely registered her other facial features. Well, he’d noticed her lips because…well, just because. And her nose. She had a cute nose. The nose was cute, and her lips were…sexy. And yet, somehow, all of her features worked to create a lovely image of a woman who was both brilliantly confident and alluringly innocent.
Then his gaze lifted to her sparkling blue eyes and he was again lost. “Trust me. You’ll love it,” she promised. For a long moment, Dimitri wondered if she was referring to her lips. Then the rest of their conversation came back to him. Lobster. Ravioli or something. Not her lips. Dekera!
“What are you having?” he asked, leaning back in his chair, unaware of how intimidating his posture looked.
She propped her chin up on her laced fingers and she looked demure and enticing. “I always get the fettucine Alfredo here. Tony makes the best!”
He lifted an eyebrow. “And you decided that I wouldn’t want the fettucine because…?”
She grinned. “Because you seem more like a lobster than a cheese puff.”
Dimitri stared at her, not sure how to respond to that observation. “You think I’m…?”
“Yes. You’re very much like lobster. Admit it.” She leaned forward, those blue eyes sparkling with mischief, but he couldn’t stop his eyes from drifting lower, noticing the shadow of her cleavage. At that moment, he was completely distracted, absorbed in the very conservative view of her breasts that was still sexy as hell.
Tony placed two wine glasses on the table, then glared at Dimitri while he uncorked a bottle of red wine. He didn’t bother to pour a sample for Dimitri’s approval either. He simply poured the wine, then leaned over. “She’s a good girl! You’re not gonna look at her like that!”
A moment later, Tony walked away and Dimitri’s gaze followed his path, noticing three other men, all glaring at him as if he’d just murdered someone.
“Ignore Tony,” Pepper told him, following his gaze. “He’s a bit…protective.”
“Of you?” Dimitri asked, not sure if he should thank the men for watching out for Pepper or offended that they thought he was some sort of rapist.
“Yes. Of me.” She sighed. “I don’t know why they act like that, but I’m sure they do it to all of the single women who dine here. Trust me, those men are all very sweet and harmless. They wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
Dimitri wondered if the four were as harmless as she assumed, but decided not to tackle her assumptions at this point.
“How did you discover your passion for designing clothes?” he asked, thinking that a change of subject was needed.
Her smile turned a bit deprecating. “Oh, I sort of fell into it accidentally. When I was a teenager, just starting off in high school, I had to come up with some way to earn some money to help with household expenses.” She shrugged dismissively. “We were in a…place…that was next to a store that gave away clothes.” She fiddled with the folded, linen napkin, turning it around and placing it off to the side but no longer looking into his eyes. “My sister needed something for a job interview. I had seen an old suit that was boxy and completely dated, like something from back in the eighties, or some other decade. But the material was good quality. So I paid the four dollars to buy it, then borrowed a sewing machine from my high school home economics class, and with a few snips and tucks in various places, I was able to update the suit into something that was more current. That suit helped my oldest sister win the job and the rest is…sort of history.”
Dimitri listened to the story, but heard what she wasn’t telling him as clearly as what she’d admitted. “Why did you need to earn money? Where were your parents?”
She smiled, the look more wistful than happy. “My father…I never knew him. When my mother told him she was pregnant with me, he disappeared.”
Dimitri was stunned, not sure how to respond. He watched her carefully, but all he saw was the closed expression, the hard, blue eyes that had previously been sparkling with mischief and happiness, as well as the
