Chapter Six
“Wait, wait, wait.” Emery held up her hands as she perched, feet tucked under her, on a stool. “You’re going on a date with this guy? What happened to Operation Self-Love?”
Emery, her sister Isla, and McKenna had gathered for their weekly wine and bitch session. They rotated hosting duties, and tonight the three girls were lounging around Isla’s immaculate kitchen. A spread of veggies, dips, cheeses, crackers, and chocolates were artfully arranged—as was Isla’s style. Two bottles of wine were open, but Emery had opted for a boutique beer, which she gestured with as she spoke.
“I thought you were trying to help him get his ex back,” she added.
“It’s a test date,” McKenna clarified. “So I can really see what’s going on. If I’m going to have any chance of helping him, I need to know what his flaws are. Well, other than being a workaholic.”
Isla leaned on the kitchen counter, propping herself up on her elbows. “Any guesses?”
“He’s a bit of a mystery,” she said, reaching for a celery stick and dunking it into a bowl of homemade hummus. “Definitely an introvert, which normally I wouldn’t like. But he’s got this strong, silent thing going on that’s quite yummy.”
“Why does it matter whether you like him if this is just a test date?” Emery asked.
“It doesn’t.” McKenna busied herself with cutting the wheel of camembert into six perfect pieces. “I’m just saying…”
“Self-love not all it’s cracked up to be?” Emery cackled. “Screw the ex. Maybe you should take him for a ‘test drive’ as well.”
“Emery!” Isla shook her head in a disappointed mother hen way. “McKenna is doing something good for herself. There’s nothing wrong with taking some time alone to figure out what you want in life.”
“Not the advice I was expecting from Mrs. Love-up Wifey To-Be.” Emery took a long draw on her beer. “I thought you were pro commitment.”
Isla huffed. “I’m anti settling.”
“For the record, I know exactly what I want.” McKenna sighed. “That’s part of the problem. Reality is not matching up to my expectations. Hence why I’m fine going on a fake date.”
“So where is he taking you?” Isla asked.
“I have no idea. I told him to set it up so I can see how creative he is. All I know is we’re meeting after work Wednesday night.”
The truth wasn’t quite so cut and dry as that. McKenna hadn’t initially planned the whole test-date thing in advance. But having dinner with Beckett—watching him glare at the waiter when she’d flirted with him and hearing that he made time weekly for his family—was a little too enjoyable. Why shouldn’t she get some personal benefit out of this arrangement? And a fake date was the only kind she was allowed during Operation Self-Love.
Though keeping her end of the bargain might be tougher than she expected. McKenna had a pretty good idea what had gone wrong in Beckett and Sherri’s relationship—it was the same reason McKenna was still single. Expectations.
They were good to have, but they also caused problems. She didn’t want to settle for a deadbeat, but it seemed the serious guys didn’t want to settle for her. And she’d put money on the fact that Sherri wanted hearts and flowers and romance, while Beckett wanted someone who understood and supported his drive and ambition.
Yeah, expectations could be a contrary bitch like that.
“So what’s the criteria?” Emery rustled around in a bag of corn chips and pulled out a handful, dropping crumbs all around her in the process. Isla frowned and reached for a tissue to wipe them up. “Are there any instant fail sections? Like if he clips a roundabout?”
“I see you’re still going with the whole driving test thing,” McKenna said drily. “No instant fails. But I want to see how he goes setting a date up, if he’s attentive and engaged, if he makes me feel special. I suspect his ex was looking for a little more romance but Beckett is…well, he seems like a very logical guy. So maybe I can give him a few pointers for the grovel.”
“The grovel?” Isla raised a brow.
“You know, that bit at the end of a chick flick where the guy is all ‘I made a terrible mistake not treating you right’ and then they kiss and she does the foot-pop thing.”
Emery shook her head. “The foot-pop thing?”
McKenna rolled her eyes. “Haven’t you watched The Princess Diaries or like any other rom com made in the last two decades?”
“Uh, no, because Anne Hathaway is the spawn of the devil and I don’t hate myself.” Emery munched on her corn chips.
Isla shook her head. “You hate everything romantic.”
“It’s the way of the man-repeller.” Emery winked.
McKenna’s friends dissolved into an argument about the merit of chick flicks and she went to pour herself another glass of wine. As she reached for a fresh bottle, her phone buzzed. These days, especially when she was already with her besties, that was a rare occurrence. Which could only mean one thing…
Mother.
Or rather, her mother’s assistant. The formidable Mrs. Jones, a woman whom McKenna was certain had come out of the womb wearing a twinset and a disapproving frown. Her first word had likely been no.
Smart freaking casual? Honestly, who required a dress code for a family dinner…at home, no less.
McKenna snorted. No chance of that, at least not where her family was concerned. They had three doctors, one lawyer, and her, the lowly retail worker. A.k.a the black sheep. Just freaking great.
At least her faux-date with Beckett would give her something to look forward to. She’d been planning to wear her sparkly dress on their outing, but that might now have to be saved for the family dinner.
Sequins were smart casual, right?
McKenna rolled her eyes and tapped at her phone.
…
Beckett raked his hand through his hair for what must have been the hundredth time that afternoon, while he waited for McKenna to show up. They were supposed to meet in the foyer of their building. But she was already ten minutes late.
He frowned. Perhaps he should have brought his laptop down with him. Ten minutes could be used to achieve quite a lot—he could have answered some emails, or tweaked that one line of code that was bugging him. He could have approved the graphics his designer had sent over, or worked on his beta testing release schedule. Or he could have even—
“Beckett?” McKenna waved her hand in front of his face, blinding him with her neon-pink nails. “Oh, you are awake. I thought you might have been in some weird open-eye sleep trance.”
He pushed up from the foyer’s couch. “Definitely awake.”
It would be hard not to be wide-awake around McKenna, not only because she was gorgeous but because she seemed to enjoy wearing shades of the retina-searing variety. Usually coupled with something sparkly. Beckett briefly wondered if looking at her clothing had the same effect on the brain as looking at a screen before bedtime.
He zeroed in on the purple leopard print book in her hands, which had a pen attached with a black ribbon. “Why are you holding a notebook?”
“How else am I going to take notes for the review?” Her tinkling laughter ran right through him, like the sound had somehow hitched a ride on the blood pumping through his veins.
It left him with a most unusual humming sensation that was equally pleasant and foreign.
“Review?” He raised a brow.
“Well, this is a test date. I’m sure you’d want some feedback at the end so you can understand how to improve, right?”
Beckett wasn’t so sure about that. He’d never been the kind of guy to crave praise. In fact, he much preferred to know in his gut that he’d done a good job rather than hear it from someone else. However, he had struck a deal with McKenna and if this was her method of helping him get Sherri back, then so be it. Any discomfort from listening to her pick apart his approach would be well worth it when he got his life back on track.
After speaking to his mother today—who was adamant that she was in the right and, as such, had not gotten her job back—he really needed to make sure things were smoothed over with Sherri and her father. Quickly and for good.
“That was a rhetorical question, in case you wondered.” McKenna smiled sweetly, but Beckett had the feeling there was a tough interior beneath her My Little Pony packaging. “Don’t worry, I won’t be harsh.”
“My feelings don’t bruise easily,” he replied.
“Good to know you have them,” she said with a wink. “I wasn’t so sure.”
“Do you think I’m a robot or something?”
“Well, it’s just that…” She tilted her head as if trying to figure out exact what she wanted to say. “You don’t seem awfully cut up about losing Sherri.”
“I’ve entered into an agreement that goes against my personal way of doing business in order to get your help in winning her back. How does that show a lack of feeling?”
“Oh boy.” She sucked in a breath. “I don’t even know where to start with that.”
He thought about standing there and arguing with her that a lack of outward emotion didn’t necessarily represent a lack of inward emotion, but he wasn’t willing to get docked points before they’d even started. While he might not need praise, he didn’t want to fail her test, either.
But what was it about women who refused to believe that he felt something simply because he wasn’t doing a Hallmark-style declaration?
“How about we start with the date?” He looked at his watch. “We’re already behind schedule.”
“You got somewhere else to be?” She cocked a brow.
“No, but I don’t want to miss our reservation.”
McKenna’s large blue eye sparkled. “In that case, let’s go. Lead the way.”
Suddenly Beckett’s frustration was replaced by an entirely new sensation—a kind of churning, acidic anxiousness that wasn’t as unpleasant as it sounded. He reached for McKenna’s arm and she readily handed it over, a smile blooming on her lips that told him he’d scored a point.
He glanced at McKenna’s outfit. Originally he’d planned for them to walk the ten minutes to the restaurant, since it wasn’t raining for once. But her legs were only covered in a set of sheer black stockings and she’d worn a pair of heels that looked more suited to skewering a steak than a romantic stroll.
Or should that be, skewering a man’s heart?
Let’s not forget this is nothing but a drill.
So why didn’t his body’s automatic reactions seem to understand that? He had a sudden need to impress her. To wow her.
You just want to past the test. Totally normal for an ambitious Type-A person. Totally 100 percent normal.
Instead of exiting through the front entrance, Beckett steered her toward the elevator that would take them to the underground garage. As they walked, her nearness overwhelmed him. McKenna was just…so much. She smelled like dessert—sugar and peaches and vanilla ice cream—sweetly cloying in the best way possible. And the warmth from her shoulder brushing his arm made his cotton shirt feel as though it was about to burn up and disintegrate right off his body.
“You look lovely,” he said as they stepped into the elevator. “I like the…fringy things on your eyes.”
She beamed. “Thanks. They’re faux mink false lashes, actually. I bought them because I saw this girl on YouTube review them. They’re just as soft as the real mink but, you know, without the potential for animal cruelty. I was a vegetarian for a while but…”
McKenna prattled cheerfully as they dropped down to the basement and walked to the spot where his Mercedes was housed. He’d never met anyone in his whole life who talked as much as she did, but he never felt pressure to talk back. In fact, she seemed quite happy to tell him all about her flirtations with being a vegetarian, then a pescetarian, and that she loved CAM-Ready cosmetics because they were cruelty-free.
The upbeat tone of her voice soothed rather than irritated him. Perhaps it was because he could stay quiet without facing accusations of being disinterested.
“So, where are you taking me?” She slid into the passenger seat and pulled the seatbelt across her middle.
Beckett swallowed. A moment ago, when she’d been standing, her black leather skirt hadn’t seemed that short. But now, extra inches of her stocking-covered legs had been exposed to his hungry eyes. A chunky silver tab dangled over her thigh, the zipper itself extending all the way up to her waist. He wondered what it would be like to slide the tab up and watch her be exposed.
He cleared his throat and focused his attention on steering them out to the street. “Tide Pool.”
“Fancy.” She bobbed her head. “We probably could have walked.”
“I thought you would be cold.” His gaze dropped to her legs again. “That’s a very short skirt.”
McKenna bristled. “I’m not sure whether to be annoyed at your judging tone or happy that you were concerned about my comfort.”
Beckett stopped himself from correcting her; he wasn’t being judgmental at all. But it was probably better that she thought that rather than know the truth—that the thoughts about what lay underneath her skirt had gotten him all tongue-tied and…horny.
What the hell was wrong with him? He’d always hated those guys who thought with their dicks instead of their heads. Yet now, in her presence, he was at very real risk of losing his head…the important one.
“I guess that’s up to you,” he said finally. “I can’t tell you what to think.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed her studying him. “I can’t figure you out, Beckett Walsh. Are you so honest that you come across blunt, or are you just an asshole?” She sounded genuinely puzzled.
Ouch. “I suppose if you’re asking that question then this date isn’t off to a very good start.”
It wasn’t the first time someone had called him blunt. In business he didn’t mind it so much, but in his personal life he supposed it probably wasn’t the best way to be. There was such a fine line between bluntness and honesty that he wasn’t sure exactly where to step all the time.
Like most things about dealing with people, it was not as black and white as he would have preferred.
“I don’t try to be an asshole,” he added.
She laughed. “How about I start taking notes once we arrive? That’ll give you a fresh start.”
He palmed the steering wheel, pulling the car slowly into the valet entrance of the Crown Entertainment complex. Within minutes they were at the restaurant, which Sherri had talked about numerous times. It had required some schedule juggling in order to get a reservation. But if McKenna wanted to see what he could do—then he’d give her the best.
A maître d’ led them through the dimly lit restaurant, which had a modern yet intimate atmosphere. It was certainly a lot fancier than the places he usually preferred to dine, which were more of the ma and pa home-style meal varieties. In fact, when McKenna had first suggested the date he’d thought about taking her to this little place out in Carlton where the family’s matriarch still ran the kitchen—with an iron fist, he’d heard—and they made the best Gorgonzola gnocchi. But it wasn’t “gold star” worthy—at least, Sherri hadn’t been too impressed the one time he’d taken her there.
“Well, I certainly feel like a princess,” McKenna said as they took their seats. Their coats had been whisked away, and now her skin was playing peek-a-boo with a slinky top that had cut-outs at the shoulders.
“You haven’t been here before?” he asked.
“I have.” She nodded, sucking on her lower lip for a moment. “My parents eat out a lot because they both work such long hours, and my dad’s office is just up on Bourke Street.”
“What do they do?”
She wrinkled her nose. “Dad’s a name partner in his law firm. Mum’s a GP and has a clinic with her business partner in East Melbourne.”
In other words, McKenna came from money. For some reason, that surprised him. He supposed she might not be filthy rich, but certainly her family would be well off enough that she shouldn’t need to beg and bargain for work. More than that, McKenna struck him as incredibly humble. Not to say that all wealthy people weren’t humble…but it seemed to be a less common quality, in his experience.
“Both my brothers are doctors, too.” She rolled her eyes. “Guess what that makes me?”
“The creative one.”
A grin crept across her face. “Good answer.”
She flipped open her notebook and scribbled something down. The gold details on the pen flashed in the lighting as he tried to read her handwriting. But in the dimness, her flowery, looping cursive was hard to discern.
“No peeking,” she said, looking up. “I’ll give you a rundown at the end of the night.”
They flipped through the menu, and Beckett ordered a bottle of wine to be brought to the table. He tried not to think of his monetary issues as he ordered, rather looking at it as an investment in a solution. It was that mode of thinking that had gotten him to take a number of financial risks that had paid off during his career. Though somehow, as he watched McKenna study the menu with her tongue poking out the corner of her mouth, he wondered if his wallet was really the thing most at risk.
“What do your parents do?” she asked without looking up.
“My mother is a supermarket cashier,” he replied, cringing a little at the white lie. But after hearing what her family did, he didn’t want to say his mother was willfully unemployed. “And my father passed away when I was a baby. He was an engineer.”
Apparently that’s where Beckett got his too-quick, too-logical brain from, according to his mother. She didn’t always mean it as a compliment, but Beckett took it as one anyway. It made him feel like his father had left something behind for him.
“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that.” McKenna looked up, her brow crinkled. “That must have been tough on you and your sister.”
“Well, he’s my father. Not hers.”
Kayla’s father was a whole other kettle of fish—a paternal Houdini who always cared more for himself than he did for his daughter or the mother of his child. He’d drift in and out as he pleased, wreaking havoc on Kayla’s hopes for a happy family every damn time.
Beckett’s hands clenched under the table. “And he’s not worth talking about.”
“Duly noted.” She bobbed her head. “I won’t be nosy.”
It wasn’t that he wanted to torpedo the conversation, but his family was a touchy subject at the moment. Especially with the added stress of his mother and her job situation…not to mention Kayla’s assessment about him enabling her weighing on him like a bag of bricks.
Who was he kidding? His family was a touchy subject all the time. Beckett’s need for privacy seemed to bug a lot of people, but McKenna wasn’t giving him a hard time. Thankfully.
“You still with me?” she asked, cocking her head. “You’ve got that glazed-over, cogs turning kind of look.”
“I’m still here.”
He wasn’t sure what else to say. But the soft-eyed look she gave him relieved any pressure in his chest. She wasn’t going to pry. Wasn’t going to poke and prod until it felt like he’d need to storm off to get the space he needed.
“I was thinking we could get some oysters to start,” he said. “I know this is a test date, but I figured an aphrodisiac couldn’t hurt.”
He flipped the cover closed on his menu and reached for his wine. For a guy who’d grown up loving tests, he felt way out of his depth.