Ruthless King

That was so nice.

She wished she had something like that. Of course, you had to have a family in order to have a family lunch.

Kind of helped a lot.

“Actually, we might have to cancel it this weekend,” Regent said. “We have something to do Sunday morning.”

Oh. That was disappointing.

“Sure, we can do it next weekend,” Thea said before calling for the boys. “Nice to meet you, Jilly.”

“You too. Bye.”

“Bye, Regent,” Thea said.

He nodded to her, his face softening slightly. It softened more with the boys.

But no one hugged goodbye. Seemed these people weren’t huggers. That was strange to her.

As they left, she felt a sharp pang of loneliness. Which was silly. She wasn’t alone. She had Regent.

“Why did you want to throw your laptop?” he asked.

“Because it’s an evil device sent to torture me,” she said.

Regent frowned.

“It keeps losing my work or won’t open the right document. It’s so slow. But it’s fine. It’s all I have right now. And maybe I should just use pen and paper for a while. I need to get some, though.”

“Pen and paper?”

“Uh-huh, and some sticky notes. I love sticky notes.”

“I think we can arrange that,” he murmured. “Now I have to go make some calls. I’ll meet you for dinner in an hour? Is that enough time to get ready?”

“Sure!” She only needed five minutes.

Leaning down, he lightly kissed her and all of her worries disappeared. Perhaps he was shy about touching her in front of others. Their relationship was still new, so she got it.

Well, sort of.

Not really, since she wanted to touch him all the time. But not everyone was like her.

37

When she arrived in the dining room an hour later, Jilly realized that she should have used her other fifty-five minutes a bit more wisely.

Candles had been lit around the room, and the table had been laid with gorgeous cutlery and dining ware. There were even cloth napkins.

Things were classy when cloth napkins were used.

She glanced down at herself. She’d washed her hands and changed her top since she’d gotten some of the mayonnaise from her sandwich at lunch.

“I need ten more minutes,” she said as she turned to race out of the room.

“Freeze,” Regent said firmly.

She froze. Darn it.