Now she was standing, looking around impatiently for their waiter. “Where the hell is that idiot anyway? If he thinks for a minute he’s getting more than a five dollar tip, he’s out of his mind. Nathan, don’t you dare leave him more than that, do you hear me?”
Nathan looked as though he would love nothing better than to strangle his very difficult sister-in-law at this moment. “For all the shit you’ve given that kid tonight, I ought to leave him a five hundred dollar tip,” he groused.
Lauren glared at him. “Well, there really is a sucker born every minute, isn’t there? Jules, do you see the guy anywhere? I need refills here. Pronto.”
As she raised her arm again to flag down a waiter – any waiter – Ben took hold of her wrist and lowered her arm.
“You don’t need any more booze tonight,” he told her in a quiet but firm voice. “I think we can all agree that you’ve had way too much already. Stop embarrassing your sister and Nathan and behave yourself.”
Ben wasn’t sure who was more shocked at what he’d just said – any of the three other people at the table or himself. But even as he spied the furious expression on Lauren’s face, he refused to back down and kept her wrist pinned to the table.
He’d never seen her this angry before, her green eyes glittering fiercely, and he was more than a little afraid that she was either going to spit at him or bend over and bite his hand. Instead, she employed a different dirty tactic and kicked him – hard – in the shin with the pointy toe of her ankle boot.
“Ow. Dammit,” he cursed, releasing her hand to rub his abused shin.
Lauren wasted no time in springing to her feet, grabbing her clutch bag as she did. “Screw you, Ben Rafferty,” she hissed. “You might be my boss at work but outside of the office I’m the only one who gets to boss me around. And screw that incompetent waiter, too. I’ll get my own drink. Better yet, I’ll get someone to buy me one.”
She flounced off angrily, not such a easy feat considering how much she’d had to drink. If he hadn’t been so pissed off at her right now, Ben might have actually laughed at the way she swayed a bit unsteadily in those sexy black lace ankle boots with their towering heel.
Julia sighed. “I’d better go after her. When she’s in a mood like this, there’s no telling what kind of trouble she can get into. I’m sorry, Ben. She’s never this out of control. I have no idea what’s bugging her tonight.”
“I think I do,” he told Julia. “I upset her earlier in the day, and coming here tonight was probably not the best move under the circumstances. I thought – well, that I would try to apologize, but I can see she’s clearly not in the mood to be reasonable.”
“I’m glad you came,” Julia told him earnestly. “Nathan and I have both enjoyed getting to know you a little. As for Lauren – well, she’s been off her game for months now, and I’ve been trying to figure out why. Oh, God! I’d better go rescue that guy she’s hitting on over at the bar. Excuse me.”
He watched with concern as Julia hurried over to the bar, where Lauren was rather drunkenly starting to drape herself around a good looking guy who seemed far too interested in her for Ben’s liking. He took a sip of the red wine Nathan had ordered with dinner, his grip on the fragile glass stem nearly hard enough to snap it in two.
Nathan was grinning at him, even as he shook his dark head in disbelief. “Dude, you might be the bravest person I’ve ever met,” he said, awestruck. “Nobody, and I mean nobody had ever told that girl she’s had too much to drink. Not even her dad, and believe me, my father-in-law can be a pretty intimidating guy when he wants to be.”
Ben’s mouth quirked up at one corner. “Yeah, so I’ve noticed. I’ve met him, you know. Last November. He came by the office to thank me for not sending Lauren on a trip to Brazil. He seems like a great guy.”
Nathan nodded enthusiastically. “The best. So is Natalie. I couldn’t have asked for better in-laws. They are the nicest, most down to earth people you’d ever want to meet.” He gave a little shudder as he reached for his own wine glass. “I was engaged once before, broke things off when I realized what a mistake I was making. Now, her parents would have been the in-laws from hell – the mother was a stuck-up witch while the father was the biggest pompous ass you’ve ever seen.”
“Hmm, sounds an awful lot like Elle’s parents,” lamented Ben. “I mean, both of them are always polite to me, I think that’s part of being British or something. But I’ve never felt that they approved of me, or think I’m good enough for Elle.”
“That would suck for sure,” agreed Nathan. “I guess I’m lucky that Julia’s family is so great. Even my pain in the ass sister-in-law isn’t quite as bad as she seems. Julia’s right – things have definitely been weird with Lauren these past few months. I know Julia and her parents are all worried about her.”
Ben frowned, realizing it was the second time today that Nathan had brought this particular subject up. “Any special reason?”
Nathan shrugged. “I think for Julia it’s more of a gut feeling. A “twin thing”, as she calls it. I mean, those two might seem as different as night and day, but they’re also two halves of the same whole. Julia picks up on vibes from Lauren and vice versa. But from what I hear Lauren has been spending more time than usual on her own. When she’s in California, she holes up in that cabin of hers most of the time, doesn’t even see her folks all that often. And she drives my mother-in-law nuts when she takes off for a day or two at a time on that crotch rocket of hers. Lauren thinks nothing of driving down the coast on her bike, and not saying a word to anyone about where she’s going. I understand Robert really lit into her a couple of weeks ago for worrying Natalie so much.”
Ben silently applauded Lauren’s father for his actions, and did his best to keep his own anger under control. As tough as Lauren might act, she’d only been driving that damned Ducati for a few years, and he could only imagine how recklessly she drove the powerful motorcycle.
“Do you think something at work is bothering her?” asked Ben, discreetly trying to discover if Lauren had dropped any hints to her family about possibly quitting her job.
“Probably not,” acknowledged Nathan. “I mean, she does love her job, is always talking about her most recent trip and showing us photos. Julia’s more or less convinced that Lauren’s got man problems, and that’s what set her off recently.”
“Is she seeing someone?” asked Ben casually, determined not to betray his interest in the subject.
“Nah. I mean, at least not that anyone knows about. Julia swears that Lauren has never brought a guy home even once to meet their parents. And that she never, ever, brings anyone to the cabin. That place is like her sacred space, you know? I’ve only been invited there twice, and both visits were brief ones. So who knows if Julia’s right or not. All I can say is that if Lauren does have a man in her life, the dude must either be a little crazy or else he’s some kind of superhero. He’d have to be one or the other – maybe a little of both – to have the guts to take her on.”
Ben fell silent after that as he mulled over everything he’d just learned. The facts that Lauren never introduced her men to her parents – while Ben had met both of them separately, though admittedly not as her boyfriend, and that she never invited anyone to the cabin – a place he’d spent the happiest ten days of his life – were both extremely interesting. But that knowledge wasn’t any help in figuring out what was bothering Lauren right now. Karl had seemed positive that Lauren wasn’t seeing anyone right now, and yet her twin sister – arguably the person closest to her – seemed to believe otherwise. As for himself, he didn’t know what to believe these days – about a whole lot of things, it seemed.