18. Amy

18

Islept like shit.

Actually, I'm not sure if I got any sleep at all.

My head feels like it's stuffed with cotton and even the sludge we call coffee isn't making a dent in my brain fog. To make up for the weekend I missed, I agreed to work a double today, which means I was in at 5am for the breakfast crowd and I'll be here through dinner. The lunch rush will be starting soon and I'm in the breakroom grabbing some food while it's still slow.

I'm about halfway through my Caesar salad when Becca appears in the doorway. She's gnawing on her bottom lip and looking at me like she has something she really doesn't want to have to tell me.

"Oh, God. What now?" My fork falls from my fingers to click against the plate.

Her lips twitch into a smirk. "It's nothing like that. You, ah, have a customer when you're finished with your break."

My heart drops. "Tell Chad that I?—"

"It's not Chad. Really, you know I'd never throw you under the bus like that," she folds her arms across her chest and leans against the doorway. "When were you going to tell me you were seeing someone?"

"When am I supposed to have the time to see anyone?" I snort, picking up my fork and stabbing at the romaine with more force than is necessary. "Why would you even ask me that?"

Becca chuckles and pulls out the chair across from me, "Oh well, you start to assume things when the same gorgeous guy with sexy metro-biker vibes keeps coming here for lunch and finally asks for you by name."

I laugh, even as my heart starts beating faster, "Jesus Becca, what are you talking about?"

Becca shrugs and leans forward, "You really don't know who is waiting for you out there?"

"I really don't." Except a man's image is floating before my eyes as I push my plate back. A man who's been coming here for lunch every day for the past month to ask for a date and then abruptly vanished for a whole week after the auction. My appetite vanishes. "Do you think Chad sent him?"

"Chad would never hang out with someone this cool," Becca snorts.

With curiosity gnawing at me, and before I have a chance to talk myself out of what I'm doing, I push my chair back and grab my apron as I head towards the dining room.

I spot him the moment I come around the corner and my feet shuffle to a stop. Our eyes meet and heat flares to life in my core.

He's sitting in the same booth as always. He looks the same, but at the same time not. His eyes are dull, missing the spark they had before. His face is gaunt, and I don't remember ever seeing him with the dark smudges that line his eyes today. It's like he's not sleeping either. His long hair is pulled back in a half-hazard knot and his clothes are mussed, like he dressed in a hurry or without much care. He looks very much like I feel.

I force a deep breath into my lungs and push myself forward.

His eyes follow me as I cross the dining room. His face remains expressionless. When I stop at the side of his table, the muscle in the sides of his jaw jump. Without being invited, I slide into the booth across from him.

"Hi," my fingers tangle together on the table between us. His eyes are focused on me, but he has a pained look as an awkward silence stretches between us.

Slowly, like if he makes any sudden moves it might scare me away, he leans forward. His lip's part, and my eyes drop to them. Shit, did I just lick my lips?

"Do you remember me, Amy?" his voice is deep and husky. His words slide across my skin leaving a trail of gooseflesh behind.

"I—" I'm not expecting him to ask me that. "You've been coming here every day for a month to eat shitty burgers and ask me out. Of course I remember you."

His face falls and his eyes slide closed. In fact, his whole body seems to deflate, slumping back into the booth.

My heart squeezes painfully. Was that not the right answer?

"Do you remember the auction?" he asks much quieter and without meeting my eyes. Instead, he focuses his gaze on the tabletop between us.

My heart speeds up and my mouth goes dry. How does he know?

"Um, no. I remember agreeing to it, but my memories from that night are… gone."

His jaw muscles clench and unclench at the same time his fists do the same.

My heart flutters and suddenly I realize who he is.

"It was you, wasn't it?" I whisper softly. "You won the auction?"

His head snaps up and his golden eyes lock with mine. I watch as his throat works when he swallows and he gives me one slow nod.

Oh, God! "Why are you here?" I look around, like the monster police might burst in at any moment to… arrest us or something. "I thought this was against the rules."

He reaches across the table and his large hands engulf my much smaller ones. "You said you don't remember?" His thumbs slowly stroke over the tops of my knuckles.

"I don't remember anything from the auction but," I swallow past the lump that's forming in my throat that's trying to choke me. "I remember the rules and…" how do I explain this next part? "I feel like I should remember you."

"Fuck, baby," his voice cracks and he leans across the table towards me. "You have no idea how much I want to hear that."

I lean in and my eyes flutter closed as I draw his sunshine and leather smell into my lungs. I shake off his grip so I can slide my palms up the supple leather of his jacket. I wish I could reach inside of it, needing to curl my fingers into the soft t-shirt he's wearing. I want badly to push the table aside so I can slide my palms against his smooth skin. To trace the ripples and valleys of his muscles.

Shaking those thoughts away, I lean back and fold my arms in front of me. My words are barely a whisper when I ask, "Will we get in trouble for this? For you being here?"

He leans in more, so that he's practically draped across the tabletop. "No, baby. You don't remember but, you see, you and me? We're kind of special."

I'd give just about anything to have my memories back, right now. My mouth falls open, but no words come out. I don't even know what to say to that, let alone what to think.

A million questions are bouncing around inside my head, but only one manages to fall from my mouth.

"What's your name?" I manage to ask.

"Dante."

My eyes snap up to his and I lean back so I can take in the rest of him. Shoulder length hair streaked with every color from blonde to raven, golden eyes that flash with a predatory glow, and skin bronzed from hours spent outdoors. My head cants to the side and my brow puckers.

"You don't look like a Dante."

"Dante means steadfast and enduring," he grins, sliding his arms across the table to take hold of my hands once more. "Shall I show you just how much I live up to my name?"

I shiver from a sense of deja-vu. Getting the feeling that we've had this conversation before.

With his hands loosely holding mine, he slides from the booth and pulls me after him. Without the table between us, I step into him and a sense of rightness immediately engulfs me when he wraps me in his arms. Before I realize it, my whole body has relaxed into him. My eyes flutter shut, and I rest my cheek against his chest where I can hear the steady thump of his heart.

"Amy! I do not pay you to feel up the customers! Get your ass back to work before I fire you!" Bruce shouts from the other side of the dining room.

My cheeks flame with embarrassment, both at being yelled at like a child, and because I totally forgot where I was. When I try to step away from Dante, his arms tighten around me.

"No need to be like that," Dante tells my boss. Then he looks down at me with a smirk. "She quits."