Fate Interrupted (2 page)

Dean stretched his
arms out as a baby cried a few tables over, slicing his headache in two.

“You
gonna
go inside and order?”

“In
a minute.”

Shaun wiped his
hands on a crumpled napkin. “Jonny just called, he’s not
gonna
make it.”

Dean snorted,
gazing out over the jam-packed parking lot. “After the shots he pushed on us,
I’m not surprised.”

 
“Sounds like you guys had quite the night last
night. So…how was she?”

Dean turned back
to Shaun.

“The hot little
blond you pulled from Milwaukee Street last night. I
wanna
hear every detail. Carrie took the girls to a movie so don’t hold back. It’s
just you and me.” He tipped his head down and peered at Dean over the top of
his sunglasses.
“Doctor/patient confidentiality.”

Dean chuckled.
“You wish you were a doctor.”

A burst of air
ruffled Shaun’s lips.
“Try reading my dental degree sometime,
player.”

Dean’s stomach rumbled
and he checked the bulky watch strangling his wrist.

“
This
is a safe-house,” Shaun said,
outlining the grated table with his index fingers. “So go ahead and tell me
everything that happened. Leave
no stone unturned
, my
friend. You are safe here.”

Dean stole a quick
drink from Shaun’s watered down pop, extinguishing the cotton mouth making his
tongue stick to the roof of his mouth. “She was insane.”

“Now we’re
getting somewhere!”

 
“I just pray to God I never run into her
again.”

Shaun’s face
soured. “Jon said she was hot as hell.”

“She was, but
the stuff coming out of her mouth was
waaay
outta
bounds.”

Shaun leaned in
closer, crunching down on some salt and vinegar kettle chips.

Dean took off
his shades and rubbed his itchy eyes, the crying baby behind him stepping on
his last nerve.

“Whoa, looks
like she kept you up all night. Nice.”

“She tried to.
Took three cups of coffee just to get her out the door this
morning.”

“Brutal! I hate
when they stick around like that. Who does that?”

Dean slipped his
shades back on and lowered his voice. “You ever have a chick ask you for anal?”

Shaun stopped
chewing, his face instantly sobering. “Not without the money up front.”

Dean cocked his
head to one side. “You had sex with a hooker?”

Shaun fanned a
hand through the air at him. “Come on, what happened?”

Dean took a quick
look around the sun lit patio, its inhabitants dressed in colorful summer dresses
and hats on a perfect summer’s day. It looked like something out of a TV show.
He leaned forward, pulling Shaun closer. “Well, I was right in the middle of…
ya
know, and she’s like
I’ll
let you do whatever you want to me
.”

Shaun nodded
rapidly, hungry for more of the story and his grilled sandwich.

“And I’m
thinking to myself,
kinda
late for that, lady.”

 
Shaun snorted and wiped his nose with a fresh
napkin.

“Next thing I
know, she’s asking me if I want to put it in her butt.”

Shaun’s burst of
laughter quickly morphed into choking.

“Do you need the
Heimlich? Should I call 911?”

Shaun shook his
head and tried to catch his breath. He cleared his throat with some soda and
coughed some more. “So what’d you say to her?”

Dean folded his
arms across an aqua blue t-shirt that set off his brown eyes. “I said okay.”

“What? Are you
serious?”

Dean laughed.
“Come on, man, you know that’s a one way street for me.”

Shaun spread his
hands out. “Hey, everyone experiments now and then. So what happened next?”

Dean’s stomach
rumbled again and he got up. “Hang on,” he said, heading inside much to Shaun’s
dismay. A few minutes later, he returned with a round tray of food and
continued his harrowing tale.

Shaun dropped
his napkin to the empty tray and brushed his hands together. “
Wow, that
is some freaky shit.”

Dean swallowed a
bite of his Panini, wishing it was a greasy cheeseburger. “Right?” he said,
sucking down some blue Powerade. “I thought for a minute she was going to call
the cops and have me arrested for rape.”

Shaun folded his
arms across his chest and shook his head. “She sounds wild.”

“I told her I
had a ski mask and she about creamed the sheets.”

“Holy shit,
the lucky burglar
,” Shaun laughed,
draining his drink. “That’s an oldie but
a goodie
.” He
glanced around and leaned forward. “Do you really have a ski mask?”

Dean frowned. “Do
I look like a bank robber to you?”

“Some people
actually use them for skiing,
ya
know.” He covered
his mouth with a fist and quietly belched. “Jon said her friend, April, was
lame in the sack, so it looks like you picked the long straw.”

“Isn’t the long
one supposed to be the good one?”

“Jon said that
at one point he secretly checked her pulse.”

Dean laughed out
loud. “We should’ve gone for these two brunettes over by the bar. I tried to
tell him and the next thing I know he’s talking to Megan and April.”

“I
gotta
be honest, I don’t miss the bar scene, man.”

Dean pressed his
lips together.

“Okay, maybe a
little, but I get to live vicariously through you and Jon, my last two single
friends.”

Dean rolled his
eyes behind his sunglasses and watched a pretty lady lead a cute little girl
with blond curls and an orange sundress out onto the patio by the hand. They
snagged the last open table and sat down.

Shaun stared at
Dean with his mouth hanging open.

Dean stopped
chewing. “What?”

“How do you do
that?”

“Do what?”

“That soccer mom
just gave you fuck me eyes.”

Dean nonchalantly
glanced over at the woman who was busy helping the little girl open a bag of
chips. He lifted his shoulders to his ears. “What can I say? I’m a people
person.”

“All I know is I
wouldn’t want to be out there shacking up with a different psycho every night
of the week, always changing your phone number and having to move out of state.”

“I would hardly
call the occasional weekend hookup
every
night of the week
,” Dean replied, wolfing down some barbeque chips. “It’s
not that bad. Besides, I always do a strip search to make sure they’re not
carrying any weapons.”

Shaun leaned
forward and clasped his hands on the table. “Don’t you ever get the urge to
settle down?”

“Not really.”

“Dean, you’re
almost thirty-five, for Christ’s sake.”

Dean’s eyebrows drew
together. “I just turned thirty-four.”

“Either way,
you’re middle-aged now.”

“You’re
middle-aged,” Dean mumbled under his breath.

Shaun stared
blankly at him. “Nice come back. The point is you can’t keep this lifestyle up
forever. You need to find a nice girl to settle down with so Carrie and I can have
someone to go to dinner with who doesn’t want to talk about
The
Doodlebops
all night long.”

Dean opened his
mouth to say something and took another bite of his sandwich instead.

“Face it, man,
you have a serious commitment problem and you need help.”

Dean stopped
chewing and furrowed his brow. “I just signed a two year contract with a new
cable provider.”

Shaun laughed.
“See what I mean? You can’t even talk about it without making a joke. It’s a
defense mechanism.”

“I don’t have a
commitment problem because I like my life. I like doing my own thing whenever I
want without worrying about someone else’s plans for the day.”

“You just
haven’t met the right person yet. Believe me, all of that will change when you
do. When you meet the right person, you’ll want to bend over backwards for them
just to change a light bulb, or fix the toaster, or whatever, but you’re not going
to meet the right person shopping where you shop.”

Dean snorted and
took a sip of his blue drink.

“You need to
start shopping at higher end stores.”

“Like
where?
The library?
The grocery store?
This isn’t a Lifetime movie.”

Shaun jerked his
chin behind Dean.
“How about that brunette over there?
She looks like a nice girl.”

Dean twisted in
his chair and lowered his head, peering over his sunglasses at the
twenty-something sitting all alone across the patio, which seemed like a crime
in of
itself
. He had never seen someone look so
beautiful while working on a laptop. Her long, chocolate-colored hair danced with
the gentle breeze as her slender fingers gracefully punched away at the
keyboard. A white tank top set off her firm breasts and tanned arms. His eyes
dipped beneath the table where long legs spilled from a pair of tight jean
shorts. He licked his lips and looked back up to find her staring right at him.
His eyes widened and he whipped back around, knocking over his cold drink.

Shaun jumped
back in his chair to avoid the spill but the chair’s back legs refused to budge
against the concrete. He teetered on two legs, his arms wavering in the air for
balance, and slowly crashed backwards with a loud crack. The incessant chatter
around them stopped on a dime. Shaun rolled to his feet in the thunder struck
silence that
followed,
his face flushing as he
realized all eyes were upon him. He held his hands up for everyone to see. “I’m
okay, just a huge bee. Sorry
bout
that, I’m allergic.”
The crowd stared at him with blank expressions. He pulled his chair back up and
plopped down, careful to avoid the blue liquid dripping from the table. “Are
you high?” he hissed, glaring at Dean.

Dean broke into
a mad case of the giggles and righted his empty cup. “That was the funniest
thing I’ve ever seen,” he wheezed. “I wish to God I had been rolling video.”

Shaun surveyed
his pants. “It wouldn’t have been funny if you got that Smurf piss all over me.
These pants are brand new!”

Dean pursed his
lips. “Who wears white pants anyway? What are you, Mr.
Roarke
?”

“News flash, hotshot,
it’s
summertime. People wear white in the summer.”

“Yeah, at a
wedding,” Dean snickered, his eyes subtly gravitating back over his shoulder. The
way the brunette’s wavy hair spilled over her shoulders made his stomach twist
into knots. It was like capturing lightning in a bottle. Her luscious breasts
cried out for attention and he obliged, imagining what they must look like
naked. The thought of handling them stole his breath. She turned his way, as if
sensing his eyes upon her, and Dean whipped around to face Shaun.

“Just go over
and say what’s up.”

Dean wiped
a sheen
of perspiration from his forehead with a napkin,
butterflies swarming in his gut at the mere prospect of approaching such
splendor with such simplicity. “And say what? Hi, I’m Dean
wanna
have a slumber party sometime?”

Shaun adjusted
his short-sleeve button down, watching the mystery woman’s every move. He ran a
hand through his thinning sandy blond hair. “I would. Can you imagine having a
pillow fight with that?”

Dean took a
stubborn breath and released it back into the wild, unfamiliar with the feelings
wringing the air from his lungs. The chatter and bursts of laughter around them
suddenly seemed louder. A light breeze tickled his hair. He swept a loose lock
back into place and shook his head. “She looks too young.”

Shaun’s jaw hit
the floor. “And when has that ever stopped you before? She looks like Natalie
Portman…but with way bigger tits. Just go over and say hi.”

Dean mopped
sweat from his upper lip and tried to slow his racing pulse. “I’ll pass.”

“What?” Shaun cried,
drawing some attention from the tables around them. “What is wrong with you?
You’re Dean Jacobs! A single successful guy no woman can resist. Now stop
fuckin
around and go get her.”

 
Dean brushed crumbs from his t-shirt. “Nice
pep talk but I don’t have my A-game today, man. I’m way too
hungover
.”

Shaun slid Dean’s
empty cup across the grated table. “Go get a refill and offer to fill hers up on
your way inside.”

Dean smiled at
the suggestion, unable to present a formidable defense, which, for him, was an
anomaly.