Date Shark, Page 6

  Standing this close to him, Leila couldn’t help noticing the details of his smile and body. He was taller than Eli, slightly more broad shouldered, and a dusty blonde—that amazingly enough looked like his natural color—instead of Eli’s darker hair. His smile was more playful than Eli’s, too. It promised fun, the kind that made you laugh so hard you couldn’t catch your breath. The more Leila saw of him, the less she minded how close they were. It took Leila a moment to realize he had stopped wiping her cheek and was simply watching her. Blood rushed to her cheeks, but stuck between him and the chair, she had nowhere to go.

  “Did you know you’re missing a button?” Luke asked.

  Leila’s hand clutched at her shirt, praying she wasn’t letting too much cleavage show. She had completely forgotten about the button. “One of the models tore it off … she tripped and … oh, never mind.” She sucked in a lungful of air and braved looking up at Luke again. “Did you need something? You said you came back here to find me.”

  Leila’s change in topics prompted Luke to take a step back and let her start breathing normally again. “I wanted to talk to you about doing some shoots for Ana’s website. She said you were looking for a new photographer.”

  “Yeah, our old one moved to L.A. a few weeks ago. Don’t you already have a job, though?”

  Luke shrugged. “Newspapers are a dying breed. They don’t pay as great as people think. I’m always looking for some side work.”

  “Great,” Leila said, glad this wouldn’t be the last time she saw Luke. “Why don’t you call me this week and we can set up a time for you to bring your portfolio by. Ana will want to see it as well. Do you still have my work number?”

  “I do.”

  “Good. This week should be a lot calmer now that the show is over. Give me a call when you have some time off from the paper.” He may be looking for side work, but Leila did remember briefly checking out his credentials after they spoke. Bachelor’s in photography, working on a Master’s, he had been at the Tribune since his freshman year in college and had gotten considerable acclaim in his nine years with them. It would be fantastic to have someone with so much experience shooting for them.

  Leila moved away, her brain already jumping ahead to everything she already had scheduled for the coming week. Mentally she was already halfway through her appointments when Luke grabbed her arm gently and prevented her from getting any farther away from him. Leila looked at him expectantly.

  “Is that the only reason I can call you, to set up an appointment?”

  A dozen different thoughts ran through Leila’s head in that moment. Eli’s advice was by far the most dominant. Luke passed his checklist, and she did want to see him again, but should she say yes if he asked her out? What about hard to get? Leila decided to save that decision for later, maybe after she had been able to talk to Eli about it. First he just wanted to know if he could call her.

  “If you think of another reason to call me besides your portfolio, I don’t think I’d be against that,” she said.

  Luke grinned. His hold on her arm turned even softer, more seductive as he trailed his hand up to her cheek. “Do I have to call? Can I ask you right now if you want to ditch this mess and go get a drink with me?”

  “Now?” Leila’s brain stumbled before righting itself. This was too quick. She needed to talk to Eli first. She tried to come up with an excuse and realized she already had one. “I can’t tonight. Ana and I go out for an early breakfast after every show. But maybe later this week we can do something.”

  Stepping back slowly, Luke smiled. “I’ll see you later this week then.”

  Leila nodded, not verbally agreeing to anything yet. Did telling him “no” tonight count as not accepting a first date? Leila pulled out her cell phone to call Eli, but Ana poking her head into the dressing room put that thought on hold.

  “Ready?”

  “Hold on, let me fix my hair before we go.” Leila tiptoed over discarded clothes to get to the mirrors.

  “What were you doing back here this whole time? I thought you’d be ready by now. Blueberry drenched waffles with a gallon of whipped cream on them are calling my name.”

  Settling for a cleaner version of her ponytail, Leila got her hair back in order and sighed at her clothes. It would have to do. “Sorry,” she said to Ana, “I got distracted.”

  “By what? The interns will clean all this up tomorrow.”

  “It wasn’t the mess. It was the photographer you sent back here.”

  Ana scrunched her face, trying to remember. “The blond one? Yeah, he was distracting.”

  “He asked about a job, and a date.”

  “What did you say?”

  “No. He wanted to go out tonight.”

  Ana frowned at her. “Leila, you could have ditched me for a date! I wouldn’t have minded.”

  “I know, but I wasn’t sure about saying yes. Eli told me I shouldn’t go out with someone just because they ask me because it makes guys think of me as a fallback option.”

  “When did he say that?”

  “Last night. We ran into each other after I had dinner with Conrad and we talked for a while.” A while. They stayed at the café until midnight when it closed and the staff finally told them to leave.

  “Don’t rely on Eli too much, Leila. He’s good at what he does, but he isn’t God.” Her suddenly dour attitude reinforced Leila’s idea that Eli being banned from the fashion show had something to do with her and not him saying something about Ana’s designs. It annoyed Leila that Ana wouldn’t just tell her why she was upset, but she was not about to ask her.

  “Eli’s right, though, isn’t he?”

  Grimacing, Ana nodded. “Just don’t let Eli influence who you date too much.”

  “Why not? He’s trying to help me,” Leila argued.

  “Uh-huh,” Ana said. From the way she said it, though, Leila got the impression she didn’t believe it. Her lack of faith in Eli shocked her. If he wasn’t trying to help her, why was he hanging around?

  Chapter 7

  Vanished

  Eli’s phone started buzzing as he rounded the last corner back to his apartment. He slowed his jog back to a walk and tugged his phone out of the pocket of his running shorts. He didn’t usually answer his phone when he was running because he hated sounding like a creepy B-movie caller breathing heavy into the receiver when he picked up. When he saw Leila’s name flash on the screen he answered it right away.

  “Sorry, did I catch you at a bad time? It sounds like you just finished running a marathon.”

  “No, just a couple of miles.” Eli took in a deep breath and tried to calm his breathing. “How did the show go last night?”

  “Oh, it was fine. A little crazy, but it was good other than that.”

  “Good, I’m glad everything worked out.”

  Leila tried to stifle it, but Eli could hear her smothered yawn through the phone. “Sorry,” she mumbled. “I didn’t get to bed until almost three last night. I just woke up.”

  “Go back to bed then,” Eli said, trying not to think about Leila in bed too much. “Sounds like you had a long night. It’s Sunday. Stay in bed and relax.”

  “I wanted to talk to you.”

  Eli was glad Leila couldn’t see the grin that broke out on his face. Unfortunately it only lasted until her next sentence hit him.

  “I need your advice, Eli.”

  Of course. Why else would she be calling him? Eli closed his eyes for a moment and dug up his professionalism. “Sure, Leila, what did you need advice about?”

  “I … met someone. A guy at the show last night. He’s a photographer and he asked me out.”

  Eli was starting to wish he hadn’t eaten that morning. She met a guy already? How was he ever going to get the chance to befriend her if she started dating someone right away?

  “I told him no,” Leila said, giving him hope, “because I already had plans with Ana, but I told him he could
call me this week. I didn’t say for sure I’d go out with him, though. I was trying to follow your advice, but I don’t know if I’m doing it right. I don’t know what to say when he calls.”

  Tell him no, Eli wanted to shout at her. He didn’t. “Well, have you thought about whether his career and position in life is something that matches with yours? He’s not another college student, is he?”

  “Well, he’s working on his master’s degree, but he already has a career as a photographer for the Tribune. He’s a couple of years older than me, and he seemed genuinely nice and funny. And attractive.”

  Eli didn’t like the wistful way she said attractive.

  “Anyway, he just wanted to get a drink last night. I know I’m not very good at seeing people’s real intentions, but it didn’t seem like he wanted to ask me out for any reason other than just to get to know me. I don’t know, what do you think, Eli?”

  Eli couldn’t prove Conrad right. He couldn’t prove Ana right. “You were really interested in this guy?”

  “Yeah. I do want to see him, but I don’t want to keep making the same mistakes.”

  “Leila, that wasn't a hard and fast rule I expected you to follow. I only wanted you to think before you accepted a date.” Eli’s emotions tried to talk him out of his next sentence, but he beat them back. “If you feel confident about this guy’s intentions and you really want to go out with him, then say yes when he calls.”

  Her sigh of relief echoed through the phone.

  “And call me if you have any questions before you go out … and after so you can tell me how it went.” Eli was sadistic, he realized that, but he couldn’t force himself to leave it alone. Even if he had to listen to Leila tell him about a date with another guy, he wanted to hear her voice.

  “Thanks, Eli. You’re so great. Thanks for letting me bug you in the middle of your run.”

  “It’s no problem. Call me any time, Leila.”

  When she hung up, the urge to thrown his phone against a wall almost got the better of him. He probably would have if it hadn’t rang again. Without looking at the caller ID, he picked it up blindly, hoping Leila had remembered something else she wanted to ask him.

  “Mr. Walsh, this is Dr. Evans.”

  Eli’s hand went numb instantly. The feeling slowly started spreading to the rest of his body. “Yes?”

  “I’m calling in regards to your mother. The medication we started her on yesterday is having adverse effects. We need your permission to make a change in her care plan.”

  “What kind of adverse effects?” Eli asked.

  Dr. Evans cleared his throat before answering. “Well, the delusions became worse almost immediately. She began calling for your father and couldn’t be calmed without a sedative. While under sedation she suffered a minor seizure. But most troubling was a sudden drop in kidney function.”

  “Her kidneys? That wasn’t one of the listed side effects.”

  “No, Mr. Walters, but with the widespread damage to your mother’s system, the possibility for additional side effects is always present.”

  Widespread damage. There was a lot of that going around. “What do you want to put her on?”

  “I would like to go back to Haloperidol.”

  “But that wasn’t controlling her delusions.”

  Dr. Evans sighed. “It worked the best. We don’t have many options left. Your mother’s body can’t withstand any drug with too severe of side effects. She tolerates Haloperidol and gets moderate relief from her symptoms. Unfortunately that is all we can offer her at this stage. Do I have your permission to change her care plan?”

  “Yes.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Walsh.” Eli began lowering the phone in hopes that he could cut him off, but his words slipped in anyway. “She asks for you every day, Mr. Walsh. It might help her if you came to visit.”

  Completing the motion Eli had started, he ended the call and shoved the phone back in his pocket. He was on his way home, but the anxiety burning under his skin spurred him to pick up his pace again. He ran. The distance, the growing ache in his side, he ignored them both and forced his feet to keep slapping against the pavement until everything had been sweated out of him. Thoughts of his mother dropped off of him and splattered on the pavement. He wanted everything gone. It all evaporated except Leila.

  She had called him for advice. That was his job. He collapsed under the awning of his apartment building, holding his phone and willing her to call him. Eli was the one who needed to talk this time. He needed advice, but had no one to ask. He sat there until a line of ants crept out of a crack in the sidewalk and decided to start investigating his shoe. He got up, looked at his watch, and realized he needed to head upstairs and shower if he had any hopes of making it to his next appointment on time.

  When Eli pulled up to Dolcini an hour later, he had a hard time forcing himself to get out of the car. Surprisingly enough, it didn’t have anything to do with Leila. His hesitation had more to do with an all too vivid memory of meeting with Selene Howard two weeks ago. Most of the time, Eli met with a woman and got excited about trying to help her no matter what her faults were. Women like the hair chewer and Selene Howard were a different story. Eli closed his eyes for a moment and didn’t move. When he opened them, he immediately made himself open the car door and step out. She spotted him right away and gestured wildly.

  Groaning, Eli made his way over to Selene. An enormous handbag was slung over her shoulder. The sight of it made Eli cringe. Averting his eyes, he put on a professional expression and held his hand out to Selene. She gripped it as if he had just been caught in a mousetrap and simply held on. She didn’t shake his hand, just latched onto him. Eli felt as though he had just been taken prisoner.

  It was a struggle to not strip himself of her presence as he led her into the restaurant. Pierce caught sight of them immediately and ushered them through the growing lunch crowd to their table. As he retreated, Eli couldn’t help shrinking into his chair just a little. When Selene’s giant bag plopped on the table, Eli fought the urge to bury his head in his hands. He had really hoped she wouldn’t do this again, but she did. One by one, Selene unloaded her trinkets. A small framed picture of a seven-year-old boy, a baby rattle, a toy car, a hospital bracelet barely bigger in circumference than a quarter, a glass locket containing snipped baby hair, and a small jar that made Eli close his eyes. The severed umbilical cord carefully preserved in a see-through glass jar was too much for him. He did not want to look at that all through lunch.

  “There now,” Selene said, “it’s like Jeffery is right here with us.”

  She beamed. Eli nodded. It sure was. Keeping his eyes away from the stored tissue, Eli asked, “How is Jeffery, Selene?”

  “Oh, he’s just wonderful! Jeffery is the best little boy in the world. He was so sad to see me leave this afternoon. He never has been very good at staying with babysitters.”

  I can’t imagine why, Eli thought sarcastically. “I’m sure he’ll get used to it at some point.”

  “I hope so.”

  Catching sight of Megan, their waitress, Eli looked at her, grateful for the distraction. She had a pleasant smile on her face. She was Conrad’s best waitress, one Eli preferred to work with, but her smile faltered a bit when she saw the collection of oddities nestled carefully on the table. She was better than Eli, though, and shook it off. She took their orders politely and headed back to the kitchen. Selene picked up her menu and started looking through it. When she gasped unexpectedly, Eli looked over at her. Flopping her menu down flat on the table, Selene pointed at one of the desserts.

  “Jeffery would love this! He adores Crème Brule. Sweets are his favorite.” She giggled. “We elves try to stick to the four main food groups: candy, candy canes, candy corns, and syrup.”

  She laughed even harder and looked up at Eli. “Do you know what that’s from?”

  Baffled, Eli shook his head.

  “Elf. Have you ever seen that mo
vie? It’s one of Jeffery’s favorites. We love to watch movies together. I tease him sometimes that he’s an elf with how much candy he wants to eat!” Selene laughed at her own joke for several more minutes before collecting herself and turning back to the menu.

  Eli thought he was safe to get back to deciding on his own entrée when a few seconds later Selene shivered exaggeratedly. He couldn’t help but stop to see what had startled her this time.

  “The garlic shrimp sounds divine, but I don’t think I can eat it. It’s served with fava beans.”

  He knew he might regret it, but Eli asked, “Are you allergic to fava beans?”

  “No,” she said wide eyed, “but they completely freak me out! Have you ever seen Silence of the Lambs? I’m sure you have. Everyone has seen that movie. You remember the line where he says, ‘I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti,’ don’t you?” Selene shivered again. “I haven’t been able to eat fava beans since watching that movie.”

  “How very interesting,” Eli said. This time he meant it. Selene was a whole variety of bizarre. He didn’t personally work with anyone other than couples going through rough areas in their relationships, but he had a friend who would love to spend a few hours with Selene Howard.

  Before Megan came back to take their order, Selene managed to pull out two more food related movie quotes. One from Ratatouille, and one from Miss Piggy, although Selene neglected to inform Eli of what movie that one came from. At least the movie quotes were a distraction from the umbilical cord they were having dinner with. Eli even started to view the movie quotes Selene kept throwing out as a game, trying to guess the source before she inevitably told him the answer.

  As they ate their dessert, an homage to Jeffery, Eli tried several times to begin conversations with Selene that did not include her young son. Eli wasn’t against talking about children. He actually enjoyed children quite a bit, but Selene’s complete fascination with her son was more than a minor flaw. When he tried to ask her about her profession as a Human Resources Director, that too turned toward Jeffery.