“Why didn’t you sleep well?” I ask. She’s currently seated on the passenger side of my car.
“I don’t know.” Frankie looks away from me. She’s lying. She knows.
“Frankie? Why didn’t you sleep well?” I repeat.
“Because you weren’t in bed with me, okay? Fine, I’m a needy, whiny girlfriend and it appears I need you in my bed from now on so I can sleep. Happy?” she snaps at me.
I smile. “Insanely happy.” I pick up her hand and bring it to my mouth. “If it makes you feel better, I slept like shit without you too.” I fucking like that she needs me. I wish it wasn’t so hard for her to admit that, though. I get it, I think. She wants to be independent, doesn’t want to rely on someone else.
The thing is, I really fucking want her to rely on me. I’ve never given her a reason to think she couldn’t. I’ve always done everything I can to help her whenever she’s in trouble. That won’t stop.
Baby steps, I remind myself. I just need to take baby steps and not rush this.
“Why didn’t you just come in? You seem to have a key to my apartment, which I would love to know how you got that, by the way.”
“I have a key to everyone’s house, babe. I did come in. You were asleep so I left you, thinking you needed the rest.”
“Emilio, how long did you watch me sleep?” Frankie asks.
“About ten minutes.”
“Creep.” She laughs.
When I pull up to the curb out front of the diner, I turn to her. “Wait for me to open your door.”
Frankie rolls her eyes. “I know the drill.”
I step out of the car and immediately search up and down the street before I make my way around to her side. Scanning left and right again, I then open the door and hold out a hand to her. Which she doesn’t take.
“We can’t be showing any kind of PDA in public, Emilio. My father has eyes all over this city.”
“Fine, but when we get back to your apartment, I’m going to make up for all this missed time touching you,” I promise her.
“Deal.” She smiles.
I pick a booth at the rear, sitting with my back to the wall and my eyes on the door.
Frankie smirks as she sits across from me. “Paranoid much?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You do.”
“Fine, I don’t like being out with you without security.”
“No one is going to come after me. You do know my father owns this city, right?” she says.
“Being cocky gets people killed, Frankie.”
“Maybe, but I’m also here with you, and no one is going to protect me against the bogeyman like you always do.”
She’s right. I’d never let anything happen to her.
“What do you feel like eating?” I choose to change the subject and pick up the menu.
“You,” Frankie whispers. “But I’ll settle for waffles with strawberries and cream.”
“Fuck, babe, you can’t say shit like that to me. Now my dick’s harder than it already was.”