“Hold up. How do you know about those?”
“Put it on my tab, remember? I covered your whole evening.”
My jaw drops. I clap a hand over my mouth as the laugh bursts out of me. “Are you serious right now? That’s so embarrassing. Oh my god. Cinthia and I had no idea you paid for all that. I think we just assumed the bar was running some kind of special. Or that we were the luckiest women in the world and they miraculously forgot to charge us.”
He grins behind the rim of his glass. “You were a pricey gamble, I’ll tell you that much. All I could do was pray you gave me your real number.”
“Well… youwerevery cute,” I say, reaching for my wine again. “Sunburn and all.”
“So then? What was our firstrealdate?”
I fold my arms on the edge of the table, lips curving with the memory. “Steakhouse. Brazilian. One of those places where you flip the little card to red when you’re full.”
He points a finger. “Fogo de Chão!”
“Yup! And you were a menace. I think you went through half the restaurant’s supply of meat that night.”
“I’m a big boy. What can I say?” He winks. “I can eat my weight in beef. Speaking of…”
The server arrives, placing the platter before us like a precious offering. Each slice of Wagyu is cut so thin it’s almost translucent, the marbling delicate enough to shimmer beneath the ambient light. A rectangular slab of black volcanic stone sits at the center of the table, steaming faintly, the heat rippling off its surface.
“Just a few seconds on each side,” the server says with a practiced smile. “No oil needed. Enjoy.”
Declan lifts the tongs and looks over at me. “Ladies first?”
I roll my eyes but lean in, taking a slice between the tips of the tongs and placing it on the stone. It hisses the moment it touches, curling slightly as the smoky, buttery scent blooms.
We fall into a rhythm—grill, dip, taste—between slow conversation and laughter. Every bite melts on the tongue; every memory we pull up from the past makes the wine taste better.
I swirl the wine in my glass, the burgundy catching the light. “Okay, wait. Do you remember the hotel in Barcelona? The year before we had Willow? The one with the clawfoot tub and the actual candle menu?”
Declan lets out a low groan, then chuckles. “Oh Christ, don’t remind me. You nearly drowned us both.”
I laugh into my glass. “That wasn’t my fault! You said bubbles were romantic.”
“Bubbles, yes. A full-on foam tsunami flooding the floor? Not exactly what I had in mind.”
“In my defense,” I say, jabbing my chopsticks in his direction, “the instructions were in Catalan and I thought two caps sounded... modest.”
“You dumped half the bloody bottle in.”
“You didn’t stop me!”
“I was too busy admiring your arse in that silk robe,” he says, completely unapologetic. “By the time I noticed, the tub looked like something out of a kids’ cartoon.”
I cover my face, laughing. “And then you slipped.”
Declan grins, tipping his glass toward me. “Flat on my back. Nearly cracked my skull on the tile while you sat there cackling.”
“I wasconcerned!”
“You took a picture.”
I shrug. “It was funny! You looked like an insect lying on your back like that.”
He leans in slightly, voice low and teasing. “And you looked sexy soaking wet, laughing so hard you couldn’t breathe. God, I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”
“You would… all of it? Me and you?” I ask softly, resting my chin against my hand as I study him across the table.
